Ten In Thirty

I apologize for not writing frequently, but that's mostly because I update the blog while I'm at work.  The issue is the new job doesn't have a lot of slack time for to think deeply about my Karate practice.

I recently started moving my practice around so it resembles the test as closely as I can make it.  This means I do all ten kata in a row.  Because I'm not stopping to do the Bunkai between each form I can basically do the whole thing in around a half hour. 

As a result I've found my weak spots in my kata which is great, but absolutely infuriating. I had definitely thought I had everything nailed down way better than I do.  I also learned that I need to practice this everyday because little practiced katas have a tendency to fall apart when not touched upon at least every three days.

I think I've mentioned that I had a few weeks of 10 to 11 hour work days and as a result I have crippling pain in my left hip and right ankle.  I literally sat so long I compressed and shrunk tissue in my hip.  I also tend to cross my ankles for long periods of the time. The result ended up doing the same in my ankle.  So it was back to the PT to sort out all that stuff.  Walking is painful and running doesn't work at all. This means much of karate can be fairly painful. 

I'm back to taking Ibuprofen once a day and icing several times a day.  Warming up and stretching have become pretty important and I should have more conscious of it in the past.

Notes from class:

- Kyle and Sarah are off to Yakima to do their confirmation exam this exam.  I sure wanted to be there.
- Our youngest member of the adult class, Maia, is a new Brown belt.  She's learning and retaining at a phenomenal rate.  I'm super jealous of that.
- Reed, Daniel, and Olivia are off to tournament on the 12th.  There are doing a three person demo based on the kata Wando.  I'm experiencing a bout of jealousy.  I'd love to do something like that, but time is the villain.