Events

There were many events undertaken by Police Judo Instructors, students, and volunteers throughout 2017 – below are a few of the highlights:

TTC Police Judo completed important and needed food drives for the Yo Bro Youth organization. Commendable community spirit and effort from Head Instructor Brian Shipper and the support of the club members.
Good work by Yoon in leading a group of dedicated Police Judo volunteers and delivering another two semesters of Ray Cam Kids Judo at the Ray Cam Community Centre through the VPD PAL/Police Judo Program. A community service VPD – Police Judo partnership
Police Judo volunteers once again stepped up to assist when TTC Armourer and friend to many in Lower Mainland law enforcement, Bob Steele, suddenly and unexpectedly passed away. Our volunteers helped prepare a fitting memorial send off in the TTC 50-meter gun range.
More Police Judo workouts led by TTC Head Instructor Brian Shipper and assisted with Police Judo Volunteers for the VPD New Kids through VPD Ethnic Diversity & as well as the VPD Cadets program.
Continuing community service demonstrated by Police Judo with the annual workout for the VPD Police Museum Spring Break Camp and Summer program.
SFU Police Judo Junior Program has grown immensely over the past year. Fall semester 2017 we had 50 students registered in the program. Thanks to all the volunteers who help regularly – 2x a week – to maintain this important youth program. This program has been running for 14 years now (started in the old VPD Police Gym at 312 Main St. in 2003 – moved to SFU in 2010). A number of the youth who started with this program have now moved on to the senior program at SFU. Great to see this continuity. Judo should be for life!
Chin-I Hsiang led a community service Summer Camp Police Judo clinic for youth at Trout Lake Community Centre.
Congrats to our members: Josh Jewett, Samrat Thind, Kevin Li and Jorden Davidson hired by RCMP and joining depot for the training. Welcome back, Cst. Thomas Gysler, Cst. Carla Tsang, and Police Judo black belt, Cst. Sergei Zamjitski returning back on the mats with their new badges ready to serve.
Congrats to Police Judo students who were recently hired by the VPD: Alisha Nakamura, Akash Dhaliwal, Nitish Sharma, Andrew Inglis, Harman Gosal, Christopher Chan, Kelvin Trinh, and also to Ahmed Bouchiba - hired by the Sheriffs.
Special thanks to Zan Tsang and MiHee Choi for their incredible work on selling the Ali Lambert Memorial shirts and great support from the Police Judo students on buying shirts. The text “Be Kind; Be Gentle; Be Strong” encased inside the logo created by Ali Lambert and finalized by Grace Eng has come become a Police Judo standard.
Special thanks to Ray Bergen – Ali Lambert’s grandfather – for his generous support of Police Judo. In addition to coming up to SFU Police Judo and providing a presentation on Ali’s legacy and his support for our work, he has made a 5 year, $5,000.00 a year commitment to Police Judo (in addition to other donations he has provided). If you check the Police Judo website – he is listed as our corporate sponsor through his company Canreal Management Corporation. For more information on Ali Lambert, her logo contribution to Police Judo, and our shirts, check out the link: http://policejudo.ca/police-judo-news/2017/3/7/new-police-judo-logo-by-ali-lambert. If you are interested in shirts, Zan will be running another batch for Feb, 2018. It should be noted that Ray Bergen is also a generous supporter of Odd Squad Productions - the charity founded by a number of the Police Judo Instructors.
Congrats to Sheriff Brad Endean on a number of fronts. He was promoted to Sergeant this year. He is now in his third year of running Police Judo in Kamloops and the club is growing and expanding. Brad was a guest instructor at the first international Police Judo clinic and has prepared over 120 videos on Police Judo techniques. These will eventually be made available to Police Judo members. He has expanded his program to offer training and workshops to a number of agencies including Kamloops Bylaw officers, Kamloops First Nations Band, and Williams Lake RCMP officers. And congrats to his daughter Kiara on her recent promotion by Aberdeen Sensie John Huntley to brown belt!
Throughout this year, we were fortunate to learn judo techniques from our judo friends visiting including Kevin Thorneloe of New West Judo, Terry Maniwa & Layton Keely of Abbotsford Judo, and Mario DesForges from Yukon Judo to other international judo experts such as Sensei Katanishi of Switzerland, Olympic and World Judo medalist, Yuki Yokosawa of Japan, Takeru Nobeashi of Japan, and Judo BC head coach Jeremy Le Bris originally from France.
Some of our recreational Police Judo students participated this year in a number of judo training camps such as Ilias Iliadis and Georgii Zantaraia at Abbotsford, Travis Stevens and the US National head coach, Jimmy Pedro in the US Open in Florida, and Travis Stevens in Invermere. All the students represented Police Judo well.
A contingent of Police Judo students joined Chin-I Hsiang and Launa, Rowan, and Aidan to travel, meet, and learn judo from Neil Adams, an international Judo legend and a former World Champion along with Sportif Judo and Kids Judo 101 creator, Peter Gardner for the international Sportif Training Camp and Tournament in Edinburgh Scotland, April 2017.
The first International VPD Police Judo Clinic was hosted over 4 full days at the TTC to a full house of law enforcement members from across BC, Alta, and also from Washington and Switzerland. 60 participants had a week of training, both on the mat and in the classroom, on the Police Judo, judo basics, LE tactics, and a host of other relevant topics. The clinic wrapped out with a demonstration of judo fused with arrest and control tactics by the developing Police Judo Demonstration Team. This set the foundation for their first public and major roll-out at the Odd Squad Gala. The feedback for this was overwhelmingly positive. We will be hosting the second annual VPD Police Judo Clinic May 1-4, 2018.
Top police cadets from Beijing in the People’s Public Security University of China returned in 2017 for multiple Police Judo visit and workouts – joining in with TTC students and SFU Police Judo students to learn the basics of Police Judo tactics and techniques.
Paul Blundell – Assistant Instructor at SFU Police Judo - along with several Police Judo volunteers, ran a number of community service volunteer self-defense clinics for females in Burnaby. These were well attended – and an important part of the Police Judo volunteer spirit.
Thank you to Margot Thorneloe, the Judo Mom and black belt helping out with Police Judo, as she led the Police Judo group representing and showing the volunteer Police Judo spirit at the Adrian Oliver Memorial Run.
Sadly, our long term, dedicated volunteer and VPD role player Mi Hee Choi (and recently promoted brown belt) left to Korea to start her new chapter of life. We are proud of her and the outstanding character she demonstrated daily at judo. She is continuing with judo training under the wing of the top instructor Jun-Ho Cho in Korea. Wewish her good luck and all the best with her new journey. Police Judo is always open for you whenever you are back in Canada!
In March of 2017 Police Judo instructor Al Arsenault and Sgt. Mark Steinkampf – along with other Police Judo and VPD members attended the International Law Enforcement Education and Training Association Conference in St. Louis and presented Police Judo to force options trainers from around the world.
Police Judo Instructor Chin-I Hsiang and Cst. Dave Steverding attended First Nations communities in the Carrier Sekani Region and provided both drug education and Police Judo clinics. Police Judo volunteer Mi Hee Choi assisted as well.
Police Judo Instructor Al Arsenault and Sgt. Mark Steinkampf provided two days of training for the Park Rangers of Vancouver – on both Tac Com as well as Police Judo basics.
Police Judo provided workshops for Paladin Security on tactical repositioning, and dealing with edged weapons issues. These were led by Al Arsenault, Mark Steinkampf, and Toby Hinton.
Brian Shipper – Head Instructor at TTC Police Judo (now VPD Police Judo) – has started a black belt registry with the help of Adelphie Cheng. This will codify the black belt legacy for Police Judo.

In June, our Police Judo volunteers Amy Kelly, Ben Miller and Neil Roploc paid on their own travel expense led by VPD Cst. Al Kussat and his wife Naomi, again joining the second year of the incredibly rewarding experience of running weeklong Police Judo sport activities along with delivering drug awareness education to over 1,000 youth in the Mexican border towns of Tecate and Ensenada. An incredible trip to the top of the Baja, filled with some amazing highlights including meeting government officials in Ensenada, and working on a plan to provide the kids of Tecate with a sports stadium so we can return and run Police Judo camps. Kudos to all the participants, as this is self-funded and a trip driven by volunteer work. Look forward to 2018!
The VPD Force Options Instructors were training hard over the past few years. Congrats on the grading for all of them and thumbs-up for their dedicated hard work practicing at TTC Police Judo morning sessions and also joining in for the Police Judo clinic and additional training when possible. These members have integrated Police Judo tactics and training into physical training in Force Options Training.
On December 1st, Our Police Judo Demo Team led by William POON with 18 members from 3 clubs (JIBC, TTC and SFU), along with the Police Judo volunteers, showcased the first major public demonstration for the Demo Team at the Odd Squad 20-year Anniversary Gala event in front of 350 guests. A great performance with much positive feedback!

Ret. Cst. Al Arsenault is finalizing the first Police Judo book – focusing on joint lock controls for law enforcement. Think you have it tough with a 2,000 word assignment? Al’s book is at 300,000 words in addition to thousands of pictures. To make this manageable, he will be publishing a series of books – this first one on joint locks from Police Judo due out in Spring 2018. This has been an ongoing project for the past 7 years – and will generate much interest, not only from North America, but also international.
TTC Police Judo will be continuing on as “VPD Police Judo” in 2018. Brian Shipper remains the head instructor. Much more to come on this, including the formal development of the VPD Police Judo Demonstration Team, and more training opportunities. 100 judo gis were just purchased for training purposes by the VPD Force Options Training Unit. Lots planned. Stay tuned!

Achievements

2017 Police Judo volunteer of the year- Zan Tsang – incredible work spirit and volunteer service.
Dan Lisk, Paul Blunden and William Poon received Police Judo Assistant Instructor certificates in 2017. Congrats!
SFU Police Judo student, Michael Mercado grades to black belt. Congrats!
SFU Police Judo brown belts Amy Kelly and Patrick Chan earned their black belts by demonstrating the length of their experience, volunteerism and leadership as well as helping coach the Police Judo Juniors and Senior students. Congrats!
Val Prociak and Dr. John Clealand from Kamloops as well as Hayden Roberts from Calgary were promoted to black belt in May. Congrats!
VPD Cst. Bryan Nykon represented Police Judo won Bronze medal in 2017 World Police & Fire Game. Bryan is helping with Force Options training for the VPD, and has volunteered for a number of the VPD Police Judo training sessions.
Launa Hinton won (second year in a row) for two categories of Bronze medals on -48kg both U18 & U21 in the Canadian Nationals (invitation only - top 8 in Canada from each division) the “Elite 8” tournament in Montreal Quebec. Launa has been selected for the Elite 8 in Montreal in January 2018 – she heads out for the week training camp prior to the tournament on Jan 8th, 2018. This tournament will be broadcast on the Fight Network.
Both Ayumi Morita & Aidan Keyes of Police Judo Junior are selected from Burnaby Zone and will represent for 2018 BC Winter Game in Kamloops
Recreational Police Judo member, Howie Hoang, won the gold medal at his very first judo tournament at the US Rainer Cup in Tacoma
Thumbs up to the Police Judo Juniors, despite their young age, they demonstrated their courage and confidence, and participated the local competitions and Samuri judo session to expand their judo experience. Some won medals and some did not, but who cares. It’s the spirits counts! Our junior Kiara Ballantyne - 7 years old - made a good judo friend at her very first judo tournament in Abbotsford!

Thank you

To all our in-house black belt instructors: Rick Hawkins, Tak Izumi, Yoon Choi, Justin Yuen along with Adelphie Cheng, Margot Thorneloe, Dan Lisk, Paul Blundell, William Poon, Jag Ghangas, Frank Molnar and Hemant Kulkarni, for assisting our program continuously. We are looking forward to your help with another upcoming year!
Police Judo Volunteers with your time and efforts from coaching juniors, role players in the clinics, Odd Squad events and productions, demo team, assisting BC forest fire to mop the floors…etc- you guys rocks the house!!
The Police Judo Board of Directors, Ret. Insp. Tim Laidler (founder of Police Judo), Dr. Kim Polowek, and new treasurer, Cheryl Steinkampf. Special thanks to Deb Laidler – our NCCP Coaching advisor – for the help and assistance for providing our senior belts with the NCCP foundation for coaching, and the assistance with program oversight and delivery.
Ray Bergen for his generous support of Police Judo. Ray has also brought in additional support from his friend Eric Martin – so thanks to you both.
Special thanks also to VPD Chief Cst. Adam Palmer for his support of both Odd Squad Productions educational work and Police Judo.