Tag: kids mma

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: TECHNIQUE WEEK OF 8/5/24   This week’s Junior Samurai stripe challenge is Green for Technique! Students can earn their green stripe by playing a minimum of 5 minutes of Jiu Jitsu games at home with a parent or sibling.  Make sure to fully explain the rules, and also how to stay […]

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: FITNESS WEEK OF 7/29/24   This week’s Junior Samurai stripe challenge is Red for Fitness! Students can earn their red stripe this week by completing the following workout: 20 Ninja Roll Ups, 20 Pushups, 20 Squats, and 20 Jumping Jacks three times through (for a total of 60 of each exercise).  […]

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: TECHNIQUE WEEK OF 6/24/24   This week’s Junior Samurai stripe challenge is Green for Technique! Students must describe and teach two techniques to a parent and drill/practice for a minimum of 5 minutes.  The longer, the better!  Students will be expected to describe and name the techniques they taught and, potentially, […]

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: FITNESS WEEK OF 6/17/24   This week’s Junior Samurai stripe challenge is Red for Fitness! Students must complete the following exercise to receive their red stripe: 20 Squats 10 Pushups 20 Jumping Jacks Repeat x5 for a total of 100 squats, 50 pushups, and 100 jumping jacks.  This workout must be […]

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: INITIATIVE WEEK OF 6/10/24   This week’s Junior Samurai stripe challenge is blue for Initiative.  Students can earn a blue stripe by successfully making their bed each morning for three days in a row.  These must be three consecutive days, and the bed must be made with care and precision!

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE: INITIATIVE Week of 5.13.24 The Junior Samurai Stripe Challenge this week is Blue for Initiative!  Students can earn a blue stripe by successfully completing three acts of initiative or kindness.  Some ideas include: helping out with chores at home, making a new friend at school, taking time to call or reach […]

JUNIOR SAMURAI STRIPE CHALLENGE 02.05.24   THE STRIPE CHALLENGE THIS WEEK IS RED FOR FITNESS   Students can earn their red stripe this week by successfully completing 50 pushups a day for three days in a row.  Must be consecutive!

THE RED CORNER || 09.25.23 ||   Updates from the north star mma academy in philadelphia   Happy Monday Team! We have a HUGE week ahead of us in our Jiu Jitsu program. Before I get into details, let’s give a big congrats to our Jiu Jitsu competition team for a solid performance this past weekend at […]

  There are a number of tough questions in combat sports.   How do I optimize my training?  What’s the best solution to a given problem?  How do I balance training and life?   As a coach I’m constantly asked questions like these (and if you know me, I often give long winded but ultimately […]

  Ok, full stop.  Definitely believe in yourself!   With that said, when preparing to engage in something challenging, we can often start to doubt ourselves.  Am I mentally strong enough?  Durable enough?  Do I “have what it takes” to get this job done?   These questions can be hard to answer because, well, there […]

  At the Olympic level, athletes have a massive team working behind the scenes to ensure that their training, time management, and recovery are fully optimized.  These athletes also train and compete full time and often have difficult decisions about where to invest their limited resources of availability and energy.   At that level, by […]

Quick one for you today!   The word “passion” has taken on a lot of romantic, intimate, and otherwise lovey-dovey connotations.  But originally, passion comes from the Latin root of pati and means, literally, suffering.   When we are passionate about something, we suffer for it (and anyone who’s been training Muay Thai or Jiu Jitsu will tell you […]

  The word routine comes from the same origins as route, suggesting a circuit of behavior that leads you back to the beginning so you can start anew.   I think a successful routine does have that element to it: you will always circle back to the beginning to review the fundamentals from a position of greater wisdom and […]

  You may notice that this Monday Mindset section is being delivered on a Tuesday.  Well, I gave myself a break over the weekend to enjoy some much needed family time — and whenever possible, you should too.   The goal of training in any martial art is not necessarily going to be a belt […]

  Happy Monday Team!   We are back for another hard week of training on the mats!   Thank you to everyone who observed the slight adjustment in class scheduling this past weekend.  Any time we operate on an adjusted schedule and we don’t have a student walking in for a cancelled class means we […]

  It’s super easy not to really go for anything.  No risk, no reward, but also no failure.  And there’s something nice about that.   Because what if we fail spectacularly?  What if everyone sees us fail?   Often, it’s not so much the failure itself that causes stress.  It’s failing publicly.   My next door neighbors growing up […]

  “Protect yourself at all times.”   That’s what you hear from the referee before you touch gloves and get after it.  So, what does it mean?   Well, you are responsible for protecting yourself.  You, and you alone.   Despite all the rules, rounds, and presence of the third man, things can (and do) […]

  Quick one for you today!   We often think of mastery as being a destination at the end of a long path.  And, in some ways, it is.   But mastery is more a process of calibration than it is a journey towards a spot marked off on a map.  As such, we will […]

  I want to preface this entry by saying that, yes, it is absolutely important and OK to have your own specific, selfish goals in training.  In fact, we all do, and it’s both healthy and normal!   With that said, the Tragedy of the Commons is a situation in which individuals take from a […]

  Ha, I know some of you have seen me juggling like a clown here and there in the gym.  So, why juggling?   Aside from the surprisingly deep metaphorical similarities that juggling has to life, jiu jitsu, fighting, or whatever, it’s also a pretty simple yet difficult task.   As a coach, I often […]

  What better day to discuss service than today, where we celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr?   So often in martial arts we only see things through our own self-centered lens.  We come to class to make ourselves better.  We do what we think is best for us.  We prioritize our well […]

Let’s keep it real today fam. Resolutions are for quitters. The goal is not to commit to a resolution, but rather to reshape your lifestyle. The end of one year, and the beginning of another, create a great symbolic opportunity to address areas of your life that are unfulfilling.  We are inspired to seek out […]

  Happy Monday Team!   We’re back for another busy week of training here at the academy.   Please note that the academy will be fully closed on Saturday, December 24th.  We will be open as normal on New Year’s Eve (12/31).   Also, for the remainder of the year, all friends and family are welcome […]

  If you are training long enough, at some point you will have to take some time off.  This is inevitable.  Work, family, friends, relationships, injuries — these can all demand significant amounts of your time (and, rightly so) and pull you out of a comfortable training routine.   Coming back from a long layoff […]

  Unlike more traditional martial arts, which have highly regimented curricula and skills that must be learned and demonstrated for each successive rank advancement, Thaiboxing and Jiu Jitsu are more performance based. You either can, or cannot, execute the skill against your opponent. As such, it can be difficult to know where to invest your […]

  Happy Monday Team!   What a weekend!  Friday night saw competitors Brittany Walker and Paul Sims engage on the Ground Zero Grappling stage here in Philadelphia.  Both put in strong performances but did not walk away with wins.  So it goes sometimes!   Saturday we shot up to New York City for Gianna Vadino’s […]

  My two favorite words in the English language. Yes, and No. Yes is usually my first favorite, because it means I’m going to get what I want, or that we are in agreement so we can move forward. No is also super useful.  Now, I may not get what I want, or maybe we […]

  Happy Monday Team!   If I could describe this upcoming month in one word, I would probably say “TUMULTUOUS!”  But that’s not a bad thing.   We are packed to the gills this month with some awesome events and changes both big and small.   Please note that our Striking 101 Review Test is […]

  I’m guilty of really rambling on and on about mindset, paradigm shifts, etc. — but one lesson I learned as a competitor is this:   The extra work is a choice.  Inaction is a choice.   Losing, too, is a choice.   Making the right choices isn’t always easy, though.  We are extremely good […]

  Happy Monday Team!   We’ve been working our tails off this month and I’m excited to wrap it up with a strong showing at the Finisher’s Submission Only Grappling tournament this weekend!   September is shaping up to be a huge month for competition as well — we still have some irons in the […]

  I completed my high school wrestling career as a senior in the 130lb weight class as a nearly 6′ tall bundle of knees and elbows.  I spent my entire high school athletic career being as tall and skinny as possible — I competed freshman year at 119lbs.   When I stopped wrestling halfway through […]

  I originally wrote this in the early Spring of 2019, when we had just secured the large space we now call the “Thunderdome.”  Prepping 3400 square feet (including demo) while also teaching a full schedule of classes was not easy 🙂 Novelty, Plateau, Reward. These are the stages of every endeavor. It’s funny, 15 […]

Short and silly one for you all this week!   For any of you younger students who are yet to move out on your own for the first time, here’s a piece of advice: buy the toiler plunger before you need it    As martial artists, we too need to invest in ourselves so that […]

  Picture this — you’ve been running around all day, and at your last stop you go to pull out your wallet to pay for something and, whoops, realize it’s missing.  What do you do?   A reasonable person would retrace their steps — can you tease out any moments where you might have taken […]

  Seriously! Give yourself a pat on the back from time to time. We start our journeys as wide eyed beginners, wholly focused mostly on whether we can, or cannot, actually do something. That is the beginner’s burning question: “can I do this?” As we grow beyond that initial insecurity, we start focusing more on […]

  Be careful with your excuses. They expose your values. When an athlete or student tells me they want to take their training to the next levell, but then makes an excuse for skipping practice, or not focusing on the drill, or whatever really–there is always something written between the lines. Truly, I do not […]

We’ve all heard that expression, “so-and-so talks the talk, but does he walk the walk?” I’m sure we can all relate to this on some level: we know a few people who talk a big game, but when it comes to delivering on their word (or threats) they are (un)surprisingly a bit lackluster. In fight […]

Hey Team!   After a looooooong hiatus on my weekly newsletter, I’m back!   I’m looking forward to sharing some of my own personal training experiences, insights, and tips here in “The Red Corner.”  Traditionally speaking, the champion or higher ranked fighter would be assigned to the red corner — so it seems like an apt name for a place […]

In one of my earlier emails, I told you that persistence is one of the five core tenets of martial arts. It’s a must for kids to learn to fulfill their obligations and stick to their commitments – but what makes them want to do that? In martial arts, we attribute it to one small […]

You know how good it feels to set your sights on a goal and then achieve it. It’s empowering and invigorating – and it’s not just a matter of chance. Goal-setting is an important life skill. The good news is that studying the martial arts can help your child learn: The importance of setting goals How to […]

There are a lot of emotional benefits available to kids who study the martial arts. We’ve talked about some of them already, but today I’m going to talk about one that sometimes gets overlooked: Martial arts classes are a great place to make friends! Think about how most of us make friends. Friendships often start with commonalities, […]

As adults, we think a lot about stress. Modern life is difficult. We worry about paying the bills, doing our jobs well – and we worry about our kids. That’s part of our jobs as parents, but we don’t want our kids to be affected by stress. It’s not good for them physically or emotionally. Still, […]

It’s time to talk about the emotional benefits of studying martial arts. Let’s face it – kids have a hard time managing their emotions. You’d be hard-pressed to find a parent who hasn’t had to deal with their share of temper tantrums. It’s exhausting. Also, consider the other side of the coin: it’s exhausting for […]

In the last couple of blog articles, we’ve been talking about the core tenets of martial arts instruction, and today’s tenet is one that a lot of kids need to learn. I’m talking about self-control. Control is something that’s hard for kids. Their brains and bodies aren’t fully developed, and from the time they’re babies, […]

You know how that saying goes, right? Try, try again! And that brings us to our next core tenet of martial arts: perseverance. Perseverance is what keeps us going when it would be easier to give up. It’s what makes us get up when we fall down – and it often means the difference between […]