Never ending stances

Today, Sensei Noia had us work on our kata again but  before that, we did what felt like the never ending stance drills.  I always like doing these doing these stance drills because I know that my stances can always be better.

Never ending stances…

We started in a horse stance doing punches and double punches.  Next, we started in the horse stance, pivoted to the left and reverse punched, pivoted back to horse stance and double punched, then pivoted to the right and reverse punched.  It really gets the hips warmed up.

For the next drill, we stood in a left foot forward front stance, brought our feet together and switched feet, putting the left foot behind, and then front punched.  We did the same but we switched feet twice and punched twice with one count.

We started in a stationary front stance and did blocking moves without our hands.  The idea here was to open and close the hips.  Next, we did the same hips movements but we added the hands.  Next, we started moving forward but Sensei wanted us to move our feet very fast and block.  We then did the same explosive movements but with a block and reverse punch.

The next drill was really different.  We started in a left foot forward back stance, then we  moved the back foot up next to the front foot and punched then put the left foot behind in a back stance and repeated.

Time to count on kata…

Sensei counted out each move for Jion and Bassai Dai twice.  He wanted us to do each move at full speed and full power.

We then moved on to Kanku Dai.  I lost count of how many times Sensei counted it out but it was more than five.  For this drill, Sensei wanted us to turn as fast as possible.  The forward movements were slow and easy but the turns were to be super fast.  These drills are very hard on the hips if done correctly.

We finished with another full power kata but slow and with no rhythm and then a full speed, full power Kanku Dai.