Tonight was made very hard due to an experiment in torture that my own father devised. We decided to get to karate early to work on kata again, but he had planned to bring his weight vest and hand weights to help me with my Sochin.
It took me 35 minutes to get through five Sochin with the weight gear on. And let me tell you what, I was about ready to be done after that. I’ve never had my legs burn like that before. Right before class went on, I took the weight gear off and did a Sochin without it and it really felt different. My center remained tight and my limbs felt much stronger and more free.
Then it was time for class! We did many basics during the first class, which I was still mostly numb for. In between classes, we went and weighed the weight vest and hand/foot weights: 51 pounds.
The second class remained somewhat of an open swim time, which featured me doing Sochin for
Not being one to stop at only 7 kata, I went off to the side and knocked out another 8 of them to bring my total for the night to 15. I rounded out the night by helping a few of the lower ranked students with their kata and I was DONE. As I type this, my legs are starting to knot up, so I think I’m going to go and stretch out for a bit.
Thanks Dad. 
Sochin Counter
Accomplished / Goal == Percent Complete
60 / 2000 == 3%
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Dude – at this rate you’ll be done by April (or something – I didn’t really do the math). Your attitute and committment are excellent. Keep up the good work. Geez – when I was marathoning and doing strength training with a weight vest, we’d add like 15, maybe 20 pounds. 51 pounds on your relatively small frame is freakin’ huge. You, sir, are an animal. You’re such an animal I bet you’ll scare the crap out of tweets95.
He won’t scare me…For now he’ll be way too worn out to feel like even bothering me. Once he starts getting used to it though, then maybe…
My personal theory is that when it’s all over, he will be a pair of giant thighs with Josh’s head sitting on top.
But seriously…. I’m continuously amazed at the feats of pure sack you accomplish, man. I am so going over to your place when the orc invasion begins.
I believe your theory to be correct. Two thighs, giant in circumference, with my Elendil helmet atop them.
I can’t really pinpoint whats driving me right now. I want to be so overprepared for Sandan that I look like some sort of Greek god incarnate when I approach the testing panel. That’s still a long way off, but I figure starting now is good.
I think that perhaps Sensei Hassell’s direct recommendation that I do something is a driver too… by the time he sees me in April, I want him to know by looking that I’ve been doing what he asked.
There is something inspiring about watching other people strive for goals… my Dad for his brown belt, for his kata goal for this year, the lower ranks for their next belts. I don’t like subsisting, and watching people work hard for what they want is motivating in and of itself.
One final thing: I love this stuff. I’ve found that often times I settle to a certain level of “you are this tough. Attempt nothing greater than arbitrary level X.” That’s when I set goals to spur me into action to raise that level of performance.
So I guess, in the end, a lot of small things are making me do this. I doubt very seriously that I will be able to maintain this pace. I may level out around my required 12-13 kata eventually, but I’m going to try to go as long as I can like this.
Thanks! Have you given any further thought to marathoning again? I wanted to bring that up but I didn’t get a chance since our lunch at Olive Garden before Christmas.
And for the record: I only did 5 kata with the 51 lbs (weight vest + 20 lbs of ankle/wrist weights). I did it once for Sensei Hartman with only the 31 pound weight vest. But it was still really freaking hard, and I will be really shocked if I’m able to do something like that every week.
It will be subtle, we’ll hardly notice the transformation, but when it’s done we’ll be amazed. One day he’ll just stop being an elf and start being a dwarf.
I will be marathoning again… the time frame however is dependent on one other thing: graduate school. If I get accepted into graduate school for this fall – I will probably delay the marathon. If I don’t end up in school then I suspect I will try and do one this year. I feel like I can’t commit the time to do both just as I’m starting out in school so the marathon my slip a year or two. But I’m definitely committed to doing another one.
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