Salih Avci

Salih Avcı is a Wing Tsun and Escrima martial artist.

Salih Avcı is one of the chief trainers of the SEK (Spezialeinsatzkommandos, the special response units of the German state police forces), MEK, ZUZ (the SWAT unit of the German Customs Service, and GSG 9 (the elite counter-terrorism and special operations unit of the German Federal Police) in Germany as well as various other special forces ranging from the American Rapid Response Team (RRT) in Chicago to the special police of one of China's biggest provinces. Avci is a security consultant for the Ministry of Justice in Germany.

Avcı was born in Turkey in 1962 and moved to Germany in 1971. He started training in Wing Tsun in 1980 in the European Wing Tsun Organization (EWTO). In 1986, he attained the 1st technician degree. In 1997, he left EWTO to found WTEO (Wing Tsun-Escrima Organization).

Avcı is still the world chief trainer of the organization. Today, WTEO has more than 8000 students, excluding law enforcement forces. There are more than 70 schools of WTEO alone in Germany and several others in the Netherlands, Turkey, France, Austria, Spain, Jordan, Italy, Sudan, Greece and La Reunion.

Since 1997, Salih Avcı has been the head and chief trainer of the young and dynamic martial arts organisation. As head of the Organisation, Salih Avci is responsible for the standard of the instructors’ training and the students. He leads the official seminars that take place around the world.

He has been training the SEK (Spezialeinsatzkommandos: special police commandos)of the largest German federal state North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) since 1992 in the areas of safety and interference techniques. The NRW Police Force is the biggest of the 16 German state police forces because almost a quarter of the German population lives in NRW.

In 1996 Salih Avcı became a member of a working group organised by the Ministry of Justice of NRW that had the task of revising and setting new guidelines for law enforcement, he was then assigned as Chief Instructor of that group. The new techniques of Avci WingTsun/Escrima were introduced into law enforcement in NRW. Other public organisation were including Avcı WingTsun/Escrima into their training. The Customs Office and the Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigations use Salih Avci’s experiences and abilities for training their task forces.

The positive results that were reaped from Salih Avci’s system during real-life dangerous situations resulted in the training of the police of NRW Avci System. These techniques are now being applied on a daily basis by officials in NRW. Other Federal States in Germany have stated their interests in incorporating Avci WingTsun/Escrima into their officials’ training.

Salih Avci was born on the 6th of May, 1962 in Karasu, on the Turkish Black Sea coast. He is the eldest son, with two sisters and a brother. After their father’s emigration to Germany in 1964, the whole family followed in the 1970s. After completing high school and a two-year stay in Turkey he started his technical training in the field of electro-mechanical machinery equipment.

He started his training in the Chinese combat art WingTsun in 1980 and two years later the Philippine stick and weapon combat art of Escrima.

At the end of 1984 the first martial arts school was officially opened in Aachen, west of Cologne, the largest city in NRW, and trained the two combat arts Wing Tsun and Escrima. Others followed in the next couple of years around the same town. Today there are 100 schools and over 60,000 students (including police and law enforcers) in Germany, with Salih Avci as the highest level instructor.

By 1986 he had dedicated himself exclusively to the professional instruction of the martial art. He was invited to various combat training courses and in 1992 he was invited to demonstrate his techniques before the Director of the special forces of NRW, who was impressed by the highly effective skills of the martial artist.

Until today, Salih Avci is the coach of the special forces of the state of NRW. The involvement has led to developments in the police interference and arresting techniques, resulting in substantial improvements in the dangerous fields of work.

Salih Avci’s unique approach to the combat art lies in the practical application of his techniques to disarm and arrest without the use of excessive force or weapons, even in life-threatening situations. Salih Avci does not focus solely on unarmed techniques. He has developed traditional short and long stick techniques to be used efficiently and practically without causing unnecessary harm to the person being arrested. A general-purpose tool for protection, disarming and arresting was the result of Salih Avci’s practical modification of the “tonfa”, which is used by the police.

Apart from the realistic application and professional use of self-defence and arresting techniques for civilians and officials, Salih Avci trains actors and fight choreographers for film and television.

Salih Avcı is married since 1993 and has four sons and two daughters.