Too tired to post last night. Wednesday – senior training, medium intensity class. Stance work followed by kakie uke combos leading to takedowns. Very good fun. Kata to finish, the intention is pushing towards gradings I guess.
Thursday, no training, helping out elsewhere with teenagers homework…need sleep.
Too tired last night to even write up the blog!
Good kids/beginners class, plenty of energy. Some coming up for grading soon so had to do format stuff – basics and kata, sigh. Still fun though.
Senior class, only eight students – kata to warm up then took them through some bunkai based around Taigyoko Shodan. I really like a version involving absorbing a hand grab, using the opponents energy to counter- its a little off the wall for gkr but all legal, official, ok stuff. Then kicking drills and a lot of stance work. Plenty of strength challenges - core, legs, arms – lots of partner work - working on that theme of feeding the karate. Then conditioning. They have to be tougher and stronger and faster than me and my sempai Janet…
Trying to get involved in the activity of the class as much as possible, too easy to just walk around issuing instructions and correcting.
I have a quotation each week which we briefly discuss at the end. (Somebody sent me a link which has pretty much all the wisdom anyone could ever need…)
Feeling a little guilty – a fairly outrageous weekend with no real training at all – if I keep this up any one will think I actually have a social life. But I did TALK about karate a lot…
So rather tired and lethargic I made my way back to Ashihara tonight. And I’m so pleased I did – excellent class! I coped better – YAY.
Sensei seems to like to build on a realistic fighting combination in two parts, practising individually first then moving to partnerwork with focus pads and adding in layers. Mixed up with pushups etc and stretches. Couple of nice takedowns and - shock horror – a little groundwork with locks. Whats a nice little GKR girl coming to?!? I teamed up with a new white belt girl whos done some kickboxing and it was a good matching, we could both play with the new ideas and work through the issues.
And kata – essentially one long realistic combination. I learnt a lot as always.
Sensei is wanting a commitment…in another month or so I could get a yellow belt!!!!
Oh god, am I really starting off on this track again? Can’t I just learn it and dispense with the ladder?
Wednesday night Senior training – some combinations and then a whole lot of kata – Hangetsu and Sepai. Solid stuff but I’m a bit overtrained, legs still sore, flexibility not at its best. Need more snap.
A good friend, a little older than me, who also struggles with the system somewhat, has been continually pulled up at assessments over the shape of his wrist, seiken not perfect etc. Commented to me – “Just let me hit them, see how that feels, then tell me whether its any good or not!”
He hits bloody hard. Pretty – well no. Effective – I’d say so.
Thursday – A little Intuflow, few hours relaxation.
Great kids/beginners class tonight – plenty of energy, everyone had fun, lots of different activities, usual basics. I whacked them all with noodles till they blocked properly, they all got to hit me back. Finished with light sparring concentrating on timing, distance, learning to move.
Adults/senior class – worked the legs mainly with different moving kicks gedan/chudan/jodan. Shin and thigh kicks with shin blocks (why is that etched on my mind i wonder – this is so not part of our approved curriculum but it suddenly seems like a very good idea). Then gedan barai against kick, moving forward to the inside or outside position, exploring options. Gedan barai as an attack. Mixed in core strength stuff, group medecine ball situps, pushups, leg raises, stretches. Finished with quick conditioning.
Ashihara again tonight. I’m surprised at how well my body has recovered considering the extent of the damage, still badly bruised but I’m walking…
A physically hard class as ever - lots of running and fitness drills, diabolical tests of strength, and hard/strong focus pad work. And basics – one thing I can do is kihon, even though its not life as as we know it Jim. I got some good help with the unfamiliar focus drills, greatly appreciated.
So that went a lot better. I feel good! Yay!
Apparently its just possible there might have been a tiny amount of initiation going on the other night…
How fking primitive.
Subtitled : It seemed like a good idea at the time…
Ashihara sparring is kickboxing with throws. I’m not trained enough yet and I’m not conditioned in the right places to be able to keep myself safe.
Friday night, small group, young hotshots and experienced black belts. Coped fine with the green belt and the one female, not a problem, but was systematically and good naturedly demolished by the others. No surprises there, used to it and I expected nothing less, but the level of damage is not sustainable.
Interesting – they don’t allow head strikes and got cross with me although I am very controlled (eliminates about half of my usual arsenal) but they delight in uncontrolled head kicks (their heads are just a little out of my range, need a trampoline).
My tactics need revision and my legs need to be a helluva lot tougher.
Follow my own advice – “Everyone needs a project”!
Senior training tonight, again a very humid evening - sauna training.
Basic strikes a gazillion times, very familiar territory.
Then long, hard conditioning to abs and pecs – and a few other places when the targeting strayed. I really enjoy this stuff, its a challenge that requires a particular sort of mental discipline, a milder form of the Ignore the Pain Drill. Don’t know if the conditioning is particularly effective because we don’t do it consistently enough, but I try to cover that in my own classes, and arms and shins in my own training.
Then three rounds of Hangetsu and some sparring to finish.
An okay class but I didn’t need to think much and there was too much instruction – its the preoccupation with technique again. Sometimes you just gotta let people go do it.
Kids class first, one hour, usual fun. There are four five year old girls in the group – one who is blonde and wears tshirts saying “I’m the Cutest” (sigh) who can’t hit anything, two who can’t see the point in following any instruction, have the concentration span of fleas but gossip at every opportunity, and one who trains hard, hits hard, kiais hard and just loves it. During the break she pretends she’s the sensei or practises kata. Wow.
Kids love to play “How hard can you hit the sensei?!” so we did that quite a bit, doubles as conditioning for me.
Second class 1 1/2 hours, now adults and older, keen teeeagers – really good group. Tag sparring to warm up then situps, pushup, leglifts. Then attack/defend kumite drills where the defender is NOT allowed to go backwards, getting progressively more intense. Then nasty squats and stretches. And kata repeating groups of moves over and over, workshopping, NO COUNT. Finished with conditioning.
Well the long weekend was a writeoff trainingwise – ferries, sun, music, alchohol, food, family, good fun - my gosh where did it go…
So it was back to Ashihara with a vengence tonight. Hard, fast class – full on sabaki, blocking/striking combos, switch drills, kicking and knee drills on focus pads, then more sabaki carrying through to locks and takedowns. Add into the mix different kinds of situps, leg lifts, partner pushups, jumping drills and a lot of stretching. Hot, hot night with the humidity at 98%.
I am so totally bad at this stuff its hard to believe I ever trained at all. There are basically no similarities or familiar points of reference – everything is different. Its sink or swim stuff and I’m floundering.
So I’ll go to the sparring class on Friday night!