3rd Dan
Dean began training with us as a youth for many years, and was awarded his first degree junior blackbelt 6/9/2010. He was then one of the “fab four” junior blackbelts to go for their 2nd degree blackbelt together, along with Mattias, Jupin, and Nico Zacharatos, and they were awarded their 2nd degree blackbelts on 12/14/11. He continued his training and was awarded his 3rd degree on 10/29/2014.
After our volunteer assistant Giancarlo Hamner went off to college (and later started his career), Dean became our volunteer teaching assistant, until he went off to college too. Then the torch was passed to Ewan McColl until he also went off to college (you see a pattern here).
But lucky for us, our former assistants continue to stay in touch with our blackbelts over the years.
Dean is a great example of an amazing martial artist who would dazzle the younger ranks with his very high flying jump kicks on the heavy bag! When assisting with teaching,he was encouraging and patient while working with the younger lower ranks, and participated in our karate tournaments.
We’re so proud to have Dean as a Zacharatos Blackbelt, and our martial arts family!
