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It's bad enough to show up dirty, but smelling of alcohol? I wouldn't dream of drinking before training. I don't have anything against drinking, per se, but I really don't think alcohol and MA training go together. I want the people I train with to have clear heads in the dojo. It's too easy to injure someone. I sure don't want to be practicing self defense moves with someone whose judgment and reactions are impaired. You need to have a serious talk with you Sensei about this.

Run all your katas. If you have a bag, practice all your kicks and kick punch combos. Run through your self defenses. Many of them don't require a partner for practice purposes. Run floor excercises. Don't forget to properly warmup and do your stretches when you finish. In other words, there are lots of things you can do to practice at home.

Find a good Chiropractor. I had a similar problem after water skiing on 4th of July. Never had been to a Chiropractor before but I was in agony so I gave it a shot. My Xray revealed 5 compressed disks in my lower lumbar. It took several adjustments to get me straightened out but I did fell better after each one. That was a month ago and I'm back to normal now. As an aside, my Chiropractor is also a Tai Chi instructor. He advised me to keep up my Wado Ryu training and just be careful, especially with kicks and take downs. He said MA training would actually help my recovery. He was right. I noticed that I could be in a fair amount of pain before entering the Dojo and feel perfectly normal when I left.

The problem that I have with kicking the knee is that, although it is a good target, is the possibility of a lawsuit being thrown your way. Personally, if it's a self defense situation I'm concerned with stopping the bad guy's aggression. I'm going to do whatever it takes to make him stop fighting me. If that means I have to break his leg so be it. I'll deal with the courts later.

Our adult class meets 3 times a week. Our tuition is the same regardless of how many times we attend. I go to every class with few exceptions. Most of the other adults are hit and miss in their attendance which actually works out very nice for me. There are a lot of times when it's just me and Sensei. I get one on one training that would probably cost me a whole lot more if I were in a different dojo.

Don't know about the backhand part but in our dojo jrs. don't train in the adult class.

I noticed in your profile you've trained in Bojutsu. That reminded me of a situation that happened to me many moons ago when I was a young teenager. There was this kid in our neighborhood who was 2 years older than me and outweighed me by about 50 pounds. One day he decided to beat me up and I couldn't talk him out of it. I had no martial arts training back then but I did know there was no way I could stand toe to toe with him and win. He charged me and I ran. As I was running (he was gaining on me BTW) I was looking for a weapon and, lo and behold I saw a big long stick lying on the ground (that's why I mentioned the Bojutsu). I reached down, scooped up the stick, whirled around and began to lay into him with it. The stick was actually a piece of a bamboo pole that his father had used for a beanpole. Anyway, I beat him about the torso with that bamboo pole until there wasn't enough of it left to do me any good. Just as I was about to turn and make my retreat he gave up and headed for the house. When his mom saw his injuries she told him to stay away from me because I was crazy and dangerous. LOL. If she'd only known the truth. I was neither crazy or dangerous, just scared spitless and looking for a way to keep him from pounding me into the ground.

People say I look like Chuck Norris but I don't think so. I'm much taller.