Summer Break

Tomorrow I'll travel to the Baltic Sea and take a vacation. We do a little bit Kendo too, but mainly I want to do a little summer break and relax at the beach. I hope the weather will be nice, because the prognosis weren't good yet.

After my trip to the Baltic Sea, I'll go to Budapest and participate at the Hungary Cup. The next three weeks I'll be far away, maybe I have some time blog though.
Anyway I'll be back in three weeks. :)

Race against the Clock - Pushing Endurance

Some days ago I bought a pulse computer and did my first run now. It's awesome and a lot of fun. The track I have chosen is 4,4 km long and I needed 23:53 min. In the beginning I felt very well and I wasn't too fast, but the last kilometre was quite exhausting.

Long-term endurance is not as important as in other sports because the muscles are trained for steady, continues use of power. After some minutes the anaerobic system gets active. This metabolism allows long and continues burden of muscles.

In Kendo you need an activation of the maximum power as fast as possible, what is only possible with aerobic work of the muscles. Therefor I only do a short training but with higher intense. My pulse computer allows me to find the optimal rhythm for running. I based my calculation on a simple formula:

(180 - age) +/- 10 = 156 - 176

It's not useful for person beginning with doing sports, but that's not my case. I had an average heart frequency of 176 this time and I'll probably reduce it a little bit next time.

Anyway... I am on the run now.

4th KenVO Squad Training

Yesterday the 4th KenVO Squad Training took place in Leipzig. I got up 6:10 am in the morning and met with Stephan at 6:50. I went out of the house earlier than I do it on weekdays. We met the others (namely Tino, Patrick, Liv, Lilli and Elisa) and went to Leipzig.

We started the training with a normal warm-up and probably ten-times Kirikaeshi. Then we did basic strikes in different variations, but not in the easy way. On the first whistle we had to do Kiai and keep the tense in our bellies, this tense is also shown by stopping breathing. On the second whistle we had to execute three strikes in a row without breathing. Very exhausting. To calm down a little bit the next exercise was Tsuki. In the beginning slowly, then faster ending up with Ai-Tsuki (both try Tsuki at the same time on command).

I did a good job at the Tsuki training and I didn't feel uncomfortable anymore. Anyway our trainer had some good advices for me.

• execute the thrust with the hip
• Fumikomi-Ashi is very important
• I shouldn't care about my arms that much, just naturally raise them

After some more exercises and a little break we did some more technique training. This time Nuki-Do. In the beginning the motodachi started with a Tsuki and at the same time we executed Do. It became more difficult with every round and we ended up with Men-Nuki-Do.

My timing and the step side-wards and even the Do strike work quite well. The real problem is the Zanshin after the strike, my arms don't do what I want them to do and I get stuck. I really have to improve the movement of my arms and body after the Do strike.

It wasn't exhausting enough and we started the final showdown before our mid-break: Suburi of all types, Double-Naname-Suburi on command, Koshiwari (very hard). We all felt like dying, even our friends from Berlin being invited to this training. But, this was not enough. Again Koshiwari in a very special manner anybody knew before: Koshiwari with jumping and without stretching the body to relax. Well... now some Hayu-Suburi. We survived.

After 1:20h we started again, just a short break to take a breath. We did Mawari-Geiko and Jigeiko. I met all important persons for Geiko and one of the final rounds I met, as always, our trainier Tomo. He always forces me to strike with his strong centre and his dangerous Maai.I have no time to relax at least a bit. Strike after strike. My body felt so weak even before we started and after two minutes of bleeding I felt like dying. I gasped for air and he said:

You are weak. Gasping for air is NOT a problem. Invest everything you have into one strike, its not a problem if you fell down after the strike. Overwhelm the weakness of your body with strength of your heart and fighting spirit.

Its not like I am not able to fight, but it's meant to be able to cope with very strong Kenshi on high national and even international level. Another reason why I started my extra conditional training.

Anyway we survived this day, but it was not enough. There was a kind of sport event in town and we have been invited to present Kendo. Again those wet clothes, our muscles felt like pain. The only reason to smile was a free meal and drinks. It wasn't enough though and we did a, almost traditional, stop at Macess (McD) afterwards.

Puh... what a journey. Big thanks to all who take part on this, especially Dresden's Kenshi, and of course our friends from Berlin.

On the long run...

Today I did my first running session. The track is 11,1 km long, straight through the Elbe Valley (World Heritage Site) and it took me 1,5 hours. I did this session with one of my classmates (Holger) who is an experienced sportsman able to guide me quite well through this journey.

I never run before, so it was something new to me and I didn't know how fast I should run. In the first half hour we did almost the half distance. Quite fast for a newcomer running with ~12 km/h. After this first part I started to struggle and we walked for a while. We slowed down a little bit for the last kilometres and were even able to talk. That's very good because your pulse is not to high and not too low. Anyway I'll buy a pulse computer soon to optimise my running speed and training.

It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed the long run.

Technique Shiai and a training with tense

Yesterday was the last Kendo training of the beginner course for this semester at Dresden University. As every semester we do a little Technique Shiai for beginners. They don't have a Bogu yet and can't do a real Shiai. Therefor we do this Technique Shiai as a little suprise without telling them before.
The participants have to show what they learned in the last six month and three referees have to judge them with Hantei decision. The exercises have been Kirikaeshi and Uchikomi-Geiko (Men,Kote,Kote-Men,Do,Men). Its always lots of fun. In the beginning they are quite shy and not very self confident. But in the latter rounds all of them give their best.
I was a referee and before we started Stephan gave us some instructions which important points we should look at:

• Fighting Spirit and Kiai
• Distance (Maai)
• Flow of the movements
• the overall beauty

In the final match my decision differed from the other to referees.
Her last men strike was much better than his one and she invested everything in this last technique while he only did a steady, but good technique. I gave more importance to this mental process than the general lookalike.
In fact all of them have done a great job and its difficult to decide. I hope all of them will continue with Kendo as it teaches you coping with sudden difficult situations.

Afterwards we did a very intensive and exhausting training because we had only one hour.
Some points I figured out:

• the attack interval is nice in Jigeiko
• fight against weakness of the body with fighting spirit
• 100% concentration, 100% strength in 100% of the time
• even more flexibility between Men, Kote, Do and Tsuki

Well, its time for the next training, no time to write more detailed stuff

Offence / Defence

Last week we did a great exercise to learn the basics of every Shiai called Offence/Defence. The main purpose of this exercise is to train the physical and mental power, agility, reaction as well as the players condition. Some students of the Waseda University (Japan) brought it some years ago to our Kendo Club, but sadly we are not doing it often enough.

The Rules

Depending on the experience lasts 30 seconds until one minute. One player is the defender. He tries to avoid an Ippon of the offender by evading the attacks (Nuki). You can do it with Hiraki-Ashi and Okuri-Ashi, what is in my opinion very elegant. Another method are fast steps backward with Ayumi-Ashi. It is very japanese-like if you can evade with footwork.

Another method to avoid an attack is the use of Suriage or Kaeshi techniques. The defender shouldn't use Ukekata (Basic Blocking) all the time, because he wouldn't do it in a real fight. The offender must do an Ippon in the prescribed time. He should try all the techniques he is able to do, to become more flexible. Very important is good concentration to see an opportunity for a strike. The offender should NEVER stand still, because he is in a hurry. In fact the situation of Tsuba-Zeriai and Issoku-itto-no-maai is not good for the offender.

The Situation

To get a better understanding why this is exercise is important one should make some things clear. Imagine you are the Taisho of a Kendo team in a final match. Your team needs an Ippon to win the match. For the other team its enough to reach a draw. Now you have 30 seconds left. Its a difficult situation, after all the matches you have less physical and mental power and could easily make an mistake. You shouldn't be carelessly while doing Seme and a Strike. That's the same in Offence/Defence.

I always try to imagine this before I walk to the baseline when I am the offender.

My Keypoints

• fast Seme
  
• well-placed strikes, variety of Men, Kote, Do and Tsuki
• when the defender is doing Uke another place can be hit, I have to watch that clearly
• gain the ability to analyse the defender while striking
• as a defender: try to evade with footwork only (very japanese-ish)

Kote-Men: How do I do this?

A very nice Waza is Kote-Men and in the last several training lessons I improved a lot not knowing even why. As far as I can analyse it my hip and feet move much faster forward while my arms and shoulder are more relaxed making the complete sequence of two strikes and two steps much faster. The keypoints I want to look at the next training:

• relaxed shoulder and arms
• left leg is relaxed but ready for a move and under tense
• the left leg is straight to activate the movement as fast as possible
• the hip pushes the body forward
• the left leg must move insanely fast forward to start the second step and Men-Strike

I need to get all those points of my movement under better control, because it affects a lot of other techniques too. I.e. the fast switch of relaxing and tensing the left leg is very important for a pure Men-Strike and the Zanshin afterwards.

Yet Another Kendo Blog Is Born

After ages of silence I thought it would be great to have a place to track all my thoughts, ideas and stories about Kendo. I had a little black book for that purpose, but it was only helpful for smaller notes and very rustically. I started doing Kendo with 17, more than 4 years ago, at the Kendo Club in Dresden. After a very difficult first year with a little break it became a major part in my life and now I couldn't live without it. Mainly I want to use this for my personal notes, but also for little reports about tournaments and experiences.

I may invite you to my little blog and you hopefully enjoy reading and watching it.