First Night Of Adult Class!

I shouldn't expect that something like this would be so exciting to me, but last night was our first class of adults only.  After several years of working in and around the children that made up majority of the class I was having a hard time imaging how the class would actually flow. 

It's been over four years since I've been in an adult only class.  At my old school we had grown so much that we had split due to space considerations.  The adult class always remained fairly modest, while the kids class swelled so much that my old teacher had to make two kids classes. 

Here, due to the time we have in the space, expansion isn't going to happen easily.  Our main class ran from 4:15 to 5:15 so bringing in new adults was going to be extraordinarily difficult.  I figured the new adult class we be relegated to a small number of people until some recruitment could happen.  I was fairly surprised when we ended up with twelve people!

Two brand new folks and a host of others from the past now could make an evening class giving us a strong start.  Jason is a big red-bearded man and would probably make a good Viking impersonator, while Tom looks like he's had a hard life.  Tom had some martial arts experience a long time ago, but has long since forgotten all.  Both had the look of people trying to get their feet underneath them, but neither complained about the repetition of moves or the work on basics.

Reed focused on teaching the intro to Pachu.  Since Shudokan doesn't have a style per say, we adopt others.  In this case we are using Ryuryu, an traditional Okinawan style. 

We worked on footwork and then added hands.  A lot of fun and a slightly different method to absorb material.

The Black-belt class which used to be called the after-class consisted of me, Mark and Daniel. After I did some kata work Daniel had us work on something called the three elbow flow.  I guess it has a long complicated name that he didn't catch, but it was one of the exercises taught at a recent seminar.  Another thing I missed in the last month. 

The sequence:

- Uke starts with a right punch.

- We cover our ears (not really, but that's what it looks like), step forward with left.

- Block with right, turn right, push down with left arm, turn with elbow strike to face.

- Left hand goes down and right hand goes to back of head.

- 6/12 o'clock throw, holding arm and kneel on "gun".

A fast, fun technique that I hope to take to the north with me next week.