Sifu Klaus Brand

WingChun Grandmaster

My name is Klaus Brand and I live in Berlin. 

For more than 30 years I have been training WingChun and for exactly 50 years I have been practicing martial arts. I started judo with my dad at the age of 5, later I started boxing and after practicing various martial arts I began studying "Wing-Chun" in the late '80s. This style was known only to a few in Germany at the time, so I was one of the first to train this art in Europe. At that time, the art was misinformed in Western countries, but I sensed the hidden potential that was in it.

At the beginning of the 90s, at the end of my career as a professional soldier, I held the 2nd Technician Grade in Wing-Chun and opened a training centre in the district of Karlsruhe (south Germany), at the same time I ceased my civil service status and started a completely new chapter of my life, a fresh start, so to speak at the age of 30. During my time as a soldier, I was a group leader of a helicopter exploration team, then trained as a lone fighter (which compares to an army ranger), later a commando leader, followed by my training as a teacher at the school of the German army. At the school I was a fire rescue instructor and taught recovery from destroyed buildings. Other subjects I instructed at this time was self-protection and object protection, later I was a teacher for nuclear, biological and chemical defence.

From 1994-1998 I studied (full-time study), up to the 4th Technician Grade, at a martial arts university. Consequently, I started the necessary development of the style WingChun and opened training centres in Germany, the USA, in Namibia, Malaysia, England, Romania, France and the Philippines. Since then, I have been able to teach more than 10,000 people, which makes me proud. To this day, my WingChun style or what is known about it is trained and taught in trainings centres worldwide.

Today I'm Dai Sifu, a WingChun grandmaster and grandmaster in weapons combat, Escrima which I started 27 years ago. In the mid-90s, I created WingChun Combat and a few years later reformed the WingChun style entirely to its own distinctive style. I also subjected the weapons combat style Escrima to a complete renewal. In the final analyses my styles became unique arts of self-defence. Just a few years ago, I created another style called S.A.T. (Special Applications Training Program), which deals with pure applications without but also with weapons. A modern style without traditional aspects and without any graduation system. It is a functional tool, consisting of my rich experience of martial arts over the past 50 years. Today I train all these arts with the greatest precision and experience. I still conceive the same enthusiasm in the daily training as if I had started just yesterday.

The first decade of developing my autonomous style 'WingChun', along with over a decade as a soldier, was the most instructive time of my life. The attitude as a soldier and martial artist always helped me to go forward with will, courage, diligence, perseverance and honor (the 5 virtues of the IAW) and a clear vision. So I was on my way, as guided by an invisible hand, always successful and I unite to this day the most loyal and loved people around me, which in turn gives me a lot of energy and serenity. My luck and my success in private life, in sports and of course in the profession based on the fact that I have always stayed on the path and never gave up, despite encountering strong and weak people, makers and excuse seekers, people with a solid personality and those who swim with the tide. I have never let myself be misled and always trusted my thoughts and visions. The law of attraction repels evil and attracts good in unbelievable regularity. I feel that I have to go ahead, as I have learned from other visionaries. It overwhelms me when I see how people who follow me are happy and successful. Something that is useful to one’s self, logically must be useful to others.

If you follow the right path, success runs like a thread through life the lives of those on the path to the side, because generous thoughts have strength and vitality. WingChun is not just a hobby, it's a way of life, a life principle, a mindset, an attitude. Graduation and titles are unimportant in this art. Rather, it's about training and improving. Any expectations of grade or title contain the germ of dissolution in itself. Only the feeling of happiness to train and improve is what unites us in our hearts and makes us successful together. WingChun students are not successful because of their grades, they only get the grades or title because they are successful. 

I define success with a harmonious and self-determined life, physical and mental productivity and a life in freedom.

Dai Sifu Klaus Brand

October 2020