Bay Mountain Martial Arts

My favorite way to spend my free time is training Wing Tsun and Latosa Escrima with my Bay Mountain family. I’ve been training with this school for 14 years and will continue training with then for the rest of my life. If you are looking for a good quality martial art that works go check them out.

I have taken Escrima and Wing Tsun (Kung Fu) classes here and continue to be a part of the Bay Mountain family even though I injured my shoulder (not from attending class here). Sifu Simon is incredible and all of his instructors across the Bay area are a joy to work with. Being a female in a predominantly male environment was never any issue at all– not only is everyone extremely helpful, honest and dedicated, but they are a joy to be around and I always looked forward to every class (wondering if my Sifu will give me a sword or a staff to work with on occassion — ahh the joys!). Not to mention, Sifu Simon is one of the best Kung Fu instructors in the world (and I mean both in person and on paper/​lineage). Regarding Escrima, Simon regularly has Grandmaster Rene Latosa instruct his students — this from a martial arts perspective is amazing as most high level Escrima Studios in Europe fly the Grand Master out to teach for a weekend. We are just lucky he lives in the Bay Area and loves to teach at Bay Mountain. Regarding a previous post about someone not being called back after leaving a message, call back! There was a point where there was some restructure, so I’m sure it wasn’t on purpose. They have an awesome office manager.

I’ve been with Sifu Simon for over seven years, and before that was learning Korean Kuk Sool Won. I am now the Instructor for the San Mateo Class. Wing Tsun takes the bio mechanics of frighting to it’s logical extreme. I don’t know of any Martial Artist who doesn’t think that what he or she trains is the best., what I can say is that Wing Tsun in competently unique in it’s approach. The same complexity also exists for the Escrima under Grandmaster Rene Latosa. These arts can be mentally as well as physically challenging if not frustrating. The reward for learning these arts reflects that.
Sifu Simon is the best teacher I have ever had on any subject, it just happens that he teaches Martial Arts. His student base includes Masters of other styles, so when you meet him do not judge this book by its cover.

I have been a part of Bay Mountain Martial Arts for over 5 years and it is an AWESOME organization. Not only do they teach incredible martial arts systems, but the people are great too. The students work well together and there is a strong family feel in the group, which is a big plus for me. I really can’t imagine being involved with an other organization.
Come give it a try!

I spent a good deal of time on Unilocal comparing various martial arts centers in the Bay Area. Pramada W.‘s review sounded so wonderful I figured that this might well be the place for me. And perhaps it truly is wonderful. But alas, poor customer service left me with no choice but to pass this place by.
I expect a certain level of service in a place. For example, if you list an email on your website as an administrative contact, I will assume that I will get a response in fairly short order. Not with BMMA. Three weeks and a day was their response time.
Worse, I expect that your pricing discounts are not random and exclusionary. They offer discounts for undergraduates. «Great,» I thought. «I’m a graduate student on massive (full) student aid. I doubt the restriction will be limited just to undergrads.» Wrong. Apparently at BMMA, financial struggles are not really their concern. In fact, one could be a wealthy undergraduate and get a discount, while my $ 0 EFC gets me nothing. Obviously they need not offer a discount at all. But if you’re going to offer a discount, please be sure it doesn’t alienate whole swaths of your customers.
It’s really too bad they couldn’t get their act together here. I thought I’d have really enjoyed this place.

The really cool thing about Bay Mountain is that everything has logical grounds. What I really liked from the beginning is the structure — it doesn’t feel that you start with some technique out of the blue, doesn’t feel like you start from the middle of something — the approach is to convey very general principles and ideas first, and then work your way into more details. Whatever you learn always references back into everything else you did, so it really becomes one whole (not a set of number of techniques).
Highly recommended to both novice and seasoned martial artists!