Class led by Brad. Stretch and kihon blocks, with a focus session on kokutsudachi (back stance). Went through Empi a few times, then finished with ippon kumite.
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Class with Ivan. 100 cuts to warm up, then we spent the rest of the time working on the partner drills from progression steps 1 – 5.
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Class with Sal, Steven, Joshua, Elijah, Dalton and Ryan. Stretch and requirements. I supervised Dalton and Ryan, and finished by instructing them on The Tradition. After the break, we had one on one matches.
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Today I demonstrated several iai as part of a Kendo exhibition for the cultural awareness day at the mall. Ivan was unable to make it. I lead our demonstration, performing kneeling iai 1 and 7b, standing iai 1, 2, and 7, and the jo kata. A couple Japanese students abroad also demonstrated their sport kendo Kirikaeshi in full bogu.
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Class led by Brad. Stretch followed by Basai several times through. Finished with ippon kumite.
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Class with Sal, Steven, Joshua, Elijah and Dalton. First class back from the break. Stretch and requirements. Worked with Dalton first, then reviewed a couple of Joshua’s moves. After a break, we worked on stance and movement, unobstructed at first, then adding altered terrain. I then split the dojo and gave Sal one half while I took the other half, doing unarmored altered terrain parry with each student (me first, then passed over to Sal). Finished with Balance 1 & 2.
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Class led by Brad. Warm up, then a full review of kata (taikioko 1- 3, heian 1 – 5, basai, tekki), then all the kata again in mirror form. Finished with sanbon kumite.
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I competed in the Best of the Best for 2013 (it was held a little late). I achieved a 54%, taking fourth place out of ten competitors.
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Another special session with Hiroko and Ivan. Kana and Masao were present, but we let them do their sport kendo while we worked on Myo Sim. Free Fighting techniques 1 and 2, kneeling iai 1 and 7b, standing iai 1 and 7, and one step techniques 1 – 8. Finished with a couple times through on the Jo kata.
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Special session with Hiroko and Ivan. We warmed up with kihon, doing room lengths of each of our strikes and blocks, then went through Standing Iai 1 – 8. I then demonstrated Kneeling Iai 1 – 8 as a quick memory aide/review and we finished up with three way rotations through One Step Techniques 1 – 10.
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Special session with Hiroko and two study abroad students from Japan, Kana and Masao. We’re getting ready for a cultural demo end of January and Hiroko wants to include the two students. Kana is a nidan in her style of kendo, and Masao has taken a year of it. Their form is of the sport variety, so we took a while comparing the stances, cuts and blocks to begin with. I then took them through Standing Iai 1 a few times, and then we switched to shinai and did a little bit of one-attack and three-attack parry.
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Class led by Brad. Taikioko Shodan a number of times through, mostly going extra slow to focus on good timing in our technique. Studies in stance and form. Some work on punching with our hips, not our shoulders. Finished with more work from last week where we receive an incoming jodan punch and use it to control/throw our opponent.
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Class with Ivan. Standing Iai 1, then one step techniques 1 & 2.
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Class led by Brad. Brief stretch and then we worked on Kanku for a while, then finished with some ipon kumite with a focus on kibidachi zuki and alternate kibidachi-based reception of an incoming attack.
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Class with Ivan. We did 100 cuts to warm up a little, then I discussed some of what I had mentioned to my WCoS class the previous evening, talking about stance, hand position, and blade angles. We then went through Jo Kata a few times, discussing a few detail/rough points for Ivan.
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Class with Sal, Ferocitas, Elijah, Dalton and Ryan. Stretch, warm up, and requirements. I then reviewed a few key basics, talking about stance, movement, hand position, and blade angle when blocking and attacking. We then covered The Mantis (a new move for Dalton and Ryan). After a break, we did some advanced response training, refined strikes, and finished with several rounds of “Ninja”. This concludes classes for 2013, the dojo will re-open late January.
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Class with Ivan. Standing Iai 6 – 8 and some parry.
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Class with Sal, Elijah and Dalton. Stretch and requirements. After the break, I did armored parry with Dalton, then we all had one on one matches totaling 32.
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Class with Elijah and Dalton. Stretch, focus session on The Illusion, requirements. Break. Add-on, multi opponent machine gun, evasion, one attack parry.
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Class with Ivan. It has been a while, so we just reviewed standing iai 1 – 5 and the jo kata.
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Class with Sal, Steven, Elijah and Dalton. Datlon finished up his first boken before class (he’s been coming early the past four classes or so to make his boken). Stretch and requirements initially, then I reviewed The Illusion (a new move for Elijah and Dalton). After the break, we had 27 one on one matches.
Conditions: Muddy with intermittent light rain.
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Class with Sal, Ryan and Dalton. Stretch and requirements, followed by covering The I Move, a new practiced move for Ryan and Dalton. After the break we started with refined strikes, then did 200 full circle cuts with steel, drilled on stance and movement, and finished with Ryan and Dalton doing head blocks with steel while Sal and I attacked.
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Class with Sal, Steven, Elijah, and Dalton. Stretch and requirements. After the break, we had 27 one on ones.
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Class with Steven, Elijah, Dalton, and Renee. Stretch and requirements. After the break I did a focus drill on movement, focusing on weight transfer and having control of our motion at all times by engaging our quads, then did refined strikes, and finished with a rotation through two drill stations; the target gamut and cutting pattern 1 on the 8″ square cabers.
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Class with Steven, Elijah, Mary Ann, Dalton. Stretch and requirements. One on One sparring after the break totaling 30 matches.