09.23.06 - Saturday Practice

New Items Today:

1. Blocking Drill – American Kenpo
2. Blocking Drill – IKCA Version
3. Throws – Elbow lock

Reviewed Other Items:

1. Mat work
2. Master Form

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Warm-ups
We did some pretty good stretching today as part of our warm ups. We can usually tell when we are going to get a dose of Hapkido as part of the lesson when we start stretching our wrists and hands. We generally got good an limber all over as well as doing our usual basic warm up drills for kicking.

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New Blocking Drills
Sifu ran us through a blocking drill that I hadn’t seen before. To my knowledge, none of us had seen it before but I could be wrong about that. Anyway, the drills were essentially the same but we tasted two different flavors: the original American Kenpo version and then a version Sifu referred to as the “IKCA” version.

We started the American Kenpo version in a basic horse stance with arms at our sides in a ‘ready’ position. We then did a series of blocks: upward, inward, outward, and downward, then returned the hand to ready before bringing it down in front of the body in a sort of downward pushing motion with an open hand. Finally the hand returns to the ready at the side and you do the same series of motions with the other (left) hand. Upon the end of the motions with the left hand, you begin a similar set of movements using both hands/arms at once. The initial move brings both arms up and crossed in a high block with the wrists facing out, followed by a lowering of the arms but, still crossed, blocking directly in front of you with the wrists facing in. Both arms then move to the respective sides to do an outward block, followed by a similar motion for a low block, then returning to ready before a double downward ‘push’ with open hands. The final move is to return to the ready position.

After running through this awkward new set of movements a few times, Sifu shook it up a little bit on us. I don’t know if he did this himself or if this next drill already existed somewhere in the system but the end result is a drill that uses the same principles but in the context more appropriate to what we train in IKCA Kenpo.

Starting from the right neutral bow, the first move is an upward block, to an inward, then extended outward, downward. We then do a blocking move that essentially blocks with the interior of the forearm as we bring it back across our center before doing the downward ‘push’ with the other hand covering. Then do a switch and do the same thing on the other side. As I stated above, it is very similar to the American Kenpo version but it better incorporates the moves of the IKCA.

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Mat Work
Next we broke out the mats. First up was side falls. It stills seems funny to me that I have to ‘learn how to fall’ but week after week, I still struggle with different aspects of ‘falling’. The side falls aren’t too bad and I’m ok at them. Where I struggle with this maneuver is in getting everything to hit or ‘slap’ at once, the goal being to dissipate as much force as possible by spreading the impact across greater contact surface area all at once. Sounds good. Seems simple. But you can just hear it when you do it wrong. Instead of a single ‘thud’, it sounds more like you were just poured out of a can or something.

Next up was forward rolls. These I am a little better at then the side falls but I have a hard time with my left side. When I roll to my left side and stop, I should land more on my right side with my right leg straight, my right arm straight, and the should both slap or impact at the same time to dissipate force. My left leg should be bent and my foot should be roughly behind my right knee planted on the ground. My left hand should be up in a guard position. This sounds like a lot of stuff to remember, but the funny thing is that is only a lot to remember when I roll to my weak side! For some reason it is almost instinctual to do these motions correctly on my strong side but I get discombobulated going to my weak side. All I can do is practice.

Next we did something that I thought was a lot of fun – we got to throw each other around a little bit! Sifu taught us two maneuvers in which we basically trap the arm of an incoming punch and then maneuver ourselves into a place of leverage and execute a throw in which the attacker is allowed to roll out of. The first one put us inside the aggressor’s strike. The second one utilized an elbow lock. I really liked the elbow lock. Sifu ran us through a line and did each technique on us individually before he unleashed us on the class. Of course, he has much more experience at these things and makes it look so easy and also makes it easy on us as well. A poorly executed maneuver, especially a throw, can be really… uncomfortable. I was the first one to do execute the elbow lock in the line so I was being really careful at first because I didn’t know what I was looking for. The cool thing is that I managed to get the basic move down pretty quickly and it didn’t take many repetitions and I could really start feeling the flow. It got to the point where I could almost pick the spot that they were going to land in before I actually did the throw. I was a little anxious about the elbow though – I couldn’t really tell if I was applying too much pressure or not. Nobody complained and they seemed to be landing okay, but I really wasn’t sure. Before I knew it, my time was up and I rotated out as it was my turn to be thrown. I was really surprised that when my elbow was locked out and the leverage was applied, it really didn’t hurt. Pretty cool.

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Master Form
I finished out the day by doing the Orange belt portion of the Master form over and over again. It really is sort of funny how worn out you can get doing ‘air Kenpo’. I keep telling myself to imagine if I was in a real fight and had to deal with actual impact and the forces related to it. The key to the form as we have all been told over and over, is the correct pace and most importantly, correct breathing. I have the major moves down, I just need to pull the rest of the package together.