EUROPEAN CHAMPS!
Our congratulations to David Onuma and Steve Payne who both won gold medals in the European Brazilian Jiu-jitsu championships. David won in the brown belt group and then went onto win the bronze medal in the openweight against a huge opponent. Steve won in the white belt divisions which was incredible as he’s only been training for a year once per week. Great coaching by david as usual and best wishes to Corey Donoghue who was unlucky in the blue belt division. Looks like there’ll be more to come.
I just wanted to thank all the crew at the Academy who at some point or another have spent some time with me on the mat particularly the ‘Friday night’ crazies who just don’t seem to want to go home!!. The Academy ethos is perhaps one that can only truly be understood if you train there and spend time with some of the extremely talented students and instructors alike. I publicly credit and thank Guro Bob for his substantial role in my development as a student, teacher, coach and fighter. He has been my teacher and guide for nearly 12 years, ans strangely enough it is during that time period that my martial arts journey has begun to make sense. Brazilian Jiujitsu is just a part of that journey for me but it has not overtaken any of the other core areas that I train in and that is taught at the Academy.
Lastly I want to thank the many students who give up their time to train in my classes because without them, I wouldn’t be there!
Wow! What a fantastic achievement for the Academy. Congratulations to David and Steve on an amazing result, that really is raising the bar! I have heard, through a lot of hard work and talent Sifu David has blown through the ranks of the BJJ world and the proof is in the pudding as they say. It looks like Steve is set to follow in those footsteps too!
My best wishes and congratulations to all who competed.
I hope to see some of my old training partners at B.I.G in March, it should be fantastic.