Kaizen 2025

Recently we attended the Kaizen Relentless 2025 Expo at the Rushcliffe Arena in Nottingham which is organised by my friend Lucci.

Kaizen is one of the premiere martial arts events of the year and we have attended and taught there annually for years. It all started with my friend Anthony Pillage who is unfortunately no longer with us. 

Lucci brings the biggest and best martial arts instructors from across the UK to Nottingham each year to discuss ideas and platform what they do on a much bigger stage but more importantly its about building connectioms in the industry and getting to know each other.

Unfortunately many martial arts shows use their platform to sell awards and dinners to those who will pay it and we all know its a joke as often the pepple getting the awards are totally irrelevant in the industry. 

Kaizen is not like this and it comes down to Lucci wanting to bring the industry standards up across the board and to do this we need to network and communicate. 

There were master Karate instructors, Krav Maga practitioners, Arnis battles, combatives, Ju Jutsu, the list goes on and on and attendees can try training in any art they wany hosted in the zones you just have to jump in. 

We even had the true warriors of the day such as those who were disabled, That is worth a ton of respect in my book, struggling with health issues and still training regardless takes Fudoshin (The Immovable Heart) and makes you guys stronger than all of us! 

We were teaching Ninjutsu in Zone 2 at Kaizen and had a group of lads jump on the mats who were a pleasure to teach. I remember saying to one of the lads we are going to do Oni Kudaki (To Crush The Demon) and this little blonde lad looked at me dead pan and said I'M NOT A DEMON 🤣

We also taught some adult students about the implementation of Kyusho im your technique. Pain compliance is important so utilising sensitive areas of the body (pressure points) when striking makes every strike as efficient as it can be. It obviously worked as one guy was saying he didn't know you could make your strikes so painful but if you demoralise the opponent via pain they lose the will to fight. 

Alexandra had her debut at her first big martial arts expo and absolutely loved it despite being very nervous and was getting annoyed that the guys were going easy on her. 

It was great fun teaching at Kaizen and we finished the day off by going and seeing Marilyn Manson for my 40th birthday. 

These types of martial arts events are important and people like Lucci who are true leaders deserve our support with these events over the shallow organisers out there. It gives us a chance to meet the people we often talk to (or cross words with) on social media and that leads tp lifelong friendships. 

I often wonder about Tony's legacy amd what it would be like if he was still here but I think I get it. Tony gave us community, he certainly made me establish connections with people who have made major moves in the industry for the right reasons and I'm sure he would love to see what we are doing now. Its true though that community and events like Kaizen are important as "all you need is love" as Tony said. 

The network and community make martial arts great and without the people a dojo isnt a dojo its just a hall. The industry has been struggling after covid but make sure you attend events like Kaizen or just reach out to thag person you want to learn from, sometimes speaking to someone and attending an event can literally change your life. 

Oh and I finally got to meet Clive Turner in person absolute legend 😂🙏🙇♂️!