We were introduced to:

1. Sanchin Dachi
2. Nekoashi Dachi
3. Kokutsu Dachi – this style will be most familar to anyone familiar with the work of Hong Kong Phooey, who often adopted this as his stance of choice.

Of all of these Kokutsu Dachi was possibly the hardest, but all of them feel strange. We’ve spent every lesson so far in the parallel stances, or Zenkutsu Dachi, so adding three new ways to apportion weight was very strange, and the reason Kokutsu Dachi was so stange is that it’s pretty much the same as Zenkutsu Dachi, but with the weight reversed, so it’s easy to mistakenly lapse into “normality”.

Combination

We did a few interesting combinations this week too, the most fun (difficult) being

1. Begin in Zenkutsu Dachi,
2. Move the front foot across the body and turn 180,
3. Ushiro Geri, kicking towards the direction we were just facing
4. Then without putting the foot down, place the foot behind and across the body
5. Turn 180

Immediate Combos

One thing that is particularly nice about getting beyond the complete basics is that the practice gets more interesting because it is done in strange combinations.

Leg work and kicking.

One thing that’s apparent about Aaron is that he’s a lot younger than Sensei’s John or Duncan, so his approach is more energetic. One of his more enthusiastic exercises was to prepare for Mae Geri, and then (keeping the raised knee up at all times) perform a hop, then two hops in quick succession, then a three, then four, and then a rest (still with the knee up). Then do 2, 4, 6 and 8 hops, then another knee-up-rest. Then 4, 8, 12, 16 and 20 hops.

Then change legs.

That’s 90 hops per leg, after which we went into kicking practice.

This made the kicks particularly hard work and also quite messy, because our major muscle groups were already burning, so the supporting muscles had more work to do. I was ok for most, but was, for the first time in a karate class, a little short of breath by the end of the kicks.

Aaron will be starting his own class soon, aimed at young kids, who hopefully have more energy than we more senior students.

After the group warmup, 30 seconds of running, and a couple (literally only a couple) of pressups, we went into the now familiar 180 and 90 degree turns (to left and to right). One of the group was having real trouble grasping the whole thing, moving far too much, and moving the wrong foot; the rule is, the back foot always moves first, and the back foot always becomes the front foot in the next stance. He got it quickly once that was desccribed.

The early stance work forshadowed the main focus of the day: stances during kata.

Fast Kata

It has been said several times, that “the fella who invented the Taigyoku Shodan has done it in n seconds”; where n has varied between 6 and 9 depending on who’s re-telling the stiry. Sensei John has also described how the senior class can execute it together (and properly) in 18 seconds.

So this week, we added a new Kata Variation – Fast Kata. On the first run (no pun intended) we took 26 seconds.

Lesson of the week: there’s no point doing the kata fast if you just bobble around like Corporal Jones of Dad’s Army.

Here we had small movie-plot twist: stances that should be strong and low were (in some students and after several moves) becoming narrower and thus, weaker. There was also irregularity in the deviation because some people were successfully managing to stay low with right handed stances, but becoming unstable when in left handed ones (and vice-versa).

Concentrating more on the stances we still managed to improve on the second and third runs, reducing the time to 22 and then 19 seconds.

Of particular note was that the group governed it’s pace well, keeping together through the whole kata on each occasion, even with the added pressure of the clock.

After warm up we’re now going straight through the basic blocks and strikes, and then also going through the open hand moves. It became apparent tonight that nobody else in the class had gone through the knife-hand blocks and strikes before (or they wouldn’t admit to it) so adding the second weekly class has definitely put us a little ahead of the group that started together.

Combinations

We did some moving combinations this week, moving up and down the hall in Zenkutsu Dachi performing:

1. Ushiro Tsuki, Mae Geri then Uchi Uke.
2. Mawashi Geri, Ushiro Chudan Tsuki

We also extended the Corners Exercise from previous weeks to include a Mawashi Geri. This made it a lot harder than it already was because of the significant extra movement.

Face to Face

We’ve also done a little more face to face work. Initially doing the straightforward:

1. Jodan Tsuki blocked by Kake Uke
2. Jodan Tsuki blocked by Uchi Uke

Before adding a block and response so that:

1. when A throws a Jodan Tsuki
2. B blocks it with an Uchi Uki, and then,
3. B responds with a Jodan Tzuki from the other arm.

This nicely illustrates the correct arm to block with since you either open up the opponent’s entire flank, or end up face to face with arms flailing.

Fitness

We’ve also started adding a little fintess work to the session (a doddle compared to the 2 hours of circuit classes I was doing during marathion training) but fun nonetheless. We typically split into two groups and line up at opposite ends of the Dojo before runing past each other and executing 5 of whatever technique sensei calls out, followed by 5 press ups or 5 sit ups. This continues until the less fit people look wobbly and start to lose coordination (and determination), which isn’t very long.

Grading Date

The other news tonight is that the grading has been moved again, though it’s still not confirmed. This means that we may not be able to attend, again. Apparently there’s a problem finding a venue, which is a bit lame really. Sensei is wondering aloud whether he could get a small grading set up at the senior class so that we can attend. The only thing stopping us at the moment is that we’re not yellow belts.

Recall

A final word – as there’s been more to write about it’s also harder to remember everything that happens in classes, which conversely means that writing it all down is probably a very good thing!

The second thing we noticed was Aaron had advanced from green to blue belt (he’d obviously gone to the same grading as Tony last weekend). So Portsmouth is now a little more colourful. When we began at our own dojo, only orange belts were in evidence, one of those belts (Tony) has now advanced to green, and in the “other” dojo there are now two blues (because there was someone we’d not met before there last night).

Sensei Duncan, for that was his name, began the class with the usual bow in, and Mike took warm up. What was immediately apparent was that Duncan’s classes have more chat and banter. This is probably a reflection of the fact that our class all started together so we’ve maintained a bit of that newbie shyness and respect as a group.

Strike and block with stances

Following warm up we normally go into strikes, then blocks, then stances, going through slow, and medium pace before doing hard and fast. Occasionally later on in the sessions we will go through some combinations, sometimes in Heko Dachi and other times travelling forward and back. Tonight, however, we started straight out combining blocks, stances and strikes in a way we hadn’t before.

Starting in Heko Dachi we dropped back to Zenkutsu Dachi with a Jodan Age Uke over the front leg, followed by a Ushiro Tsuki. Then as we change stance we repeat it – with the other leg and arm. This was a concetration exercise as much as anything else and worked hard on our coordination.

Maintaining Zenkutsu Dachi throughout we did other block and srike combinations with the block always being first and done with the arm over the front leg:

• Uchi Uke with Jodan Tsuki
• Soto Uke with Ura Uchi
• Gedan Barai with Hiji Ate, and
• Gedan Uke with Mawashi empi

We followed this with some advacnced blocks and strikes, but again instead of staying in heiko dachi we would begin in kiba dachi for the first few strikes/blocks and then move into Shiko Dachi. We did the following strikes:

• Haito uchi
• soto shuto uchi and
• uchi shuto uchi

and the following blocks:

• chuge uke
• kake uke and
• mawashi uke

Kick combos in long stance

Having thoroughly tested our brains and coordination it was now time to test our legs. We initially focused on Mae Geri, and worked through the kick slowly. Then instead of one kick per count we moved to 6 repititions of 2 kicks per count, and then 3 kicks per count. We did the same with Ushiro Geri, but only for 2 kicks per count. We’re finding the kicks the most difficult thing at the moment, so it was great to focus on them in this way. I’m sure as our legs get stronger and our balance better we will find them easier, however the movements still feel quite alien.

Looking Kata

Following some leg stretching we went into taigyoku shodan, but with a twist. Normally each count represents a block or strike, however this time in addition to the blocks and strikes being counted, everytime there is a change of direction one count is taken up by a look to the intended direction of travel. With the looking kata, wheverver someone flinches or makes a move when they should be simply looking, we yame, start from the beginning. This exercise reinforces the importance of looking.

A kata is a representation of moves associated with defending yourself against several imaginary opponents. Without looking you are simply going through the motions without appreciating the reasoning behind why, and the kata then turns into some obscure form of japanese line dancing. It took us several attempts to get this right but it served not only as good lesson, but also a good opportunity to fine tune the kata in time for our grading.

Yellow stripes

Following the seiza those of us who had yet to officially receive our promotion, from 10th to 9th Kyu, were awarded our ‘yellow stripes’. This is recognition of our learning to date, and doesn’t require any official grading like promotion to yellow belt would. On receiving this accolade we received a certificate and a yellow stripe ribbon. This would attach nicely to the white belt of our Gi (if we had one). We can grade for our 8th Kyu (yellow belt) without wearing a Gi, but we are not allowed to wear our yellow belt until we actually get our Gi. The canvas/cotton decision will probably be made once we’ve been graded to yellow belt, which apparently could be as soon as next week – watch this space…

The variations we’ve tried so far include:

• slow kata
• medium kata
• fast kata
• legs only kata (with hands behind back)
• self paced (Hajime) kata
• Kiai on every Uke
• Kiai on every Geri
• Kiai on everything
• Wibbly wobbly kata (very relaxed with smooth movement and no tensioning)

This week, Sensei added a new variation.

• Mokuso Kata

Going through an entire kata with your eyes closed is not something to be done without supervision, but it’s a good learning experience. Whilst the whole class closes its eyes, the Sensei and Sempai watch to ensure nobody gets a clout or hits a wall.

If stances and movement are correct, then (for Mokuso Tagioku Shodan at least) after the 8 turns, 8 blocks and 12 strikes, the class should end up back where it started, and all facing the same direction. We didn’t do too badly.

What’s particularly good about it is that you become more aware of making every movement and stance correct, and also focus on using audible cues to affirm position and orientation.

By day, our dojo is a nursery school, so thankfully there’s no shortage of exceedingly small chairs. With one chair per person, the chair exercises were as follows:

Mae Geri with Chair

When standing in Heiko Dachi we placed the chair in front of us (with the seat facing) so that when the kick was fully outstretched we were kicking above and beyond the back of the chair. This illustrated clearly that not only must the preparation be right, but the return must also be high and distinct from the placing of the foot on the floor.

Mawashi Geri with Chair

Having turned the chair through 90 degrees we practiced Mawashi Geri, this time using the top of the back of the chair as a target, rather than an obstacle. The object is to aim for the lip of the chair, but not to make contact; stopping just short of it and controlling the kick at it’s fullest extent. The chair was then reversed so we could practice the other leg.

Yoko Geri with Chair

For Yoko Geri we brought the chair to our side, but facing away from us, then kicked over it. This again was a strong illustration of how to prepare and return from a kick.

Ushiro Geri with Chair

Finally, in an exercise similar to the two-person Ushiro Geri we did with Sensei Simon two weeks ago, we stood in front of the chair, and used the little hole as a heel target. Performing the kick with balanced slow accuracy was more important than a fast kick.

New Strikes and Blocks

Two weeks ago we were unable to attend the yellow belt grading, but several of our class did attend and now have their belts (though they’re waiting for their Gi’s to arrive before wearing them). This week the yellow belts (and those of us who would/should have attended the same grading, began learning some new strikes and blocks.

Whilst GKR focuses on basics, we had until now been focusing on the most basic subset. The new techniques included:

• Soto Shuto Uchi
• Uchi Shuto Uchi
• Chuge Uke
• Kake Uke
• Mawashi Uke

Four of these five are open hand techniques, which we understand are not taught initially in order to concentrate on core muscle memory and to help limit the potential for inadvertent finger snagging when beginning simple kumite.

We did each of them very slowly, without going in to too much detail about technique. This was similar to the process we followed in learning the basic moves, start with a general idea using broad brushstrokes, and then refine it. Obviously the refinement bit will take a while.

Corners Exercise

A new exercise was introduced tonight, quite a tiring one this because we did approximately rokujyu repititions.
From Heiko Dachi we moved out feet to two shoulder widths apart and entrered Zenkutsu (only rotating our feet, and orienting our bodies to the left hand front corner of the dojo.

The exercise involved repeatedly executing a ushiro tsuki, then reorienting to the opposite front corner and again executing a ushiro tsuki. This meant we were throwing a right arm reverse punch to the left corner of the dojo, and a left arm reverse punch to the right, with the appropriate shift in stance from left to right and back each time.

After around sanjyu of these, Sensei changed the combination to ushiro tsuki, mae geri, chodan tsuki, ushiro tsuki. We then did another sanjyu, getting faster after each jyu.

Cotton and Canvas Gi’s

Whilst we were having a little water break I asked Sensei John a few things including “what kind gi might be most suitable for a beginner, cotton or canvas”. Since he’d not used canvas, his vote went for cotton. He did venture an opinion on the noise issue though. Canvas gi’s make a pleasing thwack sound when they are moved briskly (akin to whipping up the duvet when making the bed, and rather reminiscent of top-notch Hollywood sound effects). Sensei John pointed out that if you’re concentrating on the noise you make, you’re not concentrating (a) on your technique or (b) during kumite, on how your opponent is preparing to attack you. So for Sensei John, the pleasure of the audio feedback is not a plus, but a potential diversion.

Prior to this I’d also asked the wider community about Gi’s, and had some useful feedback.

Breathing Exercises

Sensei John brought up the subject of breathing exercises, and checked if he’d covered it at all. Now, previously I’ve heard of the the whole, in through the noise-out through the mouth “thing”, but it’s never made any sense to me. Sensei John said he envisages the inhalation going through the nose, then around his head and through his body, whereas the exhalation is an exhaust from the centre, so the nose mouth separation can help induce calm through focusing on self-familiarity if in a stressfull situation (such as meeting multiple undesirables in a dimly lit back street). Of course, this doesn’t take account of sniffles in the winter and hayfever in the summer, which is the main reason why I’ve never twigged the practical side of it, but conceptually at least, it makes sense now.

This was probably the biggest class we’d been in. There were a signficantly large number of white belts, probably due to a whole bunch of new people attending their first class.

Rich took a particularly good warm up, and included everything he needed to in the right order. The interference caused by mirroring the class (as you face them) is a challenge still, understandably as it takes a lot of practise to get right. It’s caused by the person at the front instructing the class to use their right arm, but as that person is facing the class they have to demonstrate using their left arm. It’s a bit like the Stroop effect or patting your head and rubbing your tummy at the same time. Sensei John tends to get this right, but amusingly when he turns round to demonstrate a technique to the class and faces the same way as them, he has to undo this training, and it’s almost possible to see the cogs whirring as he works out that left really is left. GKR certainly tests your mental agility as well as your physical agility.

It was interesting to see the new people in training. We went through Taigyoku Shodan, several times, with arms and without arms. I found this a really useful opportunity to practise my stances as the pace was slow enough to work on making sure my feet were two shoulder widths long, and one shoulder width wide, my back leg straight and my back straight for long fighting stance.

The new folks had a little trouble, after all, the turning in first kata is enough to begin with, let alone learning all the moves, but they all seemed to do really well. Its good to see how we must have been at the start of our training, and how quickly we’ve come along. Although the orange and green belt demonstration of Bassai Dai highlighted just how far there is to go.

With John we concentrated on more confusing combinations (like last week), in a continuing push towards combining any move, on any side of the body, with any other move, rather than becoming reliant on a left-follows-right-follows-left technique. Combinations included:

• Jodan Tzuki, followed by a Jodan Age Uke, both with the left arm, then both with the right.
• Chudan Tzuki, followed by an Uchi Uke (again 2 lefts followed by 2 rights).
• Chudan Tzuki, followed by a Soto Uke.

With Simon we concentrated on improving kicks, with focus on:

• technique

  For Mae Geri our positions were all a little top heavy, so we all had to sag into the preparation position a little more, with the knee raised as high as possible, this made thrusting the hips forward to power the kick a lot easier.

  We were also introduced to a similar technique for improving our Yoko Geri which involved tipping the hip facing the opponent up during the preparation phase so as to affect a more direct horizontal strike.

• balance

  This was hard work… Beginning in Heiko Dachi, prepare for a right leg Mae Geri, strike, and return to the prepard position, i.e. knee up, supporting leg bent a little, then turn 90 degrees to the left, keeping on 1 foot, strike again, then turn, strike again, then turn. Repeat for at least two full rotations (8 kicks), before changing legs and rotating the other way

• accuracy

  Here we concentrated, with a partner, on Ushiro Geri, one doing the kicking, the other providing a visual target (just outside of striking distance). The important thing was that the kick was central and that toes are kept pointing straight downwards, height can come with time, but horizontal accuracy is harder to learn.

Golden nugget of the day: The preparation is as important as the execution.

We’re going to use these for doing slow deliberate practice strikes and blocks. We hope that the addition of the weight to the basic practice will help in two ways

1. Build primary muscle memory
2. Strengthen the supporting muscle groups

Having used them a couple of times they appear quite suitable for their purpose – not too large, with no corners or sharp edges to catch, so hopefully they’ll be worthwhile.

Open Hand

Everything we need to know for yellow belt uses closed hand techniques, so that whilst learning sparring basics there is less risk of broken fingers.

In time, I expect we’ll also want weighted gloves for practicing open hand techniques. We’re only being gently introduced to open-hand as a “future concept” by Sensei John at the moment, and that’s because we see the higher belts doing it and so ask questions about it.

So we were doing:

1. Jodan Tzuki, followed by a Jodan Age Uke, both with the left arm, then both with the right.
2. Chudan Tzuki, followed by an Uchi Uke (again 2 lefts followed by 2 rights).
3. Chudan Tzuki, followed by a Soto Uke.
4. Gedan Tzuki , followed by a Gedan Uke – this one in particular requires a lot of movement of the wrist to do slowly and properly.

We did a few rounds of turning through 180 and 90 degrees with a reverse punch, however, the orange belts, bless ‘em, couldn’t keep themselves in time, so the whole thing was shambolic. It was far better last Friday when we managed to go both forward and reverse around four times (at 100%).

We also did a little movement this week, moving forward and punching, and moving back and punching – though Emma and I found ourselves reverting to Boxing cover when we did this.

The boxing guard is very different to karate because the weight, size and padding of boxing gloves affords their use as a barrier, so the guard is high. In karate, you must protect the head, body and legs, so the guard is lower, and pushed away from the body so that incoming strikes can be intercepted earlier.

The other movement training we did was new. Beginning in Heiko Dachi, perform a Soto Uke, then bringing both arms up to a level front guard before stepping forward into Han Zenkutsu Dachi (with the same side leg that just blocked), performing an Ura Uchi , and then back to a full reset.

The first grading approaches, for some.

Most people from our class will be going for their first grading this weekend (we’re missing it because of a prior arrangement to attend the Whitfield Volleyball tournament). To pass from white to yellow belt it’s necessary to know the basic punches, kicks and blocks (though you don’t have top do them that well) and also to know the pattern for the first kata, which also, you don’t have to do brilliantly, get get the legs and shapes right.

Sensai John has us pegged as instructors of the future, and so is letting us get some practise in front of the group by taking the warm up. He has invited us to the Instructors class on Sundays once we have our yellow belts. This makes the fact we are going to miss the grading because of the Whitefield volleyball tournament very annoying, and a potential business trip may scupper my chances of getting to the next grading; but, all in good time.

The Friday night session has fewer white belts and more coloured belts in attendance, and this week we got to do some funky new intermediate level blocks (Mawashi Uke and Chuge Uke) usually restricted to those who have already got their yellow belts. We also did some more combination work too, for example a head block, followed by a stomach level punch, and then an inside hooking block. We did various mixtures of blocks and attacks using the same arm, including head level block followed by foward sweeping block which involves a lot of thought in the transistion

Whilst we were doing this the higher grades were sparring. We watched a green and orange belt for a time, and I realised that my current concern that I’m not doing enough CV exercise is soon going to be allayed once I have my yellow belt and start sparring. It looks both physically and mentally challenging. Physically because the amount of movement – you have to be very light on your toes or your opponent is going to going to get you. And mentally challenging as you have to constantly read your opponent so you can block their attacks, and when you attack yourself you have to maintain control, and attack without contact. As Sensai John said last night, it’s easy to go and lay into someone, but far more difficult to throw a punch and stop 2 inches from them.

Sensai John also asked how our legs were doing. I’m certainly feeling and seeing the benefit (which is a most pleasant, welcomed consequence, in a relatively short space of time). However this is not just an aesthetic difference, last night my kicks certainly felt much more controlled and stable than normal so I can see improvement there too (although I think some of this was due to Tony’s consideration when taking the mixed group through the kicks). I hope this has a knock on effect on my volleyball too…

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”.

This week we were introduced to travelling kick combinations, using
Mae Geri and
Mawashi Geri alternately whilst moving forwards and backwards.

We went through both the
first kata and
second kata, which use almost identical patterns, and then we were introduced to the first few steps of
third kata.

We’re going to try and fit an extra class in each week from now on. Going once a week is OK to begin with, but we need to get a little more experience before we can start to practice together at home and know we’re not going to injure ourselves. Sensei John has also suggested we attend the Sunday
Sempai training class, which sounds attractive, both because we’d learn more by being surrounded by many more experienced practitioners, but also because once qualified we’d get to ditch the coloured belts and have a stripey one instead.

So, Tuesday, it was actually me that got to go out to the front of the class and tell them all what to do, and have them all respond with enthusiastic hai’s as I instructed them to lift their knees up, chop their legs, etc.

Most enjoyable. We also did our first one on one hitting, kicking and blocking. It became immediately obvious why one technique is important. Block badly and the block hurts more than the thing you’re trying to stop.

Naturally we thought we’d write about the experience. So today we introduce the GKR category. We understand so far that GKR is a non-contact karate, which emphasises basic techniques and patterns, with a strong community focus, so it’s an ideal introductory style: as we learn more we’ll write about it.

By the way, the literal translation of the “Go Kan Ryu” is “Hard Complete School”.