Didn’t end up making it to training this week – I was being a good son and caught up with the family for my mum’s birthday on the usual night I train, and on the alternate night we have training available I was home from work that day because my stump’s been flaring up again, so spending an evening doing karate would have been far from productive in rectifying the situation 😛 Very rude and inconvenient of my stump to flare up like that. Mind, the issues with my stump are well and truly subject material for other posts, so I’ll leave it here.

Anywho, on the training side of things – again, was another really good session, I’m finding that ever since the last grading I’ve been trying to add extra focus and energy into each lesson and it’s really paying off, or at least that’s how I’ve been feeling. There’s always that old adage that a lot of karateka note – you only get out what you put into your training, and if you don’t train every class like how you perform during your grading, you won’t grow as a martial artist. While the claims are lofty if I’m trying to say I’m living up to this in any way, I’m hoping that by training and committing myself with this elevated level of dedication, I’ll be able to progress at a greater rate… I found that when I was training throughout 2008 that I wasn’t putting in that dedicated, focused energy into my training that I’ve been working hard on achieving this year. Hopefully I’m starting to get there since I took note of how I worked during my previous grading and have started trying to apply this to each training session I attend.

… if nothing else, it is at least a good ideal to work towards 🙂

I’ve also got some thoughts to post on getting started on my next kata and on my mawashi geri technique, which I’ll tuck into tomorrow (hence the “a post in three parts” bit in the title) – it’s getting late so Wifey and I are off to bed!

Bloginated Thursday, 10th September 2009 / Karate
Tag-isms: stump | Technique | training

In an attempt to stave off the temptation to post about old video games on this blog, I’ve finally put the finishing touches on a companion blog where I can keep the off-topic stuff siphoned away to an appropriate place 🙂

I’ve given the new blog an appropriately nerdy name – RetroOtaku – and you can check it out in all its awesomeness at http://nerdisms.gisoku-budo.com/ if you’re so inclined. At this stage I’m not sure how often I’ll be updating it, but it’s there for when I want to wax lyrical about video games and junk 😉

The good news is that now I’m finished putting it together I can get back to blogging here more regularly, which I’ve been pretty lax with of late. Apologies to the regulars checking out this site, I’ll get back into the swing of things over the next week!

Oh, and if you forget about the URL, you’ll find the site linked under ‘Companion blogs’ in the side bar!

Bloginated Tuesday, 8th September 2009 / Blogs/websites
Tag-isms: RetroOtaku

It’s a little belated, but I thought I’d do a round-up of last week’s training 🙂

Was a really good session, especially since it’s been a few weeks since I last trained. I worked hard, and we covered some really good ground. I’ve also started on learning my new syllabus, which is a mixture of old techniques refined further, as well as new techniques and combinations. I feel a little unco at this point, but to be honest, it’s only been one lesson, so I think it’s a little stupid to assume I’m going to get it first up 🙂

We also did some really awesome two-person drills involving striking/blocking/countering combinations. It was a little different to some of the typical drills I’ve done in the past which were relatively static block/counter, rinse and repeat. The drills we did relied on flowing from defense/offense, starting with parry, flow though with a block to control the opponents arm… then something else ( 😉 ), then strike your partner and they do the same thing. I’m definitely not doing the drill justice here, but the end result was that the drill started resembling kenpo and some Chinese martial arts rather than “traditional” karate… which it turns out was Sensei’s intention all along, so I felt a bit clever afterwards for picking up on what he was aiming to get us to see in the drills we were doing.

Another part of the good stuff that came out of the lesson was that I got to train with one of our brown belts, and he’s keen on pushing things a bit harder in class, which is perfect as I’m always up for challenging myself. Typically in these kind of blocking drills you habitually mangle your forearms through all the striking. Back when I used to train in the previous style, if I was doing these drills with Jyastin-kun, Tank or Buu-Adam we’d normally go pretty full-on and come out with crazy bruised arms and stuff, and it was a stack of fun. While my arms are only mildly bruised (indicating that I think I need to do more body-conditioning training, which I’m pretty sure Sensei’s keen to increasingly put into our training in class, so fingers crossed!), it was good fun, but I definitely could do with going through these drills more often. Same for my shin as well, it could probably do with getting used to being bashed about a bit more often 🙂

So yeah, great training – looking forward to training again this week 🙂

Bloginated Monday, 31st August 2009 / Karate
Tag-isms: bruised arms | training

So there are two reasons I habitually check on my weight:

Number one, I’m vain 😉 I was a bit of a chubber when I was a kid, and got sick of it when I was around 15 and went on a crash, anally retentive diet for about 12 months. No snacks, smaller portions, exercise, no dessert, stuff like that. It ended up working – between a couple of growth spurts and a serious change in diet, I shed all the weight over a year, and managed to keep it off while my metabolism continued to kick in. Thankfully for me, despite my good dieting habits taking a bit of a dive during Uni (cheap meal deals at Hungry Jacks and a fresh doughnut place at the train station were good fun ;)), I managed to keep it all off throughout my studies and until I graduated and moved out. True, looking at some photos of when Wifey and I first moved in together I was definitely too skinny, but anywho, I managed to kick the fatty gene.

Number two, keeping your weight steady is *essential* as an amputee. The socket has to fit the form of your body, so if you drop too much weight or stack on too much, your prosthesis isn’t going to fit because your body shape changes in many subtle and not-so-subtle ways. Thankfully you normally get some warning – the prosthesis starts slipping off your stump or won’t sit on it correctly, you get chaffing, skin breakdown, stuff like that.

Note that I said “steady” up there – you get problems if you drop too much weight as well as put it on, in that the prosthesis just falls off in addition to all the rubbing and chafing! Mind, all that’s needed in order to fix this is to have a new socket moulded, but it depends on what you’re doing – if you’re trying to loose weight, it’s all good, but if you start stacking on the weight (and you don’t need the extra kilos), it’s the start of a slippery slope – it gets harder to walk, you might eventually get into strife trying to find a knee and ankle/foot that’ll support your weight, and the cycle hits pretty hard the further you go. As those who have been/are overweight know, it’s harder to exercise when you’re heavier, which makes it even more difficult if you’re an amputee *and* you’re overweight. Hence why I take it seriously and keep an eye on it.

In terms of my weight (moving on from my teen years), things started getting interesting once I started nearing my mid-20s and I found the weight was starting to roll back on, especially over the 12 months I had off from training around 2005/2006 (hit the archives for details – here’s the lot, most recent entry first). So, to keep it at bay and get back on track, shortly after moving into our current place I started keeping track of my weight each week. I had a few aims behind this – I wanted to trim some excess weight (particularly around my belly and waist), get back into my weight training and continue to intensify my karate training. With my weight, I was aiming to bring myself down to about 70kg (remember that I’m not that tall, coming at around 5’8″!) despite the fact that the weight training was going to pack on extra weight as well (muscle weighs more than fat, or so popular opinion tells me!), which would mean that theoretically I’d shed more fat weight by combining it with increasing my muscle mass at the same time.

So this brings us back to now – while I’m not too sure what my muscle mass is sitting at since I haven’t done any intense weight training in about a month, at my last weigh-in I was a hair’s breath away from my goal weight, so I’m pretty chuffed with myself at this stage. Funnily enough I’ve still got my damn love handles, but hopefully if I continue on, start up my weight training again next week (now my thumb’s sorted itself which means I can lift the bar without worrying about splitting the wound), kick in with intense, focused training at karate and some extra stretching and exercise between these (such as taking the dog for an extra walk or two), I might eventually get rid of them 😉

… and that ends my jumbled rant about weight, amputees, and another one of my stories 😉

Bloginated Monday, 24th August 2009 / Prosthesis or amputee stuff
Tag-isms: History | prosthesis | training | weight loss | weight training

Last week I was going to write a post about how the seasons have started to change, the days are starting to get a little bit longer, the evening’s are a touch warmer and it’ll make it easier as a result to get back into a solid training routine… and now I’m staring out the window, it’s pitch black with cloud cover, pouring down with rain, and there are gale-force winds outside… there goes that idea 🙂

Doesn’t mean I can’t talk about the up-coming change though! While I’ve always loved winter (best weather for sleeping in!), I’m looking forward to the warmer weather in the hopes it’ll help encourage me to do more intensive workouts. I love building up a massive sweat while training, regardless if it’s in the dojo or on the bench, so it’ll be good to get back into it. Mind, I’m also impatient to get back into training since it’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve allowed myself to train as my mangled thumb’s almost healed up (finally!!). Will be fine for going to karate this week, though the thumb’s not as flexible as it was before I mangled it. I’m sure it’ll be back to normal soon though!

In fact, will have to make some time to do some deep leg stretching over the next couple of days – will help with my kicks this week, I don’t want to look too rubbish at class! Will also look up my next kata on YouTube to get started on learning the basic forms in prep for training.

And the best part is that it’ll help Wifey remain sane – I’ve started doing karate all around the house again, and I think she’s getting sick of all those stomping noises I make when I practice my techniques whilst walking around the house 😉

Bloginated Monday, 24th August 2009 / General training
Tag-isms: seasons | stupid injuries | training | winter