Wow... The end of February and March 1st tomorrow. People here in Tokyo are speaking about the blooming of the cherry blossom "sakura" which will happen towards the end of March or early April and only lasts for a few days! I was stiff and sore when I woke up this morning.. I think that Thai massage yesterday may have been a bit severe..! Got a good bit of work done on my research thesis today so I was happy with that. Monday seems to be a quiet enough day around Nippori... A good few of the shops and restaurants stay closed all day. It was a pretty bad day here weatherwise... Cold, rain and wind... not very pleasant! Spoke with my uncle Francis in Chiacgo this morning and got filled in on all the action there!
Went to the dojo at the usual time for 6pm training. No sign of Kagawa Sensei at the dojo and it was Nagaki Sensei and Kai Sensei who were teaching. They both appeared a little tired tonight but I think there was a Teikyo University party held over the weekend so that might explain that! Nagaki Sensei took the class from 6-7pm. About 8 people training. Like Monday night two weeks previously we did all kata during this lesson. All of the Hiean kata, Tekki Shodan and all of the Junro kata. If I'm honest if feel that I have a lot of little errors taken out of my Hiean kata's over the past couple of weeks. You'd be surprised how many subtle changes I have made but it's important to realise that I hadn't really been doing techniques "incorrectly" previously. Matsue Sensei explained to me at the post-competition party a couple of weeks ago that he understands people in different JKS dojo's around the world have little differences in their katas... He said that these "differences" are not incorrect but the JKS Hombu Dojo like their students to do kata in a specific way and he said that he hopes other people will follow this way but he realises that it is almost impossible to achieve this.
Nagaki Sensei pointed out that my execution of yokogeri kekomi in Junro Godan is not totally correct and that I really need to squeeze my stomach muscles and lift my knee up close to my chest before extending my kicking leg.. I tend to be a bit loose in this particular movement. So I need to work on this! It was great to go through all the Junro's several times and Nagaki Sensei was always willing to answer any questions that I had. I'm not afraid to ask questions because I hate not being sure about certain elements and I'll be back in Ireland come May! For example in Junro Yondan I wasn't sure about the combined gedan barai and kagae zuki in kiba dachi early in the kata. I needed to know if this was kagae zuki or gyakuzuki... I had forgotten and I Nagaki Sensei hadn't performed the movement. Answer = kagae zuki (similar to Tekki Shodan)... Also the last two punches for the kata... I wasn't sure if the oi zuki - gyakuzuki was hamne/shomen... or shomen/shomen... Answer = hamne/shomen! We also did Tokui kata.. Once again I did Gojushiho Sho... Nagaki Sensei pointed out a couple of little improvements that I need to make.
Kai Sensei took the second class. Seven of us training and I was the only person who continued from the 6-7pm class. We practiced a lot of oi-komi up and down the dojo... Focusing on the compression and expansion of the back leg with different types of foot movements using both zuki and geri... Kai Sensei pointed out to me that I need to relax more in my shoulders and extend my punches more with shoulder snap. We also did some kumite for about 15 minutes.. Jodan, chudan and geri... Everybody in a line and attacking one person... We then progressed to jiyu kumite.. again attacking the person at the top of the line... Kai Sensei acted as referee and would say who got the score each time.. This was very good training and it was a challenge having to deal with people of different grades and physical size. The atmosphere in the dojo is always a little different when Kagawa Sensei isn't there. Even though the training tonight was very hard, I think everybody including Nagaki Sensei and Kai Sensei were a little more at ease. One of the students told me one time that he finds training under Kagawa Sensei the hardest.. solely because of how "great" Kagawa Sensei is and his stature within the karate world.
Had my dinner as usual in Jonathan's in Sugamo before getting the train back to Nippori. Spoke with Christina and my father on Skype. I have hotels booked in Hiroshima and Kyoto for when my parents visit. I'm lucky I did this yesterday because when I checked today, the hotels were booked out. There is a holiday period in Japan during their visit. Up early again tomorrow morning to crack on with my thesis. Hopefully I won't feel as stiff after my massage tomorrow!
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