Black Belt Hall of Fame - Black Belts and Black Tie

This past weekend, the Eastern U.S.A. International Martial Arts Association held their 19th annual Black Belt Hall of Fame inductions in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Martial artists traveled from nearly every state in the United States and more than 50 countries overseas to attend the weekend of awards and seminars.

The atmosphere was fun and healthy. Top Grandmasters and martial arts legends mixed easily with attendees. Guests at the host hotel enjoyed the site of dozens of martial arts teams going by, each in the distinctive uniform of their martial arts style. The black belts of many of the participants were heavy with stripes of rank, and ragged from years of training.

During the three-day event, there were seminars on teaching skills and specific techniques in Kendo, kickboxing, Jiu-jutsu, and others. Students were flying in all directions as they tried each training exercise.

I taught a seminar of core training that I developed called The Ab Revolution. It is a method of exercising your abdominal and back muscles the way they work in your real life. It uses no forward bending. The forward bending commonly used for core exercise trains unhealthy bent-forward posture, pressures the spine and discs, and is not the way your muscles work when you stand and move in real life. Click here for a synopsis of The Ab Revolution including sample exercises.



Soke Sean Martin, pictured at left demonstrating with his assistant Christopher, taught Kagedo-Essensu, (Shadow Essence) a style that he developed. Kagedo is a devastating defense technique. It does not require strength and conditioning or years of specific poses and positioning to master. For information about learning this effective technique, contact Sibilxvi@hotmail.com.



The Saturday afternoon awards ceremony was held for kyu ranking (not yet Black Belt) and youth black belts. Saturday evening saw the banquet for new inductees to the Black Belt Hall of Fame and members of the Hall of Fame receiving distinguished awards (photo at left).

Organization founders Soke John Kanzler and Kim Harper are already at work on next year's 20th year anniversary event. Contact them at the International USA Martial Arts Association, toll free at 1-800-456-3872, or e-mail EUSAIMAA@verizon.net.


The book Healthy Martial Arts won the Hall of Fame's Readers Choice award. See the book on my website.

Labels: abdominal muscles, education, martial arts, partner exercise, spirit

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