The Atlanta Neighbor, Wednesday, April 25, 1973

National Karate Tournament
Two Black Belts Take Everything
By Charles Walker

At the Seventh Annual Karate Championships held recently at DeKalb Community College, two instructors from a school that had only been in existence for six months won everything in the black belt division.
Pat Duncan and Dana Rhodes were the two black belts who took everything in sight in their division. They are both instructors at Olympic Karate Studios, which has schools in Doraville and Sandy Springs.
Pat Duncan won the kata (formal exercise) competition and the lightweigh black belt free fighting competition. Dana Rhodes won the heavyweight black belt division.
And then both Duncan and Rhodes had to fight each other for the Grand Championship. Rhodes won the contest, buy Olympic Karate Studios won an overwhelming victory, dominating the tournament, which was sponsored by Yoo Jim Kim, a karate instructor in Decatur.
"I don't think the other competitors were in as good a physical shape as we were," stated Duncan.
Ray Klingenberg, owner of Olympic Karate Studios, amplified that statement and provided an insight into the philosophy at his school.
"Any man who ceases to improve ceases to exist," the tall Californian said.
Klingenberg, Duncan and Rhodes are all three from California. They had each studied karate before they met, but once the three karatekas had gotten together and exchanged ideas, things seemed to fall into place.
Duncan and Rhodes had both studied Tae kwon do, a Korean form of karate. Pat Duncan is probably the only Caucasian beaching in the Atlanta area who has studied karate in the orient. When he was in Korea in the Air Force, Duncan began to study the martial art, and he continued it when he returned to California.
Rhodes studied under Jae Man Lee, one of the outstanding masters of the art in this country. Both Duncan and Rhodes have been practicing their art for almost eight years.
Ray Klingenberg has been studying karate for nine years. He originally studied Kenpo, a Chinese form of karate, and earned a third dan (degree) black belt.
Klingenberg also studied under Joe Lewis, national black belt champion, for five years. He learned Shorin Ryu, an Okinawan form of karate, which helped diversify his knowledge of different forms of karate.
Then Ray Klingenberg met Pat Duncan and Dana Rhodes and everything fell into place.
The three karatekas combined the forms they knew and came up with a system that is the best of several worlds.
At Olympic Karate Studios everything is specialized. Self defense techniques are taught in private lessons along with kicks, blocks and punches. The self defense techniques are Chinese. The kata and kicks are Korean.
Chinese self-defense techniques are best in the world of karate, and they are the easiest to learn, according to Klingenberg.
Then there are specialized group lessons. In one group basics and conditioning are stressed. In another group kata are stressed, and in still another group free fighting is stressed.
"Everything is oriented to the psychology of Americans," said Klingenberg. "Americans want to become as good as possible in the shortest time. Everything is engineered to do that."
At Olympic Karate Studios there is also a feeling of fraternity, according to Pat Duncan. Everyone calls everyone else, even the instructors, by their first names.
"We have real good brotherhood there," Duncan stated. "That's what makes the school so strong. We don't have any communications gap between us and our students."
And apparently, that philosophy is working. At the Doraville school, located just south of Pinetree Plaza, there are 80 students. And at the Sandy Springs school, located on Roswell Road, there are already over a hundred students.
Klingenberg said that different groups of people study karate for different reasons, but he seems especially interested in children.
In California, Klingenberg and a child psychologist worked with neurologically handicapped children, trying to teach them karate. From that experience Klingenberg learned helpful techniques for working with normal children.
Most children come to the karate schools with confidence problems. Klingenberg says that a child's self-confidence improves when he or she learns self-defense.
"Everything picks up" said Klingenberg. "Once a child gains self-confidence his school work and everything else improves."
There is even a special class for children at Olympic Karate Studios. It is a basic drill class which "creates truthfulness and honesty" within the child, according to Klingenberg, besides helping him to "face up to facts."
Women usually take karate for two reasons, the two black belts said.
One reason is for self-defense, and the other is for figure control.
Men usually come to the karate school to improve their physical condition, and most of them say, according to Klingenberg, that they "always wanted to try it."
But men, especially those whose jobs put them under stress, find an escape from stress in karate too.
"Nothing else really takes total concentration from your body and mind," Klingenberg stated, "but karate can."
With total absorption a karate class comes relaxation, he said, unlike golf or some other sport which still allows the mind to wander to personal problems.
Twenty to 25 percent of the students at Klingenberg's school are women.
"Women have all their own private facilities, if they wish," Klingenberg said.
"But most of them want to be right out there with everybody else."