Course Report - March 2000

- Saturday -

The session started with a warm up conducted by Stuart Hendry (complete with whistle) to get the old (for some of us anyway!) heart and lungs to kick into high gear. Much light jogging back and forth and squats. A light stretching routine to prepare the muscles and joints for the coming event followed this up. At this point control of the group passed to Hugh Hastings and Sanny Hunter, the chief instructors of the club.

As one group we did the Taikyoku katas to start working on picking up the person at the front’s timing, then moved on to perform Heian Sandan and Heian Nidan katas. During this time Hugh and Sanny were moving around the group correcting and encouraging people. As well as timing, the emphasis of this practice was relaxing and using minimal physical force to carry out the movements. When Hugh and Sanny were happy that people were starting to get the idea they moved us on to Sanbon Kimite (3 attacks with a defence at the end – although these rules are not set in stone, in fact sanbon can be any number of attacks).

The group was split into two at this point with black belts again practising Sanbon followed by Heian Sandan, Yodan and Gedan. Kyu (student) grades practised following an opponent and finished with Heian Shodan and Nidan again. As you can see Kata is very important to our practice as we believe that all the techniques we practice come from the kata and not the other way around as some styles believe.

Second session started again with a warm up and stretch compliments of Stuart (I could get to dislike this Guy!) We then moved on again to kata, Heian Nidan this time. From there we were coupled with a partner and practised "blind following" which involves following someone moving back and forth while keeping your eyes closed. The only indication you have of the other person’s changes of speed, direction etc is through their/your fingertips, which are touching at arm length. Try it sometime!

The group was then split into three this time black belts, brown belts and the rest. We practised Sanbon again, but to different levels and expectations. Finally, we joined up again and practised all five of the Heian katas before stopping for something to eat and drink. Many years ago it would not have been acceptable for people to drop out of a group or practice and have a drink of juice/water. We are lucky that our instructors have changed with the times and actively encourage this.

The final session started again with – you guessed it – a warm up and stretch. Then on to Heian Nidan and Sandan katas. The group was split again into two, each facing the other with a black belt at the front and rear of each. Each performed Heian Nidan while the other followed their timing while stationary. Every now and then Hugh would shout and we would all grab a partner from the other group and do Sanbon Kimite.

Towards the end of the session, the black belts were lined up in Kiba Dachi (horse riding stance) with the Kyu grades continually attacking them. As one of this group I can say honestly that I thought my hips were coming apart at one point, but I made it. Final practice was again kata, starting with the Heian katas and working up through all the katas and finishing with Empi. Grades were pulled out of the group when they reached a kata they had not been taught yet leaving only the black belts at the end.

Finally Hugh made two announcements to the group. One was to award Tommy Lucas his 1^st Dan Black belt to the cheers of the group. Normally Hugh gives the new 1^st Dan his/her black belt from the club, but in this case Tommy’s father Tom (who was one of the club’s black belts, but is unable to practice now) presented Tommy with his own black belt. From father to son. The second announcement was to award Edwin Tibbles a second Dan grade. Well done to both of you, you’ve worked hard and deserve the honour given to you.

- Sunday -

Today, as always in our group of clubs is dedicated to the Juniors. This is where they get to benefit from all the hard work the adults put in yesterday, and a chance to practice with lots of other juniors from the other clubs in the group who they may not have seen from the last course.

Sean Gray (Junior 1^st Dan black belt) took the warm-up and soon had everybody "glowing". The session was started with the Taikyoku kata performed by the whole group.After having performed this kata to Hugh and Sanny’s satisfaction, the group was split into white belts, red/yellow belts, orange belts and above. The white belt group performed the first kata again as a smaller group then basic techniques (Kihon) and finished with kicking techniques.

The red/yellow belt group practised Kihon and then the Heian Shodan kata finishing with punching and kicking techniques.

The orange and above group went through the Heian Shodan and Nidan katas, with instructors helping to improve the form of the techniques, their rhythm and the overall smoothness of the kata.

During all of this activity Hugh, Sanny and Eddie were wandering from group to group keeping the instructors right and encouraging the juniors. As a by-product of this moving around they were also observing the individuals within the groups to see how they were doing.

We then had a short break for crisps and juice (supplied by the club) before the last session (the juniors only do two sessions because we feel it would overexert them if we had them doing three the same as the adults).

The second session started with group kata again to warm-up a bit. After a few performances the group were once again split up into the same three smaller groups

The white belt group worked again on what they had been practising in the first session, trying to build on what they already had.

The red/yellow belt group changed it slightly and performed kata in two groups facing each other. One group performing while the other watched them, then the other one performing. This is a practice to improve your ability to follow other people’s timing and body rhythm and be able to "step into their body".

The orange and above group started with kata and went on to following an opponent which lead in turn to Sanbon Kimite (three attacks with the defender going back and blocking on the third).

Finally, all the groups were called together to perform kata together with an unusual slant. Normally we start kata from a standing position called "Yoi". In this case it was started from a kneeling position on the floor and "jumping" into the first position of the kata. As an observer of this I can say that the juniors seemed to find this a lot easier than the adults!

As some people were being graded for new belts at this course, the results were read out by Andy Vallance and Edwin Tibbles (both 2^nd Dan black belts).

Once the juniors were away, the adults had "just one more" session followed by their grading results.

Congratulations to all who went on to new grades, and if you didn’t move on, don’t worry. It means you have a wee bit more work to do on something. With Hugh and Sanny’s help and instruction it won’t be long.