Shotokanplanet.org

This is a log of my journey to Shotokan Karate Shodan and beyond.

Karate class so hard, even my ears hurt – 9/15/09 – Tuesday Karate class

by 2 Comments

In an effort to help prepare us for our Karate examinations, Sensei Noia has been working on our physical conditioning.  Needless to say, we have been having some of the hardest Karate classes ever.

Kata and burpees….

We started class with a run back and forth across the gym at least eight times.  This got the blood flowing and my legs warmed up for what was coming next.

Sensei Noia had us do Heian Shodan followed up with 15 to 20 burpees, after that we did Heian Nidan and another 15 burpees and then Heian Sandan, Heian Yondan, Heian Godan and Tekki Shodan with a set of burpees in between.  I was only able to do 10, 10, 5, 5, and 5 reps of the burpees.  I really need to work in this movement.

For those of you that are unfamiliar with burpees, you start standing upright, squat down low, throw you legs out behind you into the top of the push up position, do a push up, pull your legs back up into the squat position, jump up, off the floor into the standing position.  There are a bunch of videos on www.youtube.com demonstrating this exercise if you want to see it in action.  If you haven’t done burpees before give them a try, they are a really intense exercise.

Work those stances….

Sensei Noia focused on our stance training.  He had us get a partner and stood across from each other in a horse stance.  One partner put their left hand near their partners chin and punched as Sensei counted.  The other side the drill and then as one partner punched, the other side did rising blocks while holding the horse stance for 50 punches and blocks each.  We then did a similar drill but instead of a horse stance we did a shiko dachi where our toes were pointed out but our legs, thighs, were closer to parallel with the floor.

We then did a drill in a cat stance where we did a gedan knife hand block.  We then did the same stance but with the gedan knife hand block and a reverse punch.  The last drill in the cat stance was front snap kick, gedan knife hand block and reverse punch.

Next came holding a stance and counting to 10 in Japanese.  We started in horse stance, then shiko dachi, then cat stance with both left and right leg forward, back stance with both left and right leg forward and front stance with both left and right leg forward.

After 35 minutes of stance training, Sensei had us finish up with one kata.  He had us do our belt rank kata but as slowly as we wanted to do.  It took me almost four minutes to do Bassai Dai but I don’t think I could move any faster if I had to.  I might have exaggerated about my ears hurting because class was so hard but pretty much every part of my body hurts now, which is good.

Sensei Noia mentioned that we should try to practice our stances every day.  It doesn’t have to be as intense as our class but even five minutes a day will help improve our stances.

Jennifer Malloy Karate Tournament – 2/22/09

by Leave a Comment

Today was the annual Jennifer Malloy Karate Tournament.

This event is always a good tournament since many competitors show up from all over the country.  This year, the tournament hosted the US team trials for kumite.   Many of the best kumite athletes in the country were present and competing today.  Since I was a judge for our own competitors, I did not get to see much of the trials but I heard that it was excellent.

My wife, son and I also entered the kata and kihon competitions in our respective age and skill groups.  My son and I didn’t win but received a lot of experience.  My wife ended up taking home Second place in both kata and kihon this time.

It was a good tournament overall.

More kata and self defense drills – 7/29/08 – Tuesday Karate class

by Leave a Comment

Super warm up…

We started with suicides to each quarter distance line and back.  Next came butt kickers across the dojo.  Next, shuffle up and kick back and forth.  After that, we started slowly moving across the dojo with our knees up with arms up, almost skipping and then Sensei Noia would say “go” and we had to sprint to the far end of the dojo.  Next came low walks front and back.  Finally, moving back and forth across the dojo, we did a shuffle with a jab, shuffle with reverse punch, shuffle with front kick, and shuffle with jumping front kick.

My body was pretty much spent by the end of the warm up.

Different kata…

We did Heian Shodan the normal way.  Next we did it from end to to start.  We then did it from the start but we pivoted on opposite foot.  Instead of stepping to the left with the left foot forward, we stepped back with the right foot.  The idea was to pivot on the foot that we would normally move and step with the foot that is normally stationary.   Doing kata like this isn’t physically harder but mentaly it is extremely hard.

Kihon with a little twist…

From the ready stance, Sensei Noia had us step back with the left leg and jab, then go back to ready and step back with the right leg and jab.  Next came ready stance, step back into horse stance and do a palm strike.  He followed that with the same leg movement into a horse stance but with a backfist.  We finished those type of movements with step back into back stance and throw a knife hand block.

Self defense – based on the kihon with a twist above…

Sensei Noia had us partner up and do one-step sparring based on the movements that we were doing above.  If my partner threw a jodan front punch, I would step back, out of the way on the inside and throw a jab.

We did the similar movements with the horse stance with palm strike and backfist.  The idea with these movements was to just move enough to get out of the way of their punch and counter almost at the same time.

With the back stance, we used our drawhand to deflect the attack and then knife hand strike them in the neck.

Doing these simple movements shows that you do not need to move a lot to get out of the way of an attack and counter.