DarthPenguin

I will look forward to reading it then Now you have had a chance to be there for a while, how do you feel the Aikido is integrating with your other styles?

Congratulations! Glad to hear it went well and the jacked up back didn't hold you back from testing!!

Sunday 24 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 81kg x 5 81kg x 5 81kg x 5 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 67kg x 5 67kg x 5 67kg x 5 Assisted Pullups -40kg x 7 -40kg x 7 -40kg x 7 E-Z Bar biceps curls 36kg x 6 36kg x 5 36kg x 5 Captains of crush grippers (reps are per hand and did both hands) Trainer x 15 Trainer x 15 0.5 x 8 0.5 x 5 0.5 x 5 0.5 x 5 Trainer x 10

Friday 22 May BJJ session This session was working closed guard passing. For warm ups we did a few drills of either breaking posture of the top person when you were in closed guard then some drills of breaking the guard followed by standing up in guard. The standing up drill was either the two hands into armpit and stand up in a pike position to start or the single arm grab and step one foot up then the other. Bottom person was instructed to sweep if the standing person was sloppy and left it open easily. Then worked some passing. First worked the sao paulo pass from closed guard. Really useful practice as i realised i wasn't putting quite enough weight down onto my posting head and was leaving a tiny amount of wiggle room. Then worked opening the guard and either passing with a knee slice or going to headquarters position and passing from there. Couple of rounds then class was done

Thursday 21 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 70kg x 1 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 Deadlift (conventional) 60kg x 5 80kg x 3 100kg x 1 114kg x 2 114kg x 2 114kg x 2 Triceps pushdowns (straight bar) 32kg x 5 32kg x 5 32kg x 5 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2

Welcome and i echo @bushido_man96 here - good to see someone other than the two of us with a log! Will look forward to reading it

Tuesday 19 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 70kg x 1 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 Assisted Pullups -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2

Sunday 17 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 105kg x 2 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 70kg x 1 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 88kg x 2 Assisted Pullups -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2 -25kg x 2

Saturday 16th May Karate Session Second seminar day, this time the all-grades seminar with Kawasaki Shihan. Once again really good with the focus still on hip opening / closing but this time it was more focused on transition between stances and correct stances. One again it was really good and a lot of good learning. We then spent quite a bit of time working on correct usage of the hips in Heian Shodan

Friday 15th May Karate Session We had a special seminar for Brown and Black belts with a visiting sensei, Norio Kawasaki Shihan. Fantastic seminar with lots of great details on the correct usage of the hips in techniques with particular focus on expansion and contraction. Also tried Hangetsu for the first time!

Thursday 14 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 E-Z Bar curl 36kg x 5 36kg x 5 36kg x 5

Sunday 10 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 Assisted Pullups -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6

Thursday 7 May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 80kg x 1 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 94kg x 5 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 79kg x 5 Assisted Pullups -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 -40kg x 6 E-Z Bar curl 36kg x 5 36kg x 5 36kg x 5

Tuesday 5th May Lifting Session Squat 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 83kg x 5 83kg x 5 83kg x 5 Bench press 20kg x 5 40kg x 3 60kg x 2 69kg x 5 69kg x 5 69kg x 5 Deadlift 60kg x 3 80kg x 2 90kg x 5 90kg x 5 90kg x 5

it does crop up in BJJ discussions - it is one reason why people often put their lineage to avoid any issues. People pass around comments on schools that are known to be McDojos and just hand out belts - there is one in my city that is pretty well known and tbh it is a laughing stock in every other academy nearby. You do feel sorry for the students though as it was part of a well known affiliation and the head coach comes across as being legit but then folk would turn up at other schools with advanced belts and be properly humbled. A lot then end up leaving and moving to the other academies What i meant was in the USA martial arts academies are more likely to be someones job/livelihood than they are over here. Here it is typically a hobby or a way to make extra cash. For someone who makes their living from teaching martial arts then McDojos that make martial arts look bad may mean less interested students > less income or they may feel pressure to do the same to be competitive / make a living. Either thing being an overall negative