Nicolas Maraite

Nicolas Maraite was born in the German speaking community in Belgium in 1975.
He started training martial arts at the age of 12 when he enrolled in a Shotokan-Karatedo Club. After 5 years he changed to Hapkido for one year.

In 1992 he discovered WingTsun for the first time, but could not attend regular classes as there were no clubs in his area, so he started to learn from a friend and 12 th SG in both WT and Escrima, who lived in Germany at the time.
In 1993 he enrolled in the University of Louvain La Neuve and studied Germanic Philology for the next 5 years. Since starting university, Nicolas has kept training different martial Arts.

Despite looking around he always returned to learn WingTsun and Eskrima from his friend while living in Belgium in 1996 a leg injury forced Nicolas to abandon his training for 9 months. During his Erasmus exchange with Trinity College Dublin in 1996/97, he first met Sifu Aidan Canavan, but due to his injury could not attend classes regularly. He returned home and continued training at university when he recovered.

He graduated In English and German Literature and Linguistics in summer ’98. Work commitments prevented him from training regularly until he moved to Dublin in January 2000, where he has been working for the last 6 years.

Since February 2000, Nicolas has been a student of Sifu Aidan Canavan and after becoming assistant instructor in 2004 was permitted by his Sifu and encouraged by his Sihing Michael O’Leary to attend private classes with Dai-Sifu Rainer Tausend both in Dublin and Germany as part of the “Irish contingent” and was awarded the 1st TG by Dai-Sifu Rainer Tausend in November 2006. Nicolas has also been studying Newman-Escrima under Sifu Stefan Weber and presently holds the 6 th SG.

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