DRAZA MMA
Coaches
Coach Ajala is a Brazilian Jiu‑Jitsu black belt who began training at six years old. A standout Burlington City wrestler and former collegiate competitor, he brings a lifetime of grappling experience and patient, precise instruction to every student.
Coach Kitty is a Brazilian Jiu‑Jitsu purple belt with over 10 years of early‑childhood education experience. She’s known for her calm, structured teaching style and her ability to break down movements so children can learn with confidence. A mother of a competitive youth boxer and a dedicated student under the Relson Gracie lineage, she brings patience, clarity, and steady leadership to every class at Draza.
Coach MJ began training Brazilian Jiu‑Jitsu in 2015 after years in basketball, soccer, boxing, and kickboxing. With a background in psychology, social work, and mediation, he brings a rare understanding of student motivation and mental barriers. His teaching blends technical clarity with deep insight into human behavior, helping students move from confusion to confidence. Known for patience, precision, and a student‑first approach, Coach MJ guides students on and off the mats with a strong focus on the mental side of martial arts.
Coach Kei is a Brazilian Jiu‑Jitsu black belt, U.S. Marine veteran, and stroke survivor who began martial arts at six years old. Trained directly under Grandmaster Relson Gracie, he brings decades of experience in self‑defense, competition, and old‑school jiu‑jitsu. His coaching blends patience with intensity, shaped by a life of rebuilding, resilience, and discipline. Students learn not just techniques, but how to apply martial arts to real life with focus, courage, and intention.
Coach Nick brings the grit of a wrestler and the discipline of a striker to every class he teaches. After a tough start in high‑school wrestling, he rebuilt himself through intense training, earning a JV tournament win and later two NAGA silver medals. His path led through Muay Thai, underground smoker fights, and a unanimous‑decision victory under the CFFC lights. Now a dedicated coach and lifelong student, he teaches with humility, work ethic, and the belief that growth comes from refusing to quit.
Our Story
Since 2017, Draza Martial Arts has stood as a living lineage — a family‑forged hearth where the old disciplines breathe through new bodies. We teach not merely techniques, but the ancient human vow to rise, to protect, to transform.
Before nations, before written memory, humanity learned to survive by shaping the body into a shield and the spirit into a blade. Martial arts began as a response to the world’s first conflicts — a ritual of discipline, clarity, and self‑discovery carved into the human story.
Draza continues that story.
Mixed disciplines are not a trend; they are the evolution of the warrior’s path, the natural convergence of everything humans have learned about movement, power, and resilience. We train inside that evolution — not as imitators, but as contributors to the martial science of our era.
Each coach carries a different fire:
a lineage, a struggle, a triumph, a philosophy.
Their journeys converge here, forming a single current — a school shaped by many lifetimes of practice.
This is the circle.
This is the lineage.
Meet the Coaches.
Meet The Coaches
Finding Inspiration in Every Turn
