What to Look For in a Great Martial Arts Coach Or Instructor

If you're looking for pointers to find an amazing martial arts instructor, then you will want to read this article. We are going to cover the instructors knowledge, their own training, development and also if they have conditioning too.

Ok when on the hunt for a great martial arts coach you really need to find some body with expert knowledge in their field of education; the martial art or arts, do they hold a black belt and do they have a black belt certificate or coaching qualification? If not run!

You need to watch the instructor skills; do they hum and mess up on demonstrating a move, method or technique or perform it like an expert. Also you need to look if they uphold martial arts tradition of discipline in class time but be fine and let students ask questions too?

All coaches need to have the points I just outlined for good coaching abilities.

The Instructor must continue to train and learn new knowledge all the time. Not just become the coach and never learn again, training in martial arts means continually progressing all the time to get to total perfection and a professional coach will do this.

Does the coach lead by example? Can they perform the moves, methods, kata's, jumping kicks etc they ask you to do, only with exemption to very old master instructors who have pictures and testimonials of they performing at the high level.

A great coach will always try to be on the mat training because that is what they have chosen to do as a career and they will love what they do, so are they mostly on the mat teaching or do they have a lower ranking student teach everyone instead. So the great instructors continue to professionally develop and put this in to their classes when teaching on the mat.

All good coaches must stay in shape and have great knowledge on conditioning and nutrient. They should understand the concepts in dieting for competition or weight loss to become optimal, to help their students and themselves too. hopefully your instructor will have some sort of fitness routine in their classes, if not they need to do some continued professional development to understand more new training methods and concepts to martial arts training like MMA or kickboxing for example. Lastly they need to stay in shape for the simple fact that students look up to their coaches for motivation.

In closing they should be able to answer any questions and walk the walk.

Ok then so there you have it and quick fact file on what to look for in a expert martial arts instructor on many levels.