2022-03-15
2022-03-15, Tuesday
Subbing for ISKF Tempe at the Tempe Family YMCA.
Four students showed up to class last night - two yondans, a sandan, and a brown belt - so we dialed the kihon up a notch, giving extra attention to a couple. For the venerable soto-uke, yoko empi-uchi, uraken, gyaku-zuki combo, we spent extra time on the back-fist strike, making sure the arm snaps, the chest expands, the scapulae contract (together), and the hip counter-rotates quickly. Most people describe the hip as “vibrating” here, and that’s fine, but I think it’s important that the initial hip motion is away from the target (as it is with gedan barai). Next was stepping backward to age-uke, then forward with rear-leg mawashi-geri, landing with uraken, and stepping forward to oi-zuki. That one’s pretty challenging to begin with, but we gave some extra attention to the time between the mawashi-geri and the uraken-uchi, making sure the hand is in the ready position as the kicking leg is recoiling.
Just a bit more on the counter-rotating “vibration” on uraken-uchi: Not only does this help the chest expand but, when you do it this way, the return motion of the hip helps drive the hip rotation necessary to switch from kiba-dachi back to zenkutsu-dachi for the final gyaku-zuki of the combination. By way of contrast, when I teach the “ate” (smashing) version of uraken, I do it with forward rotation, with the hips following through as they do when swinging a baseball bat.
Next we went through the kata for the month, which are still Heian Sandan, Jion, and Sochin. For Heian Sandan, we spent more time on uraken-uchi, emphasizing the snap. In Jion, we talked about the teisho-uke/uchi performed in kiba-dachi. Some perform it as a strike along the direction of motion and some perform it as a block, orthogonal to the direction of movement. That’s fine, but in neither case should the elbow “flare out” away from the body. Just like every other thrusting arm technique, the elbow “hugs” the body throughout. In Sochin, we spent more time on the bit leading into the first kiai, talking about how the hineri-uke must be performed with the forearm held vertically. Any other orientation destroys your ability to redirect the incoming punch. Many, many people tend to let the blocking elbow flare out away from the body, because they’re accustomed to the nagashi-uke in the Tekki kata, but this wrecks the vertical alignment of the forearm. The point to remember here is to keep both elbows pointing forward throughout.
We ended the night with a bit of kihon ippon and jiyu ippon kumite. Mawashi-geri isn’t normally part of this group’s yakusoku kumite routine, but I added it because I wanted to work on the same Heian Sandan application of moves 2 and 3 that I discussed before. Mawashi-geri is tricky, because it’s so easy for the attacker to “flip” it from low to high (or vice-versa), so I like to use a defense that provides as much coverage as possible. The combined low/high block on move 2 of Heian Sandan fits the bill nicely. If you turn into the kick with the hand closest to the attacker performing the inside block, you can block both low and high kicks. Then, proceed to move 3, using the reversal of the blocks to “crank” the attacker’s knee downward, forcing the attacker to spin and expose his back.
