Cool stuff I learned this week

[Patrick]

Sorry for your loss, Ken.

[aurik]

And so it begins... (Another test prep cycle).

Last night was the first night of the spring test prep cycle.  We had 9 students there, and there are 23 students who will be testing for various grades of black belt this coming May.  (2 sandan, 6 nidan, 4 shodan, and 11 shodan-sho).  This is probably the biggest testing class I've seen since I've been an instructor.  The class was scheduled to start at 7:10 in the upstairs dojo (much smaller than downstairs, and with bamboo flooring instead of tatami mats), but the previously scheduled aikido class went over.  

As I've come to expect, the first few minutes of the class was all about setting expectations; the goal of this class is to fine-tune everything you need to know for the test.  Yes, he is explicitly teaching the test in this class.  The only material on the test is covered in the class, and the idea is you get feedback on what you need to work on in the test prep class, and then you work on those items in your other regular classes during the week.  The general rule is if you have something big that's wrong and you can't fix it during the test prep, you need to wait until the next testing cycle to test, and there are a finite number of classes you're allowed to miss (3), or you will not be allowed to test.  He always explains the rules up front, but in each cycle there are always one or two students who miss classes and find themselves "on the bubble" where if they miss another class, they won't be able to test.

We skipped warmups and went straight into hojo undo.  Unfortunately with the aikido class running late, I didn't have a chance to warmup at all, but the hojo undo kind of did that  anyways (even though I was kind of stiff for the first few elements).  Next up was Sanchin kata -- the students testing for shodan-sho apparently didn't get the memo that this part of the test was done top off (ladies are allowed to wear a t-shirt or sports bra), and they weren't aware that there is a "right" and "wrong" way to take off/fold/put away your top and belt.  Well, technically there are a couple of "right" ways, and many many other wrong ways.  The important part is that you don't drop the belt on the ground, and neatly fold the gi top, and put the belt neatly on top of the gi top.  On the test, this is done in full view of the test board; you won't get bonus points for doing it well, but you can get points deducted for doing it poorly.

The Sanchin kata wasn't much of a surprise to anyone -- they have all been subject to shime ("focus") testing for their last couple of tests.  We did one kata as a full group, and then he broke us up into smaller groups to do shime testing.  A few students got feedback on their Sanchin (mostly the shodan/shodan-sho candidates), and then we moved on to kotekitae, where we were all partnering up.  I partnered up with Parker (he is also testing for sandan) for the evening, and we worked kotekitae for awhile (arm rubbing/arm pounding).  As we were working through the different drills, we were giving each other feedback throughout the evening (we are also both candidates for shidoin licenses).  

Next came Seisan kata bunkai -- I haven't worked this much lately, so I definitely need some tuning up on it.  Parker gave me some good feedback on things that didn't look quite right, and I did the same for him.  Additionally, as we were in between repetitions, we noticed some of the more junior students struggling with a few things, so we walked them through some of the nuances.  I also gave him corrections as well, mainly adjusting his targeting by a few inches on certain parts.

Last up was our rank kata (Kanchin).  Since this is the new item on this test for each of us, this is the item we are both working the hardest to fine-tune.  The sequence I've been struggling the hardest with is the one I got the most feedback on -- it's a sequence that starts from a cat stance right after a wa-uke strike.  The sequence starts with a left half-step forward followed by a right full step into a zenkutsu-dachi.  At the same time, the right hand posts to interrupt a downward two-handed strike (think sword or baseball bat), the left hand then circles underneath to catch/redirect the opponent, while the right hand pulls hikite and then as the right foot lands in the zenkutsu-dachi, you use your forward momentum to strike with a mae-hiji-tsuki (forward elbow strike).  After that elbow strike, we shift into a shiko-dachi, perform a scooping block to catch an incoming kick, and then push forward/throw the attacker.  All in one sequence.   If you look at this video the sequence is shown in slow motion around the 1:30 mark.  

Well, our CI gave me some detailed feedback on the sequencing on that, and I spent a good part of the remainder of class working on that.  And I'll be continuing to work on it.  The thing is, we have a similar sequence in our Seisan kata (required for shodan), but there are subtle differences, and those differences are what are driving my muscle memory crazy.  But this is also the *exact* thing I needed to hear so I can work on it.  And that one piece of feedback made this class very valuable to me.

Tonight I'll be doing Kobudo and teaching again.  Hopefully I'll be able to work in enough time at the end of class to run Kanchin with the other nidans.  Until next week.

[bushido_man96]

It's nice that you can get so much focused test prep.  That'll help out tons and tons, for sure.

[aurik]

Test Prep Cycle Week 4:

The last 3 weeks have been run by Heather Sensei (our CI's wife).  She has a VERY intense personality and is a stickler for getting things right -- when she points something out, I definitely take notice.  For example, last week she decided that our testing in Sanchin stance should be with pushes/pulls instead of strikes.  Personally I prefer when they just hit you.  Sure, it might hurt a little bit, but when they push, they will see how far they can push you before you break stance.  Well, last week she decided to be pretty mean about things -- normally they push at the hips, but she was pushing on the shoulders.  It's your typical physics problem, "give me a long enough lever and I can move the world".  Well, when she pushes on your shoulders, she uses all that leverage to make you move.  Fortunately I had seen this before, and when I knew I couldn't keep stable in that position, I just took a small step to the side and back into a stable stance.  And that was the exact correct thing to do (in fact, she later pointed me out as the example of what to do in that situation).

One nice thing about working this class with Parker is, since we're both instructors we point out where each of us can improve.  For example, Heather called me out in our Dan kumite drill for dropping my hand in one place where I did a roundhouse kick.  I haven't been critiqued on this drill in awhile, so I probably have gotten sloppy, so the tune-up was necessary.  There were a few other tune-ups she offered to each of us, and in later weeks, we have been pointing out these things in each other's technique.

I'm also starting to feel really good about the Seisan bunkai.  Again, it's been awhile since I've practiced this drill regularly and even less frequent that I get critique on it.  As Parker and I continue to fine-tune things during this prep cycle, we are continuously giving feedback to each other.  One thing I'm trying to focus on is something that Gushi sensei mentioned in his seminar last spring -- slow down and let the audience see exactly what you're doing.  So as we're practicing for our prep cycle, I'm trying to focus on targetting and follow-through.  For example, we have one sequence where the attacker steps in with a right punch, followed by a left punch.  The defense for the right punch is a circle block countering with a hammer-fist strike to the temple.  In my demo, I make a point to stop before Parker's head, then slowly follow through, pushing his head to the side.  Then the second attack is countered with a right circle block followed with a left boshiken-tsuki to the chin.  And again, I stop right before the chin, then follow-through, pushing the chin and entire head slowly back.  

As usual, the area I'm working most on is my Kanchin kata.  One thing our sensei mentioned to us last week is that there are several times you feel like a white belt again.  When you start learning Kanshiwa (required for yellow belt), Seichin (required for brown belt), and Kanchin (required for 3rd degree).  When we learn Kanshiwa, that's the first kata after Sanchin we learn.  It introduces a lot of new moves, the concept of moving off the line, and all of the fundamentals in our kata.  (And... you do learn that AS a white belt).  When a student starts to learn Seichin, they are introduced to a lot of new sequences - moving at 45 degree angles, the concept of intercepting strikes WITH a strike (instead of block then strike), and it's the first kata where we start to see the "soft" side of Uechi-Ryu.  And finally Kanchin introduces much longer sequences.  It introduces the concept of starting from a low stance and pivoting 180 degrees while still in a low stance.  It introduces shifting from a front stance to a low stance without raising your center of gravity.  It has extended sequences that you want to get the timing and inflection *just right* on.  You want to do the sequences quick and with power, but you want to make sure you display kime at just the right moments.

And that's why it takes 2.5-3 years to go from nidan to sandan

Honestly, the last kata, Sanseiryu only introduces one new sequence, but the sequences are longer, and go in 8 directions, instead of 4.  However in terms of new movements/sequences there really is only one, and it's the final move in the kata.  So once I get completely comfortable with Kanchin, learning Sanseiryu won't be nearly the mind-scrambler that Kanchin has been.

[bushido_man96]

It sounds like your test prep is coming along nicely.  It's great that you have such a good training partner to reflect with.  That helps immensely.

[aurik]

Week 5 test prep class is in the books.  For this class, Heather invited David to help teach, and she asked him to focus on Parker and me for our drills, kata and the like.  David is a godan and has his shihan's license, so he is one of the few that are liable to be on our test board.  (You can only sit on a test board if you're 1 degree higher than the rank the candidate is testing for).  Of our instructor pool, only 7 of them are able to sit on a 3rd degree test board, and 5 of them are related to our CI in some way (his dad, stepmom, wife, or younger brother).

I like David.  He has a very different way of looking at things -- he earned his black belt (not sure what degree) in aikido before he started training in Uechi-Ryu.  As such, he tends to have a more soft and "flowy" way about him.  When he gives feedback on something it's usually very different what Heather or our CI or most of our other instructors would give.  He just looks at things in a different way.  And since he's also going to be on our test board, it's important to know the things he is looking for in our techniques.

The class ran in the usual format, and I found Heather picking on Parker and me more than in previous classes.  Little things that I didn't know were supposed to be a thing.  For example, in our kotekitae drills, she pointed out we didn't have our hands chambered for the first drill (where we were supposed to), but DID chamber when we WEREN'T supposed to.  And honestly I didn't know that was actually wrong -- I'd probably been doing that way for several years without a correction.  One thing I did mention to Parker was on the test, go ahead and hit me as hard as he can.  We're only expected to do 10 repetitions per side (instead of the usual 25 or 50), and it'll make both of us look good.  There are only a few people in the dojo I wouldn't be willing to say that to, and all of them are related to our CI (his dad or one of his brothers).

Next up: dan kumite.  Again, David was asked to focus on us.  In this drill, our main feedback was that as the drill went on, our targets tended to drift from where they were supposed to be.  We started out targeting right where we needed to, but we weren't quite striking at our partner near the end.  So something else to work on.

Next came our bunkai.  David mentioned to Parker that in certain places he needed to make his motions "bigger".  For example, there's a sequence where the attacker comes in with a right/left punch combination.  The first punch is countered with a block and hammer-fist to the temple.  The second is countered with a block and boshi-ken to the jaw.  David said that we should make those motions bigger -- this is a performance, and bigger motions give the impressions of power without expending a lot of extra energy.  He also mentioned that there are a few places where we need to enunciate our moves more.  All in all, Parker and I both felt that was probably the best performance we've done on that drill.  

Lastly, we practiced our rank kata.  There have been 3 sequences I've gone through in my head and worked through over the past week, and I'm starting to feel much better aboit these.  They're the sequences that make the kata so hard, comparably speaking.  Well, I felt that I did much better this week.  Main feedback -- slow down and ensure I enunciate my movements.  I was struggling to get through the kata that I was going faster and faster.  So now the feedback is slow down.  I can handle that.  Oh, and also there was one sequence at the end where David said "make these moves bigger".  Not grandiose, but make them definitely more pronounced. 

Next week the dojo is closed for spring break, so I'll need to do extra training on my own so I don't lose my momentum.  But I'm feeling really good about things.  I'm not even halfway through the prep cycle, and I'm feeling like I'm getting really dialed in and ready to look REALLY good on this test.

 

[sensei8]

11 hours ago, aurik said:

 

Week 5 test prep class is in the books.  For this class, Heather invited David to help teach, and she asked him to focus on Parker and me for our drills, kata and the like.  David is a godan and has his shihan's license, so he is one of the few that are liable to be on our test board.  (You can only sit on a test board if you're 1 degree higher than the rank the candidate is testing for).  Of our instructor pool, only 7 of them are able to sit on a 3rd degree test board, and 5 of them are related to our CI in some way (his dad, stepmom, wife, or younger brother)

 

 

How is your Testing Cycle panels formed for your Senior ranks?!?

In Shindokan, we test up to, and including, Hachidan. 

[aurik]

22 hours ago, sensei8 said:

 

How is your Testing Cycle panels formed for your Senior ranks?!?

In Shindokan, we test up to, and including, Hachidan. 

Anyone who is an instructor or assistant instructor can sit on a test board for candidates up to one rank below their rank.  So as a candidate for sandan, the voting members of my test board must be at least yondan or above.  We like to have at least 5 voting members of a test board, but for higher ranks that isn't always a possibility.  For example, Heather may be testing for Godan in our testing cycle, depending on if Master Thompson (judan, head of our organization) approves it. 

Tests for ranks of godan or above are generally abbreviated tests which only involve demonstrations of the core kata (Sanchin, Seisan, Sanseiryu), along with an oral examination UNLESS the candidate is also testing for their shihan license.  In that case, the candidate is given essentially the same test as for yondan.  We test for *all* ranks; as a Hanshi Judan, Master Thompson can promote candidates by himself for any rank up to Kudan.  I'm not sure what the process is to promote a candidate to Judan, but I believe it involves the Zen Okinawa Karatedo Renmei, which (I think) is an organization of 10th degree black belts who evaluate, test and promote other 10th degree black belts.

Since I will not live long enough to test for a 10th degree, I'm not worried about that particular detail

Another interesting detail I learned is that they are looking at "pre-testing" the instructor candidates for nidan and sandan.  We typically do our dan gradings on a Sunday afternoon.  In previous gradings we had a morning grading and afternoon grading.  What they are looking at doing now is testing the instructor candidates on Friday evening or possibly Saturday, and then using our newly promoted instructors to form two complete test boards, so we can run two tests concurrently.  We have four instructors testing this cycle (two for nidan, two for sandan), so that would give us enough instructors to have two full test boards running concurrently.

Our school is growing slowly and steadily -- as evidenced by the difficulty in finding a parking spot on certain evenings    But our CI is also doing an excellent job at retaining students through and beyond (first degree) black belt.  In any given adult class, we generally have at least 4 or 5 black belt trainees.  

Edited March 13 by aurik

[bushido_man96]

On 3/12/2026 at 1:31 AM, aurik said:

I like David.  He has a very different way of looking at things -- he earned his black belt (not sure what degree) in aikido before he started training in Uechi-Ryu.  As such, he tends to have a more soft and "flowy" way about him.  When he gives feedback on something it's usually very different what Heather or our CI or most of our other instructors would give.  He just looks at things in a different way.  And since he's also going to be on our test board, it's important to know the things he is looking for in our techniques.

I think this is pretty cool.  Seeing people with prior training and how that affects their current training is fun to see, and fun to learn feedback from.

It sounds like your test prep is going really well.  Keep up the good work!

[aurik]

Week 6 is now in the books.

Our CI closed the dojo the previous week, since that's when most of the kids were on Spring Break (and he and Heather went to Tahiti for a vacation).  So this past week I was fighting the fact that I'd been off for a week.  Yes, I can and do train some at home, but I do not have the self-discipline to push myself as hard as others push me.  I mean, that's why I train with others.  Tuesday's early class was pretty rough.  Heather had Parker start class with the usual junbi undo (warmup exercises), skipped hojo undo, and went straight to Sanchin.  After Sanchin, we went straight to kata -- 2 each of Kanshiwa, Kanshu (then the yellow/green belts peeled off), Seichin (then the brown belts peeled off), Seisan (then the nikyus & ikkyus peeled off), Seiryu (then the 1st degrees peeled off), then Kanchin.  Time for a water break and a few minutes to rest.

Next we started doing kata again, but after the first repetition she'd have us face a different direction.  After the second repetition, she'd face us to the front, and do mirror-image kata.  And she did that for Kanshiwa, Kanshu, Seichin, Seisan.  She did *not* have us do Seiryu or Kanchin mirror-image, but for Seiryu she had us all face different directions so we ran the risk of running into each other.  Needless to say, by the time Kanchin came around, I was completely gassed.

One thing I'm noticing that as I'm past 50, it doesn't take long for my conditioning to deteriorate, and it's harder to get it back when I start training again.  So when we do close the dojo I'll need to make a point to do more training on my own or at least SOME type of cardio.

Wednesday night was our black belt prep class - as this class is mainly black belts, she's more focusing on fine tuning our techniques than she is on yelling at us to do things right.  (Once you've been through the prep cycle once she goes a LOT easier on you).  Occasionally she'll have other instructors come up and run parts of the class so that we can get other instructor's perpective.  Last night, she asked me to do the student's Sanchin checks.  This was a bit of a break for me, which I appreciated.  So I did all their checks, and then we went straight to the other techniques.  I feel that Parker and I are starting to look really good with our bunkai and yakusoku kumite drills.  I did make a point to ask Heather if to ask Richard (our CI) if we could practice the bunkai downstairs the last couple weeks before the test.  Unfortunately when we are upstairs, we (or at least I) can't really do the sword attacks due to the low ceiling.  I smacked the rafters once with a bokken, and I really don't want to do that again.

Thursday was a combination of kobudo training and teaching.  In kobudo class we focused on the first set of bo no hojo undo bunkai, and ran through that set over and over, focusing on a few of the details.  The details aren't as important for me since I was the lowest rank in the group (geared more for brown and black belts), but I figure while I'm working on them let's not get into bad habits.  That was also a pretty tiring session, but in a good way.

Saturday we had our semiannual black belt (and black belt candidate) training.  This is where our CI transfers a lot of new material that he's picked up from other senior instructors.  He gave us corrections on a few of the hojo undo techniques, and then he had us run sanchin twice as a large group.  He then broke us up into smaller groups, with the older students going first and the younger students second.  And he did a lot of checking on Sanchin to the point we ended up staying in stance for about 7-10 minutes, which feels like a LOT longer.  By the end of this, my quad was cramping and my shoulders were exhausted.  But I made it through.

For the second half of the day, we ran through kata, starting with Seiryu and then moving on to Kanchin (required for 2nd and 3rd degrees respectively).  He broke down some of techniques, and discussed how as black belts we're supposed to start learning more of the "soft" aspects of Uechi-Ryu.  One thing he mentioned is how in certain spots we're supposed to "float" or be light on our feet.  And he talked about how we're supposed to start learning to flow from one movement to the next.

After that, he had us start working one of the sequences in Kanchin, arguably one of the hardest ones.  He broke this down into its individual components, starting with the first movement, then practicing that, then moving onto the next in the sequence, etc etc.  The sequence involves doing a movement that is interpreted as catching a front kick in a shiko-dachi and then throwing the kick (and the opponent).  He discussed how you need to start the throw from your back foot, and I swear, I could see the power actually transfer up his leg, through his hips, to the shoulders and the arms, like a wave moving up through him and into the imaginary opponent's leg.  It's EXTREMELY hard to describe, and it'll take me a long time to figure out how to do it... but it's really cool that I was able to *see* that.