Sensei Cieplik has been showing us some new movements fairly often.  I guess I should call them new combinations since the moves are the same.  Doing certain moves in different order really makes the mind work.

We started with our normal front kicks during our warm up. Next came front kick with back kick.   Sensei said as soon as the leg comes back from the front snap, just let the back kick go.  That felt much different than I was used to and the power felt much greater than before.  It’s as if I am using the snap back from the front kick to start the back kick.

Next, we did horse stance, front leg, or side we were facing, side snap kick, step accross side thrust kick.  Next came horse stance, front leg front snap kick with step behind back kick.  That movement was really different.  This movement felt very powerful.

Next, we did, front leg front snap kick, back leg front snap kick, putting the back leg back behind and then reverse punch.  The mental concentration here is much more than the physical part.

We then worked on some punches, moving forward, jab with reverse punch.  Then, moving forward, reverse punch, jab, reverse punch.  This movement was a bit hard to do at first but once we got our minds around it, it wasn’t too bad.

Another new combination was moving forward, front leg front snap kick, step then sanbon zuki.  This wasn’t too hard but it was different.

After that, we moved on to kata.  We did Hiean Shodan a couple of times.  Sensei made the point of having everyone do the blocks with two hands.  I have always done this from almost the time when I started so it wasn’t anything really new but I did concentrate more on my hands then before.

Next came Heian Sandan and Sensei made the recommendation of doing a three quarter front stance between horse stance and front stance.  This allows the body to come around very quickly and powerful.

Next came Jion and some Bassai Dai.  Even though Bassai Dai is not my current kata, it is good to be getting a head start on it.

It was a great class and it always leaves me looking forward to the next class.

Very hard class but good!

We spent almost the entire class doing kihon and a lot of it.

We started out with a horse stance doing punches and blocks.  Then moving forward with front punch and then triple punch.  After that came moving forward and backward, rising block, downward block, inward block and outward block.

Next came the kicks;

Moving forward, front snap kick, then double front snap kick, then roundhouse kick and double roundhouse kick.   We also did front snap kick with side thrust kick to the front.  Then came front snap kick, side thrust kick to the side, back kick and then roundhouse kick.

Then back to a horse stance and stepping sideways, side thrust kick, then side snap kick.

After all the kicks, we moved into a back stance.  Moving forward and backward with knife hand block.  Next, we did the same move but with a front snap kick and ending in a nukite.

Next came, outward block, move into horse stance, elbow strike and finish with a backfist.

Once all of the basics were done, we did kata.  At the point, Sensei Noia had us do Heian Shodan but I was having a really hard time.  Both my body and my mind were spent and I could not concentrate after all the kihon.  We did it a second time and then we did our own belt kata.  My Jion felt better than Heian Shodan for some reason.  Maybe I was just on autopilot at that moment.

That was one of the first classes where my mind and body seemed to be exhausted.  Oddly enough, after class, I didn’t feel too bad overall.

Sensei Gatch had us spend the entire class working on Kihon and Kata.

I always enjoy classes like these and today was no exception.  We started with some simple combinations.  Moving forward and backward doing downward block with reverse punch, rising block with reverse punch and inward block with reverse punch.

Sensei Gatch spent a good amount of time explaining hip rotation and how important it is for our upcoming examination.  We then did a drill where we stood with our body facing to the right and then stepped out to the left and threw a reverse punch.  Sensei then had us put more weight on our back leg and drive off it.  Again, the idea was to get a lot of hip rotation and it worked.  My hips were screaming.

Next, we worked on back stance with knife hand block.  The time that I spent working on back stances in my Thursday class really helped today.  Moving both forward and back felt almost effortless.  Sensei also explained that our knife hand block should be as strong as our reverse punch.  He said that our punches are strong but our knife hand block were much less powerful.

We then moved into kata.  We started with Heian Shodan and then we did our own belt rank kata.  One of our assistant Sensei’s gave me some really good advice.  When doing Jion, the move where I go from the right hand middle block into the outward block followed by the step with front punch, I am using my shoulders, throwing my back leg (straight) around instead of drawing it in and bringing my knees together.  I realized that if I do that movement like I when going from the rising block (move 9) into the downward block (move 10) in Heian Shodan, the move is much smoother.

It was a good class and I have a few things to work on outside of class too.