Downtime training record and a "Incident"

Since I'm not in classes for a bit and feeling better after a bit of illness it was time to jump back into the morning workout routine. As usual Bob at Striking Thoughts has added some motivation to my workout. In his most recent video he had something called "burpees." So I've added those into the workout and things have dropped back to the beginner mode. So where I was able to do three five-minute sessions, I can only do two. Here's today's accomplishments:

15 pushups
5 burpees
5 minutes of the knee/switch-foot drill
5-7 burpees
30+ pushups
5 minutes of drill
30ish pushups
5ish burpees.

Needless to say I was completely gassed. I'll remind you that I was in a 37 degree room doing this and I was completely soaked. It took a good part of an hour to cool down.
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So I'm at my friends birthday party this weekend. She's quite fit and knew that I attempted to be a gymnast in High school. She proudly showed a set of rings she'd bolted into her ceiling in her training room. I asked immediately if I could try them out. No problem she said. I pulled myself into an inverted pike (feet straight up, head down, and then lowered my legs into a "L"). This was followed by a crack, a bunch of disorientation and me sitting on the floor holding one of the rings. Both H and I sat looking at each other in disbelief. Apparently the load wasn't rated for 200lbs. Oops. Folks from the party ran around the corner not sure what they were going to see - me laying on my back holding one of the rings while H stood near by with a glass of Scotch in her hand. Nice.

Last class

With Teacher going off to parts unknown I felt obligated to go to the last available class. I thought he was just going for two weeks, but I find out that it's off till November!

Nilon was there, but he does appear ready to go. Little Sister was there and was handing out pain as usual. She loves the heel palm strike and managed to clack my jaws a few times. So painful. You'd think I'd learn to keep my mouth shut or move my head back.

Teacher Slim made a showing and showed me some creative locks to throws. My shoulder has never hurt more. I'm glad for the break.

Time flying

I've started school at night so I haven't been able to sit down and write at all. Just a quick couple of notes:

Teacher is going on a 2 week vacation. A rare thing indeed. This will help me catch up on studies.

Nilon reports that he is moving away. As soon as he said this I started feeling down because no one is going to challenge me like he did. It was good and bad. Now that I said that I'm sure he won't be going.

I tried to continue my morning workout and got up to three five minute rounds, but the cold temperature and just plain exhaustion has made me fight a cold and keep me in the bed whenever I get a chance.

Right Hook to Plateau

I've made jokes to my friends about being beaten up by children and can usually back it up with some horrible injury, but last night was a classic.

As anticipated the first hour was attended by just Little Sister and myself. Teacher still looks like death warmed over (fighting a cold). We got a new gal, Angel, who is roughly my height and weight. She'll be a good addition if she stays.

So Little and I are paired to work on one-step exercises. These have been expanded somewhat by Teacher so we can work on combos. So I would do two punches and Little would respond with a combo of punches and kicks. Right away she rams her knee in my side which drops me quickly and then does a redneck punch to the jaw. All I heard was, "bing!" I blame her for the rest of the night's poor performance.

I couldn't do anything without using too much muscle and over-thinking everything. Definitely not an aha! kind of night until Beard showed up at the 2nd half. He asked if I wanted to work on anything in particular and I said kotegashi. Each time we work it I learn something new, but last night everything he said was valuable and made perfect sense. I realized that for the first time I was able to learn a huge amount - I might not be able to put it into play - but it all made sense. Unlike the once in awhile insights. Have I grown?

Footprints in the Gut

I was trying to settle into a restive sleep last night and, as I like to do most evenings, catalog my aches and pains - especially after a vigorous class. Unfortunately for me the amount of heat I put off makes me a very attractive sleeping spot for our cats. Over the years I've become used to their weight on my chest and legs, but last night I noticed something a bit more painful that usual. The inevitable ache of a serious bruise on my abdomen which the heavier of our two cats felt was the perfect spot to roost. Thankfully she thought better of it after about of half hour of my twitching around.

The bruise came from a kick we don't practice that often - the thrust kick. Explained to us as a way to move people away without serious injury. However we proceeded to do just that. Moving from a front snap to a thrust required a retooling of strength and accuracy we didn't appear to have. So there was a lot of oofs and whoofs when the wrong footing or placement occurred.

The class seems to be going through a dry period again. We were saying goodbye to Lux and Beard will start back to his Judo class Thursday. Little Sister only comes for the first hour. So the new class structure will be Little Sister in the first hour and Beard for the 2nd. Hopefully someone new will come. I guess I shouldn't complain about the personalized lessons...

Segue

I was helping my wife prepare her classroom for the new school year last night so I didn't get to beatings. So I've included a video of me on the receiving side of Kotegashi as we do it. Not very smooth, but I find it effective.

I've also, finally, started a drill in the morning that Bob at Striking Thoughts suggested. Taking a wavemaster, doing knee strikes for five minutes intervals with push ups interspersed. In fear that I would go into arrest I started with 2 minutes on the timer and then three. Tomorrow I'll try three three minutes rounds. So far I'm better than I thought, but the wavemaster has a tendency to move away so I'm either chasing it down or pulling it back. I'm hoping to shake off those extra pounds from wine country.

Overcome

I actually counted four or more times that I tried to find an excuse not to go to class last night. I was hoping that my wife was too tired from work and wanted me around to barbecue. I got the barbecue correct, but I was ushered off to beatings while she went back to school.

It's not an uncommon phenomenon for me, and I imagine others, that it literally takes wild horses to get to class, but once there I feel completely at home and totally refreshed and invigorated at the end of class.

Arms of Steel was visiting between semesters so his little sister stayed for both hours of the class. I mention this only because we did a little light sparring and AOS was pretty rusty with the sparring portion, but his sister who probably only ways 100 pounds, literally punched and kicked me with near her full force. I was thinking to myself, "who let this cat out of the bag?" and "Am I allowed to do the same to her?" I was completely discrete and punched and kicked appropriately, but most of it was rendered ineffectual because she kept getting inside my range, so I couldn't set up a good kick or punch. I hate kids.

We ended class with something I think we stole from Aikido classes. Multiple attackers and we could only use aikido to move people around. Awesome fun, but my fat was slowing me down.

Post Vacation

It seems like I'm typing that title out more often than I thought possible, but I live a good life so I have the strength of ten and bleed my vacation time to the very edge.

I went down to California to hang out with my wife and help her pack up and come back home (she was in school), but while I was down there I got to visit Uchi Deshi. I got to catch the 2nd half of his class and we were able to hang out and get to know each other.

As an aside I would like to mention that I was in amazement that I was able to meet someone through the internet, travel halfway across the world and meet them and find out that not only could we tolerate each other, but actually enjoy each others company.

The dojo he attends is easily the most impressive place I've ever been to. Two stories high and had a mat area that easily 50 by 50. Incredible. Plus the location on the beach makes it a stellar environment in which to learn the gentle art.

Tonight it's back to class and I'm already out of shape.

Weight of the belt

Teacher asks me last night, "so how does that belt feel?"

My first thought was "heavy."

When I put it on it doesn't feel right. I'm sure most of that is I'm so used to seeing the green belt that this seems out of place. The other part is that whenever I get to say Brown Belt in relation to myself I have dichotomous moment in which I say to myself, "that doesn't sound right," and "wow, I actually know something." I starting to think that a large part of the path is to come to believe in oneself and the skills you have. Colin mentioned something along the line about having the skill of a Black belt and coming to terms with the other portions of the path. I can feel myself getting comfortable with the role slowly. I can feel others giving me more respect - perhaps I'm accepting it more...

I noticed last night that everyone has heavy bruises on their arms. No one is complaining so that's nice. We still look like a bunch of abused husbands.

Bumps and Bruises

Oh how I ache. I'm used to seeing these types of pictures on Striking Thoughts because Bob does TKD. Those bruises are just from knife hand blocks.

Brown Day 1

I think I felt different. Kinda like, "Am I good enough for this?" and "Oh hell yeah, I went through the gauntlet!" The gang was giving me a lot of respect though, which was nice.

The brown belt against my red gi looked gross. Oh well, at least the little kids won't be calling me Santa Claus anymore.

Class had six last night and we worked very hard. I'm still drained from Tuesday so class felt very difficult, but I swear everyone was working harder than usual. Lots of knife hand blocks and spinning back kicks. Got some great pointers that I was able to immediately work on.

Still tired, still sore today. Not much to write about..

New Brown!!!

I thought it lasted an hour, but I was told it was only 40 minutes.

I thought I was going to puke about halfway, but I didn't.

I thought I was going to remember some strategy, but I couldn't remember how to spell Tang Soo Do.

Teacher called me earlier in the day and told me the basic format of the test, but I can honestly say that it didn't prepare me for what was coming up. We had a standard class for the first hour which I found exhausting anyway. My notorious bad breathing (breath holding) exhibiting itself right away. We broke for a fairly long time (20 minutes) which I didn't realize I should have been appreciating a bit more, then it was test time. Teacher, Teacher Slim and Teacher G sat in chairs at the head of the room. Teacher ran me through every kick, block and strike, sometimes mixing them with movement or not and then I did our first kata/hyung, Kecho hyung Ill Boo and our seventh, Pyung Ahn Sa Dan. Might I add that I was incredible.

Teacher then passed the exam to Teacher G. This was the unknown element. I've only seen Teacher G about three times in the last five years and his background is incredibly hard style. He ran me through multiple exercises with pads and movement and then threw in push-ups and back up again. I was pretty much going to puke and keep thinking to myself, "Can I do this?" or "This is got to end soon" unfortunately it didn't. He kept going to point where I was going to drop. It was precisely the feeling I had on a cardiac stress test, but there I could stop. Here I could not.

Next was Teacher Slim. With a silly grin he asked me to spell Tang Soo Do. Mentally, I was, "no problem, and I love you for giving me a break," but we I tried to speak there wasn't enough blood or O2 in my brain to carry it off. I gather it was t-a-n long pause s-o really long pause d-o. He couldn't stop giggling I couldn't figure out what I'd missed.

Teacher was the final portion of the of evening's festivities. Sparring. I wasn't even really sure if we were going to spar since I was so exhausted, but that's what happened. First it was Nilon, the man that loves to scrap. In his credit I will say that he didn't try any of his normal "invent a move" crap and stuck to the program. Second was Lux. During the first hour we had been doing minimal impact work, so this was a big change and I thought he did really great for a new guy. Then Beard. I knew he wasn't going to pull any punches when he palm heeled my cheek. Well I honestly didn't mind at that point and gave as good as I got. My last bout was with Teacher who came onto me quickly, but the irony was that I was ready for that. I laid into him as hard as I could manage and the worse thing that came from that was him popping my ear with a flat hand. Ouch = ringing.

They had me bow, gave me a belt and then we went down the street for a beer. I had to drive down the block because I could barely walk.

My favorite line from the evening was from Teacher, "I told you to fight them, not beat them!"

Test Prep Interlude

I met with New Guy yesterday for a test tune up. He's got a great eye for detail. We went over my kata and refined as much as we could. We also discussed kumite strategy. I feel a lot better. I think just talking about it with an informed party reduced a lot of my anxiety.

I asked about his background. He has five Brown Belts! He's been studying since his early teens and never got to stay in one place long enough to get his black belt. Dang.

Test Prep

The test is in two weeks.

I totally wasn't feeling any anxiety about it until I started writing about it. Thankfully Teacher appears to be constructing class to address my weak points in order to prepare me. We worked on a deceptively simple/complex forward chained attack. If I didn't come out of the kick properly balanced then the rest of the chain fell apart due to bad distancing.

We worked on Pyung Ahn Sa Dan, which is the kata he wants me to perform. Super critical eye time. He pointed out a few things that cleaned up some moves, but I found even more that needs to be addressed in the next week. Yikes. I tried it this morning and I totally fell apart. I need to warm up more maybe...

The last part of class was dedicated to Rondori and he partnered me with New, new guy. I may have mentioned before that his presence is about the most awesome thing to happen in class for a long time. He brings in a vitality and energy that is incredibly refreshing.

At the end of class I mentioned to Teacher that NNG likes working with kids! He had heard that and I think he was quite enthusiastic about it as well. Finally we have someone who loves teaching and loves teaching kids.

Holy crap update! I just got off the phone with Teacher. He wants to move the test up to next Tuesday so Teacher Slim can watch/particpate. Where's my 02!!!

Snap

That was a break.

You know when it happens, but you deny it because in only hurts for a few seconds.

We were practicing roundhouses with focus mitts as the target. Teacher was holding it at whatever distance he saw fit and it was a bit too close for me so my foot went under the mitt and my pinky toe did not. Crack.

I feel like I'm walking with a eggplant in my shoe.

The news - we got a new guy whom I'll call NNG (new new guy) until a name surfaces for him. He's got a Brown Belt in Kenwa-kai karate. I'd forgotten how nice it was to have someone to do stuff with who actually knows what to do. Insanely pleasurable.

At the end of class Teacher says that testing will occur in the next couple of weeks - gulp. That actually sounded specific.

Ah hah

When I got my green belt, Teacher pulled me aside and said that all the "ah-hah" moments I'd been experiencing were going to become less and less frequent. Sure enough the plateau of experience vs. refinement set in and over the last year or so things have slowed down significantly enough to allow me to focus on improving all the small things.

Last night I got a new version of the "ah-hah." We were do a move that looks simple and is very effective, but the execution took two hours to learn. As usual anything with taking someone's balance and keeping your own is something I find very challenging. Last night was no exception, but Teacher was able to break down everything I wasn't doing and give me a metaphor or some correction to constantly refine the work. But the end of the night it was if I had 20 little ah-hahs. Nice feeling to see and feel such quick progress.

The move was to block a straight punch, move in a bit and get the blocking arm to grab the punching arm elbow. While Uki is still in forward movement continue to pull them off balance and give them an uppercut to the floating ribs. We then did three variations of follow up, but they all a foot movement, elbow lock and a shoulder guide. One throws the person. One drives them to the floor and one retains the locked arm and requires us to shoot our feet out and ride the person down to the floor. Hard work! Sore knees! Excitement!

I also added a few pictures to the slideshow of last weeks show off for my Dad.

Bruise Randori

On Tuesday I could only attend half the class as my parents were coming in that evening so I came early to the kids class to help out/participate. After enduring that for awhile (you have to really take the long view on their progress) the class finished and I was doing jumping jacks when Nilon came in and, I swear to you, only did two stretches before he came up me all bug-eyed.

He was ready to go and I figured it would be a nice warm up, so on to Randori. However, this wasn't our regular slow, light impact kind. His first two strikes were pretty powerful and after that I knew I had to be careful as well as pay sharp attention. Nilon is hyper-aggressive and almost half my age so his advantages lay in his ability to produce a continuous attack and excellent fitness. His weakness is a lack of skill and virtually no kicking. I've never seen anyone so allergic to stretching their legs, but it's to my benefit in this case.

So we started and I have to say in all fairness it was really fun. As much as it can be painful it reminds me of how much I have learned and how I might do in a real-life situation. A kind of verification and feedback on how I've progressed in my own eyes. Well, I got cocky right off and didn't bother to protect my head and caught a spinning back fist across the chops. Again I was thankful that he doesn't look first or aim because if that caught me across the eye or brow I would have been out like a light. Thankfully, it didn't do anything, but he actually was concerned about his shot.

I shook my head and it was back on. Since I'm about 5 or 6 inches taller I have a nice reach, but he doesn't mind moving in and using elbows. I backed out and circled and used my legs for some head kicks. Round house to the noggin - point to me. I figured I'd do that for a bit and set up a pattern, but I was too slow. He moved in on a midsection roundhouse and used both arms elbow down to stop my kick. I think we all know this is a horrible block because he had to take all the shock in the shoulders in an upward motion, but I really came out bad because it felt like I had slammed leg into two pointy bits of metal. A little bit later Nilon stopped the action on his own!

Although I felt like I had taken the worst of it, he was dripping sweat from every pore. I guess he felt he got what he needed and was done. I turned to Teacher and asked how long we'd been at it. I asked this because I can never guess how long the action is - it could be 30 seconds or five minutes - when I'm in the mix I can never tell. 3 minutes he replied. Not bad. I wasn't huffing and puffing, but the elbows on the leg were starting to make my leg puff up.

We ended up doing Katas for the next hour to continue to knock the rust off and I could really feel that leg groaning. I took the ibuprofen when I got home. It's still sensitive two days later. Ouch.

Wrist Lock

Never in my life have I had so much difficulty describing moves. Beard says, "how to do explain something felt?" In my last entry I was really unable to describe a lock, but Meg asked for a bit more so I took the camera and tried to get some shots of our basic lock. Thankfully we didn't do anymore in class because my wrists are still a bit tender.

Let me just say that their are a million ways to do this and we practice as many as we can, but this is about the easiest one I could describe.

First you take the striking hand on the outside with your same side hand. This could be from a block or just a straight up grab if you are fast and accurate.

We traditionally block farther up the arm and then slide down to the hand, but you get the idea.

Next is the hand placement. The fingers go around the ball of the thumb into the palm and your thumb on the back of the hand.

I usually do the next part with two hands, but this is really designed to be a single hand take. You are supposed to role the person's fist/hand up toward their body.

Note: You've got do this starting very relaxed or the person will tense up and if you've little hands like me then you are doomed. Away to assist into moving into this position is to dig your thumb between the two tendons - ouch!

This is first part of the pain. A person can be dropped to their knees in this position if the curling towards them is continued while close in. Not very descriptive - sorry.

And finally the twist. It's not a great shot of what's going on, but let's say that not only am I pushing his knuckles towards him, but I'm rotating his hand so that the ball of his palm is now going towards his body. You'll notice that his elbow is moving in towards his body to create relief. The only escape is take a fall or other counters that take to long to describe.

I usually have to do this with two hands. It reduces slippage.

And, in other news, Nilon is absolutely obsessed about testing for his next rank. He constantly asks Teacher about it during breaks and after class. I find this repulsive because it goes against my whole gut feeling about why we are there, but at the same time I'm absolutely drawn in because I want to know too! So Teacher says, "we are absolutely testing before the end of the summer." He pointedly looked at me...

Educational Differences

Inside my body I think I heard/felt a prolonged, "creeaaakk."  To the best of my knowledge I think that could be bad.  

However, I'm typing this without a problem.  It always seems to be that way though.  During the evening I'm positive the wrist locks we are preforming are absolutely spraining or breaking my wrist, but I wake up with only minimal discomfort.  

Teacher took a new tack on the start up.  We did a traditional kicking series and I was partnered with new guy, LG.  Front kick, forward stance, back-fist, step behind into side kick.  Nice but you have to have a partner that remembered to back up so when you chambered for the side kick you'd be pressed up against them.  

At first I was working with Nilon - who was apparently asleep on his feet.  After a couple of runs up and down the length of the room he couldn't even manage to concentrate long enough to make an impact on the pads and definitely wasn't keeping up pace with my kicks.  He finally bowed out and took off.  

I was making polite conversation after he left  - essentially that Nilon was tired because he worked construction all day.  Teachers response - "If he's that tired how's he going to defend himself?"  Basically, I think he disrespected the Teacher by showing and doing a half-ass job.  I guess he should have stayed home and took care of himself.  Shrug.

So off to wrist locks and throws.  I got partnered with LG and it was back to the basics of the grab, hand position, the lock and then the throw.  I've completely forgotten all the things that can be addressed in teaching the kotegashi.  After awhile I was getting frustrated and Teacher came to the rescue.  He has a very good sense of what to focus on and what to let go for later.  I kept thinking of all the things he has told me in the past over and over until the sunk in.  Poor guy; at least he has some new folks that show earlier promise.  

That's where the crack and creak came in.  Something I never really appreciated before as it relates to the fold wrist lock.  To take someone down in the kotegashi the way we do it (ignoring all other body mechanics and foot work) is to fold wrist up as if you are waving someone over to you and then twisting that exterior.    When the person is down we have a variety of locks to utilize, but one that has escaped me is just the folding lock.  I never seen to cause anyone anxiety in that position and knew that it wasn't correct.  I was missing that the arm has to come up to allow a greater circle to be created, thus putting more umph into the wrist lock.  I had been basically stopping to soon in two or three axis.  

So LG learned quick from my realization and took me to task.  I'm glad that my audible body noises and arched back made him back off!

It's all in the hips

I don't think I'm at the point in which I can say that I fully utilize my hips in kicks and strikes. Every time I get lower in stance I have to completely retool the hip rotation. So if I'm in a deep zenkutzu stance I don't feel like I can twist my hips at all, so I'll raise up only to receive admonition from Teacher for a poor stance. Hmmm. Since I'm going up and down in stance heights, I don't have a consistent spot in which to practice and lock down what I'm doing.

My best kick for utilizing the hip snap/whip is the outside crescent using my right leg. It remains loose and my hip leads the whipping movement beautifully, but my left side just won't move smoothly. I'm having some lower back problems and some bursitis in my hip so I'm guessing that could be the problem. That, or it's the old saw - you're better on one side that than the other.

I was working with one of the new guys on those kicks and he was awesome. He kept his balance and could generate a lot of energy. New people make me sick. To compensate I took all the credit in teaching him his new skills.