Monday March 7th

I have my right foot steeped in a basin of water and ice as I'm typing this blog.  I'll explain in a little bit..!  It was a bad day in Tokyo today, rained all day and it was cold.  Didn't really matter to me anyway as I was camped inside all day working at my research.  It's coming along slowly but I do get tired from it at times... Constantly questioning myself... rewriting paragraphs and swapping and changing things around... making sure everything is coherent... The joys of completing a PhD thesis I guess!

I hit off for Sugamo about ten minutes earlier than usual today... My body was feeling a little tired so I wanted plenty of time to stretch and warm up and as well as that Kagawa Sensei would probably be at the dojo so plenty of opportunities to observe him!  When I arrived at the dojo Matsue Sensei was there and he smiled and asked me straight away.. "Are you finished?".. referring to my thesis of course!  So I explained that I had another week of work to do.  Nagaki Sensei was teaching the kids class when I arrived... No sign of Kai Sensei tonight.  There was a visitor to the dojo tonight... This time it wasn't an "ordinary" student but a student who is training at Teikyo University...  A young guy... maybe about 18/19 years old.  I only realised tonight that Riko-san (I think that is her name!) who is a young female about 15/16 who trains regularly at the dojo, is attending Teikyo High School... I'm not sure what the relationship is with Teikyo University but I'm sure they are tied together in some way.  For those of you who aren't familiar with Teikyo University... Basically it is the top karate university in Japan, a breeding ground for members of the Japanese national karate team, notorious for its intensive training regime and the alma-mater of most of the Sensei's at the Hombu Dojo.

Nagaki Sensei and Kagawa Sensei shared the instruction in both the 6-7pm and 7-8pm sessions this evening.  As usual we were drilled for the first half an hour of the 6-7pm class with kihon.  Kagawa Sensei was taking particular interest in the Teikyo Univeristy student and was often correcting his posture and the lack of extension in his punches.  Kagawa Sensei pointed corrected me on one particular point of my kihon.  As I step forward say.. Oi zuki and when I plant my leading foot I tend to suddenly stop bending my front knee.. As a result it promotes a slight stamp and is not a natural finish to the technique.. So Kagawa Sensei pointed out that I should allow my knee to bend forward naturally as my foot lands... So I tried to do this in front of him... and I got the nod of approval and the words "so...so!" which kind of means "yes.. I agree".  This is something that I need to make sure I concentrate on.

We did some jiyu ippon kumite and Kagawa Sensei paired the Teikyo student up with me straight away.  I lean guy... a bit shorter than me... nice and relaxed but fast.. very fast!  But hey.. I can be fast too!  So we were attacking jodan slowly five times then fast five times... chudan.. mae-geri.. yoko-geri.. no real problems. We were both really getting stuck in to each other.  When it came to mawashi-geri the Teikyo guy caught me a one time as I was attacking him and before I could release my kick... This woke me up and I said it wouldn't happen again.. so I increased the speed and power of my kick (thinking of Yamaguchi Sensei smacking the pad that I was holding)... Couple of times to his head and he blocked successfully and for the last one I thought I'd really let him have it by kicking him in the lower back.  I smacked him but he tended to block awkwardly and elbowed the top of my instep almost at the bone of my ankle... Sore dose and he apologised straight away.. But with the rushing of blood I didn't feel any pain about 10 seconds later..  So it's not too bad now.  Hopefully will be okay in the morning.

Nagaki Sensei took almost all of the 7-8pm class.  Kagawa Sensei seemed to be taking it easy and just observing maybe with this weekends course in Nottingham in mind..!  Again the Teikyo student was the focus of attention and both Nagaki Sensei and Kagawa Sensei were often correcting him.  Nagaki Sensei appeared a little on edge.. always the case when Kagawa Sensei was around.. but I think more so tonight.  We did a lot of gohon kumite in this session.  Again Kagawa Sensei paired the Teikyo student and I together.  We both really went at it again and to be honest it was very enjoyable!  We then changed partners for a few rounds where we did gohon kumite with free techniques... High intensity atmosphere and everybody was feeling it!  We finished the class with all Junro kata.  Kagawa Sensei was shouting orders from the side with Nagaki Sensei still really on edge.  Kagawa Sensei was stressing the importance of us doing the kata's smoothly and not so much like...1...2...3...4 but rather 1.2.3....4.  More natural timing.  I was feeling really tired for the last 10 minutes of the class as I'm sure everybody else was but it was great training with a highly charged atmosphere.

As I was leaving the dojo, Nagaki Sensei called me and basically said that I am after losing weight and the cheeks of my face are "slim"...  I just nodded and I told him that I have lost about 6kg over the past few weeks.  He was laughing!  Not that I needed to lose weight..!  I am trying to eat as much as I can.  I have two dinners everyday and when I go to Jonathan's in particular I make sure that I get the dishes with the highest number of calories!  I know my mother and all my aunts will be going mad when they hear that I have lost weight because they are always on my case saying that I am too thin!  Maybe I'll have to up my dinners to three or even four a day for the last five weeks of my stay when I plan to train every session everyday..!