Class with Bryce. Stretch and a couple times through his requirements. A couple rounds of Refined Strikes. 100 full circle cuts (boken). 20 one-on-one matches (me two handed).
Tag: portland dojo
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No students, no class. Did a little bit of personal training, 100 full circle cuts (boken) and going through katas ich, ni and san.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and once through his requirements (me matching). 100 full circle cuts (boken). Refined strikes a couple times each. Sparring 15 matches.
Almost had all-weather, but the rains stopped just before class started. Made it warm and muggy. -
Class with Bryce. Stretch and then reviewed his requirements. Then went back through each of his five practiced moves. Did some refined strikes, then broke to get get into armor. 21 matches, me with 2-handed in prep for Best of the Best (been using 1-handed typically to improve that and match him for better instruction).
Generally, with lower ranking fighters, I am less likely to be injured when sparring to win versus when I am sparring to instruct. Sparring to instruct means I spend more time on the defense, which increases the chance of bad blocks or clash. We would have gone more matches tonight, but after a couple good hits to my dominant hand (fingers of), I needed to call it so I could get some ice on it.
We took the previous week off and today was the first back on a Thursday schedule. Next week we'll move it form 6pm to a 6:30pm start both in prep for more students and to allow time for me to get home for gear between work and class.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and then once through his requirements. Focus session on Jumping Tiger 1. Refined Strikes. Esculating parry, doing 1-attack, 3-attack, and Switch including auto-switch on death.
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Class with Bryce, back at the Commonwealth Lake Park again. Stretch followed by a full run through of both our requirements (his green braid, mine silver chain, so he got to repeat his 5 moves 5 times each). We then did a focus on Jumping Tiger 2 and The Tradition, and then a couple rounds of Refined Strikes. We took a break and got into armor and then had 15 one-on-one matches (me fighting one-handed and left as we were missing a set of protective gloves).
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and reviewed his requirements. Did a study session on The Mantis and The Tradition. 100 full circle cuts (boken). Finished with a relatively short introduction to hand to hand (Shotokan Karate), covering front stance (zenkutsodachi), front punch (oitsuki), and the four basic blocks: down (gedan barai), inside (uchi uke), outside (ude uke), and rising (age uke).
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Class with Bryce. Short day today, just got right to it. Reviewed his requirements, some refined strikes, some Advanced Response training, 100 full circle on our good arm and another 50 full circle with our off hand, and finished with 3-attack parry, Switch parry, and Open parry (unarmored centered cuts).
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Class with Bryce. Stretch followed by going through his requirements. I then taught him my Cutting Pattern 4, including a brief introduction to the techniques involved (mostly the thrust deflection). We then did a few rounds of Refined Strikes followed by 100 full circle cuts, and finished with a progression of 1-attack parry, 3-attack parry, and Switch parry.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and his requirements once through. Instructed him on Gad's Sword Disarming Move. Refined Strikes, 100 full circle cuts (boken, one-handed), Balance 1.
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Got together with Bryce to teach him boken construction and help him with making his first one. I brought a selection of hickory stock that I had on hand. He is looking at arming swords, long term, so we went with a slightly longer one handed format, constrained slightly by the stock I had available.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch followed by review of requirements. Did some focus time on his newest practiced moves, the I Move and the Tradition. A few iterations of Refined Strikes, then took a break to armor up. 15 boken matches, three with me using two handed, one with me using two sword, the rest one handed.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch. 100 full circle cuts with our dominant hand, another 50 with our off hand. Review of requirements. Refined strikes. Etc.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and once through his requirements with me matching. Refined strikes and then a break to get armored up. Armored 1-attack parry, armored Switch parry, and finally 12 matches of light contact one-on-ones (me one handed for first 9, two handed for final 3).
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Class with Bryce. Stretch, then went through his Green Braid requirements. Did some 1 attack parry, some advanced response training, full circle cuts with steel (50 one handed for him, 100 two handed for me), another set of full circle cuts (100 boken for him, 50 iron sword for me), and then switch parry. I also had him try on the loaner protective gear to make certain we're ready for next week (all good).
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Class with Bryce. Stretch, then went through his Green Braid requirements. Added The Tradition (one-handed variant). Did 100 full circle cuts (boken). One-attack parry, then Switch-parry. Ended with balance 1 & 2, using new balance materials I picked up today (4×4's, bricks, semi-rounds, 1×2 cinders that the semi-rounds can slot into, & round cabers, all cabers between 4 – 5 ft for easy transport).
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Class with Bryce, trying out Cedar Hills Recreation Center. Reviewed his requirements, once through with just him, then again with me doing the same as him. Refined strikes. 100 full circle cuts (boken). A little bit of additional focus on Jumping Tiger 1 and The Mantis.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and then went through his requirements. Spent a little more time on Cutting Pattern 1. Did a few rounds of Refined Strikes, then 100 Full Circle Cuts (bokken). Finished with one attack parry followed by three attack parry.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and then a couple excercises, first just leap frog, then a leap frog / pushup burpee, traveling down and back on our dojo space. Reviewed Bryce's requirements and added The Mantis to his set of moves. Finished with Refined Strikes.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch then went through his requirements with myself doing them, too. Spent some focus time on Cutting Pattern 1 and also on loosening and turning over the wrist to achieve a better full circle cut. Performed continuous full circle cuts with boken, 50 for Bryce and 100 for me. Finished with each of us doing Refined Strikes once.
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Class with Bryce. Reviewed his requirements a couple times through, then went through requirements together, him repeating his as needed as I completed all of mine (except the cutting patterns he doesn't know).
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Class with Bryce at new location of Multnomah Community Arts Center. Stretch and review of his requirements. Added Thorn. Ended with a very brief bit of minor Balance 1.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch and review of everything he knows so far. Added thrust block, Cutting Pattern 1, and his first practiced move, Jumping Tiger 1.
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Class with Bryce. Stretch followed by a brief review of his basic cuts, then full circle cuts, 50 for him, 100 for me (boken). We then went back to reviewing what he knows so far, and then added decap block and leg block. We worked on flow a little and then I gave a sneak peek of Jumping Tiger 1 which we'll cover in full next week.
Conditions: Light rain, moderate temperature
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Class with Bryce. I provided him with a one handed boken in place of the two-hander I had him temporarily use last week. I spoke about the approach and reaons the WCoS has to training in all conditions, followed by a short stretch. We reviewed his basic cuts, working on some of the more subtle difference between two and one handed. Added thrust and the head and neck blocks.
Conditions: Intermitent light rain, cool