2005 Workout #57: Instructor Training Seminar…

The night before my second degree black belt test had been filled with travel and somewhat rude and useless hotel staff, but I was mostly beyond all that nonsense. Rest did not come easily the night before the exam, was helping me by watching a few techniques that I did nervously in the hotel room. My nerves came and went like waves… I would be perfectly calm for hours at a time, and then spend 15 minutes with the nervous tightness in the chest and mental thrashing.

I did not get to sleep until around 1 am on Saturday morning, however surprisingly the big day came without too many nerves. We woke up around 7:30 am and had breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Due to the aforementioned rude and useless staff, we were given a free buffet breakfast because of their idiocy.

I could tell from the expressions on the face of my companions, McCabe-san and Erbe-san, that they too were beginning to feel the stress that comes with the dan test. McCabe-san echoed similar sentiments that I held: a distinct desire for this experience to be over regardless of the results.

We made it to the dojo around 9:50 or so, and I was pleased to find that Sensei Hassell had everything straight for my registration so there was no additional stress added there. Our first instructor training session was held by Sensei Kerrigan of Pittsburgh, and I was a little dismayed to hear that it was going to be primarily regarding sparring tactics. For the unindoctrinated, that means we’re going to spend the next hour and a half sparring various people which is not something that is desirable right before a stressful and potentially dangerous black belt examination.

I don’t remember that much of any of the instructor training sessions, but I do recall a one thing from the first one: Oedewaldt-san knocked the wind out of me with a ill-controlled front kick to the ribcage. This would factor into my black belt test a little later on in the day, which will cause him pain soon.

The second session was after lunch, and it was held by Sensei Brewer. Luckily, I felt as if I got the good fortune to coast a little during this seminar, since we had covered most of this material during classes over the last few weeks. It was a session directed towards using hip power, something that all of our higher rank karateka have been working on.

In between the second and third sessions a wave of nerves hit me hard. I decided to eat a cereal bar because my stomach was starting to churn out acid, and I’m glad I did. Within ten minutes it was settling down and I was feeling better about this third session. Sensei Hassell wanted to take us through some of the often ignored stances of Shotokan, so we got a nice sampler of things that were somewhat foreign to us. He gave the Japanese names for them, one of which was derived from the Japanese symbol for the number 8 (hachijidachi, or something like that) but that’s about all I remember from the explainations– my mind was set on the task that was quickly approaching.

Sensei Hassell did show us something a little different, called jyu-sanbon kumite. It was sparring, but it was done with three full speed attacks to a certain target. He explained that we would be testing this as an optional third degree black belt testing requirement during the upcoming black belt test. Imagine having another chapter tacked onto your history test ten minutes ahead of time… good stuff.

We all got a chance to try it a few times. Sensei explained that this could be very dangerous, and he wasn’t kidding… during practice several people had close calls, and I clipped Peter-san in the eyebrow when he shifted into my technique. Hair raising stuff, to be sure.

We bowed out, and the training was done… it was time for The Test.