Another round of testing at the dojo and...

[Patrick]

Awesome to see the progress and the masks! Congrats.

Patrick

[aurik]

So I haven't posted in this thread for awhile, but Zach and I have both been continuing to train hard and consistently. Yesterday I successfully tested for my shodan rank -- a big milestone for me. It was the most intense and difficult test I've undertaken so far. I partnered with my CI for the partner work, and he kicked things up to eleven; I kicked my intensity up as well. I was able to hit every segment with power and intensity, but the bunkai section left me seriously gassed. In the end though, I did pass!

Here are the obligitory pictures:

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Zach is still training hard and training well -- he should be testing for his nikyu in the next couple of months.

[bushido_man96]

Congratulations!

[ashworth]

Congrats! Just saw the rest of this thread, great to see your journey, keep it up!

[sensei8]

Congrats!! Hard work does certainly pay off!! Train hard and train well!!

[aurik]

So over the past few months, Zach's training has been up and down. There are days that he's excited to go train, and other days where he doesn't want to. It's to be expected. However, over the past month or so, he's been excited to go train because he has known he is up for the next testing cycle. Last Friday he had a class (where I was teaching), and then right afterwards he had his test for nikyu. I wasn't so sure about him when he was in class, because he tends to goof around and not put his best effort forward all the time. However, when it came time to demonstrate with the CI (basically, the "are you ready to test" demo), he did great.

Immediately after the class, they all lined up for testing. I was pleasantly surprised to see one of his friends, Silvio, was also testing for yellow belt (kukyu). I didn't know he was even enrolled -- I don't think I've ever seen him here. When the test came around, he did really well. There were some areas where the CI got pretty harsh with the brown belt candidates (not yelling per se, but getting pretty critical of them when they didn't get things quite right after the second or third attempt). Zach looked realy strong on all of his hojo undo. His sanchin kata looked really strong too, and he didn't get too frazzled when our CI did the shime testing on him (pulling, pushing, striking him to test his focus).

For the two-person drills, they all had to perform the dan kumite exercise with one of the instructors, and each of them struggled with the takedown at the end (Zach included). Speaking from experience, most students struggle with that takedown, especially when I'm their opponent. Honestly, of all the techniques required for shodan, that's the technique that I'm still learning better ways to do it the most.

In the end, everyone passed. They had their feedback from their instructors, and then everyone got their new diplomas and belts. At this point, it's pretty much up to Zach when he tests -- if he works hard at it and shows that he's ready, he could test for ikkyu in March or April, and shodan-sho next November. So the ball is now in his court.

Since I was still in my gi from the previous class, our CI let me award stripes to all the advanced brown belt candidates. It was a pretty cool experience to award my son his stripe. It made me a super proud papa.

[sensei8]

Congrats to everyone at your dojo, aurik. Thank you for sharing the pictures. I believe that Zach is right on course, and that he'll do just fine.

ZACH...you hang in there; train hard and train well!!

[DarthPenguin]

Congrats to Zach, you must be (rightly) very proud. It will be especially meaningful when you are there to see him get his Shodan

[bushido_man96]

Congrats to Zach!

[Zaine]

Congrats to Zach! That's awesome!