Instructor Biographies
K. Kip Marsh, Founder
Kip grew up in northeast Ohio. Though there was one Karate school in a nearby town in the late 60s/early 70s, he had no way to attend. After leaving home to attend Northwestern University in 1972, Kip happened to see an Aikido demonstration at the student union in 1974. He began taking lessons at the campus gym, but his instructor left after 1 year. While still in college, he practiced what he could with others to include wrestling, karate, and boxing. At Northwestern, Kip played on the school Rugby club team as a charter member. He was also a Midshipman in the NROTC unit and that led to a commission as a 2nd Lieutenant in the USMC.
While in the Marines from 1976-1980, Kip trained in boxing and, as a group with his rifle company, in Hwa Rang Do. He resigned from active duty in 1980.
From 1980 to 1997 Kip trained in various martial arts while raising a family and working as a Paramedic and Trauma RN. The martial arts included in his training were taekwondo, Taiho-Ryu, and Kenpo. He attained a 3rd degree Blackbelt in Kenpo in 1998. He moved to Colorado in 1998 and opened his first martial arts dojo that year, Mountain Dragon Martial Arts, in Buena Vista, Colorado. Kip affiliated with the American Independent Karate Instructors Association (AIKIA) at that time.
Attending Karate College yearly from 1999-2007, Kip was able to meet and train with martial arts legends such as Joe Lewis, Bill Wallace, and Dr. Jerry Beasley. It was also at Karate College that Kip met Mike Lee Kanarek. After meeting Mr. Kanarek, Kip began training in HaganaH, the comprehensive system of combat created by Mike Lee Kanarek. Kip trained intensively and was able to achieve a blackbelt in Haganah in 2008. In 2003, Kip had moved with his family to Marshfield, Missouri. While working full time in medicine as a Nurse Practitioner, Kip continued to teach, as owner and chief instructor, at Mountain Dragon Martial Arts which reopened in 2003 in Marshfield, Missouri.
In December of 2007 Mountain Dragon Martial Arts closed as Kip pursued employment overseas as a civilian contractor for the next 10 years. During his deployments Kip went to Kosovo, Liberia, Afghanistan, and Iraq. While deployed, Kip continued to share his martial arts knowledge with his colleagues and to learn new skills from them. While on his last deployment in Iraq, Kip found the Self Defense Training System online curriculum created by Damian Ross. Kip began training in this system and became an instructor in 2017. He is, at this writing, a Level 3 instructor in the Self Defense Training System.
In 2018, Kip retired from medicine and returned from overseas. He reopened his dojo as The Self Defense Company Ozark Mountains. Since 2018 he continues to teach Kenpo, HaganaH, and the Self Defense Training System to people of all ages and walks of life. In 2020, Officer Tony D’Andrea enrolled in the HaganaH class. Sometime after enrolling Tony suggested that Kip develop a unique system combining the different arts, styles, and combatives in which he had been trained. Kip was hesitant at first, but during a conversation with Dr. Jerry Beasley, the founder of AIKIA, published author, world famous martial artist and creator of Karate College, Kip had a change of perspective. Dr. Beasley encouraged Kip to stop pursuing belt rank in another system at that time and to become the expert in his own style. With that encouragement, and the help of Tony D’Andrea, Koritsu Sento was developed.
Tony D’Andrea, Co-founder
Tony began his martial arts studies in about 1990 with Tae Kwon Do. As he was about to test for brown belt, he suffered a knee injury which sidelined him. He became a full-time law enforcement officer in 1997, and continues to this day in that career, where he has spent 100 percent of his career in uniform, which means numerous hand-to-hand unarmed encounters with suspects of varying levels of resistance over the last 24 years. Since Tae Kwon Do, Tony has studied aikido, judo, Western boxing, a style with similarities to Jeet Kune Do, and Haganah. In 2020 he met Mr. Marsh, and after several months studying Haganah, Tony brought the idea of a new, hybrid style to Mr. Marsh that incorporated effective techniques from a combination of the styles the two had studied. The result, after months of collaboration, was the development of Koritsu Sento.