One of Easton’s priorities as a martial arts academy includes creating a safe and empowering environment for women to train. Some of our top fighters and competitors over the years have been women, and this has not only elevated the standard but continues to inspire ladies on both sides of the mat.
By giving women the same treatment and opportunities as men – mixed classes, not treating them with kid gloves – they’re able to step fully into their power and show others they can do it too.
From coaches like Stephanie Johnson, Melissa Burdette, Emma Sojo and Allie Readmond to Centennial’s GM Kate Eischen, Easton taps into the strength of and potential of our female community to inspire and guide others in the same direction.
Women have participated in martial arts since the early 1700s, with the first records of women who boxed, and while we do everything we can to make sure they have a positive experience, it continues to be a journey.
From different competition regulations in the fight world to a variety of treatment encountered at other non-Easton academies, women still often have to fight for a place at the metaphoric table.
We’re extremely lucky at Easton to have such a host of incredible women willing to share their stories and pave the way for future generations of female fighters.
To celebrate our womens’ community, in 2022 we released a mini docu-series featuring some of our female staff members. We’ve included a few below, as well as a video filmed with Muay Thai champ Allie Readmont. Check out their stories to see how martial arts and Easton shaped their lives!
Luma Murib
Luma Murib started training at Easton at 15 years old. However, growing up in a traditional household where the idea of women wrestling with men didn’t quite fly, she had to take a different approach. She had to do it in secret. Luma asked if she could clean the mats to help pay for her membership.
Cleaning led to helping with kids’ classes and eventually Luma joined the sales team, later becoming the Operations Director for affiliate school Matrix Martial Arts and Director of Social Media for Easton Training Center, which consists of eight schools across Colorado. She runs a tight ship and fluidly keeps all of the schools’ social media accounts in sync while encouraging each school’s unique personality to flourish.
Today, Luma is a purple belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and one of the many valued women that make up Easton’s strong canopy of female leaders – a canopy that has truly become a key reason the web of eight academies operates so well and has made such an impact on the martial arts community.
Read the full article on Luma and watch the video here!
Allie Readmond
In 2023, Allie Readmond from Easton Boulder earned a spot on USA’s Muay Thai World Team, meaning she will compete in Thailand at the International Federation of Muay Thai Associations (IFMA) world championships!
Making the world team marks a huge accomplishment for Allie, as the IFMA has crowned the best fighters in the world since 1993 and consists of 140 member countries. Simply put, the IFMA World Championship is the Olympics of Muay Thai.
Being the first home-grown Easton athlete to get to this level, Allie embodies not only her own hard work and potential, but that which all of our students at Easton can look up to aspire to.
Entering the world of competition, while exciting and challenging, created a new set of challenges for Allie to navigate physically and mentally – one being the inherent, underlying discrepancy between the male and female fighting experience.
Whereas she has always felt welcome, respected and valued regardless of her gender at Easton, that’s not always the case in combat sports where women are under-represented.
In some places, men may see the women in their communities as opportunities rather than equals, and treat them as such – whether this means a rest round, an easy target or a way to bolster their egos off the mats.
“In general, with combat sports,” says Allie, “I have a little frustration because women are kind of expected to be really, really nice…and that doesn’t necessarily serve us for wanting to go after each other [in the ring]. Being super nice, smiling in weigh-in pictures – that’s an aspect that’s really unequal. Men are not expected to do that.”
For more on the topic, check out the full blog post!
Sarah Rochniak
The journey of Sarah Rochniak, Director of Operations for all of Easton, goes back over a decade. Sarah started with a part-time job in college at Easton Boulder’s front desk; she liked that she could deal with stress through movement and the types of people the environment attracted. Over time, Sarah began managing the school’s front desk and eventually became its Academy Operations Director.
To Sarah, empowerment means not only making things happen for yourself, but bringing others up with you — empowering them so that they too can achieve what they want.
“Creating the place where the opportunity even exists is huge,” says Sarah, “but fostering it and helping with that stewardship is something to continuously work on.”
Three years ago, Sarah stepped into her role in HQ as the company’s Director of Operations and now takes a day each week to visit one of Easton’s eight academies. She meets with its managers, hangs out with its staff and soaks in the vibes.
Every academy has its unique flavor, but the singular force weaving them all together — that drive to lift each other up to improve — is the secret sauce that has kept Sarah, and so many others, with us. Both on and off the mats, creating power for other people — seeing their strengths and facilitating space for them to grow — makes everybody a better versions of themselves.
Today, Sarah holds an orange shirt in Muay Thai and two-stripe white belt in Jiu Jitsu. Having such a hands-on role steering Easton’s ship has at times required breaks from training, but no matter how long it’s been, Sarah always gets excited to jump onto the mats. The environment breeds a healthy respect for other people; you never know who can kick your ass!
Read the full article on Sarah and watch the video here!
Van Tran
Easton Denver’s Academy Operations Director and the Creative Director for all of Easton Training Center, Van Tran had been working the front desk at Denver for about eight years when Easton President Mike Tousignant first came to her with an apparel design problem.
Van offered a solution: she would design a t-shirt herself. Easton didn’t have a clear design strategy, and Van had ideas that she knew could give the business some direction.
Six years later, she still designs all the apparel, from gis and rash guards to Muay Thai shorts and t-shirts, and anything that needs any type of creative direction — fliers, social media images, mugs, brochures; the list goes on.
Van has given the company a clean and consistent aesthetic when it comes to its graphic design, and she continues to explore new creative ideas through the Jiu Jitsu and Muay Thai apparel we roll out every couple quarters.
Though today Van holds a purple shirt in Muay Thai (the equivalent of a purple belt in Jiu Jitsu) and doesn’t shy from challenges, throwing herself headfirst into new things, she tells us this wasn’t always the case. In fact, when she first started with the company, it took her two years to step onto the mats!
Read the full article on Van and watch the video here!
