bushido_man96

Congratulations!

3/7/2019 TKD Class: 6:30 -7:30 pm. Basics, a brief stretch, form (Choong Jang), one-steps (white belt), and sparring consisted of combinations and testing sparring with no pads. Quick stretch after class. Tonight after forms, my instructor asked me what my favorite form was. I told him it was Gae Baek, as I feel like I get a lot of power out of it, and it just seems to "fit" the way my body likes to do things.

I've never used chalk, just a mixed grip from 120 up. never had this happen before but I did seek out the new bars in the gym with very rough gnarling which is probably the reason. I definitely recommend using chalk. You don't need a lot of it, and I've purchased some chalk balls at sporting goods stores that work really well. Our gym doesn't allow chalk, because too many people scatter it around like fairy dust and never clean up after themselves. But I can get away with using these chalk balls because I just rub what I need on my hands without making the mess, and the only chalk left over is on the bar.

Too true.

Thank you so much, Bob! Stay tuned for updates!

Our school does what called a "Little Lions" program, which is very much what you are referring to, Danielle. We have a series of stripes we give out over the course of a two month cycle, all based on character traits and physical skills: balance, coordination, listening, focus, teamwork, etc. We have two 30 minute classes per week for them, and at the end of the two month cycle, they have a testing. We run a separate belt system for these classes, as well. Its really a great way to feed kids into the regular classes, and is a big part of how our school actually keeps going.

2/27/2019 Taught TKD Class: 6:30 - 7:30 pm. Basics, forms, and one-steps today. I had a couple of fresh-faced white belts in class, so tried to hammer in on some basics. The CI was sick with the flu that day, so a surprise to be teaching, but a good one, to be sure.

Coffee with milk? May as well be a cappuccino. Those scopes really suck, but here's to getting some good news out of it. Now, about your deadlift. Do you use chalk? That helps with the calluses.

I agree. I know instructors who used to say that lifting weights would slow you down and kill your flexibility. "Bulking up" would make you slow and plodding. Not stretching kills your flexibility, not strong muscles. I can't think of any downsides to getting bigger and stronger. Then there is the school of thought that a Martial Artist should only weight train using motions they use in class; like using pulley systems to do weighted punching motions, or to stretch the legs and do kicking motions with bands tied to the ankles. Or, the most perpetuated fallacy I think I've heard throughout my MA career as far as weight training goes, was to "lift lighter weights for higher reps, to increase muscle endurance," or that lifting that way would "make you faster." The fact of the matter is that Martial Artists can reap the same benefits from doing full body, core barbell lifts (squat, deadlift, bench press, press, power clean and power snatch) as many other athletes do. These exercises strengthen the body using the body as it was intended to be used, all together, through a full range of motion. And I don't think I've ever heard anyone say, "Geez, I wish I wasn't so damn strong...."

3/2: High Plains Shootout in Goodland. It was a long drive out that morning, but that's how it goes in Kids Wrestling. Kendall is back in Kids now that his middle school season is over. What sucked is the long drive was for just one opponent each, so it was a best two-out-of-three. I'll start off with Kendall. He wrestled a 165 pounder, which meant Kendall had a weight advantage, put probably no more than 6 or 7 lbs. if I had to guess. Both matches went about the same, with no points in the opening periods, but Kendall securing pins in the second periods. Kendall did work on a slide-by that he had been practicing, which he almost hit in the second match. But, he went 2-0 against an opponent he had not wrestled before. Kenneth wrestled a 95 pounder, so Kenneth was the heavier of the two, weighing in at 106. And Kenneth had some exciting matches. The first match ended with Kenneth losing, 8-7, to, of all things, a locked hands call. I wasn't upset about the call itself, but what upset me is that the ref held his hands locked for the last 20 seconds of the match, let time run out, and then awarded the point. His opponent was really aggressive, and made Kenneth have to work, which was great. The match started with the opponent coming in fast, but Kenneth defended and was able to sprawl, get behind, and then work a takedown from behind, taking the early lead. Try as he might, he could not get a half-Nelson in, and found himself off to the side too much, and the opponent was able to stand up for an escape. Kenneth next got taken down, because he didn't sprawl, and didn't move his feet well enough, and while backing up, tried to turn sideways and toss the kid, which just helped the kid get the takedown. So, down 3-2 now, he goes on bottom, gets a standup, and then while standing, he slings the kid away, but doesn't cover, and could have got two more. He starts period 2 on top, but again couldn't get any back points. He was driving with a half, but the opponent was coming up, and he went to a knee, and got reversed. Kenneth escaped again, but got taken down again because he backed up too much, and they went to the third period, with Kenneth on bottom. He escaped again, was able to sprawl and get behind for two, but couldn't turn him, and the locked hands call came. They were tied, the period ran out, and he lost, 8-7, to the locked hands call. A tough loss. Match two, another good one. The opponent went after Kenneth like a rocket again, and Kenneth sprawled, but did it wrong and landed off to the side, which allowed his opponent to jump on top for the two. Kenneth worked a pretty good switch to get back on top, but again, couldn't get any back points. Period two started, and Kenneth had choice, and wanted neutral, so like a fool, I gave it to him. Afterwards, I knew I should have put him on bottom, because he was scoring on bottom, and scoring from neutral had been a crap-shoot. Kenneth controlled his position much better, but he gets into what I call the spin-cycle at times, and he got spun around and taken down. But he ran a really fast switch and got two, kept the kid down, but could not turn him. Period three started with Kenneth on top. He broke him down, but couldn't turn him at all. Perhaps a chicken wing would have been better than a half. Regulation ended in a 4-4 tie. Kenneth started OT with better control, swung the kid down again, but didn't cover, but as he got up, Kenneth hugged him up from behind and took him down for the 6-4 win. Match 3...looked to be the makings of an epic tie-breaking match. Kenneth got a takedown with a trip in the first, rode him out, but again, couldn't turn him. Kenneth was going to have choice in the second period, but the trip aggravated an ankle injury the opponent had, and he was unable to continue wrestling, and Kenneth won by forfeit. That was really unfortunate, because the kids were working each other hard, and I really wanted to see how this match shook out. This was the last tournament opportunity for the boys before Districts, which is this coming weekend. Top four placers in districts go on to the State tournament in Topeka.

That is very well put, Bob.

It can definitely be useful, I think, although it can be tough at times, too. Palming the face, especially covering the eyes briefly to deliver a blow elsewhere, can help in gaining an advantage. It might be something that can be pulled off in a self-defense scenario from the fence position with the lead hand, and is worth experimenting with in training. I don't think it should be a tactic of primary focus, because there are so many things to consider, but it could be useful.

I don't use apps like this, either. I'm sure they have their uses, but I don't think I would get much use out one.

Welcome to KF! Glad to have you!

Staying focused during a class for me usually isn't hard to do. Its when I've got down time that I need to focus more, and I usually try to work my mind on different things. Reading helps, playing word games helps. At work, I try to keep an eye on the surroundings, and at times I'll push myself to be on the lookout for cameras, mirrors, what people are doing or not doing, etc.

2/20/2019 Finally, after being sick for several weeks, I made it back to class. TKD Class: 6:30 - 7:30 pm. Basics, stretch, forms (Po Eun), One-steps (blue belt), and sparring (three matches). Knees didn't like it, but that's ok. I took it easy where I needed too, and the next day wasn't too bad.

2/14: League Tournament, held in Wakeeney. This is the only middle school tournament this year that has been done in the more traditional bracketing style that I'm used to seeing in kid's wrestling, with 8-man double elimination brackets and some round-robin brackets. Kendall's bracket was an 8-man bracket with two byes. Kendall had the 3 seed, which put him in a pretty good position. Match one was against an opponent he had not faced yet this season. At the start of the match, his opponent tried some slide-bys that Kendall stymied very well, and he tried to work some shots of his own, but to no avail. He did end up trying a headlock, but he was too high, and backed out of it, but the opponent took advantage and took Kendall to the ground, but never got behind the hips, and Kendall was able to get into a neutral position with the opponent, though, and didn't allow him to get any points in the period. The second period started with Kendall in top position, and Kendall attempted to ride tight waist and ankle, but the kid was pretty big, and Kendall had trouble riding at the waist, and the kid had a quick first step up, but Kendall was able to drag him back down from behind, and from there got into position to win by pin. Match two consisted of Kendall basically getting charged and ran over and pinned, so he moved to the back side of the bracket. His next opponent was the one I have mentioned previously that likes the headlocks. I talked to Kendall about being confident, and going in and being smart, avoiding the headlock and such. Well, match three didn't last very long, as they locked up and Kendall got forced into a headlock and pinned. I looked at the video after relaxing a bit, and saw what the issue was. Kendall failed to move his feet and circle with the opponent, which made it all too easy for the bigger kid to get an angle and leverage him over. This ended his day, and it was frustrating because I really felt that Kendall could have placed in this tournament. But, we discussed it and learned, and will work on solving this problem. He finished his first middle school season 13-9, which I thought was a pretty good showing that we can really build on. Now, he'll get back into the remainder of the kids' wrestling season, with one open tournament, and then districts and hopefully state.

I've been in this situation with my boys and Wrestling. I offer advice and help them out when I can, especially when I see flaws or weak spots in their game. What I've done for the most part is take drills and techniques that their coaches work with them on, and just drill reps with those things. Sometimes, though, when it just seems like they need a different solution to a problem, I'll dig up something else for them to work on, and drill it with them, especially if its something they don't get to drill on in practice.

Congrats, and welcome back! Prioritization is one of those crappy adult things we have to do, so kudos to you in getting that accomplished!

Happy Birthday, Devin!

This is interesting. I always wondered how those devices would perform when doing other activities, lifting weights. I know people who use these things, and its overwhelming to me how many people have become obsessed with "getting their steps in" during a day. I think they can be a useful tool, but I've been reluctant to jump on that bandwagon.

Saturday, 2/9: Middle school tournament at Larned. This was another invitational tournament that ran on the "pool play" system. He wrestled the 180 lbs weight class, and there were actually an A bracket and a B bracket, and the two did not cross-bracket at all. Kendall was in the A bracket, in pool B, which gave him three matches before they broke out into their own bracket. The B bracket was actually just a round-robin bracket, and there were several rounds of it, so there must have been at least 6-8 other kids he never even faced that were in his weight class. His first two matches went much the same way, winning with pins in the second period in both. The first was against a familiar opponent, a taller kid that he had trouble getting a takedown on. The taller kid was trying to use his long arms to hook Kendall's leg from the tie-ups, but wasn't able to, but this meant Kendall did a little too much backing up for my liking. He basically spent the whole first period on his feet, not able to get any points, which is something we need to work on, not squandering an entire period. Second period started with Kendall on top position. He rode fairly well, and when the opponent was almost up, he would rip him back down. From there, Kendall was able to get into a front headlock position and run into a twist for the pin. Match two started the same, having trouble winning on his feet. He did sprawl well on a takedown attempt, but couldn't get an advantage off of it. Period two started with Kendall on top position again, and he did a good breakdown, riding some head pressure with an ankle to break the opponent down, and then half-Nelson for the pin. Match three is where things got tougher. He faced an opponent who was tall, and very strong. I got a close up look at the kid between matches, and the kid already had well-developed arms, already maturing physically, and Kendall just isn't there yet. The opponent did take a decent shot and got Kendall down, and from there he muscled him over for the rest of the period. I thought Kendall had a stand-up that was going to work, but he wasn't able to finish, and got yanked back down, and he fought from his back for the rest of period one. Period two started neutral again, and his opponent took another shot, but this time Kendall defended it and had the opponent in basically a "cow catcher" with the opponent on his knees, and Kendall started to try to drive and twist him over, Kendall drove up more than around, and the kid came up with him, slipped under and got a leg to get the takedown finished, and from there is was heavy pressure, and he got turned and pinned. So he finished pool play 2-1. Next came the bracket portion of the tournament, and due to his record in pool B, the worst he was going to end up finishing was fourth place. The first of these was against another big, fast, athletic kid who pinned him in the first period. Last match was another big kid, and in the first period from the tie-up, he just twisted Kendall to the ground. I wasn't sure how that happened, but it didn't look good at all. Kendall was out of bounds, and they got reset, with him on bottom. Kendall was able to get out, and got into decent position, but was too low and the other kid was able to get up. There were a few more scrums where Kendall got into bad position, but rolled it through to be in top position, but then got rolled through himself. At one point, he was riding the ankle again, but didn't have good pressure and didn't have the tight waist, and the opponent stood up. They finished the period on their feet, but Kendall did score some points, which was a good sign. Period two started with Kendall on the bottom, and he really worked his sit-out/switch moves well, and had himself out, but he scrambled on the ground instead of starting to get up, and the opponent pounced and turned Kendall, getting him pinned. So, it was a little rougher day, with some good competition, and he finished 2-3 and took fourth place. I know he could have done some things better, but did some good things as well, and had a pretty decent day, I thought.

JR, thank you for the tips and the videos! We have spent quite a bit of time practicing duck-unders, and he is getting better at defending them. He ties up a lot, and some of the kids have gotten sneakier about working in those headlocks. Sometimes, he just reacts too slow to them, but he has been doing much better with them lately, and its paying dividends. In regards to he middle school season, yes, it is a later season. For some reason, the league he's in does this "second season" as I hear it referred to. I don't know if its used by some of the smaller schools to ensure that they have kids that can go out for both sports, or what the deal is. Unfortunately, the middle/high school that my boys will attend thinks its a basketball school, and even with no sport for conflict, the middle school team only has 7 kids out between 7th and 8th grade. I've got a pretty good idea as to why I think the other boys don't go out, but I'll save that for another post... Speaking of, here's another update. Last week/weekend, I went to three consecutive days of wrestling tournaments: Thursday (1/31), Friday (2/1), and Saturday (2/2). And I had a blast! Thursday and Friday were both middle school meets for Kendall, and Saturday was a kid's tournament for Kenneth. Thursday, 1/31: This was the Ellis Junior High Scramble. Kendall wrestled three matches; one kid from the host school, and two from another (Hoisington). The weights got kind of skewed in this meet, and Kendall's first match was against a heavyweight that his heavyweight buddy had wrestled and beat a few times already. He wrestled into the second period and won by pin. In his second match, he faced another new opponent, who was quite a bit taller than he was. He was able to tie up with him, but getting around the length was tough, and he went into the second period here, as well. Whereas his opponent was able to get some takedowns scored, he could not hold Kendall down on the ground, and Kendall was able to use a handy little knee-slide that he's been working on from the bottom to either stand up or reverse. He won with a pin in the second. Kendall's third match was another new opponent from the same school (Hoisington), and Kendall handled him pretty quickly, pinning him early in the first period, finishing 3-0 in the day. Friday, 2/1: Hoisington Middle School Invitational. This was a fun tournament, as it was hosted by a school outside of our league, so we got to see some new opponents from different towns. He did face two familiar opponents, but wrestled 5 matches total, so it was a busy day. The setup for this tournament was different than any I had seen in any kids' tournament. The wrestlers were divided into two pools, Kendall in pool A, and the other, pool B, had fewer kids in it. So he only wrestled in his pool, and then after "pool play" was done, each wrestler would face another from the other pool in a placing match; the two best from each pool faced off in a first place match, the two second best faced off in a third place match, and etc. on down the line. Kendall won his first two matches, cruising to pins in the first period in each. Neither one really gave him too much trouble. His third match went two periods, against the taller of his opponents from the night before from Hoisington. He was again able to capitalize from being on bottom and either getting a stand-up or reversal with his knee-slide move, getting him into position to win with another pin. Match number four was a tough one. It was against a previous opponent that he had handled fairly easily in his previous two matches with him, but this time, the kid came out with a different game plan. I'd seen him do it to another wrestler earlier in the day, and he basically was running and tackling his opponents, and he did this to Kendall three times, I think it was, one of the times actually taking Kendall off the mat and onto the hardwood floor on his back. He wasn't pleased with that. Kendall wasn't tying up as much with him, and the opponent took advantage with his charges. Kendall's problem was that he didn't react fast enough and didn't get his laces on the floor when sprawling, which I think he has worked on this week. After finally avoiding the tackles, Kendall was able to get the kid pinned in the second period. This made him 4-0 in "pool play," which put him in the championship match. That match was against a really good wrestler, and Kendall hung with him into the second period, but ended up getting pinned. Kendall described the kid as kind of erratic, but he was really pretty athletic and aggressive, and was the better wrestler, and I think Kendall learned a thing or two about being aggressive, and how it can pay off. But, a 4-1 day, and second place finish capped off a very nice week of wrestling for him, going 7-1 over those two days. What I was really happy about was that he did very good wrestling those two days, and he only did one headlock, and that was in his third match on Friday, when his opponent was running him backwards, and Kendall went with him, throwing the headlock using his opponent's own momentum to take him down. He's also seeing where he is on the mat, and working guys back onto the mat to secure his points or a pin. He's also choosing the bottom position more and more, as he's feeling more confident about being able to score from the bottom. I'm very happy with is progress. And both days, he was recovering from being under the weather. Saturday, 2/2: Plainville Wrestling Club Open. This one was Kenneth's tournament, and he had four matches on the day, and my brothers and their family was in town to watch, which included three cousins, so he had a nice cheering section. His first match, unfortunately, was against the local boy he's wrestled and lost to the week before. This first match was about the same, getting wrapped up tight in that darned headlock that he couldn't shake, and getting pinned. We've been working headlock defenses, too, but I think the main thing is he just needs to get more physically aggressive, so we worked on that, too. Kenneth's second match, however, was the start of something good. It was against another taller boy who had beat him earlier in the year, but Kenneth was ready for him this time. Kenneth fended off his headlock attempts, but did get taken down a few times, but was able to get points on escapes and reverses, which got him ahead in points early on. In the second period, I thought there was a point where Kenneth had him pinned, but the ref didn't think so, but he collected a good amount of back points. They went into the third period with Kenneth in the lead, and he didn't look back, winning the match, 10-5. The other kid got frustrated, and started fussing and crying in the second period, so I thought Kenneth's chances went up pretty well at that time. Match number three was another rematch, the same girl he had wrestled and beat earlier in the season. This girl is tough, too; she does good takedowns and is very good at controlling the opponent once she gets them down. Kenneth has been doing a good job of fighting off the bottom, and was able to get escape and reversal points here and there, keeping him in the match. At one point he got called for locked hands, and he was really confused as to why, and I hadn't seen it either. That stopped some momentum for him, but he was able to get it back. They went into the third period, and Kenneth ended up winning by pin. Kenneth's final match was against a club teammate (who is also one of our TKD kids ). Kenneth took him into the second period, and was able to win by pin, going 3-1 on the day, and placing 2nd! I was really proud of him for fighting through and being tough mentally, knowing he was facing opponents who had beaten him earlier in the year. Kenneth has been doing some really good wrestling from off the bottom, building his base and getting up. We've worked on starting to build that base the second he hits the ground, not giving the other a chance to try to turn him. Most of the time, he's doing this. He's also been doing better at not reaching over the top when on top, keeping everything behind the elbows, and staying behind the hips when he needs to keep control on top. Three long days of wrestling, and it was a fun time the whole way. The boys are performing well, but most important of all, I'm seeing improvement, which is what I want to see.

So very true, indeed.

Congrats!