Kashi no ki dojo was visited by Matsumoto Sensei (GB National Coach) over the weekend of 5th and 6th July.

Sensei’s main topic for the weekend was trying to read your opponent’s seme. TBH I’m still not quite sure what ‘seme’ is at my level. I have the feeling that it’s the pressure and presence that more experienced kendoka give off. Pressure in that I can feel my kensen being moved off the center line, and presence in that they seem to project such an assurance that I feel that anything I try won’t work. How to generate or manipulate seme is still something I unable to understand or do.

Sensei’s exercises were based on trying to read the your opponents intention and trying to project it. Sensei started by pointing out that seme (in jigeiko, shiai or shinsa) starts from rei. So he emphasised the points that the rei should be performed while studying your opponent to gauge their intentions/ability, the 3 steps into sonkyo should be performed with strength (to push your own seme/pressure across) and should carry through the draw and into sonkyo as well.

We began without full armour. First of all just moving in from kensen touching (too-maai) applying pressure/seme while moving into striking distance (issoku-itto-no-maai). The idead being to project our seme, but also to observe our partner and try to read their intent as well.

For the next exercise sensei asked kakarite to move in applying pressure with the idea of striking men or kote, with motodachi trying to guess from the pressure what they were intending. This was very difficult (I managed 3 out of 0). It appears I’m still much reacting to my opponents movement rather than ‘reading’ their pressure/intent.

We then moved in mawari-geiko. Was good as usual to get a chance to fence against people I don’t normally get to fence with. Tried to put some of the lessons into practice, but couldn’t really feel anything happening.

Shinsa practice – with the Stoke grading happening the next week and a number of people attending the seminar going for grades Sensei decided to have practice shinsa to give feedback. Sensei seemed happy with my men cuts, so that’s something working OKish (shodan grading is looming for October)

Day 2

Repeat of above exercises. Would appear that sleeping on it hadn’t really improved anything on my part

Move on to striking men at the correct moment. Build up pressure between the pair and then as motodachi makes a small movement kakarite strikes men.

Then performing debana men. Same as abovebut this time motodachi cuts for men and kakarite responds with debana men.

And then repeated the exercises with kote instead of men.

Jigeiko – Again a good chance to fence with different people. Was advised afterwards by O’Donnel Sensei that I should be attacking more and holding back less.

An interesting seminar, but I do feel some of the concepts are still a bit beyond me. But it’s always good to have these ideas and thoughts tucked away for when they do become useful.

Practice began with Sensei giving a short talk on shinai maintenance:

• As shinai are made from bamboo, don’t try and sand out the dents as you’ll split the fibres
• If doing any maintenance be careful of splinters under the skin, and also try not to breathe in too much of the bamboo dust

We began with kata. Depending on people’s grade they either ran through the entire Bokuto Ni Yoru Kendo Kihon-waza Keiko-ho or numbers 1-4, with some people moving onto Kendo no Kata 1-3. Pointers I recieved were:

• In bokuto kihon 4, kakarite’s initial attempt at men needs to be a strong cut as it then gives more momentum/impetus to the rest of the kata
• again with kihon 4, be careful of how far you step back during the hiki waza. The cut want to be deeper than would be usual with a shinai.
• kihon 5, the debana kote should be made mainly with a stretch of the wrists (also must resist the urge to fumikomi :) )
• kendo no kata 3:
  • As uchidachi you initial parry should be strong, with the 2nd weaker as you’re overpowered by shidachi’s push
  • During uchidachi’s parry’s the feel of pulling the kashira (right word for a bokken or just swords?) should be much like that when receiving kirikaeshi.
  • uchidachi’s raising of sword should be strong as it’s actually threatening shidachi which is what makes him move backwards
  • The ‘joining’ of shidachi and uchidachi when moving back to the center should be reasonably seamless (ie; there shouldn’t be a pause while the kensen connect, it should flow).
• Generally, to improve the appearance of the kata the movement in should start off strong becoming warier as you become closer (ie; at 9 steps your safe and showing strength, but as you come closer you should start to be more aware of approaching danger). On moving out it should be the reverse, from kensen touching the movement is careful as there’s still a chance of attack but then moving faster once you’re out of danger. This applise to both Bokuto Ni Yoru Kendo Kihon-waza Keiko-ho and kendo no kata.

We then put on armour and begain shinai practice. We began by doing kirikaeshi at walking pace. This made it obvious how much you can rely on momentum when doing kirikaeshi at full speed. Also made you focus much more on the cuts and where they were landing. I felt I had my left hand too high for the saya-men cuts, so there’s something to work on. Moved out of rotation to work with the beginners doing a basic form of kirikaeshi, Sensei had then doing it using only men-uchi and sliding footwork. When I rejoined rotation we were working on kote-men, 2 sets using one breathe. Then moved onto an exercise where kakarite would push motadachi’s shinai (with motodachi pushing back), then releasing the pressure and cutting a small kote or kote-men. Felt that the work Sensei and Sempai had done with me on kihon 4 really improved my kote here, I could feel quite a bit more ‘pop’ than usual, also the kote-men I felt I’ve made an improvement on the footwork and wasn’t ending up to close for the men, think again this was down to extending arms for kote more. Then moved on a ‘routine’ uchikomigeiko (men, kote, do, kote-men, kote-do). After a number of rotations Sensei doubled the cuts.

We then finished and Sensei asked us all to say a few words about practice. I commented that I am finding kata very useful at the moment. I think this is mainly because I’ve got the base movements down (just), and exploring some of the other concepts is making me think about my shinai kendo a bit more and also carrying over good habits.

Spent the session working through kata. Looked at both Bokuto Ni Yoru Kendo Kihon-waza Keiko-ho and the full Kendo Kata.

Due to some gradings coming up Sensei worked through Bokuto Kihon 1-4. Making note of the following points:

Kihon 1 – Check distances. Each cut has a different start ‘distance’ (for the initial men a little closer than for the kote strike but not as close as for do).
Kihon 2 – Should be a clean flowing movement between Kote and Men
Kihon 3 – The harai movement should be small and coordinated with the right foot moving forward and with the upswing for the men cut. It shouldn’t look like a wild swing in from the side and then a disconnected cut. Also motodachi should only allow their bokken to move just enough outside of the bodyline to allow kakarite to make the men.
Kihon 4 – Both sides should take a 1/2 step in to tsuba-zerai. tsuba-zerai should be done with straight arms, and the bokken should not be vertical as then your centre would be off.

Then we worked through Kendo kata 1-3
Sensei spent a lot of time correcting kamae. Left (hidari) jodan should be done without excessively turning the torso, the left hand should be over the left foot and above the eyeline. Moving in hidari jodan from chudan you should lift your arms and then they should move into the final position from above (ie; swing up with a large movement and then settle down into jodan).

Kata 1 – After the initial approach you should be close enough that Uchidachi’s strike would hit Shidachi (the aim being to cut through the tsuka (handle), both of shidachis hands, their head and down through the torso) so that shidachi has to move to avoid the cut. Uchidachis swing should be a large arc (based on what they’re trying to cut through), and should leave uchidachi off balance (weight too far forward.). Shidachi’s nuki movement to avoid should be small, and the sword/hands should move upwards not backwards (ie the kensen shouldn’t drop and the bokken shouldn’t become level).

Kata 2 – Uchidachi’s cut should end just below shidachi’s wrist. Shidachi’s strike should be made with a step forward (ie; shidachi shouldn’t just step back and strike, but should evade (nuki waza) and then step in to ensure the cut is on target)

Kata 3 – Sensei broke this down into small steps to build it up:

• First, uchidachi performed tsuki with shidachi performing the parry. The tsuki needs to be a strong tsuki and aimed towards the solar plexus. Shidachi’s parry should be performed while stepping backwards but pushing the arms/bokken forwards. The parry should be enough to move uchidachi’s kensen, but only enough to avoid the body/
• Then performed the above, but this time with shidachi’s retaliatory tsuki/push.
• Then begining with the approach from gedan, and trying to build contact/tension while coming up into chudan and then following through with the sections already practiced.

Finally got the photos from the Bowden sorted and uploaded. Not many this time, was rather busy running around with the following duties:

• Competing
• Scoreboarding
• Timekeeping
• General Dogsbodying

For the rest of the pictures
Pics from the Premier Cup to follow at some point.

I can now recommend kendo as a means of staving off a headache, glad I went along last night.

Sensei asked me to lead Taiso. Remembering the stretches wasn’t too bad, but I had some problems with counting. It’s very strange to be leading the count rather than responding.

Started with kirikaeshi and do-kirikaeshi.
Then moving onto Men strikes and oji waza. Sensei built the practice up by having us do the following exercises:

• Kakarite seme’s in and strikes men
• kakarite seme’s in, hold pressure and contact until motodachi opens for strike and then strikes as quickly as possible. Sensei said that it wasn’t necessarily the speedof the strike that was important, but being ready to move as soon as the opening came.
• kakarite seme’s in, motodachi tries to strike men when they feel threatened and kakarite responds with debana men or debana kote
• kakarite seme’s in, motodachi tries to strike men when they feel threatened and kakarite attempts oji waza of their choice

Sempai pointed out that I wasn’t really seme-ing far/strong enough as he didn’t feel ‘threatened’ enough to need to attack. I think this is another of these things where I’m doing things by rote rather than actually understanding how to do it, so need to be able to act differently depending on who I’m facing and under what circumstances.

Sensei explained to us his concept of Seme. That the crucial point in getting ippon is when the kensen are touching and seme is ust starting. And that seme carries right through the strike until you’ve turned to setup again. So from my limited understanding it seems that it carries through to what’s normally thought of as zanshin as well?

We then moved on kote-men and kote-do. Then using the same plan as above worked on oji waza in response to kote cuts.

Then it was time for jigeiko. I think I did OK, some things felt better this time. I was happy with my performance against sempai, unfortunately I didn’t get the chance to fence Sensei that evening.

2nd Practice at Eishin Juku last night. Another 2 new starters and 2 more people turning up from other dojos.

Started with kata. Worked on Bokuto Kihon form 1. I had problems with distance, I wonder if I’ve got used to practicing at certain places and subconciously picking up on distance markers, rather than actually knowing the distance from my partner?

Then moved onto shinai kendo.

After suburi we worked on cutting exercises without bogu. First of all Men. In pairs, motodachi would hold their shinai horizontally at head height. Kakarite would strike 10 times concentrating on keeping arms in position and stretching wrists, then 10 times with slightly more force and tenouchi, and finally 10 times with a small fumikomi to try and improve ki-ken-tai-ichi. I found the last one quite tricky as I kept having the urge to use a full stomp rather than the little one that was required, think I need to work on fumikomi-ing to the distance needed rather than always trying for the long distanct.

Then moved onto do cuts. First exercise in pairs was just striking normal do from a static position, then moving on to alternating cutting normal do with gyaku-do. The next exercise was kakarite standing with their feet apart and slightly sunken, motodachi would cut men, kakarite perform kaeshi while cutting alternate do and gyaku-do. The important part was that kakarite was moving their hips across their feet while cutting, the idea being to bring the hips into the cutting action for do.

Then moved onto Kirikaeshi and Do-kirikaeshi. Sensei asked me to work with the new starters working on basic men cuts while the rest of the group moved onto ‘structured’ uchikomigeiko (ie Sensei laid down which cuts in which order).

We hosted the Bowden and Premier Cup taikai at Kashi no Ki over the weekend. Both events ran very smoothly, luckily we had enough people to cover all those little jobs that come up (who remembers to add 1 person to run the BKA stand?). In fact both days finished early which is pretty much unheard of :).

We also had a team in the Bowden, due to sickness we were down to 3 members so I stepped up to fill in on slot, and a gentleman from Kodokan filled in the other position. We beat Liverpool 2-0 but were then steam rollered out 5-0 by Do Shin Ken Yu Kai.

Took plenty of photos, now just starting the fun of working through them all.

Tonight was the first night of at a new Dojo in Nottingham. Was good to see a couple of people I used to train with at Doyukai reappear.

I did take the camera, but didn’t get a chance to use it.

Practice began with Wix Sensei welcoming everyone and explaining his thoughts on how the dojo would develop. Then we moved onto kata. We practiced Bokuto Ni Yoru Kendo Kihon form number 1 and Kendo Kata 1 as well.

Then moved in bogu and began shinai kendo practice.

First exercise was to strike men from 1 step distance (using Okuri-ashi). First we’d move in to check correct distance, and then step back to make sure that the distance was right, and then cut 10 men.

Then moved onto Kirikaeshi and Do-Kirikaeshi. Followed by uchi-komigeiko, though following a set pattern rather than motodachi choosing.

Throughout the night I had problems with ‘sticky’ feet. Don’t know if it was down to overly sweaty feet or just getting used to a new floor but it did feel strange at points. Also felt myself lifting my right foot too high while attempting fumi-komi.

It’s great to have another dojo so close to home, there’s now 3 opportunities to practice withing 45 minutes of home each week. I must make sure I make the most of it. Was also good to have a brand new beginner come along last night, hopefully there’ll be enough interest to grow the dojo.

This weekend sees Kashi no Ki Kenyu Kai hosting the Bowden and Premier cup taikais in Ollerton. So I’ll be busy sitting on one of the shiai-jo scoring or timekeeping. Hope to get the camera out as well.

Was good to see a lot of people at practice, not having been for a while it was nice to get a chance to catch up.

While waiting for everyone quickly ran through kata 1-4 (couldn’t remember anything past 4). The basics appear to still be there, but need to practice to remember all the little ‘signs’ of when to move and to regain some of the feel for them.

Was still feeling Thursday’s practice So spent a bit of extra time stretching as well.

Felt like a good practice. Still trying to get back into the right feel. Occasionally while being motodachi I’d get confused or have to struggle to remember exactly what I was meant to be doing.

Was happy that I managed to get so many fences in during Jigeiko including the senior members without running out of steam too much. I might be a little fitter than I though :).

Main points to take away were remembering to push through after oji waza, I’m tending to do the technique and then stop. Plus I’m still moving up during cuts rather than just forwards, so that’s something to practice in the kitchen.

First practice back after 4 months. Had spent the previous night at home practicing putting bogu on and repeatedly tying tenegui to check I had everything right. And revising the basics like how many strikes forwards and backwards in kirikaeshi.

This might not be the most comprehensive or correct memoir, was concentrating more on not falling over (only failed once :))

Taiso – Already sweating by this point
Suburi – Felt very relaxed, but feet have narrowed again. Hayasuburi was a killer, but feet felt smoother than I remember.
Kirikaeshi/Do-Kirikaeshi – Breathing ability has gone. Distance seemed to come and go.
Seme-Men – Slight difference with the seme. Moving back foot first and then front foot. Have already forgotten the term for this.
Kote-Men – Still fumikomi-ing too deeply for the initial kote.
Kote-Do
Uchikomi-geiko – Really started losing it about here. Had to request a quick water break.
Debana-Men
Debana-Kote
Jigeiko – Luckily Sensei asked us to concentrate on the seme tactics we’d been practicing earlier in the session so it wasn’t quite as bad as it could have been. Though he did seem to change his mind a little when it was my turn.

Glad to be back. Think I’ve been worrying about restarting too much and should have jumped back in earlier. Certainly feeling it this morning.

Finally back to practice after a long break. Seemed to have suffered 3 different colds over christmas, and they seemed to finally have shifted last night.

During suburi I got picked up on having my feet too close together, I thought I’d managed to get past that but it’s another thing to watch. It felt very strange to try and keep the stance wider and I concentrated on that a bit too much. Also need to lift my hands higher on the upswing

Kirikaeshi and Do-Kirikaeshi, continuously until Sensei said stop. Really started to notice the lack of practice here, arms started to get tired and there was no way I could do it on the usual 3 breaths. In fact I ended up with each kiai being a breath.

Kihon practice. Not happy with my kote, there doesn’t seem to be enought snap / sae in them. Still not changing my step distance for nidan waza so usually end up too close for the men cut.

Waza + seme-ashi practice. Still don’t really have a feel of seme, but I felt my seme-ashi had improved a little. I’m not ending up quite as deep, so I’ve still room to react and there’s some tension left in my left leg. Need improve going forward after a strike, some suriage worked well, but then there’d be a small delay before I began moving forward strongly.

Jigeiko – Managed to get in one jigeiko with sensei. Was very scrappy on my part. Ended with kakarigeiko, I tried to put everything into it, but think I put too much in as I was hitting too hard and was soon a complete wreck. Unfortunately I then ended up bringing my dinner back up which pretty much ended jigeiko for me for that evening.

Today we had a practice with a lot of visiting high grades Budden sensei, O’Donnell sensei, Matsuda sensei and Dockwray sensei

we started with kata practice
kata 1-3
3 – chudan, don’t reach arms out too much. Tsuki should be from hips. Push is done from chudan with kensen rising up for zanshin.

Then repeated but with Shidachi using seme to make Uchidachi start the kate

4 – Overview of waki and hasso kamae. Switch feet but same distances, right fight pointing out 45 degrees. left foot should be pointing/attacking opponent. Men cut should be to head height. The block should be done using the force of uchidachi’s incoming tsuki.

kodachi 1 – new to me. overview of kamae. chudan with kodachi is identical to tachi chudan, just with left hand on hip. Kamae against jodan is the same, shouldn’t be pointing, and should cover the body as well.

armour on

taitari practice

kirikaeshi – pulled up for not enough speed and no kikentaiichi

mawari jigeiko. Absolutely knackering, but managed to survived.

A very cold drive over to Ollerton tonight, took quite a while to warm up there. Still recovering from some sort of flu/cold, so I found myself spluttering quite a bit and just couldn’t do the normal breathing in kirikaeshi to save my life.

Suburi – Tried to concentrate on using my hips more, keeping myself low/level (Sensei had pointed out that I have a tendancy to rise up when moving) and also the pointers that Matsumoto sensei passed on (using thumb knuckle for center and also lifting hands higher on upswing)

Sensei then split us into groups of 3 for the next drills. We’d work in a rota for these, 1 person as motodachi, 1 as kakarite once that set had finished kakarite would become motodachi and the spare person step in as kakarite, and then repeat until Sensei call yamme.

Kirikaeshi – Tried to concentrate on the initial men cuts and taitari, some success, but I did feel at times that I was cutting to deep so need to work on my distance. Sensei told me I need to try and do Nidan kirikaeshi, which is strange as I don’t feel I’m doing shodan kirikaeshi properly yet.

Continuous Do-kirikaeshi – had some problems with distance going forward. Seemed to be taking too large steps and then cutting too deep.

Tobikomi men

kote-men

kote-do

Men debana men/kote – Push in with very small seme-ashi, opponent reacts and then beat them to the men or debana kote

Men ouji waza – Tried some suriagi, but need to create more room or allow opponent to commit more. Was often ending up cutting too deep or hitting the kote.

Kote ouji waza

jigeiko

kirikaeshi – My arms had gone by this point and it all just went to pieces, felt like 2.5 years ago with the left hand all over the shop and wrists at the same level

Sensei’s overall theme for the evening was posture. It does make a difference, certainly I notice it during the kote exercises, keeping the back straight and the head back forces me to extend my arms more which results in a better snap at the end of the cut.

This was the 2nd day of practice with Matsumoto sensei. There was training from 10-12 and then there was an open grading for 8th thru 2nd kyu (ie; you did your best and then Sensei would award the correct grade).

There was a good turn out, though only a few people who weren’t grading (5 people @ ikkyu and above)

due to a few snags Sensei was running late so we started by running through the kihon no bokuto kata 1-5, as this was needed for the grading. Making sure that everything was smooth (or at least trying), using large cuts, good footwork, strong kiai and holding zanshin after each cut.

When Sensei turned up we began the session:

Suburi – a lot of reiteration of points from the day before. Sensei had us lifting our hands a lot higher than usual (normally we cut men with the left fist just out of eyeline, Sensei had us lift them mush further (on the same curve) so they were actually above the head).

Kirikaeshi – Again covering the points from yesterday. Sensei also touched up the breathing needed (probably something new to a lot of people there), that it should be done on 3 breaths (1 breath for kakegoe and first men, breathe in during taitari, 9 sayu men and 1 large men on 1 breathe, breathe in during taitaril, 9 sayu men and 1 large men, turn and zanshin on 1 breathe)

Kihon ho in armour – Again emphasing good form, strong kiai and a good follow through.

The practice actually ended here. And then there was a grading. Sensei had the candidates do suburi, kihon kata, kirikaeshi and then kihon kata in armour. Everyone did really well, with Sensei awarding grades from 6th Kyu through to 2nd Kyu

This weekend Kashi no Ki (Ollerton dojo) is hosting a seminar and grading for kyusha (grading is up to 2nd Kyu). Today was the seminar, led by Matsumoto sensei, the British coach

The theme of the seminar was ‘Kendo ‘Fundamentals’

Matsumoto Sensei started by talking about how one should dress and prepare yourself for kendo practice:
Kendogu – The keikogi should fit to nape of neck without being baggy. The back of gi should be flat and ‘taut’, so you need to check you’ve not ruffled it while putting on you hakame, if you have then pull it through the openings in the side of you hakeme. Hakame, when tied the front should be lower than back, and the hem bottomn should just touch the top of the feet at the front. Very important to do all of this correctly as it’s fundamental to good kendo, and will fail exams.

Tare, should always put on in seiza, make sure to tie excess himo out of the way, should be neat and flat at the back.

Do, the bottom should rest halfway down the tare-obi (the wide fabric part at the top of the tare) , it should hang straight with equal weight on both himo, pull the bottom himo on either side to ensure a tight knot. Asked about which himo first, explained that in Kendo left first when putting things on or stepping into kit, right first when taking thing off.

Seiza, should draw left leg back and sink to knee, but not flatten toes (ie move onto tops of feet) until both knees are down. Toes should be crossed (didn’t stress which way). Weight slightly on knees. Keep an upright and ready posture. Knees should be be 1-2 fists apart depending on your build. To stand you should first bring your toes back underneath your feet and then stand up in reverse (right then left).

Kamae. Should be balanced, stress should only be in the left foot and hara. My center is actually a little to the left of where I though it was, center should be occupied by the 2nd knuckle of the left thumb. Physical kamae is the most fundamental, mental kamae is also important. Should hold same kamae whilst moving. Should try to keep a ‘tall’ posture but keeping legs bent. Left foot should be raised about the same height as the height of the right toes. Kamae should be a ‘ready’ pose, ie you can react instantly to anything.

Suburi. Big joge suburi, use back to check for straight swing, cutting swing should be the largest circle possible with kensen. Men suburi, no tension till cut so don’t power through with arms. Saya-men, ensure left hand is centered, cut at 45 degrees but when pulling back up move more straightly (someone asked about whether it’s a straight lift or 45 degree pull out, no real answer (makita-sensei last year said 45 degreews to stop blade sticking)).

Moved onto paired suburi, with one recieving resoku men with shinai moving backwards and forwards. Then recieving saya-men. Sensei suggested that it’d be better to recieve keeping the left hand in the centre and then cutting forward with the right (timing was tricky and also felt a bit exposed without men on).

Kihon no bokuto with bokken. Ran through katas 1,2,4 with higher (Slightly) grades as motodachi. Emphasised distance and good cut with strong kiai. Then kyusha received

Quick break for Lunch

After lunch sensei introduced some drills based on kihon kata 1,2 and 4. He split them into 2 sets, in the first set we’d cut Men, kote, do and tsuki. For the second set we’d cut kote-men, men, move as into tsuba zeriai, hiki do and then men.

We performed these along the length of the dojo, so we could do repetitions on each pass (ie; set 2 twice). We started off with just Do and Tare, first with suri-ashi, then moving onto fumikomi. Gradually more bogu was put on, first kote, then men as well. Sensei always wanted to hear/feel loud kiai and good large correct technique. For some reason I kept trying to cut gyaky-dou rather than the normal dou, no idea why as it’s not something I normally do. In fact it took a while to realise what Sensei was telling me to correct when it was pointed out.

We also did Kirikaeshi solo (ie only striking, noone recieving).Then we formed into pairs and repeated the previous exercises, but this time striking and following through. Sensei stressed that the left foot shouldn’t move once you’ra at issoku-ittou-no-maai, and that you should push from there to cut.

O’Donnell sensei came down from Do Shin Ken yu Kai to take the session.

Suburi – Was pointed out that during haya-suburi we should actually be covering quite a distance with the ‘hop’. The example given was the side lines of a badminton court (handy as there’s one marked on the dojo floor), which after some wikipedia’ing appears to be 0.48m. I’m still having problem doing this one, I quite often feel as though me feet are about to slide out from under me. I wonder if I’m just moving my feet too much compared to my upper body.

Also introduced to another suburi exercise for ki-ken-tai-ichi. The idea is to complete a cut while jumping and switching feet across (So, start in normal kamae (right foot front), jump, cut and then land with left foot front). The timing felt very strange, and it really shows you have to be relaxed on the cut to get the speed of the swing fast enough.

Kirikaeshi – Sensei said that there’s too many ‘parts’ to kirikaeshi to be able to improve them all at the same time, so we should concentrate on one part to do perfectly for each set. The hands should drop to tsuba-zeriai naturally after the cut as part of cutting forwards, there shouldn’t be a deliberate pulling back of the arms to get into position. Then we did a form of kirikaeshi where motodachi would block 2 strikes, and then not block the next 2 strike, this was to show that striking area should be same all the time and kakarite shouldn’t be altering their cut just because of the block.

kihon – men, kote, do, kote-men, harai-men. Seme in and strike, try to do all on as few breathes as possible. Ensure that zanshin is continued after last cut, there should still be a connection/awareness between the partners until the exercise is completely finished

Kihon II – A sequence of kote, men, tsuba-zeriai, hiki-men, kote, men, tsuba-zeriai, hiki-kote, kote, men, tsuba-zeriai, hiki-do, sashi-men.

Kakarigeiko/Uchikomigeiko – Today it wasn’t a set one or the other. You’d seme in and then motodachi would decide if it was uchikomi or kakari, but this was for every cut. Found it hard, as I’d seme in and then either hang waiting for an opening (uchikomi-geiko) or try to force the opening (kakari-geiko), and usually a split second afterwards I’d work out that motodachis intent was the opposite.

Jigeiko – Feedback from Sensei was that I need to push in more. Just sitting at distance won’t work, need to probe opponent for openings and mistakes. I think I’ve been thinking too much about the working from distance parts of recent lessons and not working on moving from toi maai to issoku itto maai with enough pressure/presence to force an opening

Not the most pleasant drive to practice last night. Rainy and lots of traffic weren’t really what I was looking for. Pretty good turn out as well.

Went throught the current ‘usual’ practice:

• Kirikaeshi
• Men – First time from just inside distance, large men with no prior foot movement. Then from kensen touching, seme in and then small men
• Kote – concentrating on moving your right foot towards motodachi’s right foot to make sure you get kote rather than their tsuba
• Kote-Men – First time with small movement with motodachi not stepping backwards. Then concentrating more on the Men part (using the ‘kote’ to open motodachi’s kamae for men)
• Men ouji waza – Mainly I went for debana kote or suriage men. Still finding that I can’t get the distance right with suriage and end up striking too ‘deeply’. Not sure if it’s because I’m:
  • a – Not fast enough
  • b – too tense
  • c – need to move my back foot back slightly to give more more room
• kote ouji waza – had some success with nuki waza, even tried uchi-otoshi once.
• Jigeiko – Tried to concentrate on keeping distance open. Could sort of hold it occasonally, but then found it hard to seme in convinvingly enough to actually make an opening. There always felt to be a bit of a ‘stutter’ as I brough my left left up to push off with. Tried to concentrate as well on large cuts and pushing my body in with my hips, could definitely occasionally feel it being ‘stronger’ than normal.

Got given a copy of the Video from the Mumeishi’s last night, will watch it tonight and try not to wince too much.

A bit shorter handed than we’d expected. At one point it looked like we were going to enter 3 teams this year, in the end we only scrabbled 1 team together.

The drive down was reasonable, just a bit early for a Saturday morning for my liking. Everything went well will we left the M4, at which point the instructions got confused and we headed off in the wrong direction. But after a bit of head scratching we got to the right place.

Found a space to drop our kit. And then started going through all the usual humdrum bits of queuing. There seemed to be a difference of opinion between various shinpan over wether the shinai check should be done with or without tsuba, but that was soon sorted by switching lines.

Our first match was against Hizen Ladies (A). First reading of the programme appeared to indicate we were Match 6 on shiai-jo C, so we warmed up appropriately (it’s really nice that there’s the seperate room to warm up in, it was great to get a couple of sets of kirikaeshi in, as well as suburi). All warmed up we made our way to the main hall, only to find out that we’d misread the timetable and they were only just finishing the play offs. Oops, now to try and stay warm/limber for a bit longer.

I was first on. Got caught with a very fast debana kote about 1 minute in. But didn’t give anything else away so lasted the 2 minutes. Felt very different from the last time I’d fought there (my first taikai) as I was now able to actually watch my opponent and wasn’t quite so easily led. I’m pretty happy with my performance, though there is a video, which I’m sure will show me exactly what I was doing wrong.

Unfortunately we then drew a match and lost the last one, so out of the tournament.

Spent an hour or so in the small room doing jigeiko with anyone who was available. Some success, some bits to watch out for. As ever it was very useful/instructive to fence with people other than the ones I train with every week.

Unfortunately I had to be back in the Midlands that evening and at work the next morning so we couldn’t stay for the Party, or for the keiko on sunday morning.

I did take some photos, and they’ll follow once i’ve finished off all the Drop Dead ones.

Started off badly by bashing my foot just under the left toes on the metal edging of some steps leading up to the dojo.

Taiso followed by suburi. Busy trying to concentrate on keeping my arms relaxed all the way through the swing until tenouchi. Feels strange as though you’re not trying enough.

Sensei had us all stand against the wall so that our heals, buttocks, shoulders and back of head were touching it. Then to tuck our chin in so we were looking levelly. Apparently this is how our posture should be for kendo. Felt very weird, much more upright that I’m used to. I can see that I’m going to be installing servers at work with my back against the racks for practice.

Kirikaeshi, not sure if sensei was trying to show how important motodachi is in setting distance or just trying to draw me out more but he seemed to want to really ‘pull’ me back acros the dojo with large steps.

Do-Kirikaeshi, pointed out that motodachi needs to push kakarite to make them get something out of the exercise. Also that motodachi should take care of where they end up so that kakarite is left with a good oppurtunity to strike men.

Tobikomi men (3 on one breath), taking care not to move the front foot before the cut.

Kote-Men. Pointed out that I’m making the same size fumikomi for both cuts. It should be much shorter for Kote as it’s closer than men is. Then Kote-do

Waza practice. Build tension with kensen just touching, then one person performs seme-ashi. Other person responds with a men cut. One the first set of rotations the person who’d seme-ashi’ed then performed shikake waza against them. On the second set of rotations it was a choice of oji waza. Third set of rotations were waza against a kote strike.

Jigeiko. For some reason I found I wasn’t pushing through after a cut as much as I should do. I’ve get the push and stomp in for the cut OK, but then there’d be a pause before I could push myself through.

While packing up Sensei and Sempai were putting evil thoughts into my head about heading to Japan for some practice at Ozawa Sensei’s dojo. There is the potential for a lot of overtime over christmas so it might be possible……..

Mumeishi 3′s on Saturday to look forward too. Not expecting to do hugely well, but should be a good chance to get some practice in, get some photos and meet people.

Some photographs from Miyagawa Sensei’s last kendo practice at Kashi no Ki Kenyu Kai.