Archives for 2011

Sensei Brien shared a new, new to me anyway, kata today.  We worked on Hangetsu.

Warm up the hips….

Sensei had us work on many kicking drills to get the hips warmed up.   We stood next to our partner, held on to their shoulder and started with stationary front snap kicks.  Next, we did roundhouse kicks the same way.  Then came front snap kicks with roundhouse kicks and finally front snap kick and side thrust kick.

Hangetsu….

We spent the rest of the class working on Hangetsu.  This is one kata that I have wanted to work on for many years now.   I like the strong, powerful feeling along with the deep breathing.  I was told before that this is an internal kata because of the isometric contractions and the timed, deep breathing.  I also like the combination of very slow and very fast movements.  I plan on spending a lot time working on this kata for the health benefits alone.  It reminds me of Tai chi on steroids.

As always, Sensei Brien makes learning a new kata a great experience.  He not only tells us what the moves are but also why they are that way.

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I am really enjoying some the drills we are doing in class with Sensei Cieplik.  It’s not that I don’t enjoy everything but there are some drills that I enjoy more than others.

More hip…

From a front stance, do a rear leg knee strike, after the knee strike turn the body 90 degrees and then step back with the knee strike leg into a front stance.  We did this with both the left leg in front and the right leg in front.  We did the same drill as above but Sensei added a front snap kick after the knee strike.

Some combination blocks and punches…

We stated with moving forward and back with downward block, rising block,  and inward block with reverse punch.  Next, moving forward with outward block, job and reverse punch.  Then, moving forward and back with inward block, elbow strike and backfist which is my favorite (sarcasm) move.  Even after all these years, that move is still ugly when I do it.

The last group movements was knife hand block with kicking and striking combination’s.  We started with moving forward and back with knife hand block , then with front snap kick,  and then we added spear hand at the end.  Sensei made an awesome point about the spear hand strike.  He said, do not pull the draw hand back to the hip before the strike, just do the move from WHERE your draw hand is!  This makes the spear hand so much sharper and faster and it just feels right.

Hold on the floor or you will get pushed over….

We started with moving sideways in horse stance.  The idea is move with intent and keep the feet in contact with the floor at all times.  Next, we got a partner and moved across, in a horse stance while our partner pushed against us from the side.  The idea is to keep the intention of moving forward while moving in a horse stance.

The next drill was really neat.  We stood with our back to our partner, our partner would point at any of three spots, the back of our neck, the middle of our low back and the back of our legs.  The idea behind this is that you have what are similar to radar disk like receptors in those three areas and if someone points at those areas with intent, you should be able to feel it.  Out of five tries, I was correct on four.  There is a lot more to this than meets the eye and I hope to explain it in more detail sometime in the future.

Finish with some kata…..

We did Heian Shodan through Heian Godan, Tekki Shodan, Jion and Bassai Dai to finish up the class.

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Sensei Brien spent a lot of time on different sparring drills today but one in particular stuck out.

This is a really simple but effective drill to help develop explosive power.  We started out in a very low, lunging front stance, from there we throw a reverse punch and then spring forward and throw another reverse punch as fast as possible.  This is a double reverse punch movement but loading up in the low lunging stance helps build the legs and explosion forward.  When starting in the low stance, your back heel can be off the floor but be sure to keep the knee of the back leg pointing forward and not to the side.   Give this one a try, I think you will like it.

This article was originally posted on www.shotokanplanet.org. Any reproduction on any other site is prohibited and a violation of copyright laws.