Instructor Profile - Richard Burkett

I remember meeting Richie when he was approximately fifteen years old, I was teaching at Southport High School, when Richie and his group of friends enquired about what is was that I was teaching. After a brief conversation, the boys convinced me to start teaching them on a weekly basis. I will always remember these classes very fondly, a group of boys just training hard without too many conscious desired goals. Richie was always very athletic and coordinated and would love to learn everything he could about fighting; a passion will still share approximately twenty years later.

One by one Richie’s friends would drop off for one reason or the other, leaving Richie and his brother Daniel to train.

Richie would always make Arakan work, no matter what the situation was, I would find a lot of joy in teaching him… looking back on it, I think the main reason was that Richie always believed in Arakan, he never had any doubts, he would always come to every lesson ready to humbly learn and apply the knowledge that is presented to him.

These days, we are both a little older, hopefully a little wiser and more experienced in so many. We are both training harder than ever and enjoying the journey in a deeper way.

Thanks Rich for always taking care of me and my family, I am looking forward to training with you in our nineties!

Robert Kyaw
Chief Instructor

Martial Arts as the Ultimate Fitness Regime

Walk into any gym and what do you see? Rows of treadmills, people doing curls in front of mirrors, endless racks of weights, and plenty of people scrolling on their phones between sets. For a lot of guys in their 20s, this is the default version of “fitness.” You go to the gym, you lift some weights, maybe you throw in a bit of cardio, and you call it a day.

Building Unshakable Confidence

Confidence. Everyone talks about it. Everyone wants it. But very few people know how to truly build it.
In your early to mid-20s, confidence is everything. It shapes how you show up at work, how you handle relationships, how you interact socially, and even how you see yourself when you look in the mirror.
The problem is, a lot of young men go searching for confidence in all the wrong places - in social media likes, in trying to impress people, in pretending to be someone they’re not. That kind of confidence is fragile. It crumbles the moment things get real.
Real confidence isn’t about faking it. Real confidence is unshakable because it’s earned. And one of the most powerful ways to earn it is through martial arts.
Let’s break down why.

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