I was going to write, but then I fell asleep

2013-04-17 08:11:00

Hoooo boy, last night's training was good! Despite my hay fever I soldiered on and because of that I was dead tired when I came home. I managed to unpack my equipment bag, but nothing more. The moment my head hit the pillow I was g.o.n.e. Boom. I showered at the office just now ;)

Last week and yesterday class was led by Jouke-sempai, who was in the Netherlands for last weekend's EKC. Where we usually practice upwards of six techniques a night in 2x(2x5) bouts, he now had us repeating the same technique in a 2x(5min) setup. This dramatically lowered the amount of different things we got to try, but there are two huge benefits:

1. Muscle memory
2. The time to reflect

During kihon practice we focused on men (both oki and hayai), hayai kote and kote-men and finally hiki waza. The following points were made:

• When receiving a kote strike, do not simply turn the shinai to the left. Instead raise your shinai as if deflecting a strike to men. This opens up your kote in a much more credible sense
• This is why we practiced hayai kote in two ways. First we pressure and simply go for kote. Then we pressure for men and when motodachi opens we strike kote.

The past weeks, Hillen-sempai and Ton-sensei reprimanded me for my horrible hayai kote. I keep going in arcs, which messes up the practice we're doing. Yesterday I got the same reprimand from Miyahara-sensei. She had me do it over and over again, until I started showing something resembling a good kote-strike. Straight and through the center, no need to raise it high, no need to go wide.

Tsuyuguchi-sensei spent a lot of his time explaining hiki waza to me. Most of it was in Japanese (probably because I had given the impression that I speak it) so I missed big parts of it. However, the essence of what he tried to convey is this:

1. Keep your hands low and lock the tsuba.
2. Tsubazeriai is all about the hips, push from the hips.
3. Put strong pressure against your opponent and push away.
4. Did I say it's about the hips? Because you need to work from the hips!

I really appreciate the effort he put into explaining these things to me! It's the first time we've really spoken, so I went up to him after class to thank him again. Point #3 is a bit confusing for me, because I have often been told not to put any pressure in tsubazeriai. Not until you actually push off for your strike.

In jigeiko I had the chance to spar with Miyahara-sensei, who went over hayai kote with me some more. Try, try, try and try again. We also tried a number of other techniques, with her seemingly focussing on hayai men and debana kote. I also started jigeiko with Onno-sempai, but I had to bow out early because of my dizziness (thankyouverymuch hay fever). I spent the last ten minutes of class helping out our kouhai Gaby in practicing her kote strikes and footwork.

I haven't written much about kendo the past two months. Here's what happened.

• I missed kendo three weeks in a row because of work and health issues at home.
• The past two weeks I have spent 20-30 minutes of class in Almere teaching the beginners' group. We focus on footwork, on the proper striking posture and on how hard one should be striking.
• I'm nowhere near good yet, but I am very happy to notice small things about my kendo that are improving, despite the many glaring HUGE things I'm doing wrong :)
• One suggestion that Hillen-sempai made for practicing my hayai kote, is to use the side of a door, or a door frame. Stand in kamae with my shinai up to the door itself, then make a strike as close along the side as possible. No arcs, no wide swings.

kilala.nl tags: kendo, sports,

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