John hit Wellington for this round of seminars on Tuesday the 24th of April and immediately headed to the RNZPC in Porirua for his session with the PT staff based at the college. This session was special as it focused more on training methodologies and training the trainer rather than specific techniques.

The other milestone tied to this session is that in the next couple of months the new training package for all Police recruits with be put into action. The package is 2 years work by dedicated PT staff and is the culmination of the skill sets and techniques that John has passed onto the trainers over the last few years. The end result is that our new police will be better trained and more prepared that ever before.

After a gruelling 5 hour session we headed out for a bite to eat at Monsoon Poon (love u long time) where John consumed 4 lemon lime and bitters and enough beef Rendang to feed a small village. Then it was home for some much needed rest and relaxation. Wednesday morning was spent in preparation for the night seminar at GSW. Due to expected high numbers we added extra mat space to the floor and made sure all was ready before hitting Starbucks to test John’s iChat configuration so he could catch up with home and check in with the family.

We then spent some time at Mr Bun a local and international favourite before catching “Pathfinder” at the gold lounge (don’t bother it was bad) Then it was back home to finalise the preparations for the nights session. 7pm kick off at GSW saw 40 people on the mat to soak in the information that John had to offer. Before getting into the session John took the opportunity to promote several long term students. Due to injury and off the mat time some of the new Blues are actually some of my longest serving members of GSW. Blues were presented to Brent Lindsay, Carl Rex, Phil Stenhouse and Adrian Smith. Congratulations to the boys on there dedication and commitment to their training and development.

This session focused on more than just techniques and like the RNZPC staff, we were treated to some of the ideas and concepts behind the methodologies as well as plenty of technical data to process. As always the 3 hour session was over in a flash and John was entertaining and informative, with a story and anecdote for every position and situation that cropped up during the night. I would like to take the opportunity to thank John for his time and patience. I know his life is full on and his work load ever increasing. Thanks.

I trust everyone else had successful and informative sessions and we all look forward to John’s return in August.

Geoff G