Tonight marked the truimphant return of Sensei Brewer, and we got treated to a slow burn workout for the first half, and a blitzkreig annihilation the second half. We did some pretty simple basic drills during the first class focusing on hips and fluid motion (a lesson not lost on the brown and black belts, for sure).

Sensei was kind enough to give everyone that didn’t have a copy of the newest Shotokan Magazine a copy so we could read his article and get inspired to buy a copy. I really do need to get a subscription to that again, it will have to wait until I get paid in May.

Either way, much of the second class was spent talking about how Sensei Hassell selects katas. Sensei Brewer went so far as to say that we can be mentally prepared for the diometric opposite of our chosen Kata. Then he proceeded to demonstrate this fact by having us do Empi, then Jion, then Heian Godan, then Tekki Nidan, then Kanku Dai, then Bassai Dai, all in rapid succession.

By the end of this, I was hoofing it. Mike-san took a moment to doctor his bruised toe, so Sensei Brewer made him sit out of what was to come next. Sensei lined up the whole class and then had Erbe-san and myself get in front of them and do our chosen kata. I felt pretty good, but I wanted to ask Sensei Brewer how it looked. He said it looked pretty good, but I need to remember to keep my shoulders down and my stomach tensed during certain parts of it.

Tonight will mark the last hard workout before the exam. I’m feeling pretty calm at the moment. My Dad gave me a pep talk last night in between classes that made me feel somewhat better, even though it was a “WTF are you worried about, he can’t take anything away from you, etc, etc”. For some reason coming from him it helped. Weird.

4 days until The Empire Strikes Back.