I wanted to know if anyone could feel my pain... At my first karate school (wado-ryu) There was a Sempi there named Zach. He could only come once a month and I wondered why. It turns out that he was the unarmed combat drill seargent at the infamous Paris Island Marine Training Camp. He was the hardest teacher I EVER met. He loved what he called the "twelve step ladder", the ladder is when you (without stopping) do one pushup,then two,then three,then four,then five,then six, then seven,eight,nine, and on up.. ann with no break BACK DOWN. The worst part was, when the pushups werent machine perfect... he put his foot on your back and made them three times as hard. And sparring was r... you can guess... look at what his job is. But overall his training helped me in the long run Anyone else had hard teachers?