Academy Of Martial Arts Director Shihan Cyr

To accomplish a personal goal of providing the highest quality of Martial Arts instruction available, Shihan Cyr has trained with some of the top Martial Artists found in the world today. This study of traditional and modern systems has taken him across Canada, the United States, down into Brazil and to the birthplace of many great Arts: Japan, Okinawa, Thailand, and the Shaolin Temple in Hunan Province, China.

A humble beginning in 1983, Brian Cyr embarked upon his Martial Arts training at a small Dojo in Southern Ontario. Operating under the supervision of the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai, it was in this Dojo that Mr. Cyr would learn much of his primary Martial Arts skills. It was here too that Mr. Cyr was first introduced to Tenth Dan, O’Sensei Richard Kim, the head of the Butoku Kai. A mentor to Mr. Cyr for nearly twenty years, Sensei Kim’s knowledge of the Martial Arts was unprecedented.

Training and teaching under the tutelage of Sensei Kim until his passing in the fall of 2002, Mr. Cyr was honoured with a Fourth Dan rank in Karate and Kobudo along with a First Dan in Japanese Jiu Jitsu. More important than rankings, Mr. Cyr believes that the greatest gift Sensei Kim had to offer was his understanding of the philosophical and psychological principles of the Martial Arts. It is an honour to be able to pass this information along to new generations of Martial Artists, although Sensei Kim’s knowledge and application of Budo can never be replaced.

Martial Arts training has taken Mr. Cyr to many locations around the world, one of particular interest is Okinawa; the birthplace of Karate. During the spring of 2005, he lived and trained at the Dojo of Teshiro Hokama Hanshi - Ninth Dan Goju Ryu Karate. While in Okinawa, Hokama Hanshi tested and promoted Mr. Cyr to the rank of Sixth Dan (Renshi) and presented him with the Senior Teaching title of Shihan. Mr. Cyr is looking forward to a continuous training relationship with Hokama Sensei, and will be incorporating some of this information into his own teachings.

Believing that a good teacher must be an avid student, Mr. Cyr has complemented his study of the classical Martial Arts with modern self defence systems. He has trained in contemporary styles of Jiu Jitsu with Rickson Gracie, and is PPCT certified in defensive tactics, pressure point control, and weapons control. Throughout the year, Mr. Cyr instructs seminars for the Ontario Provincial Police and a number of regional forces in: personal protection, assailant control, standing and ground self defence. These contemporary defence systems along with his continuing study and teaching of classical Martial Arts allow Mr. Cyr to offer many practical skills to his students.

In harmony with these studies of the physical or external Arts of Karate, Kobudo and Jiu Jitsu, Mr. Cyr is a student and teacher of the soft or Internal Arts. Commencing with the instruction of Sensei Kim he studied Pa Kua and Yang Tai Chi. More recently a student of the Wu style of Tai Chi, Shihan Cyr offers an extensive Internal Arts program to his students.

With his wife Kim standing by his side, Mr. Cyr began a life long commitment to the Martial Arts in the spring of 1988, when they opened the first Academy of Martial Arts. Today with over 2,000 students, the Academies of Martial Arts are a collective of professional schools committed to the propagation of traditional Martial Arts and the personal development of its students. In addition to his personal training goals, Shihan Cyr continues to commit the majority of his time to teaching and is currently writing two books on the technical and philosophical application of the Martial Arts. He wishes to acknowledge that without the support of his senior students and family, none of this would be possible.