A Beginner's Guide to Kendo 176-177

Day 176:

Today was ever hotter than usual. Sensei decided that everyone sweating their brains out wasn’t a good idea. So, for the first half of class we wore our bogu without men. He asked a couple of the ni-dan students to wear men to receive and then we did endless bouts of kiri-kaeshi. It was really good. I felt as if I was smoother and faster this way. It got hot but not unbearable. Then Sensei said to put men on. We did a few rounds of one-step men and one-step doh. A couple of rounds of keiko rounded out the practice and then it was time for kata.

I love kata. There was a group of three of us for lower-ranking to practice the first three kata. The third of us had not really practiced kata much, so the two of us taught him the steps for the first three kata. My partner and I would demonstrate the steps and then the other student would rotate in to practice the uchidachi and shidachi roles. We did this over and over until the end of class.

Day 177:

Today was another very hot day. The heat index makes the effective temperature almost one hundred degrees. Technically, the dojo is supposed to be “air-conditioned”, but in reality only standing next to the vents is affected. Sensei gave us a long lecture about not harming our health while maintaining proper spirit towards Kendo. He encouraged us to drink lots of water during the week and feel free to practice with men off. You may not notice how dehydrated you are becoming until you get dizzy. Sensei did not want us to become dizzy and fall.

We did lots of kiri-kaeshi. At first, I did it without men to preserve body water. After it was over, I felt exercised enough to sweat. No sense in trying to avoid it now. I put on men and then joined the class again. We did more one-step men and one-step kote. We did a couple of one-step doh drills to try to loosen ourselves up.

Then we did a new drill. We had done this once before, but I never had a name to it. It’s called katsugi-men. Instead of raising the shinai above your head in the center, you life it backwards to above your left shoulder, then launch yourself forward to the side. Then you strike men and pass through. At first, I kept raising it above the wrong shoulder until Sensei corrected me.

We did a few times of the man-in-the-middle drill, where one person fends of the entire class, one at a time. We occasionally rotate the person in the middle. We did a few keiko matches at the end to finish class.