We did a warm up and then moved right into some kicking drills.

We started with some balance work.  Sensei Noia had us stand on a foam pad and hold on knee up in the air for 30 seconds or so on each leg.  My balance was really off for some reason, maybe it’s a sinus infection or something, but I was able to keep me knee up without too much wiggling around.  Next, we stood on the pad and did a bunch of front snap kicks without putting our foot down.  The front snap kicks were no easy task but then things got much harder.  We did front snap kick, side thrust kick and front snap kick all without touching the floor and while still standing on the pad.  I could not hold my balance at all.  After we finished those groups of kicks, Sensei had us do 10 roundhouse kicks, still on the pad and without touching the floor.

After that, we stood the pad on it’s side and did a front snap kick, stepped down over the pad into a front stance, front snap kicked again and then stepped back into a front stance.  The idea was to kick over the pad and also step over it without knocking it over.  After that came front snap kick, side thrust kick to the front and then front snap kick all over the pad.

We finished up with some kata.  We went out in groups and did our own rank kata.  I still need to tuck my butt under but hopefully that will improve with some more time.

We spent almost the entire class working on our kata again.  In the past three plus years or so that I have been learning Karate, we have never spent this much time working on kata.  I am sure that those from our class will do really good kata at our upcoming rank exams.

Doing all these kata with our Sensei’s watching us, we get instant feedback on what we need to fix or improve.  Little details like keeping our chest up and adjusting the height of our arms during certain parts of the kata make a huge difference.

We ended class doing kata in groups by rank.  My biggest problem that night was tucking my butt under when in the horse stance.  I need to figure out how to keep the gluteus muscles tensed and tucked at all times in the horse stance.  One of my problems is stepping over my foot between stances after tensing those muscles so hard.  It causes me to move really awkward and off balance.  It’s as if my hips lock in the horse stance position and then when I try to step they pop very quickly and throw my balance way off.  I am sure that they will get better as time goes on.