Excellent class. We spent most of the time working on hip mobility and specific parts of our kata. The moves were very hard and not only made heavy use of our hips but it also focused on speed and coordination.  One movement started in a back stance knife hand block, then spin around in to a front stance groin strike and then into a back stance double block from Heian Godan.
Archives for May 2007
Heian Godan secrets from Thursday class.
When doing the cresent kick, turn my left foot forward before doing the kick. Swipe my foot off my hand, hold the kic, then come down, reach out with my right leg in to the horse stance and push my knees forward while doing the head smash.
When doing the cross leg double block push the hips to the right at the same time when I do the block.
When coming off the first kiai, bring the right hand over the head as if pointing a pencil at the ceiling and bring the and down to the side instead of doing a downward block.
The jump height should be knee level or higher.
When doing the downward x-block, push down and then when coming up in to the upward x-block, bring the hands in and push up hard. I bounced my hands off my chest when going in to the upward x-block and it seems to work t well for me since it gives me more force and power from my hips and legs.
When doing a side kick, look first and then kick! This made a huge difference in my side kick.
Thursday Karate class and workout.
One each of Heian Shodan, Heian Nidan, Heian Sandan, Heian Yondan, Heian Godan and Tekki Shodan. (6 total)
Great class.
We spent the first few minutes of class warming up like normal but then our Sensei had us do something different. He had us pick a partner and had them massage our shoulders and upper back. He noticed that everyone was very tense and he wanted us to leave our outside mind outside. It worked well.
Then we spent the rest of the class working on kata. We did all of the Heian katas and then worked on Tekki Shodan and Jion. It was a great class andI picked up on many good tips to help improve my kata.