The Annual Grading Camp After just one weekend of RA training I attended my first Camp along with my good friend Lennart Wallgren (AKA Lionheart). Previously, I was used to JKD camps where we really just learn new skills and drills but this was very different: Since we had only attended one session, neither of us were expected to grade at the camp, but we were both thrown straight into pretty full-on fighting! We got to observe fellow Kiwis John and Carl going hell-for-leathe

When Tom met Pat… Back in 2012 I went to a Tuhon Pat O’Malley knife defence seminar in Leicester, being drawn to it because my JKD training was largely devoid of weapons skills. The seminar really made an impression on me: I was wow’d by Pat’s charisma and talent but actually it was the empty hand ‘Tapi Tapi’ (a series of fast, distracting, impact techniques) where I thought ‘Now THIS, I need to know!’ The JKD I had been taught had basically shown me how to punch and kick w