Saturday Morning Cartoons
The story of the Max Academy began as most do: early 1990s Saturday morning cartoons. I was eight years old, staring at the TV, watching my martial arts heroes, the Ninja Turtles. I don’t know what it is about cartoon turtles fighting a man in sharp armor called Shredder that inspired me so much, but I’m glad it did. I was not in great physical shape. I played a lot of video games and sat around a lot. I needed movement. My dad knew it too. He had me participating in baseball, but the position I played was known as “bench”, so I didn’t get much movement there either. So, when I came home one day with a flyer to participate in martial arts, my dad saw my enthusiasm, and he signed me up—once-per-week classes learning American Taekwondo at a YMCA. (I hope the reader is not keeping track of the number of dated, anachronistic references in this article… Saturday Morning Cartoons, Ninja Turtles, YMCA…)
My weekly YMCA American Taekwondo didn’t teach me to be a ninja or use nunchucks, and didn’t turn me green; but I didn’t have to sit out on the bench. I learned that fitness can be fun and that knowing how to fight can teach you a lot about yourself. As my skills grew, I learned the limitations of once-per-week training. I was plateauing. My instructor then hired me to help teach classes, which I learned to love. The instructor then suggested that I learn another style. I agreed. Who teaches Ninja-style martial arts, I wondered to myself. It turns out that almost no one taught Ninjitsu, so I settled for Karate. This class was twice per week and much more demanding than my other class. A Marine taught me. It turns out that if you demand more of your body and train more often, you can achieve some pretty amazing things. There are pictures of me from when I started Karate and from one year later — before we continue, let me just say, no, you will never see these photos — and you can see an apparent improvement in my physique. I was becoming less Turtle and more Ninja. The entire time I learned these arts, I competed in local tournaments. I wasn’t some Olympic competitor or anything, but I competed a lot. I probably had a metric ton of participation medals. A few trophies. Nothing to brag about. These tournaments were akin to playing tag with punches and kicks. Or performing a dance routine. Reader, this wasn’t like Cobra Kai at all. (Okay, I’m downplaying it. People got hurt on occasion — including me that one time when I got kicked in the head and spun in a circle all the way to the floor — but those times were outliers. I went on to win that match by the way.) Even though I competed, I often wondered if I could defend myself outside of the sports arena. What would happen if someone actually tried to hurt me? I earned Black Belts in both my original Taekwondo style and in the Karate style I learned. Then I stagnated. Didn’t learn anything new for a long time.
When I established the Max Academy, it was partially out of the frustration that came from doing the same thing over and over in my old system. I thought we could get more out of martial arts training. I wanted to maximize what the martial arts could do for people. So, my brilliant wife said that I should call what we did “Max Martial Arts”. (It wasn’t until later that we called it the Max Academy.) Reader, I am sorry to disappoint you if you were under the impression that the Academy is named after me; I am not Renshi Max (though many have called me this). There were several changes I implemented at the outset of Max that all came from the story you’ve heard so far:
No one should sit on the bench.
Martial Arts should demand more from you and teach you something about what you are made of.
Martial Arts should be enjoyable and exciting.
Competition isn’t the same as self-defense.
It’s that last point that I really got stuck on. I knew I needed to learn real fight skills to help everyone maximize their potential — myself included. I started to learn and grow in the martial arts again. Kenpo, Muay Thai, Jiujitsu, Escrima, Kali, and even (finally!) a little bit of Ninjitsu. There were many other styles I played with at this time as well. And what I learned, I integrated into what Max does. However, the style we utilize most in our journey at Max is Krav Maga. This is because Krav answers the question I asked while competing in those tournaments: what happens if someone actually attacks me in a real scenario outside the ring? The single best change we’ve made at Max is tailoring our curriculum to address the situations you might face in a real-life situation. Don’t get me wrong, the story of Max is not the story of my martial arts journey alone. The stories of all the current instructors (and many before them) intersect with mine to help form what we have today. The instructors help to shape what Max becomes. I am very grateful for that. We can’t maximize our potential alone. The instructors teach me and shape me personally all the time, and they have left their fingerprints all over what we do. Not a bad outcome for an organization that owes at least part of its existence to Saturday morning cartoons.
