Today was stance training day.  Sensei Noia gives us some of the hardest stance training classes and walking afterward is not easy.  Needless to say today was no different than before.

The start was the only easy part…

We started standing upright doing straight punches.  Next, we moved into a horse stance and did straight punches again.  While holding the horse stance we did rising blocks and double punches.  For the next drill, we stood upright and did the punch and outward block combination from Bassai Dai many times.  Using the hips and pivoting on the heels  is the key to drill.

Then came the kicks.  We stated with alternating front snap kicks, then alternating back kicks, then alternating front and back kicks and finally, alternating side thrust kicks.

Cross your legs and get a partner….

For this drill, we did a cross leg stance with punches.  Next, we did a front stance, then moved into a cross leg stance with a punch, then step back to in to a front stance with a downward block, then reverse punch and front punch.

After getting a partner, one of us held a pad and other punched the pad while both of us stood in cross leg stances.  I think this drill was equally hard for both of us.  The partner punching had to squeeze the core or get pushed back when punching and the partner getting hit had to squeeze or fall over.

Up to the kiai….

We finished up doing our belt kata up to the first kiai, over and over, for five minutes.  I lost count after 20 kiai’s and am not sure how many I ended up doing.  The last thing we did was our entire belt kata at full speed and full power.

I have mentioned this in many of my posts lately that Sensei Cieplik has been sharing many little details with us in every class and today was no different.  There is a big difference between doing the move and “doing” the moves in Karate.  Anyone can memorize at a kata or a where to place your hands and feet when doing basics but if you aren’t paying attention to the details when training, chances are your Karate won’t work if you ever need it in the real world.

Get your basics done….

After the warm up we did moving forward and back, two times with downward block, inward  block, rising block, outward block all followed with a reverse punch.  The details with these simple moves that we do every week are sometimes so small, we forget all about then.  Sensei had us focus extra attention our draw hand when doing these movements.  Simple things like keeping the draw hand arm close to the body when pulling it back, rub the gi and move it at the same speed as the opposite hand.

For the next drill, we stated in a horse stance, stepped across sideways and did side snap kicks, then front side snap kicks and side thrust kicks.  The details here are to keep your moving foot in contact with the floor and make sure that the little toes touch when stepping across.

Also, staying low and moving in a straight line are things that we were but often forget about.
Next came a little Karate with a Tai Chi twist.  We started in a back with both hands out to the side and too a deep breath in.  We then moved into a front stance while pushing our hands forward and breathing out. No only do you get some stance training, you get some breath exercise in too.

Pads and partners…..

We paired up and hit the pads for a while using the hook punch.  The idea here is punch forward and then curve it in to the hit the pad.  A detail that Sensei told me a long time ago was to drop down in the horse stance or back stance when doing the hook punch to make  more power.

We also worked on some knife hand blocks.  Sensei had us hit the pad with the three out middle, fourth and pinky fingers tight and the thumb and index finger loose.  This gives the movement a different feel that cannot be easily described in text, at least me.  It makes the impact feel faster and have more of a whipping type motion instead of a cutting motion.  The intention here is to put the energy through the pad instead of just on the pad at the point of impact.

Kata…

We finished up class with some kata.  We did Heian Shodan three times, Tekki Shodan a few times and Bassai Dai.  One training tip that Sensei gave us was to just hold a horse and do Tekki Shodan without moving the legs.  This will help train the legs for better horse stances since the better the horse stance is in  Tekki Shodan, the better the kata will be.

Sensei Noia ended this session with some extra hard kata work.

Class full of kata….

We started class with our own belt kata as a warm up.  For there, Sensei counted each move, sometimes making up start over again and making us repeat groups of moves, for Heian Nidan, Jion, Heian Yondan, Bassai Dai and then Heian Shodan.

We then did Heian Shodan, Heian Nidan, Heian Sandan, Heian Yondan and Heian Godan with 10 push ups in between each kata.  We then did 25 squats and Jion and 25 more squats and Kanku Dai.

We spent the rest of the class working on some joint locks from the various katas.

It was a good class and a good end to a great session.