Since rank testing is coming up in the next couple or few months, Sensei Noia is paying extra attention in preparing us for our test.

Severe warm ups…

We started off doing suicides again.  This time, one partner would run to the four different lengths of the gym while the other partner is doing burpies.  After one of us completed the first suicide, the other would run and we would do the burpies.  I don’t think would have been too hard if we did it two or three times but Sensei had us do this seven times.  By number five, breathing was extremely hard and for number seven I my running was more like a fast walk.

Slow kata with no power…

After the warm ups, Sensei had us all do Heian Shodan.  He told us to do it extremely slow and with no power whatsoever.  Doing it with no power wasn’t really an issue after the warm up that we just did.  Next, we did our own belt kata the same way.  He wanted us to pay extra attention to our focus, even though our bodies were pretty much spent.  After that, Sensei had us do our own kata once more but with full power and speed as if we were at our test.  I felt that my kata was a little rushed but overall, it didn’t feel too bad.

The idea of having us do our kata after the hard warm up was to make us feel as if we were at our test and had just finished our kihon portion of the exam.  I think it was pretty safe to assume that we were more tired after the warm than we would be after doing our kihon at the exam.

Partner kata…

We haven’t done partner kata in some time and I am glad that Sensei Noia had us do it.  I want to add this aspect to my home training an hopefully my wife and son will want to do it with me.

Sensei had us do Jion.  Sensei would call off each move, I would do it and then our partner would walk around us making sure that we were working.  By working, I mean that we were holding our stances, had our body in the right postion and tensing the right muscles.

Anyone who knows Jion also knows that there are a lot moves to that kata.  After each count, we ended up holding that position for anywhere from 15 to well over 30 seconds.  If you don’t have good focus it is very easy for your partner to push you over with little effort.

We ended up doing this one Jion for 15 – 20 minutes.  It was really intense but it certainly made me focus on every part of the kata.

It was an excellent class and I hope that we have more like it.