The Evolution of SubLevel Kenpo™

He references SL4™ as "based on his teachings from Ed Parker Sr." due to the nearly thirty years he studied with Ed Parker Sr., his last formal, but not his only instructor.

Ron Chapel originally coined the terms "Advanced American Kenpo Concepts" first with Mr. Parker's permission, and it was subsequently used on Mr. Parker's videotape series.

After Mr. Parker's death, Ron Chapel created the term SubLevel Four Kenpo based on phrases Mr. Parker himself used when he (Parker) wanted to work on very specific areas during Ron Chapel's lessons, to differentiate the material from Mr. Parker's commercially more widely known and popular "Kenpo-Karate" based on the study of "motion."

The name, (SubLevel Four Kenpo), is derived from the four distances of combat outlined by Mr. Parker in general in his teachings.

Many Kenpoist can name the four distances as; "Out Of Range, Within Range, Contact Penetration and Contact Manipulation," and they would be correct. However, it was within the lessons Ron Chapel received from Mr. Parker where the esoteric concepts of each combat range were explored in detail.

With this in mind, the sub-levels of the fourth distance encompasses all of the combat ranges, and thus all of their respective combat principles, and as such reveals the location of the previously un-included "Control Manipulation."

Shortly after Mr. Parker's passing, Ron Chapel started formalizing the curriculum passed down from Mr. Parker, and in the manner, he had always been taught. Over the past 20 years, others and I have been involved in that very difficult and intricate and very non-commercial process.

For me personally, it was intriguing to see how a martial science system is created. How everything is made to fit within the confines of a specific theme. New lessons would build upon the foundation laid by the previous lessons and new lessons would reveal aspects of already learned material that wasn't covered when it was originally taught. He, (Chapel), would explain to us that nothing should be a stand-alone principle, concept or theory. That if you want to have a martial science system that can be taught by a well-versed instructor and assimilated by capable students, all lessons must have a correlation and relationship with all others.

Today, lessons with Dr. Chapel are often broken down into SL-1, SL-2, SL-3 and SL-4. We now refer to our Martial Science System as simply the all-encompassing, "SubLevel Kenpo."™

Lineage portrait done by Ed Parker Jr.