Hi All, This will be the first of our Quarterly Newsletters for Lions Den Martial Arts. These Newsletters will give you a run down of what we have been up to in the last 3 months as well as what you can look forward to. It has now been 10 months since we have expanded our curriculum and opened our doors with a full line of Martial Arts classes and we are going to give you a rundown of all of it.
Well , it has been a heck of a 10 months. We began by leasing space from our local school district and running classes in an old classroom in the back corner of a school , to moving into a commercial space in East Greenbush. It's been a lot of work but when surrounded by such great people who started out as members and we now call friends , it has flown by and been fun along the way. In our last 10 months , We have had gold medalists in our doors working with our wrestlers ( Kendall Cross ) . D1 college coaches and teams in our room practicing with our High School wrestlers and putting on clinics with our Youth wrestlers ( Buffalo coaches and wrestlers and Hofstra Coaches) We have had professional Mixed Martial Arts Fighters in our doors and training with our Fighters and Youth Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Program. We then took a field trip to watch one of the Fighters compete at Madison Square Garden and pull out a win! Brandon Polcare won his Bellator fight via Guillotine after he was in to train and spar with Trent and Caleb. While we were in the city we also visited the world renowned Renzo Gracie BJJ gym and took a class with them. We also had Mike Davis in whom is one of my first students and he put on a free clinic for our youth BJJ program. Mike Davis then went on to fight twice in the UFC, picked up his first win and is scheduled to fight for them again in March.
In the last 10 months we had our Affiliate school and Professor Matt Secor in for 2 belt promotions and clinics. We have had many, many promotions in our Youth BJJ program and promoted our first Blue belt a few months ago ( Joe Merhige ) . We competed in our first Brazilian Jiu Jitsu competition as a Team in August and our Youth competitors took home 1'st place as a team and our Adults took home 3rd place. We faced off against all of the local schools in this event as well as many from all over the US and Canada so this was a heck of an achievement as a school. Our Wrestlers have been working hard and we have kicked off both our High school season and Youth Competitions. Every one of our high school wrestlers have seen a significant jump in win percentage this season and our youth team has been looking very strong in competitions . We look forward to the next 2 months as we finish out both the local Youth season as well as the High School season. Next month we will have a Box at the High School State Championships held at the Times Union center for any members who would like to attend. There are tickets for 3 sessions spanning the 2 days. The price is $20 per session and the box is great with a kitchen,Bathroom and plenty of outlets to charge your devices and will be a fun time.
Our classes are filling up and with that we are continuing to add more . In March you will see some changes to the schedule. We will have more opportunities for our youth wrestlers , we are adding Boxing back into the Curriculum and we are adding a Sunday Spar session for our competitors. For any adults who are planning on competing in BJJ , Boxing, Muay Thai or MMA you can come in and get some Live training in that day. Ive got some exciting things in the works and some Im working on which is killing me not to reveal just yet.
Upcoming events!! So in the next few months , we have Professor Secor coming in for his Clinic and Belt Promotions on March 1'st. We have some students who have been working hard and we may have a few up for their Blue belt promotions, so we are excited for them. We also have our kids summer camp. Registration has begun for this already, a deposit is due to hold a spot as it is limited to 20 Campers. We are already at half capacity.This is an all day martial arts camp, with a lot of fun activities and field trips. The kids will love this camp. We are also planning another field trip to the city this spring for all BJJ practitioners! Take the train down and attend a special clinic just for our members at the Renzo Gracie academy, grab a meal and head home. Im working on this being kid friendly with 2 clinics going on simultaneously. 1 for kids and the other for adults.
We also have our 2nd Naga event coming up on March 7'th. All Youth and Teen BJJ students must be attending this event. If you check out the picture on the right, you can see the turnout we had for the last tournament. I encourage any adult students who are considering doing this to take the plunge. You will not regret it. Lastly , we will have some members competing in MMA this summer. Stay on the lookout for updates and ticket sales on this as both Trent and Caleb plan to compete and we may even have 1-2 more members getting in the cage as well. If you have never been to one of these events , you gotta check one out. They are a lot of fun , especially when you have a teammate competing. That is all for now, I'll see you all on the mats!!!