Attendees: Mainly judo folks. No other aikidokas showed up until late, when Keith arrived, so I was on the sidelines watching
Actually, I'd brought my new camera along to try it out on some action shots. I spent a good portion of the evening taking pictures. I hope to get a couple online and posted soon.
Did the walk and uke'd for Keith a little once the judo folks cleared the mat.
I joined Sensei Raymond again at a Champion Judo in Pasa-get down-dena for another training session on scoring/keeping time for a judo tournament.
The folks a Champion went to a tournament in San Antonio this past weekend. They placed third in Jr. team and had one of their ladies take first place in Seniors.
Planning on aikido tonight.
A new season starting off as the old season left off. With a loss.
We won game out of three. The middle one, if I remember correctly. I think the team we played ("Way Out") moved up from the recreational league, but I'm not certain.
Next week we play "Fandango", usually the best team in the league. They've play two matches already and are 2-4, so they have the same winning percentage as we do at 1-2.
There are only 5 teams in the league this time and we play each team twice, except for "Fandango". The playoffs are around the 21st of November. Top 4 teams make the playoffs, so I hope we're one of those four.
Attendees: John, Keith, and Kim.
Ukemi: Left side a little off. Took a couple of big throws from John. Did some more left sdie simple rolls. Disastrous. Stopped quickly.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with Keith.
Techniques: Worked with Keith. Uke'd for 1-10 for him and then he uke'd 1-10 for me. I tweaked Keith's shoulder on Ude-hineri. I hope it recovers quickly.
Aftermath: Nothing of note. I collapsed my arm on the late left side and thought it might invite repercussions, but nothing so far. I'm probably going to do judo official training on Wednesday and then aikido on Thursday.
Attendees: Mike, Tim, Randy, Jeff, Greg, Oliver and Kim.
A review of the 14 double hand grabs.
I spent the day working with Jeff and it went well. 3.5 hours of double grab throws. We didn't do any of the big throws, just got to the off-balances for them.
I joined Sensei Raymond at a local judo dojo to learn how to score/keep time for a judo tournament. Sensei is one of the organizers for November's Houston Open and he needs as many volunteers as he can get. My knees need a little more rest so I wasn't going to be going to aikido in any event.
It was interesting learning the scoring, penalties, etc. I need more work on this, so I might be doing it on a regular basis depending on my body's need for rest. I could join Sensei and help out at a tournament in San Antonio on Saturday, but I'm going to be at the dojo for a review of the double-hand grabs that Mike covered a week and ahalf ago.
I hereby declare that we've been blessed with our first cool front of the fall, and right on schedule. Temps got down to the upper 50's last night and we could have slept with the windows open. We didn't though, since the dogs would have barked all night long as they would be listening to all of the wildlife wandering around the yard.
It'll warm up a bit this weekend. Then, in about 2 or 3 weeks (October 8 timeframe), we should be getting consistently cooler weather with the odd spike into higher temps.
Just about fall!
Managed to get to a night of D&D this past weekend. Survey said it was my turn to DM for the first time in a year and a half.
The party is rattling around in the remnants of the Fire Giants stronghold from the "Against the Giants" module. The use of the web spell was nicley done and effective on their part. One stairway down to the second level is not a good design for a complex.
Battle is in progress.
Attendees: Randy, Stanley and Kim.
Ukemi: Not bad. Iffy on the left side. Sensei Raymond noted me jumping on leftside big throws. Doesn't hurt, but I do need to correct it.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with Stanley. Pace seemed ok. Needed to tweak 6 and 8.
Techniques: Worked with Stanley on 1-10 with me as tori and then attemtped to get through 1-17 with him as tori.
As Tori:
1, 2 and 3 went ok. Had to try Gedan-ate a couple of times for improper hand positioning. Ushiro-ate I gave up the sidewalk. Oshi-taoshi: Sensei Raymond said he could have used my face for a Halloween mask. Too much effort. I must become bored with all of this for it to work well. Ude-gaeshi: losing control of uke's hand on the pivot. Ude-hineri: worked well. Hiki-taoshi: not controlling uke's shoulder well before the throw, spacing is good, however. Waki-gatame: worked well, getting to be a favorite technique.
As uke:
Over-committed, or something similar, on Gedan-ate. Again.
Spiked my knee on Oshi-taoshi.
Spiked the other knee on Kote-hineri
It was getting late, so I begged off bigger throws for safety's sake. The rest of the techniques went well.
Aftermath: Two achey knees. Naproxen sodium on the schedule for the next couple of days. Might wait until Saturday to go back to the dojo.
Attendees: Tim, Keith, Greg, Oliver and Kim.
Ukemi: One funky kote-gaeshi fall. No pain, but it looked funky to the watchers.
The Walk: ok.
Releases: With Greg. His deceptively long arms are tough to adjust to.
Techniques: With Greg. Ran through 1-7 as tori. Went pretty well. Keith was the overseer and tried to withhold comments until the end, but just couldn't do it. :) Then worked as uke for Greg. We spent a lot of time on Shomen-ate.
Did a partner swap and I ended up working with Kim. She was working on #2 agamae-ate. Tried some alternative approaches to help her with the timing and I think it helped. We'll see how she does tonight.
Aftermath: My knees are a little sore. Not certain if it's aikido or life in general.
tag : Aikido
Attendees: Tim, John, Keith, Stanley, and Oliver.
Ukemi: Not bad. Threw John and was thrown by John on big falls. No worries.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with Stanley. Rushed tonight. It's always something :).
Techniques: Worked with Stanley on the first couple of two-handed grab techniques from Saturday.
Then, John had us do dry runs of demos. So I had to do 1-10 both sides and Stanley had to do 1-17 both sides. That meant I had to fall for 1-17 on both sides. Good practice for me. Also, had to do the techniques 3-step, instead of my usual 1-step.
As Tori:
No hip switch on one side of Aigamae-ate.
Failed to get a good throw on Gedan-ate on right side, first time.
Real trouble on one side of Ushiro-ate, had to try it a couple of times.
Messed up with hand position on entry to Ude-hineri on the first side, fixed it on left side.
As uke:
Over-committed, or something similar, on Gedan-ate.
Failed to remember uke's response on Ude-gaeshi
Did ok on the falls for Kote-gaeshi
Left side fall for either Mae-otoshi or Hiki-otoshi was rough because I collapsed my arm.
Aftermath: Sweat, sweat and more sweat. A beer at home to make certain I was relaxed. John said we'll remember this temperature in the dojo fondly when winter rolls around. He'll be wearing his double-weave gi and standing under the heater to warm up.
Attendees: Randy, Keith, Stanley and Sheila.
Ukemi: Started working on throwing folks their warm-up kote gaeshi falls. Took some more myself with no problems.
The Walk: ok.
Releases: With Keith. My pivots are late on a number of releases.
Techniques: With Keith. Worked on 6-10. It went pretty well. Need to work on pivots for ude-gaeshi. I'm using to much arm and not enough center after uke pushes out of Oshi-taoshi. Worked a little on taking falls for Hiki-otoshi so that Stanley will have more ukes for the technique.
I then spent the rest working with Sheila on Gyakugamea-ate. Asked Sensei Raymond for some tips and he suggested a method for her to be able to apply the technique to someone my size. I'm about a foot and a half taller than she is.
The steps to handle susquatch:
1. fall along the line of your feet in the direction of your back foot
2. hook strong wrist over uke's attacking hand and get weak hand on uke's elbow
3. pivot on your back foot, off-line, to allow uke to go past you
4. continue to pivot in the same direction until uke's eyes are at a height compatible for the eye flash.
5. this can result in uke having very little time to prepare for his fall as he might be about 6" off the ground. :D
We spent about 45 minutes on this and she was doing quite well.
Aftermath: none, really, although a couple of the falls from Gyakugamea-ate were a little quick and I did not fall properly. My knees are really off, I don't know why.
tag : Aikido
Attendees: Mike, Tim, Randy, John, Keith, Robert, and Greg.
This was seminar on two-handed wrist grabs and 14 ways to throw uke.
1. double push to the chest
2. shomen ate
3. tenchi nage
4. both hands push to the side
5. ushiro ate
6. spinning arm bar
7. one hand waki gatame
8. two hand waki gatame
9. kote gaeshi
10. shiho nage
11. mae otoshi
12. sumi otoshi
13. drop to back corner
14. o garuma
I spent the day working with John and it was great. 4 hours of double grab throws. I think I liked the kote gaeshi and the drop to back corner throws the most. I was able to take the falls for the kote gaeshi with no real problems. I had trouble on my last o garuma fall. I was paying attention to what John was doing for the throw and forgot to duck my chin. Neck got a little wonky.
However, there were no lasting effects. Ibuprofen taken as a precaution.
Here are the camouflaged ammo cantainers I painted a while back. I took them up to the library and placed them in the middle of the floor. Kim almost tripped over them because they blended into the carpet.
Attendees: Tim, John, Keith, Stanley, Oliver and Stacia.
Ukemi: Not bad. No big falls in warm up this time.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with John. I'm taking too big of a step off-line and am too tense.
Techniques: Worked with John on 6, 8, and 9. I'm taking too big of a step to move off-line. I'm also rushing (duh! I'm always in a hurry) parts of some techniques. Worked with Stanley on 6-10 with a 3 step approach. Need to take the off-blance with small steps and off at 45 degrees. Need to control uke's shoulder on #9.
Aftermath: Nothing of note.
Ah, maybe next season. And the next season starts the end of this month.
The last match we played, we won. Unfortunately, the team we played (Green Eggs & Slam) had to forfeit the first game because they didn't have enough folks to field a team. They ended up with only 3 players, so the match was quite unfair. One of the players was playing competitive volleyball for the first time as a last minute sub.
We played decently all season, but not quite well enough to win.
We went to the Aggie football game on Saturday, thanks to some friends of the family who have season tickets.
We left the house around 1:45 to make certain the traffic didn't keep us from getting to the game on time. We arrived in College Station around 3:45, giving us plenty of time to watch march-in, hunt for shirts, etc. and grab something to eat.
Kim was amazed at the increase in "event" status the games show. They've closed the street on campus in front of the MSC that used to be used for march-in and turned it into a midway of sorts. Radio stations are out there, a bunch of food vendors, moonwalks, etc.
We zipped into the "C" to look for a shirt for me. The crowds were pretty bad, but not unnavigable. We had no luck finding a shirt, though.
We then went out to the Rudder Fountain area where the Yell Leaders were hosting a BBQ cook-off. We got our plates and had ourselves some bbq. The sausage stayed with me for *hours*. The brisket wasn't bad.
Off to the game.
We won. Not impressively, even if the score was 35-3. Our defense had holes through which a better team would have launched invasions. We proved incapable of blasting big holes in the Citadel's defense. Both the offensive and defensive lines look a little light for Big 12 play.
It was a fun afternoon. Much better than if we'd lost.
Attendees: Tim, Keith, Robert, Greg, Oliver and Kim.
Ukemi: Took a big fall on both sides, no problems.
The Walk: as usual
Releases: worked with Greg, tweaking each other's execution.
Techniques: worked with Greg. We went through the first 10 in a row, except for #9. We waited for fall zones to be clear for the roll-outs required so skipped to 10 and then back to 9. Initial kazushi (off-balance) proved to be the key to doing most techniques.
Aftermath: None, really.
tag : Aikido
Attendees: Oliver and Kim. Sensei Raymond was on the other part of the mat working with Judo folks. So, I was running aikido. It is educational to try to instruct. I hope I'm not screwing folks up to much.
Ukemi: Not bad. One slightly off roll on the right side. Probably collapsed the arm.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with Oliver. Oliver and Kim worked together after that with me watching.
Techniques: Exampled Shomen-ate with Oliver for Kim to watch. She and Oliver then spent most of the rest of the evening working on her Shomen-ate. She made great improvements from the start of the evening until when we stopped. I then uked for Oliver on 1, 2 and 5 to get him some more practice.
Aftermath: Nothing of note.
tag : Aikido
Attendees: Tim, Keith, and Sheila.
Ukemi: Not bad. Took some big falls in warm up this time. It was nice to get that practice in. Keith was throwing me on those and he had to adjust to my height. He had to take two steps to my one in order to be able to extend my arm enough to get the throw. We spent a fair amount of time on ukemi.
The Walk: as usual.
Releases: Worked with Tim. He adjusted my angle into the releases. Wants me to just barely bypass uke, not fall at a 45 deg angle to their path.
Techniques: Not sure where the time went, but I didn't work on any techniques.
Aftermath: Nothing of note.
tag : Aikido
