This past weekend, I enjoyed participating in two separate seminars by Master Gaby Roloff in Ottawa at the Stronger You dojo. Renshi Janet Heffernan hosted the seminar.

A little background on Master Gaby. She has been training and teaching Modern Arnis since the early 1980s. She attended many of Professor Presas’ seminars in Europe and the United States. Shortly before Professor Presas passed in 2001, she and six others were promoted to “Master of Tapi Tapi.” Professor deemed this to be the highest level of proficiency in Modern Arnis. Since Professor’s death, she has been teaching in Hamburg, Germany and travelling worldwide to teach Modern Arnis seminars.

Master Gaby first taught an empty-hand session geared more toward the karate students of Stronger You. In this session, Master Gaby covered the empty-hand applications of single sinawali and its variations. She also covered empty-hand defences against canes. The participants received this session well.

The second session was the stick session, and the participants were mostly the Modern Arnis students of Stronger You. Master Gaby covered single sinawali, redonda, and the Six Count drill. Most of the seminar focused on the last topic, the Six Count drill, both with canes and the empty-handed version. Within the context of the Six Count drill, we covered joint locks, trapping, and disarms. It was a very good session.

Here is a clip of the late Professor Presas teaching the Six Count Drill:

If you are not able to view this video, click here.

Uh oh!
Master Gaby giving a tip to Renshi Janet

I had a great time in Ottawa that weekend, hanging out and training with Renshi Janet and Master Gaby!

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