A Beginner's Point of View 265-266

Day 265:

Today was a hard practice all about harai-men. We had kiri-kaeshi, men, and kote drills, but they were leading up to a special drill where we would make openings in preparation for striking men. I was encouraged to make my movements small to keep center as much as possible.

In fact, the secret seems to be using less shoulders and more hands to make openings. This keeps you on target for men. At the end of class, I made the request to add lots of kata from now until the promotional. I need to get back into practicing the first three as well as learning the fourth and fifth katas.

Day 266:

I had the day off from work today, so I decided to go to both basic and advanced Kendo class. Instead of being a motodachi, practically the whole class was in bogu, so we rotated like normal, except for anyone less than 17 years old, who would be in the instructor’s line. We practiced kiri-kaeshi, men, kote, and doh strikes.

Class was running late and by the end of it, the instructor made up big drills with multiple iterations of kihon strung in a long chain to test our endurance. We did a men-kote-doh combination and then a huge men-kote-doh-men-kiri-kaeshi drill. That last one stressed my lungs as I tend to scream my kiai a lot. About ¼ of the way into the kiri-kaeshi, it felt like my lungs had shut down. I’m sure they didn’t really shut down, but my kiai suddenly became really hard to do, quiet, and my body felt like it was shutting down. I nearly collapsed. Fortunately, that was the end of class.

In advanced class, we started with kiri-kaeshi for a few rounds. There were only four of us, so we got to ask each other what we would like to work on. After a few rounds of kiri-kaeshi, my lungs felt like they were shutting down again. I stepped out of practice and took off men. I stayed out for a long time. My body gives me ‘false positives’ for signals when it’s recovering from anything. I’ll feel good enough to practice when I’m not really ready. This is true for injury as well as fatigue. Instead, I listened to an instructor who was teaching a beginner student all about how to take apart and maintain a shinai.

After a while and a few drinks of water, I really did feel better. So, I watched the others practice a debana drill, focusing on how to read your opponent and try to know when to start. I put on men and stepped in to practice a nuki-men drill. We would pair up and perform four aiouchi-men. On the fifth exchange, the ‘attacker’ would use a nuki-men to avoid the attack and win. We quickly practiced a drill using men-men for the purposes to defeat a nuki-men. It’s not very good at scoring, but it is good for disrupting nuki-men.

We then broke up for kata. It was getting late, so we just cut to the chase. Another student and I practiced the first three kata and took comments. I still seem to have the same problems of ‘pressing’ my partner backwards and not backing up to the starting point. Also, I was told I was getting lazy with bowing by doing it from the neck instead of the waist.

We then learned about the motions of the fourth kata. I learned I can still move into waki-no-kamae fairly well as long as I pay attention to the feeling in my right wrist in order to hide the blade behind me. We practiced both sides of the fourth kata several times before it was time to end practice for the night.

It was later than usual, but I was moving slowly from body pain. That’s the signal for ‘great workout’. The instructor and I were the last to leave, so he took that opportunity to give me a full in-depth analysis of my Kendo and what I’m lacking for shodan. I didn’t take it personally. He was trying to help me. I stayed standing on my incredibly aching feet the whole time.

He told me in great detail about how I was a ‘strong ikkyu’ and that wasn’t enough anymore. I need to start being a shodan. I need to stop relying on my speed and strength. I need to control the match and use more strategy. I need to practice more of my ‘other tools’ that I’ve been learning. He also suggested I ask other dans what they think I need to work on for the shodan exam. I think that’s a good idea.