My top ten posts...

I wondered if you might be interested to know what my top ten blog posts of all time were?  ‘Of all time’ goes back to when this blog started in February 2009. In that time I have published 260 posts (including this one) but certain ones remain popular even though they may have been written months or even years ago.  In fact five of my all time top ten posts are still currently in my ‘this week’ top ten as well, so clearly those subjects grabbed you for some reason.  So here’s my top ten, in reverse order:

10. Martial arts – a balancing act (Published 14^th Janurary 2011)

In this post I discussed my own problems with maintaining balance sometimes and looked at the physiology behind balance. I then looked at how these balance principles apply to martial arts and what you can do to improve your own balance issues. I’m still very mindful of these balance principles when I am doing karate and my balance is much improved now -always room for improvement though ;-)

9. Muscle Memory – it’s all in the mind! (Published 3^rd February 2011)

This post was designed to dispel a few myths about muscle memory. I wrote about disliking the term ‘muscle memory’ preferring the more accurate term ‘motor memory’. I then tried to explain the best I could the physiology behind motor memory and how we produce motor maps in our brains that help us to unconsciously execute complex motor movements such as martial arts moves. My main point was to explain that the muscle/motor memory resides in the brain not the muscles!

8. Six things I’m looking forward to post black belt (Published 27^th January 2011)

I wrote this post 6 months before I took my black belt grading as part of my black belt preparations. I was aware from other bloggers that many people suffer the ‘black belt blues’ after achieving there shodan grading and I wanted to avoid this. I felt that having some kind of plan or post black belt objectives to think about may help to prevent that ‘anti-climax’ feeling that some people get. All I can say is 17 months after achieving my black belt I have not at any time felt like giving up or felt rudderless or directionless in any way – and yes, I have been enjoying those 6 things I wrote about in this post.  A good job really because the prospect of Nidan grading is raising its head at me in 7 months time!

7. Teaching karate to young children. (Published 6^th July 2010)

Wow! Has a lot of water gone under the bridge since I wrote this post. Back then I was a brown belt student helping out in class to gain teaching experience for when I could take my instructor’s certificate post black belt. I now have many hours of teaching experience with kids in after school karate clubs. I still find it rewarding and sometimes frustrating and I’m still always looking for new ideas to motivate and teach kids – it’s all definitely a challenge still!

6. How much did your black belt cost? (Published 19^th April 2012 – still in this week’s top ten)

I wrote this post after reading about how some martial arts schools really exploit their students and overcharge them or tie them into extortionate contracts. I decided to work out how much it had actually cost to get from white belt to black belt in terms of class fees, licence fees, grading fees, equipment, course etc. I calculated that it had cost me £1577 over 4 years to get my black belt or £7.58 per week! I concluded that this was good value for money.

5. The black belt grading – an observer’s view. (Published 30^th November 2010)

Six months before I took my own black belt grading I partnered one of our teenage girls for hers. This gave me an opportunity to have a sneak preview of what to expect for my grading – there’s always method in my madness! I wrote a report about the day which has proven to be very popular.

4. Barefoot care. (Published 21^st September 2010 – still in this week’s top ten)

I wrote this foot care guide because I was getting problems with my own feet – mainly cramps, blisters and cracked skin on my the underside of my toes from friction on the hard training floor. I presume this post is so popular because it appeals to people, other than martial artists who also train barefoot or just suffer from foot problems in general. I must confess that I don’t do everything that I mention in the guide but I think my feet are a little stronger now, though I still get the occasional blister!

3. Why do we…. sit in Seiza? (Published 14^th July 2009 – still in this week’s top ten)

This was one of 8 ‘Why do we……’ articles that I wrote and has proven to be the most popular. I was fascinated with the traditions and rituals that surround traditional martial arts and decided to try and research the origins and meanings of them. I still really value the opening and closing seated bow ceremonies that we practice in our club and teach it to all my children’s after school clubs.  All the kids seem to like it too.

2. Ikebana and Martial Arts – a shared philosophy. (Published 3^rd December 2009 – still in this week’s top ten)

As part of my learning to understand budo I went through a phase of learning about other Japanese Ways including Ikebana (Japanese flower arranging or The Way of flowers). Reading about Ikebana I was amazed at how similar the philosophy was to that of budo and so wrote a post about the subject. It is still very popular and remains in my weekly top ten posts every week.

Okay, so now for my top post of all time. I can’t, in fact, take the credit for this post because it was actually written by several of my readers – I just edited and compiled the information you gave me – so give yourselves a bit pat on the back because you hold the number one position in my top ten posts of all time:

1. The World Guide to Passing Your Black Belt Test. (Published 16^th November 2010 – still in this week’s top ten)

This guide resulted from me asking my readers for any tips they had that would help me to prepare for my black belt test. I was so overwhelmed with the response that I got that I decided to compile all the tips into a guide that others could also use giving credit (and a link) to every contributor. It has been phenomenally popular, receiving at least 1000 more hits that the number 2 post! I sincerely hope that all the contributors to this guide who received a link to their own blog/website continue to get as much traffic via this post as I receive from it.

Well that’s it; my top ten posts of all time. I hope you enjoyed reading it and a big thank you to all of you who continue to read this blog and especially those who take the time and trouble to leave me a comment.

Happy blogging!

SueC

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My Martial Art Aims for 2012...a progress report

At the beginning of the year I wrote a post outlining my Martial Arts aims for 2012. Just to show that I’m not ‘all mouth and no trousers’, as they say, and to keep me focused on achieving these aims, I thought I’d write you a progress report….

We are now a quarter of the way through 2012 so hopefully I have made some progress with my aims. Here’s a recap on what I wanted to achieve and how it’s going so far….

1.       To improve personal fitness and overcome a repetitive shoulder injury:

I had planned to produce a personal fitness programme to work on at home because this worked quite well for me when I was training for my black belt grading. However, despite buying a couple of kickboxing workout DVDs (which I thought would be a fun way of working out) I haven’t really got very far with this. I could make 101 excuses why I haven’t got a fitness programme worked out but that’s all they’ll be – excuses. Anyway, my job finishes next week and I’m going to have a lot more time on my hands so I will definitely get to grips with this aim for the next quarter of the year!

Just because I haven’t got my act together at home doesn’t mean I haven’t been working on my fitness. Oh no! Sensei seems to be on a mission to get us all fitter so we have been doing a lot of fitness drills and exercises during classes. We have a regular fitness binge at the beginning of class with push ups, sit ups, burpees, straight leg raises, squats, lunges, planks etc. So all is not lost with my personal fitness aim…..

Talking about doing push ups, they are a real problem for me at the moment because of this dratted shoulder injury. I have been receiving physiotherapy for several weeks now and things are improving, slowly but surely. Apparently, due to the initial injury (probably rotational cuff injury) I have been allowing my shoulder to roll forward to compensate and reduce the pain. This has resulted in the muscles in my shoulder blades not working properly and my right shoulder blade is misaligned and weak. I have been working on some exercises to correct this and things have improved. However, after a heavy punching or throwing session my shoulder is throbbing and the muscles leading up to my neck and down the right side of my spine are knotted and tender. Definitely a work in progress this one…

2.       To continue to develop and improve martial arts skills:

I think I have only missed one karate class and a couple of kobudo classes this year, so not a bad record. We have also had a couple of ‘higher grade’ classes for black and brown belts. About 8 – 10 of us have attended these and we have covered some pressure point techniques and some wave form striking techniques. Having covered them in some detail during these classes we are now looking at how they can be applied in bunkai. I wasn’t too keen on wave form striking the first time I met it, read this post, but now I am much more amenable to its merits and how it fits into the bigger picture.

I graded successfully last week in kobudo with the nunchuku, so now I will be back training with the bo for a few months and probably the bokken as well (I love the bokken!)

I have also attended a regional kobudo course. This was very interesting, not to mention painful! We learnt some nasty wrist and ankle throws using a sai, ouch! Did some bo fighting, great fun, and learned a battlefield signalling kata with a tessan (fan). I loved learning that kata and what all the signals meant – I’d definitely like to take up the tessen as one of my weapons.

My karate instructor also put on a kobudo seminar recently.  He went out to Okinawa last summer to train in kobudo with Hokama Sensei and is now teaching us some Okinawan bo and nuchuku kata. This was an interesting experience because the Okinawan way of teaching kobudo is very different to the Japanese way, particularly when taught in a jujitsu club – see my recent post: What exactly is kobudo?

For later in the year our club is planning its first gashaku (training camp) which should be fun. As well as karate training we will be free to take part in other pursuits available at the camp site such as archery, swimming, climbing etc. There will also be lots of socialising and BBQs so let’s hope the British weather doesn’t let us down!

3.       To improve teaching and leadership skills…

This is probably the aim that I have made most progress on so far. The sports leadership award course that I wanted to do hasn’t happened yet because there aren’t enough people in my area wanting to do it so the organisers have told me to enquire again later in the year.

However, I have done a lot of teaching – independently. I ran a 6 week after school karate class for 4-7 year olds at a local primary school which seemed to go okay. Most of the kids were great and made good progress in the time they had. One or two expressed an interest in carrying on with it so hopefully we will see them at the club. Discipline issues remained a problem with a couple of the boys and I tried various tactics to sort them out. I really need to reflect on these classes so that I can improve them for the next time we run such a course, which hopefully will be after Easter.

In fact my sensei and I went into a local primary school last Wednesday to do a karate demonstration and talk to enthuse the kids. We just need to wait and see how many are interested in coming along to an after school club now.

I also went along to my first Instructors training course in January. That was interesting experience training with all the senior instructors from our organisation – I definitely felt like the new girl! However it was a chance to learn firsthand all the changes that are happening to our syllabus which are quite exciting.

Looking back, it feels that I am fairly on track with achieving my martial arts aims for 2012. Of course there is no real endpoint to achieving these aims but I find that writing things down really helps me to stay focused and on track.

My latest venture is setting up a martial arts library for the kids in our club but more on that later…..

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Low carb eating - how did it go....

Do you remember a few weeks ago I wrote a post called 'Escape the diet trap' based on a book written by Dr John Briffa. This was about a low carb, high fat, high protein diet which Dr Briffa said was a more natural or primal way of eating.

In essence the diet works because by cutting out carbs you prevent insulin peaks in the bloodstream. Insulin not only pushes sugars into cells where they are metabolised for energy, it also pushes fatty acids into cells where they bind with gylcerol (sugar chains) to form tri-glycerides. Tri-glycerides are to big to diffuse back out of the cells so fat effectively becomes locked into the fat cells.

This means that if you continue to eat carbs, no matter how much you cut your total calorie intake, your fat will still be locked inside those cells and your body will preferentially metabolise sugars (and cry out for them by making you feel hungry) followed by proteins (from muscle). Weight loss will stall even though you still have a lot of excess fat on your body. Repeated insulin spikes also lead to insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes and metabolic disorder.

If you cut the carbs (particularly grain based ones such as pasta, rice and cereals) and replace them with extra fat (eat full fat versions of products, e.g greek yoghurt, butter, cream but avoid all trans-fats) and protein (fresh meat and fish but not too much processed meat e.g ham, sausage, bacon and soya protein) then the result will be that you avoid insulin peaks (fat does not stimulate insulin production). Your body will now preferentially burn fat and with the lack of sugar in your blood the triglycerides inside fat cells will breakdown, releasing the fatty acids into the bloodstream where they can be metabolised for energy i.e you will burn up your own fat! You will not lose muscle bulk either.

Anyway, that's the theory and I've been putting it to the test for the last 3-4 weeks. The results...

Okay, I didn't have a major weight problem but for years I've had a stubborn 5-6 lbs of excess fat around my middle that just wouldn't budge whatever I did. It was as if my body had a set point at which it could lose no more weight but the set point was too high! I started the low carb eating plan from this set point. Three weeks later I have lost nearly 4 pounds, I am the lightest I've been since 2008. I think my set point is finally being lowered.

The other positive but unexpected effects I have experienced include a complete cessation of all 'gurgly gut' symptoms. My stomach is flat and stays flat all day! I didn't think I was particularly sensitive to grains but presumably I was. The other positive thing is that I no longer fall asleep in the evening in front of the telly - something I have been renowned for in my family. I used to put the tiredness down to it being the end of a busy day and relaxing on the sofa in a warm room just flipped my off switch. Now I have just as busy a day but my energy reserves seem to last me right until bedtime. I now enjoy watching the end of films as well as the beginning!

I am also sleeping better at night. As long as I can remember I have woken 2 or 3 times in the night, tossed and turned and had periods of wakefulness during the night. Now I am sleeping through until about 5-6 am and then still managing to get back to sleep for another hour - this is a new and welcome experience for me.

These positive effects mean much more to me than the weight loss - I FEEL so much better and I don't think I will go back to eating lots of carbs again. It has changed the way I shop, cook and regard food. It is a bit of a challenge to work out ways of filling that carbohydrate sized hole on the plate every day but there are plenty of low carb cook books out there to help with ideas.

I am a convert. Why don't you give it a try.....just for one week and see what you think?

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Escape the diet trap - some new ideas on weight loss...

I read an article in The Times supplement last weekend that throws some conventional ideas about diet and fitness on their head!

The article was a promotion for a new book written by practising doctor and nutrition expert Dr John Briffa and included extracts from the book ‘Escape the diet trap’.

Basically he’s saying that conventional views on calorie counting, low fat foods, high carb intakes and aerobic exercise are bad for you if you want to lose weight and don’t work. Here are his reasons why:

·         Restricting calories leads to lowered metabolic rate – causing weight loss to stall at a higher level than ideal.

·         Restricting calories also leads to increased cortisol levels which pre-dispose to fat accumulation around the middle of the waist and can lead to insulin resistance.

·         Research shows that diets that are richer in fat and more restricted in carbohydrate than traditionally advised are better for weight loss and better at improving markers for type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

·         Low-fat diets have been proved to be ineffective for weight loss. Briffa explains that fat storage is not simply about calories but is under hormonal control, namely insulin. Insulin helps deposit fat into cells and keeps it there and eating a carbohydrate rich diet increases insulin levels – promoting the storage of fat. Paradoxically, diets rich in fat and relatively low in carbs actually lower insulin levels, allowing the body to give up its fat stores more easily.

·         Eating less saturated fat has not been associated with reduced heart disease but avoiding industrially produced, partially hydrogenated ones is.

·         Prolonged aerobic exercise such as running, rowing and cycling is associated with good health but not with weight loss. They do not burn calories quickly enough and make you hungry.

So what does John Briffa think we should be eating instead and what should we avoid?

·         Eat a diet relatively rich in protein – protein satiates appetite and reduces hunger.  Eat only fresh, unprocessed meat, fish (especially oily fish), seafood and eggs.

·         Eat only ‘natural’ fats, including saturated animal fats, olive oil, butter, avocado oil, coconut oil and full-fat yogurt.

·         Reduce carbohydrate intake, particularly those that contain added sugar and/or starch.

·         Avoid all processed and manufactured foods including soya based products and breakfast cereals. Also avoid beans, lentils and peas which are rich in potentially toxic substances called lectins.

·         Drink plenty of fluids. There is evidence that dehydration inhibits the uptake of glucose into cells, leaving blood sugar levels high and hindering the mobilisation of fats from cells.

What about exercise?

(Remember, this is to promote weight loss rather than get super fit)

Briffa suggests the best exercise to promote weight loss is High Intensity Intermittent exercise (HIIE). This is brief, intense exercise with periods of relative rest. Research has shown that there is improved insulin sensitivity, which would be expected to speed weight loss. HIIE also was found to stimulate the metabolism of fat and fat loss.

Example of an HIIE routine using either a cycling, running or rowing machine:

·         2 minute gentle warm up on the machine

·         10 second ‘sprint’ on machine at about 80-90% maximum intensity

·         Slow cycle, jog or row for 30 seconds

·         Repeat cycle or 6-10 sprints

·         2 minute cool down on machine

There are some interesting ideas here. I like the scientific rationale being put forward; it generally fits in with my basic understanding of biochemistry and metabolism. I may even download the Kindle version of the book…..

What do you think?

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My son's shodan success....

Sam

Yesterday my karate organisation, the SSK, held another black belt grading session. This time it was my son Sam's turn to grade for his black belt so how could I not go along to support him? In fact there were five people from our club grading, four for shodan and 1 for sandan. My husband partnered Bruce who was grading for sandan so three of our family trekked over the Pennines to the grading centre near Manchester.

As everyone in the UK will know, winter decided to make a sudden appearance yesterday, so it was in wind, rain and sleet that we gingerly drove over the Snake Pass to Manchester. There was snow and ice forming at the top of the pass, causing me to skid a little (I was the designated driver for the day) but once we were off the highest point it just turned back to rain.

We safely arrived at the venue at 9.20am only to be locked out for an hour. The caretaker had gone on holiday and had delegated opening up the building to his teenage son who was nowhere to be found. We decided to just sit calmly in the dry of the car and watched the organisers do the panicking as they tried to locate a key!

We finally got into the building and my son and the other grading students went to get ready and started warming up. 16 students were grading in total from a variety of clubs in the SSK.

This was the third successive dan grading session that I have attended (the first to partner someone else, the second for my own shodan grading and this one as a parent of a grading student) so I pretty well knew what to expect. I knew that I would not be allowed to sit in and watch the grading (even grading partners have to leave the room when not needed, unless they are also grading themselves) so I went prepared.

Any parent foolhardy enough to stay for the entire grading  (like me) is banished to the draughty corridor outside the grading hall with only a few plastic chairs to sit on and a small kitchenette to make tea/coffee. So I took a deckchair, my computer, a couple of books, newspaper and food. The only view I could get of the grading was through a small window in the door to the main hall. As this opened onto the grading mat rather than the training mat at the other end of the hall, I had quite a good view.

The day was organised with the usual military precision - it has to be; with 16 students grading the grading panel had to observe and mark 804 separate demonstrations in 7 hours - no easy feat. Dan gradings are a pretty formal affair for us - no talking, clapping, cheering or shouting encouragement is allowed at all so the mood tends to remain sombre and serious - like an exam!

I'm always amazed at the ability of the children to maintain focus and concentration over such a long time period; it's enough to tax most of the adults so I think the children do really well, especially as they don't have their parents with them. The youngest student grading yesterday was only 10 and she was very focused and self-reliant for one so young. In fact she attained the second highest mark of all the students, a brilliant achievement. In our organisation the children and adults follow the same syllabus so you can directly compare them.

Sam receiving his belt and certificate

 Obviously my main attention was on Sam, and our other club members. My son did me proud, just like he always does, and put on a great demonstration of karate. He is such a cool cucumber, no sign of nerves - just quietly getting on with it. He and his grading partner, Dave, have trained really hard these past few months and it really paid off for both of them yesterday.

We also had two other teenagers grading for shodan, Max and Ben, both of whom managed to pull some magic out of the hat and put on some of their best performances to date. Then their was Bruce, grading for 3rd dan. Poor Bruce's syllabus seemed to be twice as long as everyone else's and much of it was given to him on the day, so he really needed to know ALL of his karate techniques as he didn't know exactly what would be thrown at him on the day - he sailed through it with exemplary grace and style and has become the first 3rd dan student in our club.

Our successful club members: Bruce,
Ben, Steve (instructor), Max, Dave and Sam.

Basically it was a clean sweep - all 16 students achieved their respective dan grades which were all well deserved.

By now we had heard that the weather had deteriorated and the Snake Pass had been closed to traffic because of the snow; so tired but happy I drove my cluck of dan graders home - the long way!

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Thoughts and discoveries about karate training part 2 – learning the basics

This is part 2 of my review of posts I have written over the last year or two. In this post I look at how I am learning to understand my own body and my attempt to master control over it through training the basics of my art…

Every martial artist comes to appreciate the importance of training in the basic or fundamental ways of moving for their art. In karate the basics are generally thought of as the range of different punching, kicking and blocking techniques along with the various stances that can be used. We generally refer to this as kihon training. Most kihon training is done as whole class teaching with the students standing in rows, punching and kicking the air, moving up and down the dojo in various stances or working in pairs punching and kicking against a pad.

However, during the last couple of years training and through researching and writing for this blog, I have come to the realisation that basics are even more fundamental than kihon training. It’s about how we actually move our bodies at all, how we balance, how we align our muscles, bones and tendons, how we coordinate and time our movements and how we internalise and remember our techniques. In short, it’s about understanding and mastering our own bodies and minds.

My general approach to my own personal training and development in martial arts is to identify my weaknesses (or have them pointed out to me, which is what generally happens) and then follow through with that at home to discover why it is I am making a specific mistake and what I can do to correct it. For example, some of my most fundamental problems have revolved around leaning and having a fairly shaky dynamic balance.

I explored my leaning problem in If I had a pound…. and concluded that the leaning was related to my balance problem. This lead me to research into what balance actually is, how our bodies control balance and how we can utilise that knowledge in martial arts. This led to one of my most popular posts so far – Martial arts – a balancing act.

However, there is no point in researching or writing about it unless I’m going to practice what I preach, so I do actively try to think about the principles of balance when I’m training in order to stop my leaning and wobbling. I think I’m making some progress in this respect and my instructor has not told me I’m leaning for several months now. I still occasionally wobble when turning but I realise immediately why this is so and take steps to correct it – I’m finally starting to understand my body!

Still on the topic of body movement and alignment I became fascinated by the principle of nanba aruki after reading something about it in a book (Empty hand, by Kenei Mabuni). Initially I found it hard to believe that a couple of hundred years ago Japanese people used to walk with the same arm and leg moving backwards and forwards together (nanba aruki walking). It seemed so counter intuitive.

I set out to research the subject and discovered that the principle of moving the same arm and leg together so as to pivot around your centre line was inherent in all martial arts systems and led to greater efficiency of movement. The maxim, ‘Don’t force, don’t twist and don’t disconnect’ comes from the application of the nanba aruki principle. I now see nanba aruki in action in pretty well all my karate techniques and use it as a bench mark to decide whether I’m executing techniques correctly or not.

Of course there always has to be an exception to the rule and in karate this is the gyaku zuki punch (reverse punch) which definitely does not utilise the nanba aruki principle. I wrote about this in Gyaku zuki – odd punch out? I’d read somewhere (possibly in Kenei Mabuni’s book) that this punch was a modern 20th century addition to karate, introduced when karate became a sport. However my own research suggests that the reverse punch has very much been a part of karate for a long time as it is present in several old kata. Odd punch out or not, the gyaku zuki remains an important weapon in the karateka’s arsenal and is practiced extensively during kihon training.

Another fundamental principle of movement that we need to master and is notoriously difficult to do is the principle of hard/soft. By that I mean tensing muscles when you need to and relaxing them when you don’t. We gradually come to appreciate as we train that punches are harder and faster when muscles are not all tensed up.

I wrote about this problem in karate – hard not tense and suggested that one way of learning to relax during the execution of techniques was to participate in a softer style of martial arts and that for me this is sword training. To get clean, fast sword strikes you have to relax and let the sword do the work. I am trying to adopt the same thinking in karate i.e. let the fist do the punching (not the bicep) but it remains a work in progress!

And finally, how do our bodies remember how to do all these basic, fundamental techniques and ways of moving? I tackled this subject in the post, Muscle memory – it’s all in the mind! I described how the learning and remembering of new skills was a staged process in which, through repetitive practice, led to the development of new neural pathways and the laying down of ‘memory maps’ in the brain – a process that can take months or years to complete depending on the complexity of the skill. These memory maps can then be executed quickly and subconsciously whenever we meet a stimulus giving us the impression that it is our muscles that have remembered what to do when in fact it is our brains.

I feel I have come a long way in understanding how my body moves and how I can align my limbs and torso to maximise efficiency yet generate maximum power in technique. However, I’m also aware that I still have a long way to go – like I said, those memory maps take a long time to lay down and become stable! When I watch my instructor moving with such speed, grace and fluidity I feel like a dancing elephant in comparison but I can also see that I have made progress and there is no reason to why more progress can’t be made if I continue to train – in the basics.

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My first nunchaku grading....

It must be the grading season or something because I've just graded for the third time in 4 months. This is one of the problems of training in two different clubs:- their grading schedules aren't aligned to each other, so you get no gradings for months and then three in quick succession. I did my first bo grading in June, followed by my 1st kyu grading in karate in July and on Sunday I did my nunchaku grading!

This nunchaku grading has sort of snuck up on me. Two weeks ago my instructor reminded me that I only had two more lessons before grading and then realised he hadn't taught me the manipulation kata! Suddenly the pressure was on, for both him and me.

I managed to learn the basic bones of the kata in one (intensive) session and practiced like mad at home. By the time the next lesson came I was able to do the kata in a passable way so we worked on improving some of my technique - I was holding the batons in the middle rather than towards the ends, I wasn't throwing my arm out straight or high enough with the strikes and I was a bit confused about some of the transitions between the different strikes. With these ironed out I was able to practice intensively at home again. I also managed to fit in an extra Tuesday lesson, so by the time of the grading my nunchaku kata was,well, okay.

The grading itself was short and sweet (about 10 mins) but had the usual array of problems. Some of the things I had prepared to show the grading officer did not necessarily coincide with the things he was expecting to see; not to mention me mis-hearing what he had asked for and showing him something else!

Things got off to a less than perfect start with the blocks. He asked for a rising block, I told my partner to kick me and did a downward block - doh!! "No, a rising block Susan". Sorry! I then got my partner to do a hammer fist strike and did the correct block. Inside and outside blocks were fine...on the right hand side. Nobody told me I had to do them left handed as well, at least not until the grading officer requested it. This proved extremely tricky! I managed to reverse the inside block in a passable manner but the outside block eluded me (but I think I managed to fudge it).

Moving on swiftly.....The grading officer then asked for a wrist lock and this went okay. The arm lock was next..."That's another wrist lock Susan, I want to see an arm lock". Well that was what I had practiced as an arm lock. I don't actually know any other arm lock techniques at the moment so I wasn't sure what to do next. "Just apply the cord further up the arm near the elbow and it will be fine," he said. So I did what he said and he seemed satisfied. Phew!

Next up was the wrist throw, followed by the head and hip throw. They went fine. Then it was two strangulation techniques. They went okay as well. Finally it was the manipulation kata.....would all the intensive training pay off? Or would my hand keep failing to catch the baton? Would I forget the sequence of strikes? I had just one chance to find out.......

I started off with single forward strikes (left and right), followed by foot return strikes, then overhand strikes where you catch it behind your back, followed by those strikes that you catch under your armpit, then underhand strikes caught at the front, finally double forward strikes followed by figure of eight strikes. Well, apart from fumbling once or twice to catch the baton I have to say it went okay!  His only comment was that I was a bit stiff and needed to sway a bit more with the batons.

The last item on my syllabus was to explain the history of the nunchaku. I had prepared my little speech about this but he didn't ask me. I have been told before that if the grading officer misses something out - don't remind him! So I didn't.

Finally we were all called back onto the mats to hear the results. Due to the slight problems in the early part of the grading I had mentally prepared myself to hear the words 'pass with credit'. But, what I did right must have been done pretty well because I heard him say 'Susan, nunchaku level one....pass with honours.' Wow!

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SSK 1st Anniversary - a review of our first year

On August 17th 2009 a new professional karate association was set up, called Seishin-do Shukokai Karate (SSK). My club was immediately affiliated to this association, my instructor was one of the founding members, and we are now approaching the SSK’s first anniversary.

It has been quite a year for both instructors and students. The aim of the association was to move away from the modern ‘block-punch’ style of karate and return karate to its more traditional Okinawan roots. This has involved a massive expansion of the syllabus to include more in depth analysis of kata and bunkai and the development of a broader range of self-defence techniques, including throws, pressure points and ground fighting skills.

As well as expanding on traditional karate training, the SSK is also developing its competition focus by developing both kata and kumite squads. It has already achieved several champions and medallists, including a junior kata world champion.

This last year has been a steep learning curve for all of us. We have had to learn to break fall, this was not something we needed to do before as we never hit the deck. Now we’re throwing ourselves all over the place! We also do a lot more partner work with a lot of close in stuff – this has taken a bit of getting used to for many people but let’s just say we know each other a lot better now!

We’ve also had the opportunity to attend several courses, some internal and some external. This year, several of us attended a seminar with Patrick McCarthy and also one with Iain Abernethy. I found this exciting – these are people whose books I have read, whose reputation I am aware of, now I’ve had the chance to train with them in person.

We have been on this new journey together. I won’t pretend I wasn’t a little apprehensive to start with. My club was moved out of an organisation I knew and trusted to one that was an unknown quantity, one that was yet to establish its reputation.

The leadership that the SSK has shown has been amazing. In such a short time it has achieved so much. Seishin-do means ‘the Way of positive spirit’. There has definitely been a lot of positive spirit shown by the SSK’s leaders. Several local clubs have joined us since the launch and others are showing interest, it seems to be going from strength to strength.

Standards have been set very high. It is very noticeable that people are training harder and achieving more because of it. They are more motivated and have higher expectations of themselves. Everybody seems to be enjoying this ‘new’ karate.

The first dan gradings were held in May. Our club had three 1st kyus testing for 1st dan. Boy, were they made to train hard to earn the right to test! It was quite inspiring to watch them really raise their game in the preceding few months before testing. My husband was able to get a ‘sneaky peek’ at what the grading was like because he acted as a partner for one of the men who was grading. He came back exhausted after a 5 hour marathon and I know the grading candidates felt they had really earned their black belts.

I have no regrets about my club affiliating with the SSK. We have gone from strength to strength and feel that we are learning some real karate now. One of the best things about the SSK is that it has brought all its affiliated clubs closer together. Through the internal courses we benefit from instruction from all the SSKs instructors and we are getting to know students from other clubs much better.

For me personally, I was asked to be the SSK’s publicity officer and now manage a blog for them on the SSK’s website. This feels like quite a responsibility and has brought me closer to the heart of the SSK – a position for which I feel deeply honoured.

There is no looking back now – the journey can only move us forward. If the SSK makes as much progress during its second year as it has its first then its future as leading karate association must be assured.

Happy anniversary SSK.

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My 100th post - a review

This is my 100th post! I'm amazed I have found 100 different things to write about but then that's the thing about martial arts - it has unlimited potential to provide us with interesting things to research, analyse, discuss and share with each other.

I have decided to use this post to review both my blogging and martial arts experience since I started this blog back in February 09. My initial reason for starting a blog was that I wanted an outlet for my creative writing efforts - poems and stories that I have written over the years but never attempted to publish. However, I was worried that I wouldn't have enough material to keep a blog running for very long so I decided to test out the waters with a martial arts blog.

I love writing this blog! I had no idea what kind of things I would end up writing about but books, your blogs, training experiences and talking to other martial artists provides constant sources of inspiration, ideas and questions to answer through blogging. I now consider this blog to be part of my martial arts training. It is the place where I think about my training, analyse what I am learning and look outside of my own small martial arts world to put things into a bigger, broader context. One thing you start to realise is that there are more similarities than differences between different martial arts and people often just take different paths to achieve common goals.

I decided quite early on that this blog would be more than just a training log. Documenting your training schedule is fine but I think people's training schedules don't differ too much from each other so I think there is limited mileage in blogging about it over a period of time. How your training

affects/enhances/damages/changes you is much more interesting than a list of what you actually did. It reveals more about your art and more about you as a person/martial artist. I also like to explore broader themes such as cultural and historical influences in martial arts. Here is a brief review of the subjects I have posted on in the last 10 months:

Japanese culture: I have looked at several different Japanese Ways, including Chado (tea ceremony); Shado (calligraphy); Kodo (Way of fragrance) and Ikebana (Japanese flower arranging). What I learnt from this is that in Japan budo is just another Way of life - no more or less important than the others. Each Way offers a path of focused and progressive training in the respective art and is about self-improvement and seeking perfection. In Japan you would be no more revered as a master of martial arts than you would as a master of flower arranging or calligraphy. I think this puts things into perspective!

History: I have researched and written about the history of the style of karate that I do, which is Shukokai and I have traced its lineage and the main senseis responsible for its evolution and development. This has helped me to see how my art fits into the broader context of martial arts. I have also started to write about the history of the katas that are practiced in shukokai karate. This has proved to be a very difficult process and has involved piecing together snippets of information found from a wide variety of sources. It has also surprised me that there are so many variations of some katas, so ensuring that I have put the correct history with the appropriate version of the kata for me has also been problematic.

Budo culture: I have been quite intrigued by some of the 'traditions' that are observed in traditional dojos, some of which we just take for granted and don't really question why we do it! This is why I started my little series on Why do we......... So far I have looked at sitting in seiza, practising barefoot and the wearing of gis. I also wrote an article about the power of the kiai. These little articles have covered the history and purpose of the tradition. I appreciate these traditions much more for learning about their purpose. I have a couple more ideas for my Why do we...... series for next year so you will have to wait for them!

Training aspects: I find it difficult to write too much about specific martial art techniques and self-defence strategies. This is because I am still a student in the kyu grades and so don't have the knowledge or experience to tell others how to do it - that would be patronising in the extreme and I have no desire to take that approach. Instead, I have tried to discuss technical aspects of martial arts from a learners point of view, sharing with you my observations, personal difficulties, research and personal opinions. I have been particularly interested in problems that women face in martial arts training and have written several posts on the subject. These views have come about as a result of reflecting on my own training and observing the training efforts of other women in my dojo or on courses I have attended. Of course my views may change as my training progresses or as a result of comments you make to me so my views only represent me as I am now.

I haven't actually written much about my own personal progress in karate or kobudo since I started blogging, so here's an update: In karate I have graded twice since I started blogging, moving from 4th kyu (purple belt) to 2nd Kyu (brown belt with 2 white tabs). All being well I expect to grade for 1st Kyu (brown belt with 3 white tabs) around June/July next year and for black belt about 9 months after that. I have also seen my club transfer from one organisation (SKU) to another (SSK). This has meant we have all had to get to grips with a much more comprehensive syllabus. I have also attended a few courses and participated in both kata and kumite competitions. I took up kobudo with a jutitsu/kobudo club about 6 months ago and have just graded in level 1 tonfa. I intend to study the bo as my second level 1 weapon after Christmas and also continue my study of the bokken. It has been quite a busy year!

However, none of this tells you what I am good or bad at so here are my personal reflections of my karate ability. My upper body techniques are better than my lower body techniques - I punch better than I kick! For a woman my punching and blocking is quite hard though I still sometimes punch the pad with the wrong knuckles suggesting that my wrist is not always straight. My stances are generally accurate and strong as are most of my movements, however, I don't yet have the speed needed to execute moves powerfully. Kicks are my weakest thing; my mae geri doesn't snap back enough; my mawashi geri is okay against the pad but useless in sparring; my yoko geri is laboured and has the wrong foot position and my urisho geri would only be useful if I was aiming for your knee - I cannot get height on it at all! As for anything spinning? That brings me to my other weakness - balance. If I turn too quickly I lose balance and I'm not too hot at standing on one leg either. However, I'm good at break falling and can do many self-defence techniques quite strongly. We all have different strengths and weaknesses. I think identifying and acknowledging them is a step towards making progress.

Well I hope you have enjoyed this review of my blogging and martial arts experiences over the last 10 months. Of course there would be little point in writing a public blog if no-one was interested in reading it so I would like to thank all my readers for their comments. Receiving comments is one of the best parts of blogging for me - I love the interaction with other people and welcome all styles of comments, whether you are agreeing with my post or not! I will always endeavour to reflect on your comment and reply to it so please keep them coming.

In the new year I am hoping to give my blog a face lift, possibly even a slight name change, not sure yet. Well, whatever happens I'm looking forward to writing my next 100 blog posts!

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