Thursday, August 03, 2006

My first Randori and I broke my foot

Sensei said that we shouldn’t train to the point where we get bloody knuckles. I’m planning never hurting them again by hitting the Makiwara. Once a Sensei from a different city got blood all over a Makiwara and ruined the pad that covered it. It had an illustration of a tiger that had clear tape around it.

I didn’t realize that knuckle push-ups will always hurt. Now that I think about it, I think I realized it when Sempai John told me to ignore the pain when we were doing them together during Gasshuku. I didn’t realize that it hurt him too.

I don’t think I was using a roundhouse at that time. I know that we I practiced once with him when he was telling me what to do. When I was sparring, I never aimed at the head. I was just aiming at his stomach. I know that one time he roundhouse and touched my neck lightly. I’m thinking he either blocked hard when I front snap kicked and broke it. Or he broke it when he tripped me with is sweep kick. I was going for a low kick while all of a sudden he dropped to the ground and swept me off my foot, which made me land on my butt. I remember as time went on, we punched and kicked harder. I don’t know how I broke my foot when I sparred with him. That’s all I remember that has to do any thing that deals with kicking and my feet.

This is what I said on karatekorner.com. “Last night was my first experience of actually sparring with someone. I loved it and thought that it was really fun. I learned that I need to practice these techniques by myself so I can use them correctly and have good form when I actually spar. Of course, the black belt was really easy on me by not defending and evading all of my strikes. He usually let me attack first. When did attacked me, sometimes I didn’t effectively block his strike because I’m not used to blocking yet and wasn’t expecting it. It did feel good when I got a counter attack in when he attacked me and started blocking all of my moves.”

“I wasn’t expecting to be the only white belt to spar with a black belt last night. As I was sparring with him, the other white belts just stood and watched. I would have thought that Sensei would pick a higher and more experienced white belt to spar with Sempai. When he was teaching us the sparring techniques, I know that I didn’t perform as well as my fellow white belts. My kicks were horrible because I’m so uncoordinated. I wasn’t chambering with my kicks because I wanted to keep up with everybody else. My crescent and sweep kicks were bad because I didn’t make half circles. In addition, many of my kicks were off target. By the end of his lesson, I was slower and performing worse than everybody else because I was so tired. Therefore, I was surprised that Sensei still wanted me to spar with him.”

This is what I said in my journal. “For a good hour, Sempai David taught us sparring moves. It was nice to work with him again. I learned how to do all types of kicks. Most of my kicks stunk. Sensei noticed and yelled at me to chamber. Some of my kicks were way off target. Sempai noticed and tried to correct me. I think we were going too fast because my quality of my technique was bad. Cory was doing better than me! As we were doing that Sensei came up behind me and slapped the top of my shoulders. Of course, that startled me. Sensei corrected and reminded me to be in Sanchin Dachi. Sempai had to remind me to make a circle when I swept kick. When we were done, I was tired. Then Captain David asked me if I Randoried with anyone before. I said that I thought so. Then he said not to break his ribs. We stared to spar. First, he told me what to do and as time when on, I made up my own stuff. However, he was really good. Once he kicked my neck. Another time, I landed on my butt because he swept kicked me and I was kicking him with my other foot. Maybe that’s how he hurt my foot."

"Ever since Tuesday, the top of my right foot has been tender and swollen. Yesterday, it turned really black, blue, and purple near my toes and ankle. Rhea says that it’s still swollen, but I can’t tell. On Thursday, I had it wrapped to keep the swelling down. It didn’t help that I had a big split under one of my toes from athlete’s foot. From sparring, I aqurired the biggest blood blister on my left big toe that I have ever saw. So, my feet hurt for a few days. Anyways, sparring was fun.”

4 comments:

Lizzie Woolley said...

By supergroup,

"Hi Lizzie

About the knuckle push ups.. As you train, you will feel the pain less... I used to hurt right away.. now I can go across a whole gym floor in wheelbarrow position on my knuckles without it hurting as much... but it takes time, patience, and determination.

Now.. about your foot..

I believe that there is no way that Sempai David broke the top of your foot with his sweep. A good foot sweep might have caused bruising on your ankle or side of your foot.. not the top.

From the description that you gave of how Sempai David allowed you to attack first, and that he was able to touch your neck lightly with his foot, it sounds like he was using alot of control. I bet you that he was moving slowly most of the time.

So the other alternative, from your journal, would be the fact that your kicks were off target. You might have come upwards with the front snap kick ( rather than thrusting forwards ). Beginners tend to do this, and what that does is that you can smack the top of your foot onto Sempai David's blocking elbow that is placed to protect his center.

This is my best guess. So.. check the technique of your front snap kick technique. This is easy to do.. stand in front of a chair and try to do a front snap kick over the seat of it. If you are raising your foot upwards, instead of lifting your knee first, the chair will fall over as your foot smacks into it.

12:42 PM

Lizzie Woolley said...

Hi Supergroup,

I finally revamped my blog. I got rid of the things that you suggested including the thread in another forum. I deleted all of my essays that I worked so hard on. I realized that it wasn't worth people stealing my work. I don't want people getting an easy A because of me.

I think that you are right about my front snap kick. Last Thursday, I was talking to my Sempai about my kicks. They told me that I still scoop when I kick. I don't chamber when my leg comes up. I kick and then chamber. My kicks are especially bad when I'm in Zenkutsu dachi.

Mir said...

I'm glad that you have found some solutions to your problems. Big hugs! You have found quite an awesome Sensei, and dojo to train in.. I'm really glad for you. Many people would travel many miles to get the quality instruction that you have.. great for you.

Ah.. yes.. I've been guilty of scooping my kicks now and then, especially when I'm under pressure in sparring. It's like my brain forgets to bring the knee up first.. although you'd think that would have been ingrained in me from all the repetition that I do in class to force that knee up. It just takes practice to get your leg to remember to lift that knee. It's just a bad habit to scoop. In fact, this action of scooping can cause injury if done at the wrong time, and wrong place.

You have a very interesting, and wonderful blog, and I can't wait to read more about your progress. Keep up the good work.

Lizzie Woolley said...

Thanks for reading my blog supergroup. I'm glad that you comment on it too.