A Beginner's Point of View 52-53

Day 52:

Today we started off without warm-ups. It’s a good thing I warm myself up automatically after putting on doh and tare before class. My wrists were hurting badly and to top it off, my right leg had a twinge of pain occasionally. I had no idea what was wrong and it worried me. However, after stretching and lining up, the pain went away. Maybe the pain was simply my muscles being stiff. If my muscles feel stiff again, I should probably try just doing stretches at home to see if that works relieving the pain.

We started off doing kiri-kaeshi with rotating partners. A good drill to work out the stiff muscles, too. We continued to do kote strikes and men strikes. By the time we were doing kote-men strikes and doh strikes, the pain was completely gone.

After that, we did keiko with rotating partners. My partners were all higher-ranking than me, so they took it easy on me. It can be a little annoying to receive that, but I can see why they do it. If they fought at their best level, they would completely frustrate me and that’s not what they’re there for. After three keiko in a row, I was out of breath. I had to stop and breathe for a few minutes. I look at the others and see how they seem to go on and on without stopping for breath and I remember how they’ve been doing this for more than one year. I’m only at about half a year of experience, so maybe I’ll gain more endurance as I practice.

During another keiko, it looked as if my nakayui was coming undone. I called a halt and inspected it. Sempai happened to be the one I was practicing with, and she inspected it also. She said that as long as it stayed kinda tied and did not overtly unravel, then I could continue. It still made me nervous. What if it unraveled during a strike and bamboo began to flex too much? Well, I decided to just pay attention to it and continue. It did not seem to unravel anymore, so I would re-tie it back home. Sempai also showed me that when I start to get out of breath, I also let my chudan drift off to the side so I am not pointed down the center line vertically like I should. I didn’t even know I was doing it. That was good to know.

We did a drill where Sensei would stand in the center and strike as Sensei declared, pass through, strike as Sensei declared, pass through, then stop. It was a fun drill. I tried to make sure that I would show ‘one Kendo’ and not vary too much. After everyone performed the drill a few times, Sensei said to keep going, but to choose our own strikes and try to succeed as he would defend and counterattack. That was also fun. Then, Sensei would rotate us to be the one in the middle receiving strikes to practice defending and counterattacking. This was the highlight of the practice. I like facing off against several different kendoka in a drill. This is what seems to really make me try to use what I’ve practiced.

There was more keiko again and only after halfway through the next one I was out of breath again. I noticed that this time, I would regain breath much more slowly than earlier. My heart was also pounding very fast. I took this as a sign to stop. I called an end to keiko and bowed out. I spent the rest of class resting and watching the others. This time, there were actually two of them practicing nito style, which is using two swords. Fighting nito is very different than fighting itto style, which is one sword. Nito has you gripping a sword in each hand and forcing you to move them together to fight and block at the same time.

At the end of class, we must all have been exhausted. We did not perform the bow out ceremony, but instead just put the dojo back in order and changed into our street clothes. Too bad, I like the bowing out ceremony.

Day 53:

I’m taking the day off to rest my wrists. They’ve been sore for a while and I want them healed before another tournament.