Decent karate workout tonight. Was rather short, and I just did kata; but I feel moderately tired. On a related note, tonight saw the triumphant return of one Gamal Castile to the dojo. I actually got him to show up. It's been almost 6 years since he donned the gi. He was a bit rusty, but he's still got it in him. Great to have him back.

Tonight marked my triumphant return to the dojo after the birth of my second baby. Before class and during the kids classes, I took the opportunity for some much-needed kata training. I focused on Shotokanryu kata tonight covering the 5 Heian, Bassai Dai, Kanku Dai, Jion, Empi, and Wankan. That had me pretty sweaty, so I snagged one of the other black belts (Craig) and did some slow sparring. Even though I was very rusty, it felt good for the most part.

The adult class was very small tonight; just 4 black belts. I was the senior rank, so I decided we'd work on basic sparring. We covered rather rapidly over the course of 30 minutes 5 step, 3 step, and 1 step sparring. There wasn't much talking, and quite a bit of sweating. I focused on covering the progression from 5 to 3 to 1 step sparring and on to 3-5 time attack and slow sparring. I also quickly covered the progressive training of these exercises from beginner to shodan, as well as, how to cover the same progression during a single advanced adult class. The others seem to really enjoy the training, and the prospective instructors thanked me for the ideas and insight.

Overall, I think it was a good night.

Good class tonight. Lots of kata in deep stances. Practed Kushanku Dai (ShitoRyu), then did some bo kata, finished up with some tournament style point sparring.

I missed Monday night's class due to a promise of a date night with the wife. Tuesday night we did a good basic workout. Lots of basics with the focus on doing multiple techniques at a time instead of just doing on simple block after another.

Thursday night we focused on the Tanden Kumite drills. We have a couple of new students in class that had not seen them before. For them it was an introduction, but the black belts were instructed to have at it. I personally don't like he drills, but I made the best of them; and my arms and shoulders are nice and sore and tired.

Last Thursday, we bowed in and Sensei told everyone to gear up. I was not very enthusiastic about it as I absolutely despise tournament sparring; and that is what we usually do. As it turned out, Sensei actually had some good old-fashioned dojo sparring in mind. It was a lot of fun, if not exhausting. We sparred 5 two minute rounds with about a 30 second break in between.
I ended up kicking one of my partners in the goin. Sorry Craig. I took a great elbow, straight out of Pinan Sandan, right to the floating ribs and got the wind knocked out of me. Then I got a bloody lip. People kept acting like I needed to go to the hospital or something. Seriously, it's only blood; I'll make more. I even ended up in a little ground fighting with Sensei. Tons of fun!

This past weekend was the Sensei Lou Miller's Shorin Ryu Pro Am in St. Louis, MO. The Panther team attended and did pretty Well. Sam Placed 2nd in sparring, and 3rd in Kata, Jude took 1st in sparring, and Josh got 3rd in sparring. Great job Panthers! Now we need to start training for next month's tournament in Eureka, MO.

Sensei Struchtemeyer led Monday night's workout. As you can guess by the title, we did kata; and lots of it. Sensei covered the Fukyugata and Pinan kata first, but emphasized advanced topics with the kata since it was a night of mostly black belts. After the Pinan, we focused mainly on Rohai for the rest of the class; almost an hour straight. It was an informative and physically tiring class.

Last nights class was pretty small.  2 Instructors, 3 black belts, 1 yellow belt, and 1 white belt.  Sensei Walker took the beginners to work on their kata, while sensei Kuehner took the black belts through the basic 11 kata while focusing on advanced concepts.  As always, I realized I need much more work on my kata.

Congratulations to Tania Shindo and Craig Shaw for successfully surviving and passing their shodan exam. It was a tough test and I'm glad I didn't have to take it.

Tonight's workout was a good, basic workout.  Basics, kata, and partner drills.  All the stuff that makes karate good.  It was a pre-test workout, so not much else to say.  I'm sufficiently tired and sore.  Off to bed.