2024-04-22

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

This past Saturday was “Healthy Kids Day” at my YMCA, so they asked me to staff a table to see if I could recruit any new students. I went a step farther and brought in my little furry “markting specialist” Penny. I can guarantee that many more people stopped by the table to talk than would have if it had just been me.

In class tonight, I introduced the new 8th kyu students to Heian Nidan and spent a good deal of time getting about halfway through the kata. The most time, of course, was spent on moves 7 and 8, the side-snap kick/backfist strike leading into the northward-facing knife-hand block. It requires more balance and coordination than any move in kata these students have seen so far, so it took many, many repetitions to make it look reasonably good. Later, we added a piece to our kumite drills. We’ve worked up to the point where partners can push each other back and forth across the floor, with one as the “attacker” and one as the “target.” Tonight, I asked the “target” side to start touching every inbound attack with their front hand - not “blocking”, just “touching.” Baby steps.