tags: GKR
GKR: Getting more complicated
July 13th, 2005, by Rich.
Until now we’ve been going to karate once a week, easing ourselves into it slowly. Last week we took two classes, and this week we’ll be doing the same.
We’ve recently cancelled out gym membership in favour of (a) doing more diverse things and (b) not spending so much on a subscription that we don’t make the most of: admittedly I was going to circuits on average four times a week, but this is still not enough to warrant the cost. I digress; Karate is one of the more diverse things and the extra money allows us to do it more.
This week’s classes we’ve been practicing all the blocks we know so far, and the punches and the kicks, all practiced from a straight stance.
We also practiced 1st kata with several variations: no hands, shouting on every strike, shouting on every block, shouting on everything, and the somewhat different but useful, wibbly wobbly kata, where you slump and wibble through it to cool down, and the more relaxed nature helps improve your stance.
The other thing we seemed to do a lot of was turning through 180 and 90 degrees to the left and right. Cross the back leg over, turn 180, move the back leg in and out at a tangent to it’s original course, turn 90, repeat 4 times and you end up back where you started. Then, change stance, adn do it all in the opposite direction.
One thing we do need to do is 1st kata in reverse. i.e. begin by blocking to the right rather than the left.
Sensei John also told us we coudl go for a grading in 4 weeks. Unfortunately we’re already booked in to the whitfield volleyball tournament so we’ll miss our first opportunity to go for a belt, but this won’t affect our progress so it’s not a problem or a setback, just a delay.
As we exited one of the orange belts commented that our combined Kata is getting really good and a little “frightening”.
September 21st, 2005 at 2:31 pm
Hiya, found your article by accident, Just joined GKR in Burton Upon Trent, very impressed with attitude and atmosphere of club.
Regards
Andy
September 27th, 2005 at 7:57 pm
Hi, good to see othter people enjoying GKR. My son and i have joined recently in southampton, but are having trouble learning the sequence of the first kata. do you know where i can get information to have at home, to allow us to learn it more proficiently. other than that it is a really enjoyable night and i feel better for joining.
many thanks
Lew
September 27th, 2005 at 8:19 pm
Hi Lew, the best online instruction I’ve seen so far is on gkrkarate.org, it goes through each stance, strike and block individually, and includes a handy foot chart. Rich
April 18th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
Most people round here think GKR stands for Go Kanga Ryu. Did I read you right, an orange belt training to be a sempai?
April 18th, 2006 at 5:10 pm
Hi Paul, yes you probably did read it right, but you may be inferring too much, so two questions:
July 25th, 2006 at 9:25 pm
Grrrrrrr i have been to 18 classes in total, over a 2 month period and i still need to follow someone who can do 1st kata to get it right!! I have jus turned 40.. do you think it’s my age?! lol :P
September 14th, 2006 at 11:59 am
Probably on other Karate forums, or on Kenshukai sites. They just want to spoil people having a good time. Paul’s probably one of those people :p
September 14th, 2006 at 12:51 pm
Mandie, it’s probably got more to do with your method of learning, or your method of recalling than just “your age” Try other ways of breaking the kata down, find patterns that you remember. Tagyoku Shodan is “just two sequences that you repeat (i.e. “turn, block, punch” is used six times in total and “punch punch punch” happens twice), and you do use those two patterns whilst visiting every extremity of a big capital “I” shape just the once. Find a memory trick that works for you, then once you can practice it, it will become second nature and you’ll wonder why you found it so hard. Draw big numbers on A4 sheets and lay them out, then practice just using your legs to walk the pattern; then add just the punches - do it bit by bit and it will click into place.
September 14th, 2006 at 8:14 pm
Hey! what’s this thing about Age = rising?
Some of us out here are 39 and holding!
September 15th, 2006 at 6:52 am
Heh, that’s a curious side effect of my Japanese translation plugin. When it sees words that it recognizes it inserts the translation, but it’s not very clever, so when it sees the “age” pronounced like “aggie” it assumes it’s Japanese so adds the “rising” translation. This is handy when describing things like “age uke”, but as illustrated above, without context the results are a little strange.