Post by AngelaG on Oct 6, 2004 9:24:40 GMT
First of all big thanks go out to Renshi Anthony Blades and Neil Ellison Sensei for travelling several hundred miles to come and teach us. Thanks also to John Burke Sensei for providing a great venue for the seminar and giving up his time to instruct.
There was a good attendance with grades from the lower end to the higher end of the scale. This would, I imagine, create a logistical night mare, with the instructors having to ensure that the lower grades could keep up, while the higher grades were still being stretched. However, I felt the balance was kept throughout the whole seminar.
Due to the fact that for once all of the attendees at the Seminar came from a Shotokan background the format was changed to reflect that particular style. We started off with a few Shotokan basics, to get us into the spirit, and we then started working on a punching drill. We slowly worked up into doing a jab, cross, hook, backfist, hook, uppercut, and another uppercut. The drill was designed to get us relaxed and flowing and to start to release our feet from the floor when needed, rather than staying rooted in stance. We also worked on bunkai for the moves, which brought home the point that the most important part of bunkai is that it works, rather than what kata it’s from; and that we sometimes over-complicate matters.
Then Renshi Blades took us through Heian Yondan. It was broken down into several components, and drilled several times until we had learnt the kata exactly the way he wanted us to do it. Sensei Ellison then showed us the Wado Ryu version of Pinan Yondan. This was a lot whippier than the Shotokan version, and the high stances felt quite strange once you have become used to the long extended stances of Shotokan. Apart from that and a few subtle differences in body shapes the kata were very similar. Studying the kata in such detail, (both Pinan Yondan and Heian Yondan), really helped to discover new aspects of the kata, and helped show how the kata should ‘feel’ to the performer. It also demonstrated that once you have used a kata to get a certain grade that you have by no means finished with it, and there are always more things to be learnt and intricacies to be explored.
We were then shown bunkai for the moves in Heian Yondan and got to partner up and experiment. It was good getting to partner up with different people and feel how different body types work, and why certain techniques work better on some people than others.
Sensei Ellison then showed us a form from BaGua. At first everyone was quite perplexed and wondering how this fitted into what we had been taught all morning. We all gave it a go so we could understand what the moves felt like and then Sensei Ellison showed us some bunkai from the kata. Suddenly it all clicked into place, the form was very different but the applications weren’t actually much different from the bunkai from Heian or Pinan Yondan. In addition we were told how some of the hits affected the opponent from a TCM (meridian/pressure point) view. These moves were devastating, with scarily little effort as we all found out (Sorry Chris!!)
We finished off with everyone running through Heian Yondan again, trying to remember all the important points that had picked up on throughout the day.
It was a long tiring day, 6 hours of martial arts is always going to be hard. However, the time flew by and there was no point where I felt bored or that my money was in any way wasted. The seminar has helped me pick up several points, in a psychological sense as much as a physical sense and it was really nice getting to work with different people. There was a friendly atmosphere going on, no one minded partnering up with anyone else, regardless of rank, age or gender.
The day was rounded off with a few of us heading into Paignton after for a couple of drinks, to discuss the day and relax our very tired muscles.
My tip? If you missed this one, make sure you don’t miss out on the next one!
There was a good attendance with grades from the lower end to the higher end of the scale. This would, I imagine, create a logistical night mare, with the instructors having to ensure that the lower grades could keep up, while the higher grades were still being stretched. However, I felt the balance was kept throughout the whole seminar.
Due to the fact that for once all of the attendees at the Seminar came from a Shotokan background the format was changed to reflect that particular style. We started off with a few Shotokan basics, to get us into the spirit, and we then started working on a punching drill. We slowly worked up into doing a jab, cross, hook, backfist, hook, uppercut, and another uppercut. The drill was designed to get us relaxed and flowing and to start to release our feet from the floor when needed, rather than staying rooted in stance. We also worked on bunkai for the moves, which brought home the point that the most important part of bunkai is that it works, rather than what kata it’s from; and that we sometimes over-complicate matters.
Then Renshi Blades took us through Heian Yondan. It was broken down into several components, and drilled several times until we had learnt the kata exactly the way he wanted us to do it. Sensei Ellison then showed us the Wado Ryu version of Pinan Yondan. This was a lot whippier than the Shotokan version, and the high stances felt quite strange once you have become used to the long extended stances of Shotokan. Apart from that and a few subtle differences in body shapes the kata were very similar. Studying the kata in such detail, (both Pinan Yondan and Heian Yondan), really helped to discover new aspects of the kata, and helped show how the kata should ‘feel’ to the performer. It also demonstrated that once you have used a kata to get a certain grade that you have by no means finished with it, and there are always more things to be learnt and intricacies to be explored.
We were then shown bunkai for the moves in Heian Yondan and got to partner up and experiment. It was good getting to partner up with different people and feel how different body types work, and why certain techniques work better on some people than others.
Sensei Ellison then showed us a form from BaGua. At first everyone was quite perplexed and wondering how this fitted into what we had been taught all morning. We all gave it a go so we could understand what the moves felt like and then Sensei Ellison showed us some bunkai from the kata. Suddenly it all clicked into place, the form was very different but the applications weren’t actually much different from the bunkai from Heian or Pinan Yondan. In addition we were told how some of the hits affected the opponent from a TCM (meridian/pressure point) view. These moves were devastating, with scarily little effort as we all found out (Sorry Chris!!)
We finished off with everyone running through Heian Yondan again, trying to remember all the important points that had picked up on throughout the day.
It was a long tiring day, 6 hours of martial arts is always going to be hard. However, the time flew by and there was no point where I felt bored or that my money was in any way wasted. The seminar has helped me pick up several points, in a psychological sense as much as a physical sense and it was really nice getting to work with different people. There was a friendly atmosphere going on, no one minded partnering up with anyone else, regardless of rank, age or gender.
The day was rounded off with a few of us heading into Paignton after for a couple of drinks, to discuss the day and relax our very tired muscles.
My tip? If you missed this one, make sure you don’t miss out on the next one!
