Sensei Brien had us work on something new today.  We did a some sparring work that I don’t remember doing in the past and we spent the entire 90 minutes working on it.

Crazy hands kumite…..

We started out in a fighting stance and with our front hand, we made the shape of a figure 8 on the air.  We did this with both the left and right hands and then both hands at the same time.

The idea behind this concept was to keep your opponents mind busy on your moving hands and to keep them moving at all times.  When doing a block, you blocked and then went back to the figure 8 pattern, when you punched, you punched and went back to it again.  Keeping the constant motion when doing blocks or attacks was hard at times because I wanted to stop after every attack and reset.  Another interesting part of this was it almost totally masks your kicks.  You could also use one moving hand to block and the other to attack at the same time or do many attacks in a row.

When we started working with partners, being the offensive opponent seemed to work better for me than we I was being the defensive opponent.  I am not sure if the others found the same though.   It was some really good stuff but it needs to be practiced with a partner to be able to improve at it.

Sensei Cieplik has been sharing concepts and techniques with us that we have never done before.  Today’s theme was related to sweeping but not the sweeping that we do in sport kumite or with a broom.

Don’t scoop……

I would have thought after seven years of Karate classes that I would have learned how to do a front snap kick correctly.  While doing our kicking warm up, like we do each week, Sensei noticed that I was doing a scooping motion when my foot was leaving floor as I was doing my front snap kicks.  As my knee is coming up, my foot is doing a scooping motion and my toes are pointing down until my knee is up all the way in front.   I understand what he is saying and I did a couple the correct way but now need to figure out how to fix it permanently.   One of the things I enjoy most about Karate is when I just think I finally got it, I don’t got it.

Two steps forward and two steps back and stretch it out….

For our basics today, Sensei had us do each technique with two moves forward and two moves backward.  We did downward block, inward block, rising block, outward block, outward block with jab and reverse punch and lastly, knife hand block.

We spent a good amount of time on the next drill.  We started in a front stance with our front foot on one of the tile lines.  From there, we did a long stretching rear leg roundhouse kick, brought the kicking foot down in front, did a back fist with the front hand and then stepped in and did a front punch.  The idea behind this drill was to really open the hips and to cover a lot of ground.  In order to get the most distance you do not retract or snap back the roundhouse kick leg, instead you leave it extended with the hip open and set it down in front.  Not snapping the kick back adds a good amount of distance.

Partner sweeps….

For the next drill, we did some sweeping movements that were different than I remember ever doing before.  The one that is the easiest for me to explain was the following.  One partner threw a front snap kick and as they went to set the kicking foot down in front, the other partner used their foot to sweep their partners front leg out from under them.  The idea is to move just far enough out of the way to avoid getting kicked and as the attackers foot comes down you sweep it, either to the inside or outside, take them off balance and then give them a good punch, elbow or joint lock.  The key to this is mostly timing and taking their balance away from them to open them up to a bunch of different attacks.

We finished up class with Heian Shodan through Heian Godan.

It was another great class but I am sure my hips and legs will think different tomorrow morning.

Sensei Noia hasn’t had us do this lap and then kata drill in a long time.  I really like doing kata to warm up but it gets tough when there is a lap between each one.

Run a lap, do a kata…..

Sensei had us run a lap around the dojo and then do a kata.  We started with Taikyoko Shodan, then Heian Shodan through Heian Godan, then Tekki Shodan, Jion, Bassai Dai and Kanku dai.  I am pretty sure that t by the time I made it to Bassai Dai, my kata must have gotten very ugly but it was a great warm up.  I was proud of myself today since the last time we did this drill, I had a very hard time after the first four or five laps and today, I was able to get through the entire drill without a slowdown.

Get a partner and a pad….

We started by standing in front of our partner with our toes turned in a bit.  From there we punched the pad without twisting so that we could not use our hips.  The key to this drill is to use the core to connect the upper body to the lower body to make power.

The next drill was the same but this time we were in a horse stance.  Again, we couldn’t use our hips and we had to make sure that we tensed our butt when we punched to get connection between our upper and lower body.

In the next two drills, we could use our hips.  We got in to a front stance and started with our reverse hand out and our hips forward and closed.  From there, we twisted our hips and did a stationary jab to the pad.  When doing this drill, the knee of the front leg needs to move forward and not away from your partner.

The next drill was a stationary reverse punch.  From a front stance, we started with our front hand reaching out and our hips opened.  We then twisted and hit the pad making sure that our front knee didn’t pull back.   The key to this drill is to keep the tailbone tucked under to make power from the legs and hips not the upper body.

This class went by too fast and I would have liked another hour or so but my hips were not having the same thoughts.