bushido_man96

The competition committee has been busy the last few years, and I think some of it was sparked by some of the XFL rules; kickoff rules, for example. Then there were the gripes about OT and both teams getting possessions in the playoffs. Andy Reid was actually in favor of that change, even though they benefited from the previous format. If they league goes to an 18-game season, it'll be at the expense of another preseason game. I can see another bye week being added. But adding another playoff game would be a bad idea. At that point, the league starts to get watered down, and sub .500 teams will make the playoffs regularly. I also heard rumblings for changes in playoff seeding, where division winners with worse records won't necessarily be awarded a home game. I'd like this change, because I don't think a 6 loss division winner should be seeded higher than a 4 loss team in a tougher division. We'll see what happens.

4/4/2025 Aikido: 1:30 - 3:00 pm. We had a guest instructor in today, and it was fun to see his perspectives and class approach. We did aikitaisos, then we stood in stance and the Sensei would call out step forward or slide forward, then we'd do it back. Then he had us close our eyes while doing it. This affects me much more now than it used to. We also did some tai sabaki shomen strikes against the attacker coming forward with shomen. First two went outside the attack, to the head and then to the wrist, and the other two were to the inside of the attack, to the head then the wrist. Then it was lots of technique work: Shomenuchi kokyunage ura: I must remember to bring my elbow down to help finish. Shomenuchi iriminage with tenkan: I need to not step away as I feed the uke's head into the crook of my elbow. I also need to focus on keeping my center down throughout the entire technique. Shomenuchi Iriminage: This one was different. We stepped inside and at an angle did an arc hand placement on the chin of the uke, and push their head backwards to break their balance. I see the block/strike we do in our white belt #2 and #3 one-steps here. And I can either step in at the angle or back at the angle, and block with the shomen with the free hand if need be. It has a very intercepting vibe to it, and like it. I will play with this application in those TKD one-steps. Katatatori nikkyo with pin: From same side lapel grab. Here the guest Sensei talked about uke staying engaged and "in the fight" to an extent so that nage has to get the technique right and not have it given to him. This was a good class. I had to get up slowly from the falls so as not to aggravate my head and get dizzy. Made it work, and working with the guest Sensei and the other black belt he brought with them was fun. I really wished we would have had a chance to sit and chat for a while, but perhaps next time.

I don't think it's a lost art. I think it's just that fewer find the true meaning of it.

Congrats, @crash!

Welcome to KF!

Lots of moving. I saw some rules are being talked over. The playoff OT rules are now extended to the regular season. The suggestion to ban the "tush push" has been tabled at this time.

4/3/2025 Aikido: 8:45 - 9:45 am. After really brief warmups, we got into testing prep. We worked shionage omote and ura from same side wrist grab, and then nikkyo omote and ura from same side lapel grabs. I didn't fall down a lot, and when I did, it was front falls really slowly controlled, and I had to make sure I got up really slowly. Lots of problems with my head this week. But this class was a great focus, and I really felt the techniques smoothing out the more we worked them. Lots of good reps. TKD: Rank Class: 5:45 - 6:30 pm. I got to teach this class. After getting some upper body basics down, I wanted to do a side kick focus to help out the white belts. Doing our side kick basic, I had them do it in two counts, with the first focusing on the chamber position in the proper place, so on count two they were pushing the heel out as a side kick and not as a round kick. I had the black belts working on hook kicks. After the side kick work, I had them from the same stance working reverse side kicks, turning and looking over their shoulder, getting the feet pivoted, and driving the heel by the knee to get the kick in a straight line. This was a little tough for the white belts, but they were picking it up, and I could see they were understanding the principles. I had the black belts doing reverse hook kicks. Next was forms. I had four white belts do Chon Ji hyung, first at my count and then at their count. They all had it down, and now it's just technique clean up working forward towards testing. Black belts, one did Yoo Sin, other did Gae Baek. I didn't do my form. One-steps was all white belts. Two of them had black belts to work with, so I supervised the pair of white belts working together. I did one rotation so I could see a few others working together. Again, it looks like just technique clean-up moving closer to testing, as they all pretty well have the material down. Unfortunately, while watching one-steps, my head got really light all of a sudden. Not spinning, but definitely a change. I didn't chance going to BJJ tonight.

We have a place to hang a heavy bag, but we don't use it too much. We do use standing bags quite often. We do have clapper pads and focus mitts that I think we should use more often, but that depends on who's teaching class. I don't like to use Martial Arts class time to work on "cardio" or "strength training." The fact of the matter is that it isn't often strength training at all. You just end up doing a workout with some other tools to make the students hot, sweaty, tired, and sore for a few days, and in the end it provides no actual accumulative benefit, because it isn't done consistently enough to provide a benefit. Aside from that, there are better ways to get stronger, the most effective being having a good strength training program that uses free weights about three times a week. And this good program will take about an hour to an hour and a half to complete. If I want my students to leave class hot, sweaty, tired, and sore, I can still do that with Martial Arts focused training. My classes are for learning Martial Arts, and not cardio kickboxing or Tae Bo. Places like LA Fitness that sell a ton of memberships per year tend to have a very transient group of people training there; many sign up, but not as many are actually in there working out. Sure, there are the regulars that make it a point to stick to their fitness regimens, but if you polled the number of members that actually keep going to work out 'regularly' (we'll call that three days per week), it's probably a significantly lower percentage of the actual registered gym membership. This is a bit extreme. The Martial Arts aren't dying. Things ebb and flow. The Martial Arts have never been about "broadcasting" at any rate. It's always been about the select few that stick it out for a lifetime, and get to bring some people along the way. Not everyone that joins stays with it for life; but you can get some good students that stick around for two to four years. Instructors have seen this pattern for years and years. It's unfortunately nothing new. I find that a lot of adults have lots of things going on and either don't think they have time to put into MA training, or would just rather not fill up the few hours of time they have on their own with anything else. Our TKD school has been struggling with getting more adult students in since Covid, and most of the adults get into it because they have kids into it as well, and they do it as a family. However, the Aikido dojo I attend classes at has a very decent adult following. I agree with this. If I'm not using the time in class to teach the students MA skills, then I'm not giving them their money's worth. Nothing I do "strength focused" is actually going to be beneficial to them in a strength capacity anyway. Like I mentioned, it might make them sore for a day or two, and they might think it's worth it, but it really has no long-term benefit.

3/28/2025 Aikido: 8:50 - 9:50 am. Warmed up with aikitaisos and some internals focus, rooting through the feet (gripping the ground with the toes), and then down through the legs. I had some trouble "feeling" this, and Sensei had me lay on the ground. He lifted my extended leg, and had me try to fold it at the knee by brining my heel back toward my butt like a leg curl. He said that's not it; then he head me try to pull my heel straight back to me; I likened it to a squatting motion and that made it click. After testing the internals again, it made a huge difference. It's kind of like using tension in my legs to pull my butt towards the floor, I guess. Next, technique work. Kokyunage from same side wrist grab, or kotegashi from same side wrist grab, our choice. I needed more work on kokyunage, so I worked that one. Next was shomenuchi iriminage. We worked the entry first, and then worked the entry and the second step. Then we added the feed into the finish. I stayed low, which was an important note against taller uke, which tends to make me stand up more because I feel like I have to "reach" up to them. Lots of good technique work here, and I feel I'm getting closer to being able to test. TKD: Rank Class: 5:45 - 6:30 pm. I taught this class. Got through all of basics, but didn't have the white belts due the last two combinations, and had them focus on the more basic ones. I also took a few minutes to work on out the kinks the white belts are having when we turn in basics. I just worked it as a floor drill of it's own, and they pretty well caught on. I only see a few hiccups now. For forms, I observed Chon Ji for the white belts, Won Hyo for a high green belt, and I did Choi Yong with the black belts. For one-steps, I helped out a few white belts getting through theirs. BJJ: 7:00 - 8:00 pm. We worked guard passing again. I got both of the boy into the class tonight. Warm-up: 2 rounds, 3 min each. Nice and easy. Game 1: Standing guard pass, bottom player keeping feet forward to opponent, seated and moving, defend the pass. Standing player, try to connect, pressure, and pass. 3 min as standing player, then 3 min as seated player. Game 2: Standing player working angles and getting one leg inside seated player's legs, then working to knee slice or camping position to an over/under pass. The seated player was looking to destabilize. I have real trouble working from that camping position. Coach described it as pretty transitional, and not hanging out there too much. 2 rounds, 3 min each. Game 3: Top player now started from the knee slice/outrigger position, and try to maintain position, get pressure down. Bottom player trying to destabilize. When on top, I have to maintain a good frame on the far hip to keep them from slipping the knee in. 2 rounds, just working back and forth, 3 min each. Game 4: Back to game 1, but putting it all together to either pass if on top or destabilize if on bottom. I messed up often, but I could see how I was messing up (usually not framing on the hip when on top), so I guess that's improvement. 2 rounds, 6 min each. Both boys were in class tonight, which I thought was nice. However, Kendall just seemed to be in "big brother mode," just trying to alpha is little brother. Kenneth got frustrated and was going to leave. Kendall left, so I talked to him and had him stay and work with a guy in the class that is super good about working with everyone and not just torching everyone. That helped him out and he learned a few things. He's kind of in the boat Kendall was in at the beginning; he could wrestle someone down and get to a pin, but wasn't really sure how to finish. He'll get there. I have to figure out how to get Kendall into a "learning" mindset and out of the "winning" mindset. The easy way to do that would be to tell coach to roll with him and not hold back, and just make him tap every 5 seconds. But I'm not sure that would help either. Probably just tick him off. So it'll be a process. My head had been screwy all week, so I didn't do any live rolling, but I did get with one of the guys to work the position drills again. I really focused on the frame on the hip and blocking the knee slipping in.

I have to avoid caffeine due to Meniere's disease. However, years ago I started struggling with fried or greasier foods and found out that I had Chron's disease. You might get with a gastroenterologist to see if you have developed Chron's or colitis.

It's not just Westerners. The Koreans in Olympic TKD competitions, along with all the other nationalities competing, really like their long and frequent yells.

Nah, no red flags. That's how wrestling works. Plenty of great athletes have flamed out of the NFL and gone on to be successful in other careers: Brock Lesnar had a decent MMA career, but got cut in Vikings camp I believe. Dwayne Johnson also didn't make the cut for the NFL. Kimbo Slice played football collegiately for Florida State University and enjoyed his own run of fame. Carl Weathers was cut from the Raiders roster and enjoyed a movie career. Steveson is going to be just fine. The opponent he lost to, Wyatt Hendrickson, is no slouch of a wrestler, and he is also going to the Olympic trials. So no red flags; this is the competitive nature of wrestling.

I've moved on to Taekwondo Textbook vol 2, Basic.

I'll have to look into the print subscription, see what that's about. I picked up a print magazine on Amazon called Deadly Art of Survival. Mostly bios of various Martial Artists, but a good read so far.

This may still happen. The announcers were talking about it off and on during the broadcast. He's planning another Olympic run, but after that, I can see him getting into MMA.