Improved my Defense in Class Today

I love it when I learn something new in class. And with this blog, I can hammer it home in my mind.  This morning was a candidate sparring class. Translation: it was a class only for people trying to earn their black belt or a higher rank black belt this year.

Master KC had some sparring drills where one side plays defense and the other side attacks. Pretty standard. The novelty today was that the defensive players were NOT supposed to back up.  They were supposed to either crowd in or crowd in and angle.  This was new to me and very cool. 

Usually, if someone comes at me, I back up. When I'm superquick, I can back up faster than they can advance or even angle out in ways that befuddle my attacker. More often than not, I seem to back up into an optimum spot for people to kick me.  With this moving-in-approach, when the going gets tough, the idea was to move in closer and then angle one way or the other. By staying real close, it's very hard for the other person to get get off a good kick or even, a good jab. When you stay close, you really only need to worry about crosses and hooks. (Our school doesn't allow uppercuts, knees, or elbows so this get-close defense works exceptionally well).

A great class this morning. The second half of class was pure sparring and at full speed, I found that crowding in a viable defense and a useful addition to my arsenal.

The other big focus of class today was footwork. I like it. I could do a lot more footwork drills. Today was simple step and slides forward and back with a little work on angling with footwork.  There's room to work on how, when shelled up and on your heels, to still have good footwork. It's a challenge for me that I find myself flat on my backfoot defending and unable to move since I'm flatfooted and hunkered down on my back leg. I know conceptually what to do and that starts with, don't get into that position. I'm not sure what drill would help me isolate and solve that problem.


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A Candidate for Black Belt, Again!

I'm now an official candidate to earn my second degree black belt, potentially in May 2010 .

During my period as a candidate, I will shake a lot of hands, make some speeches, kiss some babies, and plaster the neighborhood with posters.

Just kidding. I'm not that type of candidate. At our school, the earning of a black belt is less of a single big test and more of a marathon. So during my nine months as a candidate, my marathon effort will involve:

• Making it to class three to four times per week
• Assistant teaching a few times a week
• Running 3x a week maintaining less than 16 minute two mile time
• Diligently doing my extras (100 pushups, abs, squats, and kicks) several times per week.
• And most importantly, making it to the weekly candidate class and performing well

In any case, that's the plan. Last Saturday was my first candidate class of the cycle. By eight am, I was in the dojo stretching and reviewing my katas. It felt great being back in the very high energy intense candidate classes. Class went well although I had forgotten how strenuous the cardio can be and how many times in one class I got right to the exhaustion point. My run time was fine. Sunday, I went to the gym and worked out and urg, something slipped in my back. urg urg urg.

I called my chiropractor and had him put in back in place which he did three times more during the week. By the end of the week, my hips and back seemed to be staying in place so this morning, a week after my first Saturday candidate class, I went to my second one. Today included some chuck katas which I didn't really have down. We worked chuck form one, two, and XMA chuck form. There was some bugo which I felt good on. And a timed two mile which I did in 15:21, easily under the required 16:00 but way short of my target of getting to 14:00 by the end of cycle.

All in all, it's great fun to be a Candidate. With a little cooperation from my back, shoulders, and feet, (plus from my job and family) it should be a wonderful cycle. How did I get so lucky?

PS - Anybody want to write up chuck form two for me? Anyone have a good video? Anyone want to perform?

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