This interview was conducted with Gavin in 2007, when he held the role of chief CRCA UK instructor. In 2008 Gavin made the decision to step down as chief instructor, but still retains his position today as a senior instructor within the CRCA.

Q:When did you start training in Wing Chun?
A:I originally started when I was 12 years old.

Q:What teachers have you had in Wing Chun?
A:I have had 3 teachers. My 1st Sifu was called Dave Warner who I trained with for 4 years at his home near Leicester. During this time I also did some training with a Sifu called Nigel Fan above his restaurant in Nottingham with some of the waiters that worked there. My 3rd and final Sifu is Randy Williams who I trained with in America and in England and various locations around the world when I travelled with him doing seminars.

Q:What is it that drew you to Wing Chun and made you dedicate yourself to it?
A:When I was 12 years old I was studying Judo and my Aunt asked me to go and see her as she had a book on martial arts that might interest me that used to belong to my cousin. So I went round to see her and she gave me a book on an art form called Wing Chun written by Ralf Claznitzer and Greco Wong. As soon as I read the book there was something about it that really grabbed my attention, so I started to train using the book as my guide. It was incidentally the very first book written about Wing Chun printed in English. I still have that book to this day.

Q:Have you trained in any other martial arts?
A:As I’ve already said I studied Judo, and then when I was 16 years old I started doing a Karate style called Goyararu which is now called Tetsudo. It is a mixture of Gung Fu and Karate and I really enjoyed my time training in that style and at their clubs. In fact it was the way they run their clubs that influenced me to set up mine in a very similar way.

Q:How did you meet Randy?
A:I used to go to Leicester to train with my Sifu Dave Warner a few times a week, one on one at his house. He sometimes mentioned to me that he trained with a Sifu called Randy Williams, but I had never really heard of him before. Dave showed me some books that Randy had written and from the short time I was allowed to look at them, what Randy was doing looked very good and in-depth. Dave said that one day I might get to meet him. Anyway one night in 1988 I phoned Dave to arrange to go and train with him and this person with an American accent answered the phone and said his name was Randy Williams and that he knew who I was and told me to come down and train with him and Dave. That is how I first met him and he blew me away with his knowledge and skill.

Q:Why did you choose Randy’s style of Wing Chun over others?
A:Compared to the other styles I had practiced, Randy’s style of Wing Chun was very technical and at the same time very practical, which I liked. Also he told me and showed me things about Wing Chun that I had never seen or been told about before.

Q:How did you manage to train with Randy over such a long distance?
A:I used to fly to where ever Randy was living in America and stay and train with him for a month at a time. The first time was in Chicago and after that I stayed and trained in Scranton Pennsylvania, Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia and New York. Fortunately most of the times that I stayed with Randy, he was teaching Wing Chun full time so we managed to get plenty of training done each day. I used to do this once or sometimes twice a year and in-between these trips arrange for Randy to come out to the UK to do seminars and get extra training with him before, during and after the seminars. I also used to go all over the world with Randy to countries such as France, Germany, Spain, South Africa etc, helping him do seminars and set up Close Range Combat academies.

Q:How often do you train and what do you do to maintain your skills?
A:I train Mon - Fri on a daily program that I wrote up for myself which includes doing all of my Forms, weights, running, skipping, drills, Iron Palm, Hay Goang, Gwoh Sau etc. I also read my theory on a regular basis. Obviously on top of this I get extra training when I do any classes/lessons.