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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Sensei Plocharczyk gave us a good kicking class today.

Hit the pad not your partner…

We started out with a drill where our partner hold a focus mitt and we do a front leg roundhouse kick.  Next came from leg roundhouse followed with a rear leg roundhouse.  The next drill was front leg hook kick and rear leg hook kick, which was much harder than the other two drills.

Conditioning drills…

Sensei had us work on some conditioning drills.  For one drill, Sensei had us put or focus mitt under our chest and do pushups.  Next came a drills where one partner did a pushup on the focus mitt, then picked it up with one hand and passed it across to the other partner and he or she did a push up.  We did 20 each of those.

After that came some partial pushups.  We started with a hold in the top position, next in the middle position and the next our chest was about two inches off the ground.  We held each postion for 15 to 30 seconds.

The final movement was, lay on our back, bend one leg and keep the other straight, put the foot of the bent foot in our partners hand and hold up our body with the strength of that leg and just our shoulders in the ground.  It was all core work and a really good exercise.

This class was a little different today.  Sensei Noia had spend almost the entire time working on kicks.

Combination kicks…

We started moving across the gym doing combination kicks.  Front leg front snap kick, front leg roundhouse kick, front leg hook, front leg side thrust kick, rear leg roundhouse and front leg and front snap kick.  It was a hard group of moves and I ended up really hurting my left hip trying to keep up with all younger students.   I don’t think I need to keep up with them in the future.

Kick that pad…

I ended up sitting down for a few minutes after I hurt my hip but then jumped back in for next drill.  Sensei Noia had us get a partner and a pad drills.  He then had us throw front leg front snap kicks at our partner holding the pad.  Oddly enough, my hip popped and felt much better after the first kick so I was able to continue going forward.  We spent a good amount of time working on this drill.

Next, we stood in a front stance and did reverse punch to the pad our partner was holding.  I was working with one of our younger students and could not put a lot behind my punches so I focused on my hip rotation and my form instead of my power.  I really need better hip rotation so this wasn’t a bad thing for me.

Good class overall.

Sensei Brien spent most of the class working on preparing us for our upcoming rank exam.  This was the last of our make up classes that were two hours long.

Kihon like you mean it…

Sensei had us start out with the usual basics, moving forward and back with front punches, sanbon zuki and blocks and counters.

It got interesting when we started working on our kicking drills.  When we were doing our side thrust kicks, Sensei had do two.  For example, we started in a horse stance, we then stepped across and did not one but two side thrust kicks and then pulled our leg back until Sensei told us to set our foot down.  He made a really good point, if you can do two good kicks in a row, you can certainly always do one good kick.  This really made a lot of sense to me and I hope to incorporate this into my training outside of the dojo.

Kata, any questions?…

After we finished our Kihon, Sensei Brien had us work on our kata.  He had us all do our own kata and then gave us a chance to ask him for advice on our kata.  After his advice, we were able to do the kata again and again trying to incorporate what he shared with us.  My question was how to properly execute fifth and fourth move from the end of Bassai Dai.  It is the low kick blocks.  I was having a hard time transisioning from the moves and Sensei said that I should turn on the my heels which seems to work pretty well for me.

One-step…

I forgot to bring my sparring gear to class so my wife and I ended up working on our one-step sparring together until class ended.

Sensei Noia has us work on sparring drills for most of the class.

Shift in, shift out…

We started with a partner and were shifting in, throwing and attack and shifting out.  Sensei felt that we were not shifting well enough so he had us pull out the elastic bands.  I was having a really hard time getting my body to shift forward for some reason.  It felt as if my feet were stuck to the floor but after a little while, my feet were moving a little better.

Free sparring…

We spent some time free sparring and I ended walking into one of Mike Buss’s punches with my chin.  Oddly enough, it hurt like crazy but I didn’t stop.  He has been helping me a great deal and it is really working.  I didn’t have any anger or adrenaline rush and I was able to continue sparring without loosing my focus like I would have in the past.  My jaw really hurt after class but I am sure it will heal up.

I ended up sparring with another friend and for the first time, I was throwing attack after attack.  I kept the pressure on him for one minute an never let up.  This was a first for me and I really think that sparring with Mike and the advice from Sensei Noia is starting to sink in.

We finished up class with some conditioning movements and then lined up and bowed out.

We had our Karate banquet and award dinner today.  It used to be an annual event but we didn’t have one in 2007 so it was nice to get together with everyone.

They always have some really nice video presentations and this year, being it was our clubs 30th anniversary, the videos were really good.  The first video was really neat because it was a bunch of pictures from 1980′s.  They started out with pictures of our senior Sensei, Sensei DiPasquale doing kata poses to the song Bad from Michael Jackson.  There were really good pictures of many of our instructors when they were very young, including Sensei Cieplik.

We also had four excellent demonstrations.  I did video tape them and will try to put them up on here when I have the time.  The demo started with three young black belts who are the Synchronized Kata Team National Champions.  Their kata was excellent and their timing was great.

After that came and excellent self defense demo.  It was really we done and Dale Weber ended up doing a back flip was just unreal.

One of our younger students and a cancer survivor did an excellent demo of Heian Nidan and Heian Sandan.  She is an inspiration to all Karate athletes both young and old.

The last demo was performed by William Gatch.  He is the top kata competitor in our club and will one day be the world champion.  He did an awesome Unsu that brought the house down.  There is no doubt in my mind that he will do all the way on day soon.

They also handed out the awards such as scholorships award and others.  My wife, son and I recieved leadership plaques since we assist with classes and the suprise of the night for me was the “Most Improved Senior Male” award.  I had no idea that I was getting the award and was honored to recieve it.

It was good time for all and a night that I won’t forget anytime soon.