StandStrong Academy - Martial Arts and Self Defence

StandStrong Academy - Martial Arts and Self Defence Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ), Hybrid Krav Maga, Kickboxing
Kids Martial Arts & Self Defence

18/09/2026

This week in our kids’ self-defence classes, we’ve been playing The Bob Game 😅

Quick note before we start - I only realised after editing this video that censoring one of the kids saying his actual name makes it sound like he’s swearing 😂

He’s not.

We’ve just removed his name from the video for safeguarding reasons.

Anyway…

It sounds silly.

But it teaches something really important.

How to set a boundary when somebody won’t listen.

The game is simple.

One child’s job is to convince their partner that their name is Bob.

Their partner’s job is to get them to stop.

We give the kids a simple framework:

1️⃣ Remind them politely.
“That’s not my name. Please stop.”

2️⃣ Make the boundary clear.
“I’ve asked you to stop. I don’t like what you’re doing.”

3️⃣ Give a consequence.
“If you keep doing it, I’m going to tell a teacher.”

And importantly, if you say you’re going to do something, you need to be prepared to follow through with it.

The fun part is watching the other child continue to push that boundary.

Because suddenly the student has to deal with a little bit of confrontation.

They have to use their voice.

They have to become more assertive.

And they have to decide when being polite is no longer working.

Of course, the Bob Game isn’t really about someone calling you the wrong name.

It’s a framework children can start applying whenever somebody is behaving towards them in a way they don’t like.

Someone taking their belongings.

Someone repeatedly touching them.

Someone saying something that makes them uncomfortable.

Someone ignoring them when they’ve already said no.

Self-defence isn’t only about learning what to do when somebody becomes physical.

Being able to recognise a boundary, communicate it clearly and ask for help when somebody refuses to respect it is a pretty important skill too.

And if we can teach that through a game where everyone spends five minutes arguing about whether someone is called Bob… even better 😂

A week or so ago, I had the pleasure of giving Tom his first stripe on his blue belt 👏🥋Achieving a blue belt in Hybrid K...
16/09/2026

A week or so ago, I had the pleasure of giving Tom his first stripe on his blue belt 👏🥋

Achieving a blue belt in Hybrid Krav Maga is no easy feat in itself.

Our standard is pretty simple:

If somebody reaches blue belt with us, we want them to be genuinely more capable of protecting themselves than the person who first walked through our doors.

And you don’t get there simply by holding a membership.

It takes time on the mats and consistent training.

Finding the gaps in your game and working on them.

Learning how to strike, wrestle and grapple and apply those skills into different situations.

Making mistakes, getting things wrong, asking questions and gradually becoming more capable under pressure.

So earning that first stripe on a blue belt means something too.

It means the learning hasn’t stopped.

There are still new problems to solve, skills to sharpen and areas to develop.

Little by little, the person standing on the mats a year or two from now can be very different from the person who walked in on day one.

Congratulations Tom - thoroughly earned 💪

14/09/2026

There are two ends of the martial arts spectrum we’ve never really wanted to be part of.

At one end…

Everything looks beautiful and choreographed, everyone falls over at exactly the right moment, and nobody ever seems to ask:

“Would this actually work if the other person didn’t cooperate?”

At the other…

Training becomes a constant ego contest.

People trying to prove how tough they are.

Beginners getting smashed because apparently that’s how you “earn respect”.

Neither sounds particularly appealing to us 😅

We wanted to build something in the middle.

Real training with a good culture.

Because if you want to genuinely learn martial arts, you need resistance.

You need people trying to achieve their goal and trying to stop you from achieving yours.

You need opportunities to test whether what you’re doing actually works.

Without that, there’s very little real learning happening.

But there’s another side to it.

If every time you try something new you’re worried you’re going to get hurt…

If you’re constantly stressed about making a mistake and you feel like every round is something you need to survive…

You’re not going to experiment or take any risks.

Which means you’re not learning either.

Good training needs the right level of resistance and the right culture around it.

Enough pressure to make the learning real.

Enough trust that people feel safe to try, fail, adapt and try again.

That’s what we aim for here.

So yes… We spar, we wrestle, we grapple, we put you under pressure.

But nobody gets bonus points for hurting their training partners and most importantly nobody has to earn a place on our mats

You can train hard, learn genuine fighting skills and still be surrounded by people who want to help you improve.

Those things aren’t mutually exclusive.

In our opinion, that’s actually what good martial arts training should look like.

The environment changes the fight.And a wall changes it a lot.In open space, you can move backwards, you can circle, you...
07/09/2026

The environment changes the fight.

And a wall changes it a lot.

In open space, you can move backwards, you can circle, you can create distance and disengage.

Once you’re pinned against a wall, a lot of those options disappear.

Suddenly balance becomes harder to maintain as your movement is restricted.

Creating space is more difficult.

And if you end up on the ground against the wall, the problem becomes even more complicated.

This is something MMA gyms tend to understand really well because wall wrestling is such a huge part of the sport.

But in self-defence training, wall work can sometimes get overlooked.

Sometimes simply because the training space isn’t set up for it.

The problem is that real environments aren’t big empty mats.

There are walls, cars, furniture, doorways and crowds.

And all of those things change the options available to you.

That’s why we spend time helping people learn how to maintain balance, create structure, improve their position and escape when their movement is restricted.

Because good self-defence Is about being able to adapt when the environment changes the problem.

Start them young 🥋One of the biggest benefits of our Infants programme is that for these kids, training is just becoming...
02/09/2026

Start them young 🥋

One of the biggest benefits of our Infants programme is that for these kids, training is just becoming a normal part of life.

At four, five or six years old, they’re still incredibly open to trying things, new activities, movements and challenges.

They haven’t yet built up all the reasons adults and older children sometimes give themselves for why something “isn’t for them”.

So this is a brilliant age to start building positive associations with things like:

✅ Moving their body
✅ Getting stronger and more coordinated
✅ Trying things that feel difficult
✅ Learning how to deal with mistakes
✅ Building resilience
✅ Developing practical self-defence skills

The goal isn’t to turn five-year-olds into tiny fighters.

It’s to help them grow up seeing training, physical development and challenging themselves as completely normal parts of life.

Because the older children get, the more fixed their likes, dislikes and comfort zones can become.

When they’re young, they’re still an open book.

And if we can use that time to help them build confidence, resilience and a positive relationship with learning new things…

That can stay with them for a very long time.

31/08/2026

There’s a lot going on here 😅🥋

Ryan and James working through one of the 10th Planet warm-up sequences.

You don’t need to understand exactly what’s happening to see that Jiu Jitsu asks quite a lot from your body.

You’re constantly learning to:

✅ Coordinate different parts of your body at the same time
✅ Move through unfamiliar positions
✅ Develop mobility and flexibility
✅ Improve balance and body awareness
✅ Become more comfortable controlling your body in space

And that’s one of the things I really like about Jiu Jitsu.

You’re not just learning submissions, passes and escapes.

Over time, you’re building a much broader movement vocabulary.

Things that initially feel complicated or completely unnatural gradually start to make sense.

Then eventually you find yourself doing stuff like this without really thinking about it 😅

A big congratulations to Grace and Maybelle on completing their official HKM instructor training recently 👏🥋Under the wa...
29/08/2026

A big congratulations to Grace and Maybelle on completing their official HKM instructor training recently 👏🥋

Under the watchful eye of Tommy Blom - Founder Hybrid Krav-Maga & Hybrid Combatives , Grace has now graduated as a Level 1 Assistant Instructor, with Maybelle completing her second course and graduating as a Level 2 Assistant Instructor.

For anyone who doesn’t know what goes into this…

It’s a full week of training, Monday through Sunday.

Early starts.

Full days.

Lots of physical training.

Lots of discussion around coaching.

Plenty of opportunities to practise teaching, receive feedback and develop the skills needed to lead others.

And honestly, for two people so young, that level of commitment is seriously impressive.

Putting yourself forward for instructor training means taking responsibility for more than just your own development.

You’re starting to learn how to communicate, how to support other students, how to lead a room and how to help other people improve.

This is still only the beginning of both of their coaching journeys, but they’ve both taken a really big step forwards.

Both of them have already shown how keen they are to keep learning, developing and investing in their craft and you can see this on how they present themselves at the academy.

Very proud to see them moving forward, and we’re looking forward to seeing where they take it next 💪

27/08/2026

Why We Don’t Teach Loads of Techniques

One thing you might notice in our classes is that we don’t spend loads of time teaching hundreds of different techniques.

And there’s a reason for that.

We use something called an ecological approach to training.

In really simple terms, we don’t believe that every problem has one perfect answer.

Instead, we create situations and games that give you a problem to solve, and then coach you towards finding solutions that actually work for you.

So with striking…

I’m much more interested in whether you can hit the target with power, accuracy and good timing than whether your punch looks absolutely textbook.

If somebody grabs you, I’m more interested in whether you can prevent the grab, escape it or improve your position than whether you perform one specific release exactly how I showed you.

Because people are different.

Different heights.

Different strengths.

Different movement.

Different reactions.

So rather than trying to turn everybody into a copy of the coach, we give you opportunities to explore the problem and work out what solutions suit you.

Does your solution consistently solve the problem?

Great.

Does it look absolutely perfect while you’re doing it?

Honestly… who cares?

Because in self-defence, the goal isn’t to perform a beautiful technique.

The goal is to make something work when another person is actively trying to stop you.

25/08/2026

We take the training seriously.

Ourselves? Not quite as much 😅

In class the other day, I decided anyone who could hit a triangle choke in sparring was getting a packet of Party Rings.

Highly sophisticated coaching methodology, obviously.

And yes… we had two successful applicants 😂

We train hard.

We spar.

We compete.

We help people to improve.

But none of that means the room has to feel deadly serious all the time.

At the end of the day, most of us are here because we genuinely enjoy Jiu Jitsu.

And if you can work hard, get better, challenge yourself and still have a laugh with your teammates along the way…

That’s a pretty good way to train.

Sometimes the motivation is progress.

Sometimes it’s Party Rings.

Both count.

Here’s a few promotion photos from across our kids programmes in July 🥋👏One question parents sometimes have is:What are ...
10/08/2026

Here’s a few promotion photos from across our kids programmes in July 🥋👏

One question parents sometimes have is:

What are we actually looking for when we promote a child?

Because it’s definitely not as simple as:

“Can they perform technique X?”

Of course, technical ability matters.

But we’re also looking at things like:

✅ Are their fundamentals strong for their age and level?

✅ Can they actually apply what they’ve learned when someone is resisting?

✅ Can they make good decisions rather than just repeat a rehearsed technique?

✅ Are they showing effort, focus and a willingness to improve?

✅ Are they developing in a way that’s appropriate for their age group?

And that last point is really important.

A 5-year-old, a 9-year-old and a 14-year-old shouldn’t all be judged by exactly the same standards.

Their physical development is different.

Their ability to concentrate is different.

Their understanding is different.

And their martial arts should reflect that.

For parents, that also means you don’t need to compare your child’s progress with somebody else’s.

One child might pick up techniques incredibly quickly but need more time developing confidence or decision-making.

Another might take longer to learn the movements but show fantastic consistency, attitude and application.

Progress can look different from child to child.

Our job is to make sure that when they do move up, the promotion genuinely reflects the development they’ve made.

And that makes every one of these moments worth celebrating 👏

Address

15 To 17 Brislington Hill
Bristol
BS45BE

Opening Hours

Tuesday 7am - 9pm
Wednesday 7am - 9pm
Thursday 9am - 9pm
Friday 7am - 9pm
Saturday 9am - 12pm
Sunday 9am - 12pm

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