2026-04-27

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

Last night we drew first blood! One of the students lost a toenail while kicking during sparring. It happens … but it was still a good opportunity to talk about safety and hygiene.

No hard accessories:

This one began as “no jewelry”, but has expanded a bit over time to include fitness trackers and other wearables. Anything rigid will eventually scrape someone else, break, or fall off and be stepped on, so just leave them at home. If you must wear a wedding band, get one made of silicone. I honestly don’t care if it’s a fitness tracker - safety is more important than counting your steps. Rigid hair accessories like barrettes are also no good - they fall out all the time and get stepped on. If you need to keep your hair in place, use something soft like a scrunchie.

You will, occasionally need to accommodate some exceptions: Glasses can (and should) be removed for free-sparring, but if you absolutely cannot see without them, I’m fine with shatterproof athletic glasses. Likewise jewelry mandated by culture or religion can usually be covered with tape and rendered safe. The goal isn’t uniformity - it’s safety.

Trimmed nails:

Because we’re bouncing our hands and feet off each other regularly, proper nail hygiene is mandatory. Students should keep their nails short and trimmed for everyone’s safety. Long nails tend to get bent backwards. Some students prefer to keep long fingernails, but need to accept that doing so will make it more difficult to make a fist and increases the risk of self-injury. Likewise, jagged nails always seem to find their way to a classmate’s shins or forearms, and the resulting scrape almost always ends up infected.