A Black Belt Way of Life

Master Mark Warburton returns remotely to the new and improved Press Record Studio from Sarnia, Canada. Tonight's topic? Making Taekwondo better from the grassroots through the elite level. All the criticism is constructive and done out of a lifelong love for the sport. Master Mark Warburton has dedicated his life to Taekwondo coaching and competition. He has been through every rule change thrown...

Living a healthy lifestyle, both inside and outside the four walls of the New York Black Belt Center, is a priority for Master Joseph Lupo Jr. Master Joe often uses analogies when explaining certain things to students. One such analogy is something his mother (the head chef and owner of L'Italiano Trattoria) always says, "we eat first with our eyes, then our mouth." Master Joe often refers to this...

Master Jeff Pinaroc's Taekwondo journey began in Chicago, Illinois. But it wasn't until he moved to Dallas, Texas, and set foot into Chang Lee's Taekwondo, where he was surrounded by and began training with Taekwondo champions like Dae Sung Lee, Clay Barber & James Villasana, that Master Pinaroc's Taekwondo career took off. Fighting in both junior and senior divisions by the age of 13, he qual...

Fresh off a 22-second head kick knockout in Karate Combat, Mr. William Findley joins the BBWOL podcast studio remotely from Eddie Alvarez's Underground King's MMA school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. William started Taekwondo at the age of 4 with his parents by his side. The support from his parents and many years of Taekwondo training, support, and aspirations led to a 2023 National Heavyweight...

Mrs. Mildred Andaluz is a Certified Life and Confidence Coach under the ACSTH (Approved Coach Specific Hours) with a master's degree in Counseling. Mrs. Andaluz is also the assistant community school director in the public Queens High School System. Her most important job and title is that of being a loving wife and amazing mother to your 3 beautiful children. During the pandemic, with the world i...

Founded in 2010 by Master Joseph Lupo Jr., the New York Black Belt Center has stood the tests of time for 15 years. Like anything in life, in order to succeed, it takes a village. Two of the most loyal and committed contributors to the success of the New York Black Belt Center have been Master's John Rodriguez and Chet Bridgewater. Both 5th-degree black belts and the highest-ranking students of th...

Melvy Alvarez, a second-generation taekwondo practitioner and athlete, has represented the United States of America at every world-class level. To say you were a 10x National Team Member and an International Champion is no easy feat. But without the support and inspiration from his mother, Master Marina Aguero, a former National Team member from Argentina, and his teammates at the Connecticut Taek...

Master James Thorsten was born in Korea and came to the United States as a young child through adoption in 1976. Being a Korean American raised in the Bronx was not easy. Master Thorsten quickly needed to learn how to defend himself and have the confidence to survive the tough streets of the Bronx. His adopted family decided to give him a sense of culture. Master Thorsten began taking Taekwondo le...

Grandmaster Michael Yuhasz, owner of Adirondack Taekwondo in Clifton Park, NY, his Taekwondo journey in the early 1980s with the love of comic books. Working as a dishwasher in a local restaurant, his first paycheck was spent in a comic book shop with issues of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. These comics led Grandmaster Yuhasz into a Taekwondo school and inspired him to become a Taekwondo...

 Flex Theory is an athletic development and rehabilitation program that combines explosive strength, mobility, and flexibility. But before Mr. Andre Victorian could put these concepts together, he endured all of life's hardships.  Through the loss of his business and marriage, Andre needed to pivot. He knew what he was strong at and what he did well as a successful high-level T...

Master DS Lee, son of Texas Taekwondo pioneer Grandmaster Chang Lee, has dedicated his life to advancing the art and sport of Taekwondo. As the president of USA Taekwondo’s Texas State Association, one of the largest and most competitive regions in the country, Master Lee continues a legacy built on discipline, service, and leadership.    Growing up, watching his father struggle and...

Born and raised in Queens, New York,  Chris Megaloudis  has lived every side of the world’s game. Growing up in a soccer family, alongside his older brother Mike, the sport was a way of life in the Megaloudis household. His father, Mike Sr., served as his first coach and set the foundation for Chris to follow his own passion for the game. From playing on the streets of Astoria to competi...

Born with a tremendous amount of energy and a love for movement, topped with inspiration from the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Ninja Turtles, Eleni Koutsilianos desire to become a martial artist started at a very young age. Her Taekwondo journey began at the age of 8. However, it was not easy for a kid born fully deaf in her right ear and partially deaf in the left ear. A lack of confidence be...

Adam Flohr is a Krav Maga martial artist training out of the California Defence Academy in Murrieta, California. A self described art and media guy with the gift of gab, he grew tired of feeling helpless in negative confrontations. He searched for the "toughest" form of self-defense to give him that self confidence he aspired to attain. Through learning Krav Maga, an Israeli Military self-defense...

Inspired by action movie stars like Jet Li and Jackie Chan, Sensei James Luk's mom knew Martial Arts was the perfect activity to keep a young kid safe and off the streets. Born into the projects of Woodside, Queens, learning how to defend yourself was a necessity. 15 minutes away the Shotojuko Dojo in Astoria, Queens was where his Martial Arts would begin. Under the tutelage of Sensei Kai Leung, J...

Master Marc Zirogiannis is a World Taekwondo International Referee and the Founder/Editor-in-Chief of Taekwondo Life Magazine. His journey in Taekwondo began in the early 1980s, following his older brother into martial arts. This led him to YH Park Taekwondo. Grandmaster Park, one of the first to open a Taekwondo school in Long Island, New York, was a former USA National Team and Olympic Coac...

Born into a Taekwondo family, Tim Thackrey’s life has always revolved around discipline, resilience, and personal transformation. But his early years as an athlete were anything but golden — until everything clicked. Surrounded by the right people, Tim rose from underdog status to become a USA National Team Member, Olympic Training Center resident, and Pan American Games gold medalist. After retir...

In 1991 Grandmaster Joseph Lupo Sr. alongside Grandmaster Moonsung Lee, opened the Moon S. Lee Taekwondo Institute in Whitestone, Queens, New York. Before the school was even officially open, a young teenage girl would walk in with her father to get some info on the new school in the neighborhood. Upon speaking to GM Joe, a decision was made immediately that this was where she wanted to continue h...

Born in New York, raised in California, now based out of Georgetown, Texas, Master Cy Zamani has passed his fair share of ups and downs in life. The one constant that has always pulled him through the hardest of moments is Taekwondo. From the tragic loss of his father, and later his daughter, to a cancer diagnosis, the positivity that Taekwondo brought out in his life pulled him through. Thre...

Master Carlos Villanueva, a 4th Dan Black Belt certified under the Kukkiwon (World Taekwondo) and the New York Black Belt Center, has been a lifelong Taekwondo practitioner under his father, Master Luis Villanueva. Born and raised in Tampa, Florida, his culinary career brought him to the lights of New York City. Here, he found a second home under Master Joseph Lupo Jr. and Master John Rodriguez at...

Sensei Kai Leung, a world-recognized Shotokan Karate Instructor, immigrated to the United States in the early 1960s. A seasoned Goju-Ryu Karate competitor and instructor, Leung's life changed when he met the late Toyotaro Miyazaki, who brought traditional Shotokan Karate to New York. Leung quit his New York City schoolteacher job and closed his Shotokan Karate dojo in Whitestone, Queens, to work a...

When most young kids in the 1980s wanted to be Ralph Macchio (Daniel LaRusso) from the Karate Kid movies, Eric Ruiz wanted to be Mr. Miyagi, a teacher of martial arts. As a teenager, he started learning Taekwondo. Once he gained his footing and built a strong foundation, he began learning other forms of martial arts. Black belts in Taekwondo & Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (under Professor Rob Gutierrez...

Before she became one of the most fearsome Taekwondo competitors on the planet, Grandmaster Mechelle Smith began Taekwondo in 1979 as an introverted teenager training at Grandmaster Les Zampino's school, the Northeast Taekwondo Academy in Rotterdam, NY. Training during a time when women were few on the training floor, she persisted and took the leap into competition, losing every tournament over t...

In sports, we always talk about "legends" that paved the way for the present modern-day superstars. Whether it's Michael Jordan in basketball, Wayne Gretzky in hockey, or Pele in soccer....the list is endless. In the short history of Taekwondo and open-style martial arts tournaments, Mark Williams is a name that always comes up in conversations. 5x Grand Champion of S. Henry Cho's All-American Ope...

Master Joe takes a trip to Texas for the US Masters Cup Taekwondo Championships! Masters aged Taekwondo athletes (aged 33 and up) from across the United States and the world converged in Houston from January 17th through the 18th, 2025 for an epic tournament made just for them.  This event featured international competitors from the USA, Spain, Sweden, Great Britain, Mexico, Iceland and Holla...