The latest round of sponsorships for ZenQuest's MMA team proved to be a great success!  Several local businesses and individuals stepped up to contribute and support the team.  A HUGE thanks goes out to recent additions, including Digitsu and Quest Martial Arts! They join an amazing list of enthusiastic sponsors: A-List Luxury Car Services, Victory Force Options Training, Inc., Clayson Creative Media, Lenox Woods Apartments, Jedd L. Hall, Leo Daly, The Flynn Family, and The Robichaud Family. 
These contributions made by sponsors are used to cover expenses incurred by the fighters and coaching staff including training, travel, meals, and equipment.  In addition to the pride of supporting the Berkshires’ premier Mixed Martial Arts team, sponsors are recognized in a variety of ways.  Their name or logo appears on a “fight banner”, which is displayed at each event that the fight team participates in, as well as at other special events.  Sponsors also appear on a "Walkout" style T-shirt, which is also used at the events and sold at the gym.  Lastly, sponsors are mentioned on the ZenQuest website and social media.
We’re looking forward to more success and expansion of our competition team.  Once again, big thanks to all of the sponsors!!

​Any martial art worth it’s salt will include sparring exercises. These are a way to practice applying the principles of an art in real time, in kind of “play fighting” mode.  They can include anything from partner drills to freestyle sparring, where participants move freely and experiment with the application of different moves.  Like any aspect of martial arts training, there is a right and wrong way to “spar.”  Done correctly, this part of training helps students to understand, progress, and be more effective in their chosen art.  
Some martial arts styles or gyms will actually NOT include any sparring in their training.  They may claim that their strategies are “too dangerous” to practice in a realistic way, or that sparring will somehow corrupt their art.  There is also an age-old debate on whether or not too much emphasis on “sport” sparring will detract from the essence or effectiveness of the art.  Some instructors may site philosophical reasons to avoid sparring, or that it just isn’t necessary.
But, sparring IS an essential part of training for several reasons.  First, sparring activities themselves have amazing fitness benefits...improving cardio, strength, agility, coordination, and endurance.  Sparring and sparring drills are also great for developing qualities like distancing (judging how far away to be), timing (executing at the right moment), and just a sense of how to move.  Over time, sparring also minimizes any fear of confrontation, which is possibly the most important quality that we can posses in dealing with real world challenges.  It is also essential in developing the ability to adjust what we’re doing in an ever-changing, and sometimes chaotic situation.  Even for students who struggle with sparring it, at least, help them understand many 

​ZenQuest has scheduled another round of “Advanced Concepts” training for both Uechi-Ryu Karate, and Demian Maia Jiu-jitsu.  The Uechi-Ryu clinic will be on Saturday, April 1st from 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM.  The Jiu-jitsu workshop will be the next week on Saturday, April 8th from 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM. 
In addition to some discussion on leadership and teaching issues, the Uechi-Ryu session will include advanced blocking drills and escape strategies.  This is strongly encouraged for all black belt students (and others by invitation.) 
Similarly, the Jiu-jitsu training will begin with leadership and teaching issues, then get into some advanced submissions and defenses.  All students ranked blue belt or above are encouraged to attend (and others by invitation.)  Jiu-jitsu students are reminded that their Advanced Concepts trainings are a platform for intermediate and advanced promotions.   
In addition to these trainings, winter promotions for our Muay Thai program will be conducted in regular classes during the week of Monday, April 3rd to Saturday, April 8.  Those students are strongly encouraged to attend classes that week for evaluation.