Awaiting Alan’s report….watch this space!
“After Josh took an excellent warm up, we started off by practising straight punches from natural stance. We then progressed to the main theme of the session which was, elbows. We did three different types of elbows from natural stance; age empi; maewashi empi; and otoshi empi. These were done lightly then the speed was built up.
We then practised some basics with the lower grades doing their own routine of mae geri oitsuki, stepping back age uke gyaku tsuki, stepping forward sanbon tsuki; whilst the higher grades did the 1st dan combination. These were done to count, lightly and then full speed and power. On the last time through, the black belts did the more challenging 2nd dan combination.
We then practised some kicks to get the legs going with the white belts and the lower grades practising mae geri and yoko geri keage, whilst the higher grades practiced maewashi geri and ushiro geri. For the higher grades I emphasised the need to be confident on the back kick and not to worry about the difficulty of it. The kicks were done lightly and then full speed and power with the higher grades adding uraken gyaku tsuki after the kicks.
We then moved to the crux of the session as we partnered off to practise the empis. We practised the maewashi empi with the opponent as a target. We started by doing a reverse empi from close range but then we practised doing the empis from different ranges with a double step in, a complete step using the arm as a target and then spinning around the back and doing ushiro maewashi empi. The elbows were repeated with an increase in tempo.
The empis were then used as a counter attack. The lower grades used age empi and yoko empi. The higher grades however deserved something a bit more complex. The elbows were used in response to four jodan oi tsukis. On the first one they had to step back, block with the lead arm and counter reverse mawwashi empi with any necessary adjusting footwork. On the second punch they had to step on the inside blocking nagashi uke and changing the legs to do age empi. On the third they were required to bring their front foot back whilst blocking with the lead arm and spin around the back to do the ushiro maewashi empi. And for the final punch they needed to grab the punching arm, pull their opponent down and do otoshi empi. These defences were done to count, lightly, and then full speed with the black belts adding a double empi after the counter.
After I mentioned how the elbows could be easily adapted from a wide variety of distances, we split up into groups to practise kata. Jack took the white belts through Kihon, Rachel took the orange belts through Shodan, Tom took the red belts and revised Kihon and Shodan, Rory went through Sandan with the yellow belts, Josh did Godan with the purple belts, whilst I took the brown belts through Bassai Dai. The kata wer then performed by the different groups and the black belts gave their renditions of of one of the four katas, Enpi, Nijushiho, Bassai Dai or Sochin.
Everybody trained very hard and improved on the close quarter technique of empi”.
Thank you Alan for taking such a great session and for a well written training log.
SOUTH NOTTS KARATE 