2022-05-16

2022-05-16, Monday

Teaching my regular classes at the Ross Farnsworth - East Valley YMCA.

Tonight we tried yakusoku sanbon kumite for the first time in class, and I think it went pretty well. I know some people find no value in these drills, and say that whatever skills they teach could be taught in a better way, but I find value in them, particularly for building confidence when first starting partner work.

It was the students’ first introduction to working with a partner, so it was a good introduction to how “messy” karate can get when you’ve suddenly got a real person in front of you. When you’re just doing kihon in front of a mirror, you only have to worry about yourself. Your timing, speed, etc., is your own. But once you start working with a partner, everything changes. Shorter people have to take longer steps, and taller people have to shuffle a bit, to maintain distance.

There’s also a tendency to “reach” with blocks and lean into punches when first working with a partner. All of these things need to be discussed and explained. For me, at least at this level, this is pretty simple. First, never lean forward to punch. If you have to lean, it means your feet are in the wrong place. It’s not a punching problem, it’s a footwork problem. Second, never “reach” to block an attack. If the attack is that far away, it wasn’t going to hit you in the first place.

Of course, it’s not as simple as “never” - there are exceptions. We lean into attacks in Bassai Dai and Nijushiho, and we “reach” to block in Nijushiho and Gankaku, but these students are long way from there. Beginners need to spend their time learning the “rules.” Black belts get to learn when it’s okay to break them.