B & B Jan 2019

This Sunday saw the start of the year’s courses with the first Black and Brown belt course run by Alan Campbell Sensei (7^th Dan). For the first course of the year HSKC had a fantastic turn out with eight karate-ka in all. Leading the way and heading one car we had Jim sensei accompanied by Ben, Paul B and Olivia and in the second car, kindly driven by a parent, we had Ellie, Romie, Lucy and Will.

The Haxby gang

With good Haxby tradition we arrived in good time, so we had chance to catch up with friends from clubs across the country.  After a slightly delayed start we all lined up and had the pleasure of seeing Robin sensei from JKS Bradford being awarded his 4^th dan certificate.

The session was based around resistance training with the aid of resistance tubing.  Partnered in three we began driving forward gyaku-tsuki with waist resistance then the same with arm resistance both times we did fifty punches (with both arms) so yes that was 200 punches to warm us up! After that we did some more punches but this time we had twenty counts for both arms, but this ramped up quickly because for each count we equalled the amount of punches so for one it was one punch for ten it was ten punches, so another 110 punches done! To round off our punching we then did the exercise with gyaku-tsuki step oi-Tsuki fifty times both hands finishing the warm up drills with a grand 510 punches made just like that!

Next Alan sensei decided our legs needed warming up, you guessed it, we did all the above exercises with mai-geri and if your legs hadn’t fallen off after 500 normal kicks your lucky, but we were still training with bands so our legs really felt the effort. After a very brief break we moved onto kata with the tubes, one person counting and 2 people doing the same portion of the kata in opposite directions so the tension on the bands increased with every step. To finish off the session Alan sensei decided that we could go without the bands and run through Heian Yondan.

We finished at lunch, earlier than usual, as squad training would take up the second half but that was fine with us as tube training for 2 ½ hours was more than enough for one day; expect it to be seen in the dojo soon. A big thank you to Alan sensei for hosting the course and taking us all through some very interesting and demanding drills.

Oss

Ben   

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

Xmas Course 2018

It had seemed to come around very quickly this year, but it was with a definite sense of anticipation that Ian sensei, Olivia, Romie, Lucy, Ellie and I met up down in Nottingham for the annual JKS Christmas Course. We all took advantage of the time before the course started to do some gentle stretching and warm ups, and to catch up with our extended karate family and friends that we have got to know by coming to these courses over the years.

Alan Sensei called the class to order and before training began invite Steve Sensei from Selby to say a few words about the recent trip to the JKS International Seminar in Japan. After that and the warm ups, we were handed over to Steve Carless Sensei (6^th Dan) for the first part of the course. The main part of this session was all about the legs – some additional warms ups to get the blood flowing and various exercises to improve our kicking ability and range followed before we moved onto practice not just kicking, but also defences against kicks which all built up to a really nice partner drill which emphasised the importance on moving sideways with the block and being close enough for a counter attack.

After a quick run through of Heian Nidan, Steve Sensei finished his teaching with and exploration of Meikyo Nidan, a kata not many of us had looked at before, but perfect for the Christmas course where you expect to be presented with something a little different!

Club photo a solid turn out

After a quick break for lunch Matt Price Sensei (JKS 6^th Dan) took over the instruction and the initial focus was about controlling the distance between yourself and your opponent in kumite, what attacks to throw when, and the importance of footwork. When then moved onto reaction times and reducing your ‘tells’ when you are attacking. From here the focus shifted with some self defence techniques and the ‘chaos’ drill – which we will have to try at the club sometime.

All in all, a great end to the year!

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