Continuing on the strange and horrifying trend of creativity that I was riding last week, I was tapped to start class on Wednesday night in Mapleton. I was a little short on ideas for running a class, and I was hesitant to revert back to a boring ol’ basic workout after the fun we had the night before so I was looking anywhere for inspiration.
It came in the form of a sign in the gym: “26 1/2 laps around the gym == 1 mile.” “Hm,” I wondered, “Can I really make the class do a mile’s worth of lunge punches? I wonder how far we can get before Sensei shows up!”
And there we had it. Very little warm-ups to speak of, just some simple leg stretches for the stance and we were off. The full length and width of the gym, turning the corners like in Taikyoku Shodan. We made it two laps before Sensei Brewer put an end to the classes torture, but I thought it was a great effort by everyone. Eventually, I was going to switch techniques from lunge punch, but I was going to let them do a half-mile or so before that. That would’ve been just awful.
For the remainder of the first class, I got to help a new student with her traditional first class. She was doing just fine keeping up with the torrent of lunge punches just by following along, I can tell that she’s that type that is able to follow along quickly and pick things up fast. That doesn’t come along too often in ten year old form, so it was good to hear that she has been back for several workouts since.
For the second class, Sensei Brewer took us through a kata primer. We made it through the Heians and Bassai Dai. I had the notable embarrassment of hitting a sweaty spot on the knifehand block section in the middle which sent me tumbling. Everyone had a chuckle and we were done with the class.
I really enjoy getting the opportunity to teach like that and try out new and crazy things. At its core, the concept that I tried that night was not really different than doing lunge punches up a field or at the Leeway in Pekin High School. Its simple basics, repeated until death or perfection takes you. It feels good every now and again, and I’ll say it one more time… I like guts.
It’s too often we get into a workout schedule rut… even the barn-burners of this year can seem to take on a pattern after subsequent visits. Occasionally (or consecutively, in the case of these last two workouts), its fun just to throw caution to the wind and try something new or out of the ordinary to bring a new tilt on old concepts that everyone has experienced before.
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