Our Mission: to provide affordable, consistent, high-quality instruction in martial arts and self defence in a professional, safe and friendly environment.

About Us

People have many reasons for their interest in the martial arts. Besides the obvious concerns about personal safety and self-defence, some are drawn to the physical fitness and weight-loss aspects of training. Others seek to add discipline and self control to their lives. While others like the camaradie of the classes and meeting with like minded people. Over time these reasons will change for each individual as well.

Whether your reason for wanting to learn martial arts, the Upper Hutt Hapkido Academy offers a number of programs that will fit your and/or your family's needs and your busy schedule as well.

Our Academy

Our academy culture is relaxed and friendly. But we expect our students to train hard and push themselves to achieve their own goals and to realise their martial arts potential. We have a strong team of experienced Instructors - details of them can be found on our Instructors sub-page on the About Hapkido page. You will find that we offer much more than just martial arts and self-defence training and we would like you to join our team. So come along and try out an Orientation Class for you or your children and begin your own martial arts journey.

All of our classes are run at our modern, owner-occupied martial arts studio in the centre of Upper Hutt. Further information Here.

We are also the Headquarters School for the New Zealand Hapkido Federation which has member clubs throughout New Zealand.

We are also an active member club of the World Kido Federation/Hanminjok Hapkido Association. The World Kido Federation is one of the most renowned and respected Korean self defence Martial Arts organisations in the world and the Hanminjok Hapkido Association is the largest international Hapkido organisation in the world with over 600 member clubs in South Korea and about another 400 spread throughout the world. Academy members are eligible to take part in the bienniel Korea Trip and Hapkido World Championships held in South Korea as well as attending other events and seminars held around the world including the Members Summit which is held in San Francisco in alternating years to the Korea Trip.

Our Classes

Hapkido for Adults and Teens

At the Upper Hutt Hapkido Academy we offer martial arts classes for all ages, fitnss and skill levels. Our goal is to provide you with the highest quality of martial arts instruction so that you receive the greatest value for your time and effort.

Our Teen and Adult classes will not only help you become proficient in self-defence but will also increase your physical abilities - stamina, strength, and flexibility - as well as your mental awareness and confidence. Martial arts training can also help you manage stress which can be so prevalent in the daily lives of teens and adults.

Further Information Here.

Hapkido Tigers for Children aged 7 to 12

The Upper Hutt Hapkido Academy's Tigers program is more than kicking, punching, and self-defense. Your child will learn important life and leadership skills, how to focus on maximum achievement, and build the unshakable confidence and self-discipline required to reach their full potential. They will learn how to set goals and acquire the perseverance to achieve them because we have crafted a sophisticated reward system that systematically encourages and motivates children to aspire to excellence.

Further information Here.

Little Dragons for Children aged 5 to 6

The Little Dragons program is designed specifically for children aged from 4 to 6. It is a non-competitive environment with the focus being fun, fitness, and martial arts fundamentals. In the Little Dragon’s program, your child will build self-discipline, physical awareness and of course basic martial arts skills, and bully-proofing techniques. All classes are taught using the safest, fun, and exciting instruction methods available for this age group.

Further information Here.

Hapkido Ground Combatives and Hapkido Pressure Point Combatives

These are two new standalone systems that we are introducing to the Academy in March 2019. Hapkido employs self-defence techniques on and from the ground and also pressure points to assist with the application of self defence techniques. We find that in our mainstream Hapkido classes that we don't have time to give either aspect consistent attention. Hapkido Ground Combatives will add to a Hapkido student's ground game while Hapkido Pressure Point Combatives will cover the use of pressure points to enhance Hapkido self-defence techniques. These are two martial arts in their own rights so from early next year Hapkido students will be able to study for 3 black belts at our Academy (Hapkido, Hapkido Ground Combatvies and Hapkido Pressure Point Combatives). Academy instructors are training in both systems at the moment so we can deliver these programmes to our students.

Sword Fighting

Sword Fighting skills for both children and adults is also offered as a stand-alone class or to compliment your Hapkido training. Further Information Here.

Academy News - November 2018

Upper Hutt Academy Undergoes Major Upgrade

(The Upper Hutt Hapkido Academy has just had a major upgrade with the addition of new flooring, new training mats, new training equipment and upgrade to its reception area as part of our program of continuous development.)

Training Over the Summer 2018/2019 Period

As our members know, we do not break over the Christmas / New Year period other than closing down briefly during the formal Christmas/New Year hoiliday. All Classes are cancelled from Monday 24th December and will resume on the full weekly schedule on Thursday 3rd January.

Depending on demand, we may open from 5 pm to 7 pm on Thursday 27th December.

January is a great time to start your Hapkido journey with us. Although we run a full class schedule, numbers are usually a but down with people being away. This means we can spend a bit more time with each student per class than we can normally do and this additonal time will help kick-start your training!

2019 Triple Header Seminar

Over the weekend of February 22nd - 23rd we are hosting Masters Fari Salievski and Fab Cella from KMA Australia at the Upper Hutt Hapkido Academy to launch our two new classes. Master Fari will launch our new Hapkido Ground Combatives Class. This is not a "BJJ" class but rather a specialist adjunct to our core Hapkido classes covering applying Hapkido techniques on the ground in a self defence context. Master Fab Cella will be introducing our new Hapkido Pressure Point Combatives Class. This covers applying pressure to various pressure points to assist in the application of Hapkido self-defence techniques. Both Ground Work and Pressure Points are covered in our core classes but we don't have time in these classes to explore these in great detail. The two new classes will allow students who have more of an interest in these topics to study them further. Both are separate arts in their own right so have their own grading systems.

The last seminar will be run by Master Fari and is a School Business Builder Seminar. This is aimed to help you grow your school and retain your members.

For further information please contact: callum@hapkido.co.nz