Top 10 Students Correction
I did an intense research on this, then had a conversation with Harou Matsuoka a month ago...and this is my list
1)Harou Matsuoka
2)Craig Dunn
3) Shaun Ravens
4)Larry Reynosa
5) Elliott Freeman
6) Glenn Odle
7)Jorge J. Angulo
8) Luis Santos
9) Francis Takahashi
10) Josh Gold
These are the stand out students of Ten Shin Aikido...along with Debbie Gorman, Binh Dang & Mino Osaka
Many of these names have been with Seagal since the beginning.
This person has absolutely no clue who the top ten students of Seagal Sensei are. Claiming to have spoken to Matsuoka Sensei is useless in that he would never rank his students in this way. What likely happened is he merely agreed with the caller. I joined this site to set the record somewhat straight. Any answer is going to be political in nature as there are more who were interested in Seagal and fewer who were interested in his Aikido.
The list, in no particular order, should read like this.
- Matsuoka Haruo
- Nick Scoggins
- Japanese student who can be seen taking excellent ukemi in Osaka footage on YouTube
- Craig Dunn
- Sean Dawson
- Osaka Minoru
- Carlos Gonzalez
- Mano Mitsu
- George Gonzalez
- Patrick Gorman
There are probably a number of people who trained in Osaka who should be on this list. With the exception of Josh Gold, Shaun Ravens, Debbie Gorman, and Binh Dang from the earlier post, none of the other names from that list were even Ten Shin Dojo students and, if put on some sort of Seagal student list, would be listed below these four and many others. There were a number of people who visited Ten Shin Dojo, or were 'associated' with Ten Shin Dojo, but the new list is made up only of students who spent an extended period training directly under Seagal Sensei or Matsuoka Sensei.
By 1990, or even earlier, Seagal sensei had stopped teaching regularly. Students joining after that date, who came to Ten Shin Dojo on a weekly basis, trained with Matusoka Sensei primarily, and with Seagal Sensei during Seminars and private training sessions. Everyone who, after 1990, joined or trained or became "associated" with Ten Shin Dojo - especially the associated students - did not train on a weekly basis with Seagal Sensei no matter what anyone claims.
Beyond the Ten Shin Dojo names mentioned already, there are probably 10 or 15 others who would appear on a Ten Shin Dojo student list before any of the non-Ten Shin names from that other list at the top of this post would even appear.
As to the ranking of the students above, it is entirely subjective. Some continued to train under Matsuoka Sensei, others drifted away, some no longer train, and some moved on to other teachers. Depending on the time period, the students below #1 could end up in an entirely different order.