Saturday Karate class – 3/15/08 – Kihon, one-step sparring and kata.

Another excellent class.

Sensei Plocharczyk had us start with some kihon.  We did a good amount of movements, up and down the gym including single moves and combinations.  He had us pay extra attention to our stances and hip movements, which I really need anyway.  We did all the blocking combinations consisting of upward, downward, inward and outward blocks with reverse punches.  We then worked on our kicks, doing front snap kicks and combination kicks such as, front snap, side thrust, back kick and roundhouse kick.  I was trying to apply what I learned Thursday night and used the rebound from the back kick to fire the roundhouse kick.

We then spent some time working on one-step sparring with our partner.  I feel that there had been a huge improvement in my one-step since the last test.  I can shift out farther then before, my timing is much better and my counters feel much faster and more powerful.  I do need to spend more time working on roundhouse kicks and spinning back kicks since I have never really done those before.

We finished up class with some kata.  Sensei had us do our own kata.  I did when felt like a good Jion.  All my moves were on and it just felt right.  I put a lot into the kata and didn’t have a chance to catch my breath before Sensei had us do a single Heian Shodan.  I ended up making a bunch of mistakes and my power was way off.  When then finished up with one more of our own belt kata and that Jion was nothing like my first.  It had almost no power and I made a mistake on at least one movement.   I don’t think my body gave out after the first Jion, I think my mind did.  I put so much into the first kata, I could not focus on the next two.  I guess I have some more to work on.