Fountain Hills Martial Arts recently had the honor to play host to a world renowned taekwondo and hapkido grandmaster, who stopped by the studio to administer a black belt testing session to nine students.

Grandmaster D.K. Shin, who visited Fountain Hills Martial Arts on Saturday July 27, has been studying martial arts for over 50 years.

During those 50 years Shin, as a combat and self-defense instructor, has trained the Korean Tiger Division, the U.S. Green Berets and students at the Jungle Ranger School in Vietnam.

Now Shin is an instructor at Stanford University along with a professor at Seoul Sports University and United Arts College. He lives in San Francisco but flew to Phoenix to administer the black belt degree test.

Advance Fountain Hills Martial Arts students, Kirk Burger, Noah Sehman, Marlee Spring, Ben Baldwin, Becky Chapman, Marina Sehman, Tralonie Smith, Gunnar Wise and David Valko all took part in the two-hour test session where they demonstrated their skill in taekwondo.

The students showed their mastery of nearly 40 forms, kicking combinations and sparring techniques before ending the test by breaking an object using a martial art technique.

Five of the students broke wooden boards, three broke through a stack of roofing tiles and Kirk Burger impressively broke through 12 one-inch thick sheets of ice.

At the end of the session Grandmaster Shin congratulated the students on a job well done.