Hello Palusud,
thanks for the e-mail and OK, I will do it.
This is going to be difficult, because I don´t know where to start and where to end. But ok, here I go:
I. Name of instructor and brief history, including location.
My name is Dieter Knüttel, I hold the Datu tile and Lakan Pito, 7th Dan Modern Arnis. I am located in Germany.
My first FMA-instructor was Jackson Cui Brocka, a student of Ernesto and Roberto Presas in the Philippines I studied with him from 1978 to 1984 in Germany. He was with the NATO in Belgium at that time, so we had a lot of seminar with him.
In 1983 I went to the Philippines for 3 monthgs of solid training. May main instructors there were Ernesto Presas, Rodel Dagoog, Roberto Presas, Christino Vasquez, Rene Tongson. I had others too (like Felimon Canete) but those were the main ones.
Cui Brocka died in 1984 so from then on I trained with Ernesto Presas. We had him in Germany once a year for about 4 weeks each, where he lived and trained with me. This period lasted till 1993.
From January 1994 we were associated with Remy Presas until his death.
Now I continue my research and studies of Modern Arnis with the Masters of the Philippines.
II. What does the instructor consider as their areas of strength or specialty (i.e. single stick, empty-hand, daga)?
Well, of course Tapi-Tapi, but I feel very well rounded. I do like disarms, empty hands, knife techniques, drills counter techniques and so on.
I think one of my strong side is speed, that helps me in a lot of areas.
I am a fast learner, what also helps in such a complex art.
III. What are the instructor's attributes and accomplishments?
I think I can teach well. I can analyze movements and know the strong and weak points of the technique right away.
I see how a student moves and can point out, how he or she should meve to get a better technique.
I can also structure well.
For example we have a totally different structure of disarming techniques here in Germany, that makes it much easier to learn them.
Another accomplishment is, that we have a strong Modern Arnis adssociation here, that I am the chief instructor since the founding in 1985. We have taught about 4000 Modern Arnis students in this time.
I am especially proud to have many students, that are with me sice 15 to 25 years. Our ranking structure of higher degrees here in Germany is: me, as Lakan Pito (7th Dan), 2 Lakan Lima (5th Dan) and about 22 Lakan Tatlo (3rd Dan). We have produced about 150 Modern Arnis black belts during out teaching.
Ther are many more things, but I don´t want to make it too long here. If anybody is interested to read more, what have done in and for the FMA in the last 25 years, please go to
this thread
where you can read it more in detail.
I hope this helped and it was not too long. If any questions will arise, I will be more than happy to answer them.
Best regards from Germany
Dieter Knüttel
Datu of Modern Arnis
