Frustration

Frustrated on two counts tonight - first, I haven't yet got in to the rhythm of training on Wednesdays, not Thursdays, so I'm on edge feeling like I've forgotten to do something important. Secondly the wireless card in my computer seems to have an intermittant fault and every few minutes I lose my internet connection which is very annoying. Working hard on cultivating a zen-like attitude about it, but obviously buddhism was dreamt up before the challenges of IT.

So a short post tonight - a few new faces at the Derby Wednesday last night and also quite a few of last week's punters back for more, which is a good sign. Still a way to go to build the class up to a decent size though. Chatted to one of the guys afterwards for a few minutes, he's been doing various martial arts for a while and was keen to talk, especially about Wing Chun. Perhaps I'll suggest to D that we try one of the simpler 2-person wing chun drills out in the near future.

Bartitsu and the JiuJitsuffragettes

My legs were like lead in this morning's kids classes, I don't think I warmed up properly until we'd been going for about 2 hours - obviously a week off on a business trip hasn't done me much good.

We've decided to have a grading in 3 weeks time, for the kids, the kick-boxers and the lower kung fu grades. Getting these disparate groups together and grading them all within a 3 hour period will be a bit of a challenge - T and I need to figure out a plan, particularly regarding what to do with the littler kids who don't know much of the syllabus yet (and also have a short attention span!)

Went through plenty of wing chun 2-person drills again today after the kids had gone, culminating in some wing chun sparring, which I really enjoy. Then I started learning a new single person form using a stick, just the first few moves today but it's nice to have something new to work on.

Whilst searching for a suitable picture of stick fighting, I came across this, which appears to be an old form of mixed martial arts for the victorian/edwardian gentlemen.

After the class T was pondering whether to incorporate more of the 5-animal forms into the kids syllabus instead of the more modern wushu forms we do at the moment...I'd like it if it did go that way as eventually I'd get to do a sai set which I've always wanted to learn.

The bad news is that it looks like Master Wu isn't going to make it up to Nottingham on his brief UK tour next month. So if I want to do one of the seminars it looks like a trip to Southampton or Bristol will be needed.

Conditioning

Busy kids classes on Saturday. T has decided to recruit a couple of the early teens from the second class to help out in the little ones class earlier on. This seems like a good move as it allows us to delegate stuff like holding the kick pads to them so that we can circulate and help the little ones work on technique. It also seems to have fostered a more responsible attitude in the two older kids which then paid off in their class when they're with their peers.

After the class T was keen to go through the new stuff he'd picked up the day before at the headquarters, so we spent a good hour-and-a-half going through bits and pieces - some corrections to the choy li fut 2-person set (which is called "Crane teases Tiger" apparently) and then a host of new wing chun drills including some arm toughening / conditioning ones. Some of the 2-person stuff was quite tough to do for me with a bigger and heavier opponent, which was making me focus really hard on my chi sao and using whole body technique rather than just using my arms - it was the only way to prevent being completely overwhelmed. Most of my body is aching today, so I must have been working hard. I feel like I have made something of an improvement in my wing chun technique of late, and I'd really like to do the conditioning drills with someone every day to really build on my improvements... chance would be a fine thing. Maybe I'll have to build myself a mook jong?

Spent some time with D today discussing the Derby classes, what my longer-term teaching ambitions are and picking up the leaflets and posters for me to distribute - mostly around work to start with. Unfortunately I won't have a lot of time for advertising because I'm off on a 4 day work trip overseas this week which promises to be fairly hostile and unpleasant. (And it means missing 4 classes!)

Strengthening Their Resolve

Monday night saw a host of newcomers, particularly in the kickboxing. I assume that it's a wave of people who have made themselves a new year's resolution to start getting fit. Let's just hope they keep it up....history tells me that the majority of them won't stick at it, but I hope to be proved wrong.

The decision to postpone starting the new class in Derby 'til late Feb/early March is partly to try to avoid just picking up the NYR people (and partly that we're so shockingly lackadaisical about organisational stuff that it would have been a struggle to get it sorted for a January start, anyway)

Mostly a wing chun night for me, with plenty of siu lim tao, biu jeet and 2 person work

Two Lunchtimes

I'm a little behind on my blogging, so just a quick one to log two lunchtime practice sessions at work - the first dedicated to wing chun and the second running over the kids syllabus in preparation for the grading this Saturday. I just have to hope that T doesn't ask me to lead through the Nam Chuan because I can't remember it at all!

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.

Keep Calm

Kung Fu tonight. Quite a big class, and at one point we were all doing Bokken together, which was a bit fraught, although I don't think anyone actually whacked anyone else.

The class was interrupted at one point by a really p*&sed-up guy who wandered around the hall challenging us to fight him and claiming he would kill us all. T eventually managed to persuade him to leave, staying calm and collected and reasonable sounding (but firm) throughout the 5 minute episode. I was really glad that I wasn't in charge of the class at that point because I'm not sure I'd have handled it quite so well. And just how out of it must you have to be to go in to a room full of 20-odd martial artists (some of whom were wielding swords and poles) and try to start a fight with them?

Anyway, after that interlude we got back to training, I went through Siu Lim Tao with the beginners and the first two person set, then went through the Mantis two person set with the purples. Plenty of kicking in today's lesson too, I decided to go for it during the Zi Chi drills and was doing them as fast and high as possible, so I was distinctly flagging by the end. Then after everyone else had left I ended up going through one of the kids wushu sets with a couple of people who come to the Saturdays too to help them catch up in time for the forth-coming grading.

Down to Tai Chi, today we did the long form and I managed to get to do what I've been meaning to for a while, which was sit and watch and write some notes. Who knows if they'll make sense when I look at them tomorrow, but it's a start. Then more sword form and a bit more of the two-person sword which if my favorite, finishing off with the two person pa kua.

At the end I was still so hyper that I managed to persuade P to fight with me and we did a bit of Mantis vs Pa Kua sparring. Inevitably enough he won, (next time I'll choose Wing Chun I think) but that's not the point. Hopefully I can persuade him and D to make it a habit and we'll have a scrap at the end every week....

Necessary force

Made it in time to Kung fu despite hectic meeting schedule at work. I was happy to see the lad I injured last week was there - looks like I didn't cause any lasting harm. Went through nam chuan again with T but it's still not really sinking in so it's a good job it's not something I've got to grade on. Then lots of wing chun again, and some bokken.
Downstairs to tai chi without a break and straight into yang short form to the left which is always a challenge, but I actually felt quite pleased with my focus. 

Then we did some 2-person work where D asked us to try to think of how we could "add more power" to a move. When it came to my turn to demonstrate my suggestion it was accused of being particularly brutal! I don't think I've really got the hang of the tai chi minimum force attitude - I'm more of the "if someone is trying to hurt me then they've lost their right not to be hurt" school. Finished with a bit of chen, which made my knees hurt as always, and I still can't do the exploding outwards bit properly.