Sensei Hartman’s been reminding me gently that I need to train more.  He’s right.  I completely acknowledge that I’ve been sporadic at best lately, in both my gym workouts and my karate workouts.  I have been doing some karate at home and occasionally with Paul B but that’s a sorry excuse for making it to […]

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Tonight, we did a ton of fun kata stuff, specifically the Heian katas and selected segments from Jion and Heian Godan.  As the class progressed, we did some partner drills focused on the x-block/grab combination.  Sensei Tarrant asked me a few questions after watching me do this technique and I got the opportunity demonstrate what […]

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Tonight I made it back to the dojo (thank God!) where we worked on kata and sparring drills.  We did all of the Heian kata, followed by a sparring drill where we made a circle and took turns doing blocking and counterattacks against an opponent randomly called out by Sensei Tarrant. After this, he spoke […]

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Tonight PB and I got together to work on Sochin.  We probably did a dozen kata in his backyard, and I got a chance to teach the kata to him a bit.  It still feels very natural to do this kata, which makes me happy that I have burned it in so effectively.  I’m going […]

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Last night’s karate workout was a good one.  It was a small group (only four of us and Sensei Tarrant), and we worked primarily on jab/reverse punch footwork.  We started out in sparring stance in both cases, but the first combination was pushing off the rear leg and lunging forward with the jab without stepping […]

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This afternoon, Paul and I met at the gym for a workout.  It started out with 20 minutes on the treadmill for another two miles in the books.  After that, we did a smallish karate workout that consisted of basics, blocking/punching combinations, and Heian Shodan.  It was a nice leisurely workout for a Sunday afternoon! […]

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The Karate Rosary Originally uploaded by dalcher Thanks to yesterday’s gym workout, tonight’s workout was an exercise in pain. A lot of arm movements and body shifting defined the workout, however that’s not what I want to talk about tonight. Tonight, I want to talk about my buddy Matt. We’ve trained karate together for as […]

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Tasha and I braved the snow to make it to the gym, where we met up with PW.  He and I had a good karate workout, starting out with standing basics.  We quickly knocked out 600 techniques: punching, blocking (rising, inward, outward, downward), and front kicks.  After that we did front stance training where I […]

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This afternoon Paul B and I got together for another sparring workout.  This time we worked more on ironing out some of his stylistic differences in preparation for his cross-rank exam for Shodan.  He tends toward having a high, boxing style sparring guard which leaves him somewhat open to lower counterattacks.  He also tends to […]

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Tasha was working today, so I ventured out to the rec center to have a karate workout.  I got there early and knocked out Bassai Dai and Kanku Dai before Paul arrived, once he showed up we moved into basics.  We did some stationary blocking training, and I gave him an introduction to pressing block.  […]

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