Super Summer Seminar

Early morning this morning, leaving york for Nottingham we went, mike Sensei, Ian, jim and holly Sensei, Olivia, Paul (B), Joe, Helen, Paul (D) and myself. Other than a minor scare that the A1 was shut fortunately it was past our turning so we had a smooth journey through.

After the usual warm welcomes and greetings of friends from across the country, we lined up ready to begin training. The course opened with a welcome from Alan Campbell Sensei (7^th dan) where he introduced the course and Steve carless Sensei (6^th dan) who would be taking the lead in the first training session as well as introducing Mike Gude Sensei and Nick Heald Sensei (both 6^th dan) for assistance in the training sessions if needed.

Swiftly kicking off Steve Sensei led his warmups with the standard stuff with some interesting twists like rising your hips in the spits and the “flying saucer” while stretching out our hips. After what we thought was the end of an already intense warm up we moved on to some combination work, starting with double punch choku tsuki (straight punch) followed by turning in gyaku tsuki (reverse punch) 45 degree to the rear revere back to the front then spinning 360 degrees back to the front in Heiko dachi (neutral stance) punching. After several practises on both sides and running through with speed and power we moved on to 3 combinations derived from the Shodan grading syllabus.  After these had been practised Steve Sensei informed us that we had finally finished the warmup and aloud us to quickly grab some water, straight back to it we moved on from Kihon to kata starting with enpi (flying swallow),  after a detailed explanation of each move within the kata we went on to practise it then run through in our own time, starting with senior kyu grades and then on to dan grades finally for the junior kyu grade supported by a dan grade we ran through to count.  After a gruelling first we had a quick break then we came back on for the final part of Sensei Steve’s session he took us through kata kashu.

Lunch time arrived, and it was a swift escape for haxby outside for a breath of fresh air and a cool down, the 30 minutes flew by before we were back in the hall warming up for the next session with Alan Sensei, he started us off with some tai sabaki drills (moving out of the way) in practise of close quarters rather than full length blocking. The. We moved on to a blocking drill combining all aspects of the preparation and execution of Uchi Uke, Soto Uke and Age Uke, and some other drills combining preparation and execution of attacks.  Finally, Alan Sensei had all grade running through their grading level kata for kyu grades bassai dai, Shodan and Nidan kanku dai and Sandan up kata if their choice. Each group preformed their kata and we’re given some extremely helpful advice on ways to improve, then after everyone preformed the first time it was time to retry and improve and an over all result was an improvement through out.   This marked the end of our days training but not the end of the day completely, after a few brief words from Alan Sensei and thank you we had a group photo and then it was on to gradings.

There were a lot of karate ka grading this course, a staggering 31, some grading for Nidan but the majority to Shodan, the atmosphere in the grading hall was tense as everyone lined up to begin and show off what they’ve got and showing off was what happened.  All different skill sets, and ages stepped out demonstrating their basics, kumite and kata, although not all of the karate ka graded the ones who did, graded with smiles on there faces and a fire for their next grading.    Finally, the drive home seemed to fly by, with the traditional stop off for ice cream on the way.   

The whole course was well worth the early morning and well worth the sweat thanks to the inescapable heat, as always, I would highly recommend trying to get down to these training courses especially the open course for all grades but the black and brown belt courses for those wanting to grade for Shodan and above soon.

OSS Ben 

visit www.haxbykarate.co.uk to find out more about our Club. For more information email info@haxbykarate.co.uk