I’ve been reading through some different martial arts blogs of late, inspired by some of the comments I’m getting from the wider community on my blog (super props to Black Belt Mama, as I’m pretty sure I can thank her for the recent attention!). I came across an excellent blog on BBM’s website by guest blogger Matthew Apsokardu (of Ikigai | Blogging the Martial Way) about control in martial arts (an excellent topic I’m keen to write about, but I’ll save that for another time), and from there I jumped onto his blog and read up on his post about learning kata.

Personally, I have a real love-hate relationship with kata. I’m typically slow to learn kata, and I find the initial process very defeating as I stumble through the movements. That being said, I’m sure my ultra level of unco is probably very amusing to watch, but nonetheless, it isn’t all that productive 😛

However, once I get the basic pattern down and start refining the technique, I absolutely love it. I also find that learning some of the bunkai as you go makes a huge difference in understanding what you’re doing (something emphasised by last week’s seminar), as it gives context to get a greater visualisation of what you’re trying to achieve. There’s something about getting to the heart and soul of kata that is extremely rewarding, even if I’ve only worked on relatively simple kata given the highest I’ve ever gotten to in either style of karate I’ve trained in is 6th kyu.

But back to kata – I’m currently learning heian nidan, which I’m finding to be quite enjoyable as it incorporates some very different techniques than you often encounter in your basic drills. The amount of shuto in the kata was initially a bit off-putting since my shuto is a bit rubbish (I blame my crappy stances :P), but I’m finding that by doing the kata, my shuto is gradually improving.

But to bring this rant back to some focus and Matthew’s blog, I was reading his excellent post on learning kata faster, and there are some really good pointers in there if, like me, you’re prone to temporary idiocy when learning a new kata 😛 I’ve actually picked up heian nidan much faster than I normally pick up a new kata, and I’ve found that some of the things I’ve been doing to help remember it are a lot of the principles Matthew discusses in his post. I’m going to keep it bookmarked so I can keep referring to it when I start to push beyond memorisation to technical execution of my current kata, and refer to it again when I learn my next kata following my next successful grading.

Still, I’ve been thinking – I should start throwing in more kata practice between classes, as I want to refine my technique and be able to progress at a good pace and training this only in class probably isn’t enough. We’ll see how I go.

Bloginated Friday, 20th March 2009 / Karate
Tag-isms: kata | Technique | tips

Last night I attended my first martial arts seminar, in this case looking at kata applications from a traditional Okinawan/Ryukyu perspective. The seminar was run by Renshi Jason Grifiths and organised by Sensei, and proved really interesting and worthwhile. Renshi is a student of Hanshi Patrick McCarthy, and Sensei has told us plenty about their training and background in class, so it was awesome to be able to have a training session with him. If you’re interested in checking out some of Hanshi’s work, Sensei posted a link to some videos on YouTube – click here to check them out. I haven’t taken the time to check them out yet, but I’ll have a look over the weekend to see how the contents from the training seminar might be reflected in the videos he’s posted.

Renshi had an interesting training background – akin to the adventures of Robert Twigger (see Angry White Pajamas, which is an excellent read BTW), he trained full-time and shared a place with his training partners while living in Japan. Definitely the old-school martial arts dream, and you could see how his dedication to his art was reflected in his form and knowledge – in addition to his amazing technique and form, his knowledge of how to manipulate the human anatomy and pressure points was an eye-opener. Once again, it shows that kata applications can be directed and transformed into incredibly focused, effective and direct practical application.

But I think I’m getting ahead of myself 😛 This was the first martial arts training seminar I’d attended, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. I rolled up a little bit early, did a bit of stretching and joined in on the conversation before class started. After warming up, Renshi started on the theoretical side of things whilst demonstrating the practical application on Sensei. We then partnered up for the rest of the evening, starting out with simple drills and gradually adding additional layers of complexity to the routines. The techniques we were doing were aimed more at the higher grades given the emphasis on forms from Bassai dai and Tekki, but it was enlightening to see the way movements from various kata can be translated into practical techniques.

For the evening, the majority of the applications were aimed at demonstrating chokes, holds and manipulating the body via biomechanics. The final form which aimed to demonstrate flow kata was really cool – it reminded me of the principle of sticking hands, whereby every technique aims to develop automatic reflexes by rolling between strikes and counters dynamically, but this time within a kata framework. I personally had no idea that karate featured so much in the way of chokes, gappling, holds and counter-techniques, so it really brought home that the secret of karate is to look into the kata – whatever you miss in your basic drills is covered within kata. It was also good to hear some of the theory behind differences in styles and the premise behind some of the variations in terms of technique.

While I reckon I was a bit rubbish at the drills last night, I still found it an excellent experience, and I’ll certainly be taking the principles taught during the session and translate them into my understanding of the kata I’m working on for my next grading (I’ve already started thinking of some of the deeper meanings behind some of the techniques!). Hopefully this is a sign of things to come as I continue training and have future opportunities to attend other seminars that might be relevant or interesting to me.

Thanks to Renshi for his time and insight during the session, Sensei for organising the seminar, Mitsi for being a patient training partner during the drills, and, arguably most importantly, to Wifey for being her usual awesome self in letting me run away for another evening this week and jump around in my white pajamas for a couple of hours 😉

Bloginated Friday, 13th March 2009 / Seminars
Tag-isms: chokes | grappling | kata | Seminars | Technique | training

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve done one of these!

Had training last night, went very well! It was extremely full-on, but rewarding. Sometimes when you head out to martial arts training you have spurts of flat-out exercise, and then by the end of it, you’re not feeling knackered; then you have the opposite, where despite the few breaks between drills, your gi is soaked all the way through with sweat, your muscles are getting achy, but despite it all you have that stupid look on yourself that says “Check out my awesomeness – I just jumped around in a pair of white pajamas and probably looked a bit on the unco side, but I’m exhausted and it was uber”. Last night’s training is closer to the latter – I tried to work really hard to improve my technique, though there were some points where I wasn’t sitting right in the socket on my leg and I was paranoid the leg was going to drop off, despite the fact I always strap it to my waist before I head out for training 😛

So yeah, excellent training. The only thing we didn’t cover was kata, as we’d run out of time to focus on it properly. I’ve decided that I’m going to squeeze in some extra kata practice over the next week, as I’m keen to get the pattern solid in my head so I can move beyond simple memorisation and start to focus on the quality of my technique, and from there, executing that same quality along with appropriate speed and kime. I normally take a while to solidify the pattern of a new kata, but I’ve been trying to really suss this out in my head. It helps that I’m doing pure shotokan, as there are plenty of vids of people demonstrating kata. In fact, a couple of weeks back I wanted to have a quick refresh of my kata, I looked it up on YouTube and tracked down a demonstration of it by Kanazawa-sensei, and was blown away by the technical proficiency of such an early kata in the shotokan syllabus. It’s bizarre, you think you know a kata and do a good job of it with your peers, but when you see your instructor or legendary figures like Kanazawa perform the same sequence, it really hits home how much more you can achieve with your kata.

But talk on kata could probably be left to a future blog. Besides, its getting late and I’m planning on getting into the office earlier than usual tomorrow, so I might call it a night. I’ll try and squeeze in another blog before next week’s training, but we’ll see how I go. If nothing else, expect another round-up next week along with my usual musings!

Bloginated Thursday, 5th March 2009 / Karate
Tag-isms: Karate | kata | Technique | training

Source: Gisoku no Jutsu/MySpace
Original post date: 8 February, 2007

Alrighty, a quick summary of last night’s training would be two words – kata and kumite. Was an excellent class – went through the usual warm-up and standard striking/blocking techniques, then we jumped straight into kata, and I’m really feeling solid with my saifa at the moment. It’s much stronger and my form is more controlled and better executed than it has been in ages. I’ve started going through it when I get to the training hall before class, and sometimes in the 5 minute break we take in the middle of each session (very handy that – we train for an hour and a half, so it’s a great chance to grab a quick drink before getting back into it). Sensei K commented on the quality and strength of my form and suggested that we look at going through at the next grading, which isn’t for another two months (last grading was actually on Monday night). I think June would be better, as it will give me more time to not only continue to refine my kata, but also to work on my technique in general, and get me up to speed with sparring.

This brings me to other chunk of the class – kumite (i.e. sparring), and lots of it, and with the senseis at that! I learnt to develop some new parrying tachniques and continue to work on how to move around that is advantageous for my condition, and I felt really good about it after last night’s training. I managed to sustain a foot to the belly (and to my credit, I didn’t have to take a moment to recover my breath and sparred throughout) and my left forearm is a little sore from taking the force of another kick, but it’s all good, and it’s been a while since I’ve been pushed hard whilst sparring. The good thing about the aforementioned blows is that the first one re-iterated the necessity of keeping my belly thoroughly guarded, and the latter should teach me to parry or shift the weight of the kick away from my body, rather than just try and absorb it!

So yeah, that’s pretty much last night’s class. I’m heading over to the in-laws for dinner tonight, so I’ll have a chat to my father-in-law about weight training and stepping things up, which I mentioned in a previous blog. This will also be the last class I’ll have for the next fortnight – next Wednesday is Valentine’s, so I’ll be spending that one with my other half, and will return to training the week after that; I’m hoping by then Sensei R will be able to let me know what Monday classes are happening so I can start training with Hamez and Jyastin-kun, whilst still keeping up with my Wednesday night training. Oh, and speaking of Jyastin-kun, I saw him Friday last week, and he’s got a few weeks off work soonish, so he’ll be coming along to Wednesday nights for a couple of weeks. That’ll be awesome 🙂

So yeah, there won’t be a karate-class update next week, so I might fill it in with a backstory, either about karate, or something else to do with my leg, or both. We’ll see how it goes!

Bloginated Thursday, 12th February 2009 / Karate, MySpace blogs, Technique
Tag-isms: 2007 | Karate | kata | kumite | Technique | training

Source: Gisoku no Jutsu/MySpace
Original post date: 1 February, 2007

Training last night was awesome. As opposed to some of the prior classes we’ve had lately, last night’s session was really full on, with lots of drills, running, crunches, all the good stuff. We spent a lot of time on training ours kicking, which is really good, because it’s been a while since we worked hard on them.

In addition to all the usual gear, one of the instructors proceeded to take individuals aside and running them through their current kata their training in. For those unaware of what kata is, to quote Wikipedia:

..> ..>

Anywho, Sensei K went through Saifa with me a few times and helped me get the opening forms really solid and focused, so I don’t feel anywhere near as sloppy as I have been while working on it. But the really awesome thing that happened last night was a technique he demonstrated that involves using your upper body to control your hips and legs.

I’m not sure if this will make sense, but I’ll try to describe it anyhows – by quickly drawing your arm back to your hip (as if you were preparing to do a normal punch), you can generate enough energy to quickly bring your front leg back and turn your hips so that you’re standing the usual 45-degree angle to your opponent, left side forward. This is useful in that you can use this energy to imediately throw your other hand (i.e. the one that hasn’t been retracted to your hip) as either a jab or an outside hooking block very fast. The trick of course is learning how to control this energy to avoid swinging your hips too far, too fast to throw you off-balance, which for me is going to be my task here.

Okay, so that established, why is this discovery so important? Well, because I lack a foot/ankle/calf/knee on my left leg, I have a much reduced capacity to utilise my hips and abdomen to draw power from in karate; as any martial artist knows, utilising your legs, hips, waist and stomach muscles are what generates the incredible power behind a great deal of attacks, if not possibly all of them. Because I lack an essential component in this makeup, by learning to use my upper body to compensate for this means I now have the potential for drawing out greater power in my strikes and enable me to move and counter much faster than I could previously have achieved. There is of course going to be a long learning process in order to learn to use my body thus, but I’m confident this will mark an important point in developing greater prociency in my karate.

It’s pretty logical when you think about it, though – I use my upper body a lot to ease the stress on my right leg in every day life – I’ll use my arms instinctively when going up or down stairs, when standing up from the floor, I’ll do as much work as possible with my arms to move my weight, and probably stacks of other stuff I can’t pick out that I do simply as instinct.

So, last night was definitely enlightening, as hyperbolic as that sounds, and I’m looking forward to refining the technique over time, especially when using it in kumite (sparring) and learning how to utilise it in my standard forms and kata.

Bloginated Thursday, 12th February 2009 / Karate, MySpace blogs, Prosthesis or amputee stuff
Tag-isms: 2007 | Karate | kata | prosthesis | tips | training