Thursday, July 14, 2016

Flying Elbows Of Death

In the after class Reed Sensei sat us down gave us the low down on our requirements for Black Belt confirmation.  A fee, a thesis, and the components of the physical bits (kata, 2-man, bunkai, etc.).  An intriguing piece was "good attitude".  Apparently some folks would get big britches and be a bit condescending to lesser belts.  I don't know how that would even be possible since everyone there is so cooperative.  Different times with a bigger school allows all sorts to move through. 

The other area in which we are expected to perform is the advanced elbow technique.  There are roughly three levels of skill related to the elbow techniques; the first being basic - which would equate to moving out of the way and giving Uke a shot with a elbow.  The next level would be adding a should lock and strike.  The level Mark and I are going to be working on includes a brutal takedown coupled with an arm bar.  After ten of those I had to take a handful of vitamin I this morning - and I fell great. 

The throw and locks occurred during the regular class session after a brief warm up and some partner drills based on the Kyoku Shodan kata.  The browns are just starting their ramp up for the Black Belt process and this is the first of the Shudokan only katas.  The bunkai is pretty straight forward, but I'm feeling a bit bruised from the repetition.  Being the attacker can be a bit painful because the initiating punch is always getting blocked hard to open up some area. 

The after class session had the sit down as I mentioned above, but we went into Kyoku Roku right away.  Mark has missed a few classes so we had to review where he left off.  As agonizing as I find his learning pace, it must no worse than my own.  He has to go over it slowly and repetitively until he's ready to go on.  He then got a big dose of the next steps which I mentioned in the last post. 

My last addition to the kata, following the water cups, is the straight legged kick.  A silly looking think that yori's into a umadachi; the weirdest stance I've ever scene.  One leg bent and the foot forward while the other is straight with the foot turned in.  It's so you can execute a punch to the side while the feet remain in place.  Wild!

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