01.27.07 - Saturday Practice

New Items Today:

1. Ground Fighting - Escapes

Reviewed Other Items:

1. Warm-Ups
2. Ball Kicks
3. Focus Pad Drills
4. Mat work
5. Small Joint Manipulation
6. Techniques

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Warm-ups
We did a pretty typical warm up today but did some additional focus work with ball kicks and replacement roundhouse kicks. After doing them stationary, we did some in a forward advance as well.

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Focus Pad Drills
There were two areas that we concentrated on today with the focus pads: combination striking and “Yes-No” control drills. We started with the combinations, utilizing a three count combo alternating right and lefts. My first combo was a right straight punch, a right back knuckle and a left lunge punch. After several repetitions, I did the opposite with a left straight punch, left back knuckle, and a right lunge punch. As we go through these drills, the point isn’t so much to try to tear through the pads with the power of your punches, but rather to make sure the technique is sound and the punches are on target. When the pad is hit correctly, it simply rocks backward with the force of the strike. If you are off target, the pad sort of ‘twists’ and the strike reacts as a glancing blow, with the focus pad staying mostly in place. Although you can gain some (sometimes significant) power utilizing strength of the arms, the real power of these strikes comes from proper technique. For instance, with the lunge punch coming off from the back knuckle, the power comes from the stance change combined with proper body alignment and torque from rotating the fist. When you can ‘marry’ all of these elements together into a single fluid motion, you have achieved the greatest level of striking power. Personally, my challenge is maintaining proper form after several strikes. I don’t have a partner to work out with at home but I do bang on the heavy bag pretty regularly. It’s not the same feedback but it works in a pinch.

The other half of the focus drills we did were “yes-no” drills. I did okay with these today. My control issue with this drill is not so much hitting the pads on a ‘no’ but rather controlling the depth of the strike on the ‘no’. As Sifu says regularly, the punch thrown on a ‘no’ isn’t a “miss” but rather a controlled strike that where the depth is just short of the surface of the pad. With this mindset, if you lightly touch the pad on the ‘no’ then you are not fully controlling the strike. I’m working on it. Just like anything else, my strong side is more controlled than my ‘weak’ side, but they are both developing just fine.

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Mat Work
We didn’t spend a lot of time on the mats today. We just started off with some forward rolls staying down with a break fall, alternating from right to left sides. Sifu stated that if we felt comfortable to go ahead do air rolls. I think Walt and Phyl are the only ones doing full air rolls at this point – everyone else just sort of crash lands in a semi controlled fashion. But we are all getting better!! We did just a couple of turns doing the forward rolls coming up on our feet an d then we put the mats up.

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Small Joint Manipulation
Sifu had us practice some basic joint manipulations at the wrist and elbow. I was working With Walt for this. I’m starting to feel more comfortable with joint manipulations, but I still haven’t quite made the transition to where I feel real comfortable using them in a sparring situation. We always practice in a very controlled environment paying close attention to the tap of our training partners. I’m looking forward to learning more.

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Ground Fighting
Marty led us through some things today that were pretty cool. We used some of what we have used in the past but built on the knowledge, expanding to include escapes. We started basically on the bottom and our partner was going for an arm lock. Our job was to escape the arm lock and reverse positions, winding up on top in the mount position.

I worked alternately with Alfredo, Alex, and Phyl with these, which was a good mix of body types. It was pretty easy to see that technique is vital. In some cases you can muscle your way out of or into position but if you use leverage through technique, you expend much less energy. The less energy you expend at once, the more you have to work with when you need it. I was also keen to note that subtle shifts in body position (like sprawling) can make a big difference when defending against an escape or reversal.

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Techniques
The latter part of the class was spent working technique. I was working with Brandon and Alfredo this class covering largely the Orange belt techniques, but also squeezing in my Purple belt as well. We sort of bounced back and forth between doing the techniques in the air and doing a mini line. It was really good to review the Orange belt material again with a body as I haven’t been working technique with a partner for a while now except in class. Brandon and Alfredo are coming along good and I think they are going to be great.

My Purple belt techniques are getting better. The more I am able to work on a live body, the more I can see some of the subtle parts of the technique that are hard to envision when you are working in the air. Of the things I am struggling with a little bit are really basics – timing of when to begin the technique in some cases and in other cases where to intercept so as to allow the appropriate space to operate in when doing the technique. I have this knack for moving way in and getting all jammed up. Brandon and Alfredo are both different in height and weight so working with them today really helped to work out some of these issues.