Today was the definition of a snow day. Despite all this, I was able to remain productive by working remotely and tonight has been a very quiet evening of TV and cooking.

So far my flight is still on tomorrow, so it is back to CO for me!

We wrapped up our workshop today, right before the snowstorm set in. The ride that normally took 20 minutes took almost an hour, and I had a few dial-in meetings to attend before my workday was complete.

Now I am debating whether to brave the storm to visit with my cousins. They have a big truck to come pick me up with, so I think I am going to try it. Not going to lie, it is a terrible blizzard out there, but what is life without some adventure?

More soon!

I made it to Peoria safely enough last night, but I was quickly warned that there was a giant snow creature of epic proportions descending upon 29 states.  It’s icy breath is set to lay waste to the entire Illinois River Valley, depositing 10 – 20 inches of snow.

The roads weren’t bad on the way home from Mossville tonight, but I hear things are freezing pretty solid out there now and the snow is supposed to start overnight.  I opted to be a good company man and not rent a car, opting to borrow one of my parent’s cars.  With the weather being this bad, I have asked Dad to drop me off out there so I don’t wreck his Tahoe for him tomorrow.  I feel somehow better thinking that if the car is going to wreck, it won’t be me doing the wrecking.

I don’t know what my chances are for getting out of the Peoria Airport on time Wednesday morning, only time will tell there.  More soon!

Yesterday, after Kangeiko I noticed that my car was sitting at 99,999 miles right as I pulled into my buddy Paul’s driveway to drop him off.  A few blocks later, my car hit the 100,000 milestone (on Oak Street, if you must know).  My Saturn has been very reliable to me since I bought it in 2003, and it’s fun to mark this milestone.  I hope it lasts another 100,000 miles… heck, I’d be happy if it lasted another 50,000.

Speaking of being on the road, I’m about to head to the airport.  I’m going to Peoria for two days for a workshop, and I’m supposed to be headed into arctic temperatures and a lot of snow.  I’m supposed to be back to attend a birthing class on Wednesday, I sure hope I’m not going to get stranded in IL.  Keep an eye out here for more news as it happens.

Today was the last day of Kangeiko, which always brings equal parts optimism and complaining about creaky joints and muscles.  After warmups, we headed right into combinations.  Today, it was sanbon-zuki (three punches) done up and down the floor.  After that, Sensei had us perform a shuffle step with a front leg front kick.  First, he counted three reps across the floor, then two, and then we had to cover the distance using only one technique.  I was able to do it fairly well, and it felt comfortable.

Next we transitioned into partner training, which was one-time attack.  The defender could use any block or counterattack.  This went on for quite awhile, and then Sensei had the higher ranking black belts come out to do semi-free one time attack with the same set of techniques as our Shodan test recommends back in the ASKA.  After this, they moved quickly to free sparring, or “house sparring” as Sensei Yaguchi calls it.  It was fun to watch, I keyed in on a couple of things to try to use myself.  Sensei then called our group out, and we did an interesting sparring drill where you were in natural stance, and you could freely punch with either hand but you also had to defend and counter all at once.  He was adamant that no-one move their feet, opting to swivel hips and keep distance with the head but the feet had to stay rooted.

Then it was kata time!  Today it was our individual kata (mine was Sochin).  I really tried hard and Sensei Yaguchi corrected my back knee in the last position and that was it.  Everyone got their turn and Kangeiko was finished!

Immediately after class was a mock kata tournament.  Sensei Yaguchi was not watching the mock tournament, opting to tend to the lunchtime preparations in the basement.

The lower ranks all took their turns, getting scored on a points scale system.  The black belts got to divide up into a men’s and women’s division.  In order to make things go more quickly, they opted for pairs of competitors to come out and do a random kata together and then scored them by flag to determine who would advance on to the points-scored round.  I got across from a very strong, broad looking guy named Brian who I hadn’t met before.  My buddy Paul was in a different pairing, so we were somewhat relieved that we didn’t have to go head-to-head right off the bat.

Paul’s turn was first, they selected Heian Nidan for him.  He did an admirable job, with good speed and power but did not advance.  My turn was shortly after his, the kata that was selected for us was Heian Godan.  The kata went by in a blur, but ultimately I did not advance either.  I can take some solice in the fact that the guy I was up against ended up winning the black belt division with a truly beautiful rendition of Sochin.  After the class was over, the main judge that was scoring my set of people gave me some advice.  It seems my eyes were not fixed on my target and my hips were a bit high as a result.  Sensei Tarrant praised both Paul and I, noting that my kata looked good and I would have been fine if I hadn’t been up against him.  One of the other judges chimed in that my kata looked very strong and was very good and he was on the fence.

I’m not really disappointed that I lost since it was a just-for-fun tournament and I feel like I represented myself well.  I am happy that I got some good advice that I can work on and that Sensei Tarrant seemed happy with my performance.  I am happy that we participated in five of the six workouts this week.  Kangeiko is a good way to reset and get excited about karate again for the coming year.  Even though I have many scheduling problems in February thanks to birthing classes, I’m excited about getting back in the dojo as much as possible.

More soon!

Today’s workout was a good one!  Our combination for the day was: step forward with a downward block with one hand and a rear leg front kick at the same time, landing with jab then reverse punch.  He kept pushing the class to cover more and more distance, and I was proud to say that I was able to keep up and covered ground quite well.  I noticed much of his advice about covering distance was nearly verbatim the suggestions that Sensei Brewer and Sensei Hartman make about the same topic.  I love it when karate converges.

Then Sensei Yaguchi broke from the template slightly, having a bit more partner training than normal.  We did a series of three-time attacks today, mostly focusing on a chudan-jodan-chudan series of attacks.  The defender was allowed any blocks they wanted and the standard reverse punch counterattack.  I noted a few of Yaguchi’s senior black belts were working on reaching a long way with each punch and it was rather effective.  After that, Sensei Yaguchi called the 6th degree and higher black belts out to have them perform 5-time attack.  There was one pair that was particularly interesting to watch.  One of the instructors was really projecting with his punches and happened to tag one of the others in the face slightly.  The other guy proceeded to respond with his series of attacks on his turn, opting for what appeared to be a series of pressing blocks in lieu of the first four punches, opting to cover distance to try to land what appeared to be a strongish final punch.  It didn’t work out so well (not to mention looking a little… well… odd), as it was roundly blocked and then countered.

Since I had to make it back home so I could get to work by 8 am for a meeting, I had to leave a few minutes early right as the rest of the black belts were heading into Gankaku.  Probably best… I’m not sure I could have made it through that kata if I had to do it in 15 seconds… my memory of it is just not that strong yet.  The last day of Kangeiko is tomorrow!

Today was another crowded Kangeiko morning. I began my driving duties this morning, we arrived around 15 minutes early, which is just about perfect.

Class got off to the normal start of warmups, this is the point in the week where things begin aching or tightening up entirely on their own.  Basics consisted of a front hand jab, stepping back into kibadachi to perform a downward block, then turning one’s feet in place to set up for a rear leg front kick followed by another jab.  The usual 15 minutes solid of marching up the floor in groups doing this led us to partner training.  Today’s combination was an interesting one.  The attacking side would lunge punch, the defending side would step back in back stance and perform a rising punch (a la Empi).  Then they would step forward and perform a rising backfist strike followed by reverse punch.

The rising backfist strike is interesting.  Sensei Yaguchi went through a lengthy explanation of the path of the technique.  “If you can, attack with elbow!” he said, performing a standard across-body chest level elbow strike.  He continued “If that not work, strike up under their chin, make head go back.  Not across!” and then he demonstrated this on Sensei Tarrant.  After trying this with several different partners, I have come to one conclusion: it’s hard to unlearn how to execute a backfist strike.

Finally, it was kata time.  Today’s kata was Kanku Dai, and we did a medium speed kata working on technique.  Then for the second time through, Sensei Yaguchi exclaimed “15 seconds! Do kata, train your body for speed and timing!”  So we did.  I got off to a good start, trying to stay relaxed.  When I made the turn right before the dropping technique, Sensei Yaguchi was standing there watching me.  “10 second!” he informed the class.  I was way ahead of the pack.  As I came back around for the double kick at the end, I noticed that Sensei was still watching me.  At the end, he nodded and made no corrections.  My friend Paul said he had watched me pretty much the entire kata, and that I finished a fair margin before everyone else in my group.  That made me feel pretty good, especially that he had no corrections to make in that instance!

More tomorrow!

This morning’s Kangeiko workout went very well.  It was warmups, followed by basics.  Sensei Yaguchi focused on elbow strikes; our basic combination consisted of sliding in with an upward elbow strike with the lead arm, following by a chest level elbow strike with the rear hand.  From there, we stepped forward drawing the arm across the body and performing a knifehand strike to the face and then finishing with a reverse punch.  There were so many people in there we had five rows that had to each take their turn doing 4-5 sets across the floor.

After that it was partner training time again, this time our partners were 6th dan or higher.  The attack was lunge punch, the block and counter was a high level knifehand strike and then step in with a chest level elbow strike.  After about 15 minutes of doing that combination with different partners, it was kata time.  Today it was Empi.  Because of the crowd, there were several groups each taking a turn doing a kata.  The first one that we got to do was a medium speed kata, taking care to spend the time necessary to “make good technique”.  After everyone got done with this, Sensei Yaguchi instructed us simply with “11 second!  Do kata with speed” and we were told to begin.  I finished first in the nidan group of people, which I was pretty proud of.  Sensei Yaguchi praised our group with his usual statement of “No trouble!” and we were done.  I have several things to work on in my training, but speed I can do.

More tomorrow!

This morning I awoke at 5:00 am to get ready for Kangeiko, Day 2.  I was downstairs around 5:15 am, expecting my buddy Paul to pick me up around 5:20 am.  By the time 5:30 rolled around, I was wondering why he was running late.  I texted him, and about ten minutes later I called him to no reply.  I tried again ten minutes later.  He has been away from his phone before, so I didn’t want to just leave without him and head down there, and by 5:50 am I would’ve only gotten about 20 minutes of training by the time I arrived at the dojo anyway.  About 6:20 am, I got a phone call from him: he had overslept.  I am told he has double alarms and is sleeping with his phone near him tonight to ensure that we make it tomorrow and for the rest of the week.

Today was a long day at the office.  I had a slightly abbreviated day, taking an hour off so I could go to a doctor’s appointment with Tasha (everyone is fine!)  Once I was back to the office, I was able to slay a particularly problematic dragon which should put our user story to rest after weeks of furious effort.  Hopefully this marks a return to normalcy for me until the baby arrives.  That’s all for me right now!

Today was the first workout of our Kangeiko spirit training week.  Morning came for me at 4:30 am, and after a relatively uneventful drive to the dojo the workout began.  It was packed in there, probably around 50 people in a room not much bigger than the Pekin dojo.  Everything is made logistically more difficult with that many people in such a small space, but we still muddled through.

Class began with warmups and some basic combinations.  I was buoyed by the fact that Sensei Yaguchi kept the combinations very basic, probably for the benefit of the lower ranks.  He stood in front of me for much of this section and didn’t have any corrections so that made me feel good.  We then moved on to a very simple one-time partner drill, rotating among the myriad of 6th, 7th, and 8th dans at the dojo to use as partners.  The drill consisted of the attacking side stepping in with lunge punch, and the defending side doing rising block from standing position, then stepping straight back and counterattacking with a reverse punch.  Sensei Yaguchi made it a point to talk about how going straight back helps to get a sense of one’s partner, and deflecting and stepping to the side disrupts your power and makes you weaker and more easily beaten.  Class wrapped up with kata, with each segment of black belts getting the chance to do a slow iteration of Bassai Dai followed by a fast one.

I felt good at the end of the workout, however the intervening workday and birthing class (coming up in a few minutes) is really sapping my remaining energy reserves.  It is going to be a much-needed treat to go to bed early when I get home.  More soon!