Saturday, April 16, 2016

Getting Stronger & Smarter

     Hello everyone! First off, I would like to give thanks to everyone participating in my blog. Keep asking questions it gives me ideas on where to go with the posts. Anyways, I have conducted an interview with my Karate Instructor, Mr. Myrtle. Mr. Myrtle has been teaching and learning Kenpo for more than 20 years.
     I asked Mr. Myrtle, how to get ready for my brown belt test. I told him I am ready to keep moving. He said that if I keep practicing perfect, I will soon achieve my brown belt. He also told me once I earn my brown belt, I will be assigned classes and students and have a part time job there helping out! I have teach the beginning of classes here and there.
     I'll start the class and work them out. I love to push people farther than they think because when you're working hard and you're using up all your breath you start to think in the back of your mind, "Crap, I can't keep doing this I need to take a rest." Not in karate you don't. If you tell yourself that you can do it, and you keep pushing and pushing you will feel very motivated to keep doing so, you feel a lot stronger after a workout (and also kind of exhausted) but that is the best part after doing karate...knowing you can use your stamina for quite some time without getting winded.
     Recently I was in the hospital, so karate has been a little complex for me. The doctors told me I have musculoskeletal bruising throughout my chest, ribs and near my heart. I was having heart palpitations with my chest pain, which worried me. I asked Mr. Myrtle how I should practice with the condition. He told me to take it easy on the fighting, I don't get hit a lot which confuses me to how I have the bruising, but he said if there are any bruises around your heart then it can be a serious situation and to be easier on myself.
     That is another huge thing about karate, you have to know your limits. You have to make sure your health is in good shape otherwise, you could seriously injure yourself. Mr.Myrtle told me to be stretching and work myself back into shape slowly. I've been very curious on how to become a better fighter. I've been training a lot harder, a lot smarter, and I've been using different moves every time.
      Mr. Myrtle told me to use combinations, like throwing a couple punches, then a back knuckle, then back up let them come towards you and kick. I can't decide which I like more, kicking or punching. But Mr. Myrtle also told me to counter more often. I took that into consideration and scored a lot more points with it. At this rate, this tournament better be ready for me.

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

So what is this all about?

      Hello Everyone, and welcome to my blog. My goal here is to show everyone that defending yourself is important. I decided to do self-defense because I've been involved with self-defense since 2005. If you have low confidence, if you have a lot of energy built up, or even if you wanna take out some stress, self-defense is definitely the way to go. I've been studying the art of Kenpo Karate, Kick boxing, & Grappling. So while I'm on this journey I'd like to share it with you.
       I'm mostly working with Karate. On April 2nd, I took my Green Belt test, which is four belts away from my main goal, A black belt. The best test was about four hours long, which was crazy. During the test my friends and I were expected to go over all of the techniques that we previously learned, the forms we previously learned, the basics we previously learned and all of our new material.
     My master says that Basics are the whole base of Karate. (of course) Basics teach you the most important things, like your stances... For example the fighting stance, also known as the ready position. There are all sorts of finger techniques, strikes and different punches and kicks.Techniques are very important, they are the main moves. There are 10 techniques in your first belt list, but from there on there are 16 in each list, and they are not easy to learn. There are all sorts of inserts, hidden moves, ect.
          Forms are a collision of techniques and moves put together. There are tournaments that my team and I attend. Where we perform the art and try to place. In competitions, there is open forms, Kata (Forms), and Kumite (Sparring). The way sparring works is by rank. So when they line me up to fight, they look for experience and place me in the advanced division. It wouldn't be fair if they lined me up with a yellow belt who has only been in fighting for a year. The rounds are 3:15 long. We are required to wear gear. Head gear, Hand gear, Foot gear, and a mouth guard. But in the dojo we train without it with my trainer Nic.
     I'm planning on taking my next belt test (for brown belt) in September. Which is complex goal that is going to be hard to achieve. But with the hard work that I put into Karate, I'm expecting to get it.

It has been a while.

Hey everyone, I doubt that anyone even is paying attention to these anymore but I stumbled across my old blog and remembered that I had said...