Bakkies Sensei was born in Bethlehem, South Africa on 30. November 1948.

His karate career started in 1964 practicing Kyukushinkai. 1965 he changed to Shotokan (JKA) and was graded to Shodan at the age of 16. In 1966 he commenced training in GoJu Ryu and in 1972 he trained under Higaonna Sensei for the first time when he visited South Africa for 3 months. During 1973 he spent 6 months training in Higaonna Sensei famous Yoyogi dojo in Tokyo, Japan.

In the following years he regularly trained in Japan and Okinawa. He is one of the few Westerners who still trained in Okinawa during the „old day“, experiencing a training intensity that not many Karate-ka would survive.

Despite major successes in sport karate (South African national team; 5th place World Individual Kumite Championships; quarter finals Los Angeles Championships 1975, etc) he has devoted himself to traditional karate since 1975.

In October 2015 during the TOGKF Chief Instructor Gasshuku in Okinawa Bakkies Sensei´s life master Higaonna Sensei graded him to KuDan (9th Dan). He became the first student and the first Westerner to receive such honour. Bakkies Sensei runs courses and Gasshukus all around the world. In these days Bakkies Sensei runs his project of Virtual Dojo for Karate practitioners interested in serious training of Okinawa Goju Ryu.