Richard Branden

Richard Branden grew up in a tough neighborhood. His first hobby was to draw paintings. Not being very rich, he used the paintings to get free martial arts lessons. He has over 25 years of martial arts experience beginning at the age of 10. He started training under Lou Hopkins, in Massachussets. The first black belt he achieved was for Tae Kwon Do. Later he started training with Yao Li and became a Kung Fu expert. Branden reigned as the New England martial arts champion for 10 years, before focusing on the national martial arts circuit in 1987. In 1988 he gained his first fame after beating tough opponents as Keith H. Cooke, Ho-Sung Pak and Ho-Young Pak, in the Forms Divisions. Because of an accident in his childhood (a wounded eye) he never went to sparring. After 2 years and 2 national titles he gained a spot in the John Paul Mitchell Team. Besides training Richard was also in various movies, series and shows as a stuntman or choreographer. He trained people for the Gulf Wars, and performed as 'Spider-man' in Universal Theme Parks; Marvel Comics ride. He has gained the following titles: 1992 Black Belt's Kung Fu Artist of the Year, 1991 NASKA National Championships in Chinese Weapons and American Open Forms Champion, 1990 NASKA National Championships in both Chinese Forms and Weapons, 10 Times NASKA National Champion, 6 Times WAKO World Champion, USA, London and Poland. Richard had the privilege of training with Liu Yu, a former Shaolin Temple instructor, which made him even better.