11/09/2026
I have been teaching martial arts for 30+ years and love the styles I teach HapKiDo and Jiu Jitsu.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve also taken on coaching amateur MMA and Kickboxing, and I love that too. As an MMA referee, I never wanted to take on the role of coach, but now that I have, I absolutely love it.
To say I’m passionate about martial arts and combat sports would be an understatement, it isn’t just something I do, It’s in the fibre of my being.
It is my life.
For more than 30 years, people have trusted me to teach them, and to teach them the way I believe martial arts should be taught, hard, with purpose, discipline and accountability.
These are not just expectations I put on my students. They are expectations I have put on myself throughout my life and in my own training to this day.
I treat the kids in my classes as martial artists. I care about them, but I don’t baby them.
I push them beyond what they think they are capable of, I put them under pressure and I push them hard.
Because that is the martial arts way.
We live in a time where too many people want recognition without the possibility of failure, discomfort or pressure. Unfortunately, there are also too many schools willing to provide exactly that because it makes running a large school easier and more financial.
That has never been my philosophy.
For more than 30 years, I have worked to produce martial artists with solid skills in whatever style they do but it takes discipline, commitment and hard work.
I am not a babysitting service, I’m not there to keep kids entertained, I don’t give high fives, chase balloons around the gym or play games unless there is a benefit to their martial arts development.
I’m a martial arts instructor and coach.
My goal is for every student to earn a black belt.
But a black belt should mean something, it should be earned through the grind, through hard training, through pressure, through grading and the nerves that come with it through being uncomfortable, through failure and through disappointment.
Being told that what you did wasn’t good enough and understanding that this isn’t an insult or a reason to quit. It is a reason to go back, work harder, practise more and come back better.
That is martial arts and that is the way I will continue to teach.
