Queen Cadence

Cadence is queen. In kata, that is. Because every kata has one.

We were talking about this earlier this week in class. Sensei Mark began speaking about - then demonstrating - how a nice, clean cadence - along with appropriate pauses that aren't too long or too abrupt - can add loads of umph to a competition kata presentation. To illustrate his point, he started talking about a video clip someone had sent him recently of a Japanese National Women's team doing Kururunfa kata together during an international tournament. Not only did they kick some serious booty with their kata presentation, they were amazing with their bunkai demonstration as well, really - I mean really - showing how the techniques in the kata are designed to knock the stuffings out of an adversary unfortunate enough to start some nonsense.

Here it is:

Even if you don't know the kata, it isn't hard to understand that the rhythm is solid and that those dramatic pauses are just as important as the kicks, blocks and punches were. These women are Not. Playing. Around.

 This clip of same team going through a warmup for kata Seipai emphasizes exactly why that rhythm is important. Do the cadence changes add drama and dimension to the group presentation? Of course they do, but watch how smoothly they transition from one technique to another in this short clip:

I'll be prepping for an upcoming tourney and you better believe I will be thinking of their presentation while training/readying for mine. Cadence truly is Queen :-)

Fight Club: Becoming "Tigger"

Yesterday, I hopped in my trusty ride and drove two hours to spar session in Brooklyn. It's an amazing session - one I've been to a few times before - but yesterday I finally caught part of the conditioning and drills that precede the sparring and it moved the amazing factor up a notch. And of course I'm a bit sore today, but, well...it is what it is.

Battle in the Ring: Tournament Kumite

That lone scuffle I had back in second grade may be the only street altercation I've ever had, but if  time in the ring counts, I've actually been in quite a few "put up your dukes" situations. I've learned a little something from every one of them, too - but much more from the tight battles and losses than from the wins. But what I also learned is that I like to fight. I mean I REALLY like to fight (I know, right?!?).

Understand that I'm not waltzing into bars and sizing folks up for a beat down in the parking lot, but I do like the thrill of going toe-to-toe with someone in the controlled environment that is tournament kumite. It's like a game of tag where both folks are "it" - in that one person is trying to get you while you are trying to do the same. It's a battle of timing and technique as well as creating and exploiting openings and weaknesses. It's a vertical and sweaty intensity that's fun! And through these sessions in Brooklyn, I'm learning that my game looks a lot like checkers while the seasoned veterans across from me are strategically planning chess moves.

No one there is trying to hurt anyone, but they do move with purpose. Each time I've been to the sessions, I've had at least 10 three-minute rounds but I've only gotten one boo-boo - a self-inflicted injury to my wrist when I collapsed it trying to land a reverse punch. No real harm - just a little stinging - no foul. It's karate, not knitting, so I expect to get a few owwies.

Improvements are coming slowly, but steadily. Here's what I gleaned from fight club "commander in chief"/kumite champion Gamal B. and crew yesterday:

1. Switching lead sides during the heat of battle is a very bad thing. "When a person switches sides, something probably made them feel uncomfortable in their original stance," he said. "Make them pay for it by attacking as soon as the change."
2. But a fake technique can be a very good thing because it helps you test to see what response will come from your adversary (a defensive side kick? off-the-line movement?). "If a fake is greeted by a side kick, that foot has got to return to the ground eventually," he added. "And when it does, attack for real."
3. Keep moving. It's hard to be explosive when your feet are planted. That's where the bounce comes in, because it makes getting off your adversary's centerline or blitzing in any direction that much easier.
4. Create as much space as you can when avoiding or defending against a technique coming to you - because things like leaning back a bit (instead of standing straight up) when throwing blitz-stopping side kick can make it that much harder for that oncoming lunge or reverse punch to find you. 
5. Fight everyone in a similar manner. In other words, don't open your arms when kicking someone shorter or taller and don't fight with your hands down just because your adversary has less experience. Just like in any other part of karate, how you train to do it will probably be how you will actually do it when you really need to.
6. See a target, hit a target. That "s/he who hesitates is lost" thing? Totally spot on.

At the end of the two hours, my pants, t-shirt and even my hair are all literally dripping with sweat. But it ain't really learning if you don't look like an exhausted drowned rat after, IMHO.

Full Disclosure

Saturday night while I was getting dressed to go to my son's last college dance performance of the semester, my phone rang. I let it go to voicemail only to find out later that it was one of my adult students who wanted to talk to me about something. The performance ended late and we went out to eat after, so by the time I got her message, it was well past midnight and too late to call back. Sunday was a family function that bled right into hours of grading papers for my college students. I didn't end up contacting my student until Monday morning.

As it turns out, she wanted to chat about was her 10-year-old daughter who is also one of my students. On Saturday after karate, she'd told her mom that she had been sexually assaulted by a young male relative about a week before.

Reading her message literally made me freeze. I thought maybe I had misread her text (we were both at work and unable to physically chat) but I hadn't. The tiny silver lining to this very dark cloud is that my student actually told her mother about what had happened to her. I know that I didn't tell mine.

My abuser was also a relative. It started when I was six. About 10 years back, I wrote a story about it that I have since lost (that was two computers ago). I don't think I even told my mom until I was in my late teens or early 20s. Since she passed away 21 years ago, there were only four folks still on the planet who know about what happened to me - including my attacker and myself (the others are my beloved and my best friend, who was also sexually abused by a family member when she was a child). Unfortunately, me, my best friend and my student are not alone.

According to RAINN (Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network), one in six American women will be victims of an attempted or completed rape in her lifetime - about 17.7 million folks (about 2.78 million men have also been victims). Fifteen percent of those almost 18 million women are under the age of 12 when they were assaulted. In the US, a woman is sexually assaulted every two minutes and this year, the total tally will reach somewhere around 207,754 - most of whom will be assaulted by someone that they know. To me, those stats are absolutely insane.

Emotionally, things have run the gamut for me since I heard about my student. At first I was horrified, then very sad for my young student when I thought about what she'd experienced. Next I got very angry, thinking selfishly that some of the tools I helped her sharpen on the mat could possibly have saved her somehow (of course that ain't necessarily the case). After that, I became six-year-old me again - the same confused and scared person who thought that what happened was somehow my fault, which was the biggest reason I think I didn't tell anyone until I was an adult. Telling her mom about the abuse I suffered felt like the right thing to do when we talked. I also told training partner, Ed later in the day. Now I'm telling you.

The legal end of this is now in full swing as the police and Child Protective Services are involved and a connection has been made to SATU - the county's Sexual Abuse Treatment Unit - to help all concerned deal with the trauma via counseling and other things. Add physical exams and interviews with police and it has been very stressful week for the family. It will probably be stressful for a while.  

My adult student and I spoke a little while ago. She says she's just doing what needs to be done to protect her child - a sort of "auto-pilot" if you will. My concern is that once the immediate "Just. Get. It. Done." thinking has worn off, she will feel some sort of guilt for not being able to keep her child safe. Although it wasn't her fault at all, I can understand that thinking - because being an instructor she sees for four hours a week as well as a sexual abuse survivor, I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel some guilt as well. Misguided, perhaps, but it is what it is.

So my question is this: while there are lots of MA programs that touch on bullying, I haven't heard much about things like "good touch/bad touch"-type programs after pre-school or kindergarten, much less that are designed to be used in a martial arts setting. Do such programs exist? Can anyone point me to a curriculum? I'd really like to find out more.

Randori Blues

For the record, I freaking HATE randori. Whenever it's announced in class, my palms start sweating, my mouth gets dry and I sneak a quick glance at the clock to see just how long this torture could possibly go on. I detest it so much that if it were a choice between eating beets (the absolute nastiest food on the planet, IMHO) and stepping on the mat as the randori nage, I'd gobble down those beets, flash a peace sign and call it a day.

Why do things that work so well in my head look like a tangled heap of crap when I give it a go? Why do I think so much when it's my turn? Why is writing about it now even making my heart race?

Sure, the athlete in me knows that because I hate it so much, it is probably the weakest part of my karate repertoire, which means I should be working on it much more than I do. But that OMG - here it comes ---> rapid breathing ---> butterflies in my belly ---> adrenaline dump thing that happens in the few moments between the "OK - let's do some random attacks next!" declaration and the "You're up!" nod is just too exhausting.

Here's the problem: the mandate given is that the technique isn't over until the uke is ON THE GROUND. Since I really can't clothesline or give the uke a haito to the temple, the only options are sweeps, reaps and techniques involving unbalancing to put him/her down - and that is only after whatever technique is called for (a punch to the face or empi to the floating rib for example) is complete. What I constantly hear is: you might not want to try that on him/her because of the weight/height difference. But that's what you called! So I pause mid-way - the equivalent of a verbal stammer - and the technique bumps and bounces to the finish line. I end up feeling quite stupid - over and over again.

The solution? Go back to the two-person techniques I polished in prep for my nidan test and do them over and over again. The problem with that is that most of my training - outside of class each week - is usually done solo in the comfort of my roomy kitchen. And while my imaginary uke falls so fluidly each time, my real flesh and bones ones in the dojo don't. Yes, it's frustrating as hell.

To top off the frustration even more, one of my techniques ended up making the group tangent into a discussion on the legality of continuing with a defense when your adversary has walked away. There were no answers, just lots of opinions that had us go around and around. Seems that the law also agrees with the idea that the attacked person can become the attacker if/when he continues to pummel after the threat has backed off. Unfortunately, no one in the class did. Sigh...

Let's hear it for another frustrating night of training!

One Tired Karateka

Not physically - but emotionally, which can be just as draining.

I've been training in the martial arts for a little over eight years now - which admittedly is not a long time. But in my study of USA Goju, I trained in sister schools who had their own way of doing things.  As a result, I can do almost every kata in my repertoire at least three different ways. Mind you, each head of each of those USA Goju schools descended from the same tree (as in all of them directly trained with/under or trained with instructors who learned directly from O'Sensei Peter Urban), but there are differences just the same. I've never understood that (because even when I asked I never got a satisfactory answer) - and I still don't understand it.

To add to the confusion, I recently began training in traditional Okinawan Goju Ryu, which is where Master Urban began. Yep, you guessed it - there are even more differences. But unlike USA Goju, my new school's association and all of its sister schools do things exactly the same way, which is the same as it is done in Okinawa.

In working with my Goju Ryu instructor (who trains every year in Okinawa for some period of time), it's clear that knowing so many versions of kata is kinda silly. Really, what it mostly does is lead to confusion - in that I have to remember where I am when I start presenting because that will dictate how the kata will be done - in everything from how it opens, to specific techniques in the dance, to whether I will step forward (USA Goju) or backward (Goju Ryu) when the kata concludes. Ridiculous, right?

My Goju Ryu instructor told me Tuesday that it might be time to let all the other ways - but the ONE way I want to always do the kata - go. And although I know he's right, it's a little more complicated than that because I still teach USA Goju. Understand that I really love USA Goju - but as what I know to date did not come in a very linear way (because of the school hopping), it feels like my adventures on the mat have been a constant exercise in re-learning a "better" way over and over again. Truthfully, much of what I gleaned early on was ineffective - which is why I had to make so many corrections - so to say I hate the fact that I'm now teaching stuff that is just as potentially ineffective is quite an understatement. Teaching is beginning to frustrate me to no end, and that ain't good - particularly because I have no real idea of how to fix it. The questions I keep coming back to is this: Can you teach something you don't totally believe in? Should you even try? I'm not sure...

Me thinks it's time for a teaching hiatus, perhaps...

No Respect

Rodney Dangerfield virtually made an entire career from the jokes he wrote and told about being disrespected. If he were alive to compete in last weekend's Philadelphia Pro Am tournament, he certainly would have gotten gobs of material for his stand-up routine.

The tourney was scheduled to start at 10AM. Philly is where I went to college (Go Owls!) and I love that wonderful town with all my heart, but it is still three hours away - which made me think it was a good idea to go down the night before so I'd have some fresh legs on which to compete. Saturday morning, I headed out of the hotel around 8:30AM, finished eating breakfast  at exactly 9AM at a spot that was supposed to be five minutes from the venue (according to my GPS) but didn't arrive to register until a little after 9:30AM (because the address listed on the tournament flyer was wrong. I know!). As it was my first NASKA-rated tourney, I was a little nervous, but felt comfortably relaxed as I changed into my gi and started to warm up, watching a little of the kata, weapons and self-defense competitions while trying to stay lose and alert so I wouldn't miss my ring call. I noticed that the age divisions were kind of strange - with a hybrid "45+" category (the norm is usually 10-year division blocks after the 18-29 group, specifically 30-39, 40-49 and 50+) - and the black belt kata for the old folks was after all the other black belt divisions has completed kata, weapons, self-defense AND both point and continuous sparring, but as I had spoken to the event director earlier in the week and was assured that the meet had always ended by 3PM in the previous 10 years they'd hosted it, I wasn't even the slightest bit concerned.

Guess what time this "executive" entered the ring to start competing? 3:35PM - and I had to drag the tourney director away from watching (not judging, mind you) the point sparring competitions to get him to consider rounding up a few judges and moving us to one of the three empty rings.

The ring he set us up with was in the corner of the facility - right next to a group of young kids tossing tennis balls against the wall. Every now and again while we were warming up - and even after our competition finally started - we were interrupted by a ball bouncing through the ring, followed closely by a pair of little legs following blindly after, totally oblivious to idea that the ring was "live." The center judge tried to find the tourney director again to ask him to corral the kids, but because he had one again disappeared into the crowd to watch the point sparring matches in our old ring, the competitors - those waiting on deck and those warming up - had the honor of keeping the kids and tennis balls at bay while their parents sat and watched us.

The three judges assigned to the ring kinda looked like they'd rather be anywhere but where they were seated. The center judge even answered a phone call between competitors and was still on it when I was called up to begin my kata. I politely waited for him to finish - but he didn't until one of the other judges nudged him in the ribs and said "She wants your undivided attention." Ya think?

I approached them, stopped at a respectable distance so as not to have to shout my intro (name, style and kata) before asking for permission to begin. That's when the nudging judge held up his hand and asked me who my instructor was - like THAT was the most important piece of information he could possibly need from me at that moment. It took a lot for me not to just throw up my hands at that point, grab my gear bag and call it a day. But I got through it.

I ended up finishing third in the division. When shaking the hands of the judges, the nudger admonished me for leaving the "My sensei is..." part out of my introduction. "He should be acknowledged for his hard work," he said to me. Mr. Center judge added that my score actually would have been higher, but he noticed a slight slip and had to deduct for it. I almost asked him if that was before or after he hung up his phone.

Tired, emotionally drained and hungry, I had already decided that I would not do kumite. My division, of course, had no other competitors at all and my first fight of the day would have been in the grand championship, against young women who had had at least two fights each already and who had probably eaten and digested lunch. Ready to get out of the place already, I went to pick up my award and was told they had run out. "Sorry - but we'll mail it to you if you just leave your address," the woman at the awards table said.

The three 20-something training partners I went to the tourney with would tell you it was a good one because they were in the ring competing at 10:15AM and their competitions ran relatively smoothly, but not one of the 45+ competitors would probably say the same. I don't understand how part of the tourney's population - 10 of us total - were treated kinda of like after-thoughts although we paid the same entry fee as everyone else. For us, it was a waste of a lot of time, effort, energy (and money!) to attend (the 45+ traditional kata winner chose not to even enter the grand championship) - and most of the "executives" I talked to said they wouldn't even be thinking about attending next year. If the promoters and judges would have spent half as much of time, effort or energy making sure the tournament was as good a spot to compete for the over 35 crowd as they did was for the under belts and the younger black belts and grand champions, I might not be writing this post now - or totally re-thinking this whole "sports karate" thing.

Feeling a little Rodney Dangerfield-ish at present, for sure.

My Name's Not Tigger

Because Tigger's bounce. And I don't.

I'm talking about all that jumping up and down during kumite. I hate that stuff - not because I CAN'T do it but because I don't WANT TO do it. It's got nothing to do with my knees (they are old, but they can still move when I need them to) or my asthmatic lungs (which are well-medicated and controlled, thank you very much) - but because bouncing is NOT fighting, it's bouncing - plus it seems to waste lots of energy (a direct violation of my former sensei's "six calorie rule" - about how much effort I want to use to end the fight while hoping my adversary uses much more) - but that is the name of the game in sports karate kumite, it seems.

Because I don't bounce, I got my head (and my butt and a few other body parts, LOL) handed to me in the opening round of kumite Grand Championships in my first KRANE circuit tournament yesterday. Don't misunderstand, I'm mobile - just not all "Bouncy Tag" and stuff. Considering it was my WORST FIGHT EVER (and that includes my very first kumite competition eight years ago where I promptly got DQ'ed for excessive head contact), I might hafta re-think my "No Bounce" rule - especially if I want to give this sports karate circuit thing a shot. Not having sparred since my last local tournament in October, I felt out of my element anyway, which was terrible - just like it was in that first team sparring tournament all those years ago. It. Was. AWFUL.

Trouble is, I'm a bit of a traditionalist in that I like techniques to at least sort of look the same during point fighting (kumite) and presentation (kata) as they do in the dojo. No extreme embelishments and no kiai-like sounds on every. single. technique; No glitter weapons and no musical kata (which are cool - just not my thing), either. But I also understand that I need to do something different if I want to net different results. Sigh...

Although I didn't begin karate to compete, competing IS sorta in my blood. For 24 years, I trained 5 to 6 days a week, concluding said week with a meet from November through July. Of course track and field and karate are totally different animals, but I hafta admit that the idea of competing against others my age (and usually younger, as was the case yesterday) intrigues me - so much so that I have decided to go a NASKA tournament in a few weeks, which means I gotta figure out a way around or through this thing if I'm going to step in the ring in sparring gear and a helmet.

Ironically, my kata went pretty well yesterday - which usually isn't the case (because I tend to get very nervous and rush through my form when presenting to the judges). I was the only 40-49-year-old female black belt in the traditional forms division, but I presented anyway. I would have won without presenting it, but I figured doing the "no contest" round would help set the butterflies free before the Grand Championship got underway. I finished 6th out of 7 competitors (black belt winners from other age divisions) but I think I did the best I could for that day. The only thing I'm bummed about with kata was that I didn't follow my game plan and presented a different form than I originally intended because, well, I got nervous and ended up settling for my "back pocket" kata (the one I know I can smooth out and compete with no matter what). The other kata - a Shotokan form with a whole lot of back stances (mine still need work because there aren't any in Goju or Goju-Ryu) and some spinning one-legged stuff - had me doubting whether I could get through it without a major bobble or even a slip. Yeah, I was a bit of a mental mess yesterday for sure.

But now that I've done it - and no fire and brimstone fell from the sky when I got my booty kicked and actually lost a fight - I know what to expect next time. I learned some things and took some stuff home to work on.

But to bounce or not to bounce? That is the question....