Monday 7:15-8:15PM adults

Thursday 6-7pm Children & 7:15-8:15PM adults

The Lakeshore Aikido Club will start a new course dedicated to beginners, adult and young adult. Please join us and embrace this modern Japanese martial art in a friendly and welcoming community in the heart of Evanston!

Aikido is a modern Japanese martial art (DO) based on the idea of harmonizing (AIKI) with your opponent to peacefully resolve conflict. The goal is subduing not harming. The Aikido practitioner uses circular movements and joint locks to redirect an attacker’s force and neutralize them. Aikido training is physically demanding, but it doesn’t rely on strength. It emphasizes developing endurance, flexibility, stability, and situational awareness. Aikido is a non-competitive activity, and there are no tournaments. Instead, students work with partners to improve their techniques. These include throws, strikes, pins, and joint locks. The goal is to use the attacker’s momentum against them.

All beginners classes will be include the following aspects:
– Body conditioning and stretching
– Aikido safe falling and rolling (ukemi)
– Martial arts principles
– Understanding Aikido Self-defense
– Aikido etiquette and values
– “Silent meditation” (mokuso) and mindfulness
– Aikido movements and postures
– Aikido basic techniques (kihon waza)

Every enrolled student will receive complementary
– Aikido Student Manual
– Aikido LAC Student ID
– Aikido uniform

Antonio Terrone

Antonio Terrone is a dedicated practitioner and instructor of Aikido with extensive experience in several martial arts including judo, taekwondo, and kendo. Antonio holds a 4^th degree black belt (yondan) in Aikido and has studied the art for the past thirty-six years with some of the most respected and renowned instructors in Europe, Japan, and the United States, namely Christian Tissier, Seishiro Endo, Wilko Vriesman, and Yoshimitsu Yamada. He visited Japan on several occasions and trained at the Aikido Headquarters Hombu Dojo in Tokyo under its head Moriteru Ueshiba, and other high ranking Japanese instructors. Antonio’s teaching experience includes Aikido classes and seminars in Beijing, Taipei, Amsterdam, and of course, Evanston. In Taipei, Antonio was a leading instructor in the Aikido Club at National Chengchi University, where he taught Tibetan Buddhist Studies in the Religious Studies Department. 

His newly established Lakeshore Aikido Club brings new energy into Evanston and the greater Chicago area by offering an effective system of self-defense, a dynamic and innovative form of exercise, and a vigorous path to psychological and spiritual wellbeing. The style and pedagogy of Aikido that Antonio promotes follows the lineage represented by Seigo Yamaguchi and Christian Tissier, two of the best Aikido experts in the world.

Antonio’s passion for Asian cultures is not limited to the practice and teaching of Aikido. Antonio also teaches East Asian culture, religions and literature in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures at Northwestern University in Evanston. Antonio has published several essays on Aikido including an article in Black Belt Magazine, the most well-known martial art periodical in the world, and his book, The Moon in the Mirror: the Budō Path to the Empty Mind, which came out in 2020. 

For more information on Antonio Terrone and his Lakeshore Aikido Club, please see www.lakeshoreaikidoclub.com.