Are you going to block any time soon – 7/3/09 – Friday Karate class

Sensei Plocharczyk had us work on sparring drills along with some conditioning drills.

Three person Kumite…

Sensei had us start with two partners and by chance, he was one of my partners tonight.  I have seen few people move like him and for every attack of his that I could block, he would have four, five or six more to follow it up with.  We started out with one partner in the middle and the other two on the outside.  For 30 seconds, we would spar one partner and then switch to the other partner for another 30 seconds.  The middle person would switch with one of the others and then the other two would rotate.  This really kept the heart rate up and switching partners with really different styles was rough.

Between the sparring drills, we got a little rest and during that time we did some conditioning drills.  We started with sit ups where one partner would hold my feet and the other would add resistance to my shoulders as I sat up.  Another drill that we did was sit ups while one partner was punching our abs.  As our back went down, our partner would hit our abs to make sure that we were tightening up.

We finished up class with some free sparring and a relay race.  The relay race was all conditioning.  It started out with two of us jumping up and down 10 times off a pad about 18 inches off the floor.  Next we ran to the other end of the dojo, grabbed a swissball and did moving planks across the dojo.  For there, we ran through a series of obstacles on the floor to the finish line.  Luckily, I won and didn’t have to do 25 push ups.

It was a great class but really hard.

The results are in, Karate exam results that is – 6/17/09

Testing has come to and end and I am satisfied with the results.

My wife was the first to test and she did an excellent job.  She cleared her keri and is now a full 1st kyu.  My son also did an awesome job by getting four stripes and is now a 1st kyu also.  I am also happy with my own results, I am now a 1st kyu keri.

I went into the this test with a different attitude then ever before.  I was visiting Doc Pusateri a couple days before my test and he told me to “just go there and instead of trying to impress the examiners, just show them what your Sensei’s have shared with you.”  That is exactly what I did and even though I had a lot of injuries and mental baggage going into this test, I was able to come out ahead.  For the first time, I had the attitude that I am here to take my rank not ask for it and my family and friends who saw me at the test said that I did just that.

I am satisfied and hopefully over the next six to 12 months my wife, son and I will be ready to wear black belts around our waists.

Even after five years, I am still unsure about the criteria used for rank examinations.  I am finding that ability to perform the techniques precisely seems to be more important than effort or knowledge of the techniques and Karate in general.  Either way, I am glad it is over and am already working on many of the technique issues that I need to improve on over the next six months.

Reverse blocks – 3/31/09 – Tuesday Karate class

Kata warm up…

Sensei Noia has us start with kata from Heian Shodan all the way to Tekki Shodan.  After we did those, Sensei had us do one of the Heian katas, except Heian Shodadn, of our choice but the catch was that we had to do it mirror image.  I picked Heian Yondan and oddly enough it wasn’t too terrible.  It actually felt somewhat natural.

Kihon…

Next, Sensei Noia had us work on some basics.  We started in a horse stance and did front punch about 100 times.  Next, we moved from a horse stance to a front stance with front punch and then back into a horse stance with front punch.  We then did the same foot movements but with sanbon tsuki when we returned to the horse stance.

We also spent some time working on our front snap kicks, along with front punch too.

Reverse blocks…

After about 45 minutes, Sensei had us work on some reverse block movements.  The idea was to work our minds after we were all very fatigued.    We did moving back and forth, reverse rising, downward, inward and outward blocks.

Point with the back hand – 3/12/09 – Thursday Karate class

I had to take the last week off from classes because of a nasty cold but today was my first day back at it and it felt pretty good.

Have I mentioned how much I like working on Kihon before?  I am sure that I have and tonight was exceptionally likable.

Kihon…

Sensei Cieplik had us work on a lot of kihon drills today.  We spent some time working on the standard drills such as moving forward and back with front punch, the various block and punch combination moving forward and back along with moving forward front snap kick with front punch.

Sensei seemed to be paying extra attention to the moving forward and back with front punch.  I believe that he was looking for connection.  By connection I mean, connection to the floor, using the correct muscles of the legs, core and upper back.  When I have connection and I am doing this simple movement correctly, it is one of my favorites.  It just feel good.

Advanced kihon…

Sensei gave a more advanced drill to the 1st kyu and black belts.  He did say that the 2nd kyu’s and below could try it so I did.  This move felt really natural to me even though it is supposed to be more complex.  He had us do moving forward and backward reverse punch, with rising block and reverse punch.  There is a good amount of hip movement in this drill and it felt that a lot of power was generated on each move.

Point with the back hand…

I felt that this deserved it’s own heading.  Sensei had us work on back stance with knife hand block, front snap kick and nukite.  We have often done this movement in the past but Sensei said one thing today that made it totally different to me.  He noticed that when some of us were kicking or doing the nukite, we were pulling back on the draw hand and showing our intention.  He said to “point with the back hand.”  He meant for us to point at our opponent with the finger of the draw hand while we were kicking.  By doing that, it make the nukite come without pulling it back first.  Just thinking about it totally changed (improved) the execution for me.

Kata…

Sensei had us spend a lot of time working on kata.  We did at least 10 or more kata’s starting with heian Shodan.  Again, Sensei was looking for connection.  We also did heian Nidan, Heian Sandan, Heian Yondan, Jion and Bassai Dai.  I liked to think that I am pretty good shape but after doing all of those kata’s I could hardly breath.  I think Jion took the most out of me but I might have been trying too hard by tensing too many muscles that I didn’t need to tense.

This was an excellent class and I am glad that I felt well enough to take it.

Pad drills, hitting stuff is good – 1/31/09 – Saturday Karate class

Sensei Plocharczyk had us work on some contact drills.

Hit the pad…

I have always felt that we do not hit thing enough and Sensei Plocharczyk felt the same way today.  We spent the entire class hitting pads with a partner.

We started with simple drills like reverse punch.  Next we worked on using the outside edge of our hand to strike the pad.  After that came hammer fist and we finished up with elbow strikes.

All of these movements are extremely powerful and when the hips are behind the moves, they feel deadly.

It was an excellent class and I hope we have more like these in the future.