Here comes the Sun

Thursday night was my last training session before my hols. Off for a sunny week in Wales. When I get back the school will probably be on its summer schedule, which I think will be just one Kickboxing, one Kung Fu and one kids Kung Fu per week, so I won't be able to train as fanatically as I'd like. I need to find the self-discipline to practice by myself....still, it might mean I do a bit more Tai Chi as I think that's going to keep going.

Did some Sun style last night for the first time in ages, which reminded me how much I used to like it. Let's hope it's going to make a more regular appearance for a while.

Another Feather

Regular readers (!) will remember that when I got my big pink boxing gloves it had a positive effect on my sparring that I compared to Dumbo's magic feather. Well now I appear to have found the magic feather for my feet (or my turning kick at least). It's a pair of Muay Thai anklets that I got for about £1.99 from ebay. I actually bought them to give my dodgy ankle a bit of protection when blocking, but when I wore them for kickboxing tonight for the first time, suddenly I seemed to be able to kick the stuffing out of first the heavy bag and then the focus pad without too much pain and/or effort.

Purely psychological of course - but the power of the mind is a fairly amazing thing.

Gathering Momentum

Wednesday night women's kickboxing - the class was quite a bit busier than it has been to date in the new venue, and seemed to have a real buzz about it. I think the class is finally starting to get to a sustainable critical mass and will grow some more.

Talked with T afterwards about training through August, he's still undecided about whether to collapse the classes all into the Monday night, or whether to keep it to business as usual. As you might have guessed, my preference is to keep Thursday going, 'cos it gives me more chances to train, especially during the school holidays when my other half will be home with the kids so I don't have to worry about the logistics of picking them up after work and still getting to training on time - in fact I might even be able to get there early and get some extra time in.

Act Friendly

Plenty of people at Monday's class, including a few newcomers. One of them was particularly shy, so T asked be to look after her. Of course there's nothing like being told to be friendly to someone to make you feel inhibited (or that's how it works for me, anyway), so I was completely tongue-tied for the rest of the night, which is a bit pathetic - usually martial arts is the one thing I do where I don't feel self conscious and successfully manage to chat to people I don't know.

Still, I must have done something right because she came to Women's Kickboxing on Wednesday and was very enthusiastic about training twice a week.

Throwing down a challenge

Throws this morning at kids Kung Fu. Everyone loves them. Except maybe me, in my role as "rag doll".

Being thrown by the application from the first kids wushu form feels something like this;

Grappling With It

Women's kickboxing this week welcomed a wrestler for her first lesson. Perhaps she was branching out in an attempt to become an "Ultimate Fighter"? Anyway, she seemed to pick things up pretty quick, so let's hope she comes back for more next week.

The Wednesday class definitely has a different flavour to the old Friday nights - I'm really quite enjoying it.

Had to miss training this Thursday to watch my eldest receive a prize for coming top of her class at school. Proud Mum!

Stormy Monday - again

Serious rain led to a flood in the training hall this Monday.

Although Bruce Lee advises us to "be like water", we didn't feel the need to get our feet wet, so we de-camped to upstairs. Here it was notionally dry, but like a sauna, so we were all soon soaking anyway.

In polite company I think the phrase is "Ladies glow, gentlemen perspire, horses sweat". Well, I must have been glowing pretty brightly after 3 hours of it.....

A little more Char Chuan added at the end. Still loving it.

No Training This Weekend

The Great Outdoors

Very warm for Thursday evening's classes - so hot in fact that some people had called T and told him they weren't coming because it was too hot - honest, if nothing else. The real problem is that the windows of the hall we train in don't open, so it's not only hot but very close.

Chum ku, char chuan, the beginnings of a wing chun 2-person set and then some kwok sau thay in the class, with some bokken afterwards. Talked about what we'll do over the holiday period in terms of classes which usually get fairly small because everyone with kids is away. It looks like we'll just run the Monday night classes through August and encourage those who normally only come on Thursday to swap to Monday just for the month. And I'll take the classes when T is away, which will be a first for me.

The Tai Chi class was in the garden, which was really nice, both for the fresh air and for the fact that there was quite a lot more room than when we're indoors, which given that we went through sword and then pole was a good thing. We also learnt a neat application for part of the Yang form that I haven't seen before involving breaking an arm and then some ribs. Tai Chi's not quite the gentle hand waving that so many people think it is.

Bruised Shins

Women's kickboxing.

6-foot heavy bag + about 100-off side kicks = bruised shins

(My legs aren't quite as hairy as these, but this gives the general impression I think)