LSTA Martial Arts Academy Partnership. Saber Tag league running parallel inside traditional dojo

Your 13+ Students Are Aging Out.
This Keeps Them.

Saber Tag is a sport, not a style. Your Karate stays Karate. Your Tae Kwon Do stays Tae Kwon Do. Your Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu stays BJJ. Adding it doesn't dilute your brand or your curriculum. It runs as a parallel program with its own rank system, its own equipment, its own scheduling. Three new revenue streams. Zero compromise on what you've already built.

A New Revenue Stream.
Your Art Stays Your Art.

Most academy owners worry that adding a new program will dilute their primary discipline, compete for student attention, or require new instructor certifications. Saber Tag X-treme runs as a parallel program inside the same dojo: not a replacement, not a rebrand, not a curriculum competitor. Watch what that integration actually looks like.

Or skip ahead to Schedule The Conversation.

Free Resource · Download The Kit

Get The Martial Arts Academy Kit.

The three boundaries that keep your art whole, the league formats and weekly structure, staffing and certification, equipment, an owner FAQ, plus the license economics and sponsor model. Written to be forwarded to your leadership team.

See The Martial Arts Kit →

A martial arts add-on that protects your primary discipline's brand integrity
while opening three new revenue streams.

Saber Tag X-Treme is structured as a competitive combat sport. Not a discipline that competes for your students' loyalty or your dojo's identity. Run by a licensed operator inside your existing footprint, on Tuesday and Thursday nights, with sponsor-funded student costs and a Saturday day-pass funnel. federation-registered network operating footprint. The framework that lets you add a new revenue line without dropping your guard on what you teach.

Four Things You Don't
Need Anyone To Tell You.

We've sat across from enough academy owners to know what's actually keeping you up. None of these come up in the Facebook groups, but they're the operational reality you carry every quarter.

1 · The Black Belt Cliff

Your top students reach Black Belt and quietly drift away. There's nothing past it that hooks them. Master ranks don't generate tuition revenue. Adult students disappear at the moment they're most loyal, because the structure doesn't extend.

2 · The Teen Attrition Wall

Twelve to fourteen is when kids drop out across every discipline. Same demographic crisis as Parks & Recreation, same crisis as schools. You feel it as enrollment plateau. The teen-focused engagement vehicle most academies don't have.

3 · Single-Revenue-Stream Reality

Most martial arts academies have one revenue stream: monthly tuition. Maybe seminars. Maybe pro-shop. Almost never: competitive event revenue, sponsor revenue, corporate event revenue, day-pass walk-in revenue. The standard model doesn't include those streams.

4 · The Identity-Dilution Fear

Adding a second discipline to a Karate dojo dilutes the brand. BJJ in a Tae Kwon Do school confuses the market. Owners are right to be terrified of looking unfocused. The standard "add-a-style" advice ignores what you've spent years building.

Read This Before
You Schedule The Call.

License partnerships work when both sides are aligned. Below is a plain read of which academy this fits, and which it doesn't. If you see your school in the first paragraph, the conversation is master-to-master. If you see it in the second, we'll save each other time.

If you've put ten, twenty, or thirty years into building your discipline,

, and you have a brand, a student base, a reputation in your community that you refuse to dilute for revenue. You've watched competitors collapse their identity by chasing trends: adding BJJ to a Karate dojo, bolting Krav onto Tae Kwon Do, going "MMA" because the market signal said so. You won't do that. You also know your single-revenue-stream model is exposed, and your post-Black-Belt students are drifting. You want a parallel program. Clearly its own thing, on its own nights, with its own equipment and its own rank system. That adds revenue without touching what you've spent decades building. If that's the floor you're standing on, this conversation is master-to-master.

Where this isn't for you,

If your school has under fifty active students, the league economics are fragile, wait until you've grown the base. If your facility doesn't have a 24×24 minimum dedicated training floor we can occupy on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, the schedule won't work. If your students are predominantly under thirteen, we don't serve that demographic. If your culture treats sport-based combat (rule sets, scoring, leagues), as philosophically incompatible with traditional martial arts, the Saber Tag league framing won't reconcile with your worldview. We'd rather say so up front than waste your time.

What We Carry.
What You Carry.

Our Side
  • Saber Tag as a parallel sport, no curriculum bleed into your art
  • Three new revenue streams without changing your existing schedule
  • Equipment kit, training, full LSTA insurance for the league side
  • Full league rights, operate Saber Tag X-Treme as a parallel program
  • A character framework that reinforces your existing tradition, not replaces it
Your Side
  • Floor time Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday on a recurring cadence
  • Honest student-base read, who fits the league, who doesn't
  • Willingness to operate the league with the rigor of your primary art
  • Patience for the league build, three seasons to fill, not three weeks
  • A real partner relationship, peer-to-peer, master-to-master

All Four Problems.
One Parallel Program.

Saber Tag X-Treme runs alongside your existing curriculum. Your students stay your students. Your art stays your art. The league becomes the engagement layer that holds them through the Black Belt cliff and the teen attrition wall.

CORE · COMPETITIVE SPORT

Saber Tag X-Treme League

Structured competitive combat sport. Tuesday and Thursday seeded league nights. Saturday day-pass funnel. Inter-academy and regional tournaments. The competitive vehicle that keeps your post-Black Belt students engaged and your teen students locked in.

OPERATING MODEL · REVENUE STREAMS

Saber Kinetics

The dual-sided business model integrating your existing academy with the Saber Tag league. Three new revenue streams from one footprint: league registration, day-pass walk-in, corporate / birthday / event bookings. No build-out. No new lease. Same dojo floor.

CHARACTER STANDARD · YOUR-ART-COMPATIBLE

Code of S.A.B.E.R.

Security · Aptitude · Bravery · Ethics · Resolve. Compatible with every martial art's existing character ethos. Bushido, Aiki, Jiu-Jitsu's mutual welfare and benefit, Tae Kwon Do's tenets, the Code reinforces what you already teach. It doesn't replace your value system.

INFRASTRUCTURE · INVISIBLE

WISE Operating Layer

Master-Coached Form Review, Electronic Scoring & National Rankings, the AcadevoFit-powered Wellness Platform, 12-Volume Academy System. The infrastructure your league runs on. You don't see it. Your students benefit from it. It's why the model holds at scale across a federation-registered network across the U.S. and internationally.

The Three Boundaries
That Keep Your Art Whole.

"Add a sport, dilute your discipline" is the failure mode every master has watched another school fall into. The Saber Tag X-Treme integration is structured around three hard separation principles. None of them is optional. All three together make the parallel-sport model actually work.

Boundary 1

Separate Equipment

Saber Tag X-Treme uses LSTA-issued foam-core training swords with electronic scoring. Your existing weapons, training pads, mats, and uniforms stay in their respective storage. The league equipment lives in dedicated kit storage that's clearly identified as "Saber Tag X-Treme."

Why It Matters

A student walking into your facility on a Tuesday can see (physically, immediately), that this is a different program. Your discipline's equipment isn't being touched, modified, or hybridized. The visual separation alone protects the integrity of your primary art.

Boundary 2

Separate Schedule

The league runs Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Distinct nights from your primary discipline's class schedule. Your students attend either their primary discipline's class or the Saber Tag league night. There is no class where the two are taught together. The cadence is intentional.

Why It Matters

Schedule separation prevents the worst kind of curriculum drift. Instructors mixing technique vocabulary across the two contexts because they're teaching them back-to-back. Your discipline's instruction time is protected from the league's instruction time. Two arts, two schedules, no contamination.

Boundary 3

Separate Rank System

Saber Tag X-Treme uses the LSTA sash-progression rank system, not your discipline's belt or sash structure. A Black Belt in your Karate isn't a senior rank in Saber Tag X-Treme; they earn league rank separately. The two progression systems run on parallel tracks and never cross-credit.

Why It Matters

Rank-system separation is the deepest protection. It says structurally that the two arts are not commensurable. That achievement in one does not translate to status in the other. Your Black Belts retain their meaning. The league has its own integrity. The two ladders never get confused.

All three boundaries hold simultaneously, or the integration doesn't work. This is the framework that makes the difference between an academy that adds a parallel sport and an academy that loses its identity adding one. We've watched both. The boundaries aren't a recommendation, they're the contract.

Pick The Path
That Matches Your Plan.

For martial arts academies, the natural model is to license the operator role yourself. Your academy holds the license and runs Saber Tag X-Treme as a parallel sport on your floor. The two tiers below are the licensing options. For most academies, the natural fit is the Saber Tag League Mobile License. Adds a parallel sport without touching what you already teach. The lower-tier LSMA Curriculum option exists, but it's a different decision: it adds LSTA's curriculum as a new discipline track, which does affect your existing program structure.

Natural Fit · Parallel Sport
$14,997

Saber Tag League Mobile License

Licensed to operate Saber Tag X-Treme as a parallel program inside your academy. Includes equipment kit, league rights, and the Saber Kinetics business model. Your art stays your art, Saber Tag runs as its own thing on its own nights. Three new revenue streams without compromising your primary discipline.

Best for: academies that want to add a new revenue line without changing what they teach. The natural fit for most dojos.
Different Decision · New Discipline Track
$2,997

LSMA Curriculum Commander

Lower-tier Commander License authorizes structured LSMA curriculum delivery. Adding light sword as a discipline track inside your academy. This is a different decision than the Mobile License: it does touch your existing program, because you'd be teaching LSMA alongside your primary art rather than running a parallel sport.

Best for: academies actively expanding into new disciplines and wanting LSMA as one of them. Honest caveat: this conflicts with the "your art stays your art" framing. Choose the Mobile License if brand integrity is the priority.

Three New Revenue Streams.
One Equipment Kit.

The Mobile License pays itself back through the league registration stream alone, typically before month three. Day-pass walk-ins and event bookings become net-positive contribution from the start.

3
New Revenue
Streams
$0
Build-Out
Or New Lease
100%
Sponsor-Funded
Student League Costs
100%
Operator-Carried
Saber Tag Insurance

The license includes equipment kit, curriculum, certification, insurance, and Federation backing for the league side. Local sponsors cover student league participation costs. Your dojo provides the floor on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. Your existing classes run untouched on the other nights.

Documented.
Governed. Operating.

Read the documented deployments behind these numbers →

Federation
Network Academies
Multi-State
U.S. + International
60+
Five-Star Reviews
Delivered
U.S. Military Contracts
2
Municipal P&R Partnerships

Run The Numbers Yourself
Or Talk It Through.

Path One

Run the numbers in the calculator

Drill into the Saber Tag X-Treme deep page for academies. Interactive profit calculator, three format options, sponsor model details, license package breakdown, and the implementation timeline from signed to first league day.

See League Mechanics →
Path Two

Schedule a 30-minute call

If you want to discuss your specific academy, your discipline, your existing student base, your market, and which operator path fits, schedule directly with a Success Coach below. No prepared deck, no pitch.

Schedule The Call ↓

Four masters.
The credential stack behind the curriculum.

Before you take this to your board or leadership team, here's who designed the program you'd be offering on your floor.

Co-Principals
Sifu Edward Armstrong
Norfolk, VA
Sifu Edward Armstrong
Co-Founder & Co-Principal

Built a landmark U.S. light sword academy · Entrepreneur of the Year · Featured on ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox · Parks & Recreation Contract

Sifu Julliana Armstrong
Langley AFB, Virginia
Sifu Julliana Armstrong
Co-Principal · First American Int'l Referee

3× WEKAF National Champion · NASM-Certified Trainer · U.S. military contracts, Langley AFB & Fort Eustis

Team USA, 2X GSBA World Champion, Germany 2026
Founding Masters & Technical Directors
Sijo Nathan Young
Hawaii
Sijo Nathan Young
Founding Master · Technical Director

2× World Champion · 2004 Olympics Performer · Black Belt Magazine Feature · 2nd-Gen JKD, Bruce Lee lineage

Sifu Nick Benseman
Los Angeles, CA
Sifu Nick Benseman
Founding Master · Choreography Director

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 · Tenet · The 5th Wave · 101 Stunt Credits on IMDb · JKD · Capoeira · Kempo · Judo

Why our partnership terms look the way they do

Built. Betrayed. Rebuilt by four masters.

In 2015, Edward Armstrong built a thriving light sword academy in Norfolk. In 2016, the franchise that gave the sport its international structure betrayed the warriors and operators inside it. In 2017, Edward and Julliana Armstrong (with founding masters Nathan Young and Nick Benseman), rebuilt LSTA from scratch as a federation, engineered against every failure mode they'd survived. That history is why partnership terms here favor your organization, not us. We've been on the other side. We know what predatory feels like. We refuse to build that.

Not a martial arts academy?

Here's the partnership built for your institution.

Every institution type has its own implementation. Pick the channel that fits.

The Martial Arts Academy Kit

Built to Forward to Your Leadership Team.

The three boundaries, the league formats, staffing and certification, the equipment list, and the license economics. One document, written to survive the skeptic in the room.

Request the Martial Arts Kit →
Schedule a Conversation

Talk to The Founders.
Master-To-Master Conversation.

Tell us about your academy, your style, and what you're looking to add. We'll reach out to walk through Light Sword combat as a parallel program, what integration looks like, and whether a martial-arts partnership makes sense for your school.

Get In Touch →

Earnings disclaimer: Any revenue or payback references on this page. Including the three new revenue streams and the typical before-month-three license payback example. Are illustrative potential and documented results from our founding Norfolk operation. They are NOT typical results, projections of your income, or guarantees. Actual results depend entirely on your market, your student base, your pricing, and how consistently you run the league; many operators will earn less and some will earn nothing. We make no guarantee of any specific financial result.