September 2023 marks the 5th year anniversary for Red Dragons Martial Arts. Master Sensei Lloyd and Amanda (AKA Mrs Sensei) were both secondary school teachers back in 2018. After undergoing 3 lots of major spinal surgery, Master Sensei Lloyd
realised how much he owed to his fitness and training, which had kept him strong for so long, he realised he needed to share this and pursue his passion. They made a crazy decision to drop everything, bring together their skill-sets and start a school of Martial Arts in Bristol.
Lloyd had 30 years experience in Martial Arts and numerous accolades to his name including 2 World Champion kickboxing titles, he also had 15 years experience teaching science and working with children as a senior pastoral leader. Amanda had spent many years in the Far East where a love of martial arts stemmed, her background was mainly in Marketing and she taught Business Studies for 8 years in secondary schools here and in Sri Lanka, so together they had all the right ingredients for Lloyd to build his dream of a owning a Martial Arts school with a strong USP and ‘know-how’.
As anyone who has branched off into the world of self-employment/entrepreneurial realm will know, it is terrifying and all consuming. However, in just 40 days, the school achieved its first 100 members and 5 years later it is fast approaching 400 members, now operating from 5 different locations with 3 instructors.
One of the greatest challenges was surviving lockdown, a new online schedule was created, 6 days a week. Lloyd took most of these and Amanda took care of the admin & communications and headed the Motivation Mondays and Ton-Up Thursdays. Online gradings also took place and were a huge success. A ‘covid ballad’ was created during this time (if you haven’t already, please watch the Red Dragons version of ‘Alive and Kicking’ on YouTube) which shows the huge camaraderie across the school like no other and which no doubt saw it defeat Covid times and come back even stronger. The School has always had a sense of family and togetherness which is the main ethos at RDMA.
Lloyd and Amanda feel very lucky to have such great team of experts and home grown instructors behind them now, helping them to branch out further and want to thank you all for being a great extended family and for all the support you have all shown. Happy 5th Anniversary! Thank you for being part of it!