Shotokanplanet.org

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

Kata time – 1/20/09 – Tuesday Karate class

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I ended up taking the earlier class today and spent the entire time working on kata with Sensei Plocharczyk.

Hard warm up…

We started with a hard warm up.  We jogged back and forth across the dojo twice, then we did butt kickers across the dojo.  That was easy compared to what came next.  We started with 10 pushups and situps, then we did nine and nine of each, then eight and eight all the way down to one and one of each movement.  We ended up doing 55 of each movement in a short time.  I was pretty much spent after the warm up at that point.

Lots of kata…

Sensei then had us start with Heian Shodan as a warm up and then Jion.  Next came Heian Nidan and then Bassai Dai.  After that came Heian Sandan followed by Bassai Dai with no hands.  Next came Heian Yondan followed with Jion.  After that was Heian Godan followed with Bassai Dai.  Next was Tekki Shodan, Jion, Bassai Dai and another Bassai Dai.

We then did 25 lunges in place followed with one more Bassai Dai.

Very hard class but very good.

Exam preparation is hard work – 12/1/08 – Monday Karate class

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Sensei Brien spent most of the class working on preparing us for our upcoming rank exam.  This was the last of our make up classes that were two hours long.

Kihon like you mean it…

Sensei had us start out with the usual basics, moving forward and back with front punches, sanbon zuki and blocks and counters.

It got interesting when we started working on our kicking drills.  When we were doing our side thrust kicks, Sensei had do two.  For example, we started in a horse stance, we then stepped across and did not one but two side thrust kicks and then pulled our leg back until Sensei told us to set our foot down.  He made a really good point, if you can do two good kicks in a row, you can certainly always do one good kick.  This really made a lot of sense to me and I hope to incorporate this into my training outside of the dojo.

Kata, any questions?…

After we finished our Kihon, Sensei Brien had us work on our kata.  He had us all do our own kata and then gave us a chance to ask him for advice on our kata.  After his advice, we were able to do the kata again and again trying to incorporate what he shared with us.  My question was how to properly execute fifth and fourth move from the end of Bassai Dai.  It is the low kick blocks.  I was having a hard time transisioning from the moves and Sensei said that I should turn on the my heels which seems to work pretty well for me.

One-step…

I forgot to bring my sparring gear to class so my wife and I ended up working on our one-step sparring together until class ended.

Ladders and one-step sparring – 11/17/08 – Monday Karate class

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Today was our first Monday back after an unscheduled and scheduled day off.  Because of the extra day off, we had a two hour class.  Sensei Brien was out so Sensei Beth Noia and Sensei Sarah Plackett gave us an excellent class in his place.

We started out with some simple Kihon and combinations to get warmed up.

One-step with the entire class…

The was a little different, at least for me.  We started one-step sparring with a partner and then switched partners until we did one move with the half of the class.  Next, we all lined up in a square.  One person would attack, then step into the line and we would move out and attack and keep going around the square until the entire class had a change to attack and defend with against everyone.

Ladders, focus mitts and kata…

This was a good drill.  We started shifting in and out of the floor ladder with both feet together.  After the ladder, we stood in front of one of the Sensei’s holding a focus mit on each hand and cross punched and backfisted each one.  For example, with our left hand, we would punch his left hand, since he was facing us, and then backfist the mit on his right hand and we used the other hand.  This was an excellent coordination drill and once I got the hang of it, I was able to move fairly fast.  Next, we went through another ladder and shifted side to side but with really wide shifts.  After that, we went off to the side and did our own kata.

Kata…

We spent the last part of class working on Kata.  We started with Heian Shodan and went up to Heian Yondan.  After we finished working on the Heian kata’s we spent the rest of the time working on both Jion and Bassai Dai.  This was really good since both Sensei Beth and Sensei Sarah spent a lot of time correcting each of us individually when we were doing our kata.