Taxing.

That's really the best way to describe the exam on Saturday. It was long, it was physically demanding, in waves, and it was a mental roller coaster. I did far better at the pre-exam, which was considerably harder, physically, than Saturday's exam, but I was also healthy for that one.

This afternoon when I show up for my regular stint as an assistant instructor, I'll be wearing Black around my waist. We both passed, but I could have done better. If this hadn't been me and Evan testing together, I'd have put it off till June. Evan was, as always, very clean, where technique is concerned. His speed and power suffer for it somewhat in combinations, but his forms always look amazing for it, and since forms are heavily weighted, this works in his favor.

I did my sparring part of the exam against a guy going for second Dan. I'm not more than a middle of the road sparrer by the standards in our studio, but I understand how Master Lightfoot got the reputation he has. I was still having issues with the sinuses (still am for that matter), but quite frankly, this guy never touched me during our free sparring rounds. I got to watch a lot of sparring rounds on Saturday, and the difference between training under a guy who was a professional K1 kickboxer became readily apparent. The students from all the other studios tend to stand squared up instead of sideways to their opponents, and they have a really bad habit of leading with their back legs. They don't follow up with multiple kicks or hand techniques very often afterward either. The end result is that they show a lot of target areas and their lead technique is slow and telegraphed, and once they've thrown it, they're moving to reset instead of continuing to press. Silly rabbit, if you're just going to throw a single technique, and a slow one I can see coming at that, I'm going to destroy you.

Everyone has a side they prefer to keep forward when sparring, but we're constantly told to switch off, to never go through an entire round with the same foot forward. This forces us to work on our weaker side and get better with it. I saw a lot of kids and quite a few adults (and I was the only one there above 15 going for first Dan on Saturday, the rest were all going for second or third) who never switched off their leading foot. I force myself to start every round left foot forward (this is my blind side), and will switch off to right if I can't handle my opponent that way. I switched to leading with my right at some point, but it wasn't because I was forced to, it was out of habit. If I'd been in the ring with one of our Black belts, being at less than full health, I'd have been lucky to just defend myself; there'd have been no way I'd have dominated the match. That ring was mine. I felt bad for my opponent: despite not being in top form, I had it easy. For this, I'm glad. If I'd've had to spar in top form, I wouldn't have made it.

Taxing.

That's really the best way to describe the exam on Saturday. It was long, it was physically demanding, in waves, and it was a mental roller coaster. I did far better at the pre-exam, which was considerably harder, physically, than Saturday's exam, but I was also healthy for that one.

This afternoon when I show up for my regular stint as an assistant instructor, I'll be wearing Black around my waist. We both passed, but I could have done better. If this hadn't been me and Evan testing together, I'd have put it off till June. Evan was, as always, very clean, where technique is concerned. His speed and power suffer for it somewhat in combinations, but his forms always look amazing for it, and since forms are heavily weighted, this works in his favor.

I did my sparring part of the exam against a guy going for second Dan. I'm not more than a middle of the road sparrer by the standards in our studio, but I understand how Master Lightfoot got the reputation he has. I was still having issues with the sinuses (still am for that matter), but quite frankly, this guy never touched me during our free sparring rounds. I got to watch a lot of sparring rounds on Saturday, and the difference between training under a guy who was a professional K1 kickboxer became readily apparent. The students from all the other studios tend to stand squared up instead of sideways to their opponents, and they have a really bad habit of leading with their back legs. They don't follow up with multiple kicks or hand techniques very often afterward either. The end result is that they show a lot of target areas and their lead technique is slow and telegraphed, and once they've thrown it, they're moving to reset instead of continuing to press. Silly rabbit, if you're just going to throw a single technique, and a slow one I can see coming at that, I'm going to destroy you.

Everyone has a side they prefer to keep forward when sparring, but we're constantly told to switch off, to never go through an entire round with the same foot forward. This forces us to work on our weaker side and get better with it. I saw a lot of kids and quite a few adults (and I was the only one there above 15 going for first Dan on Saturday, the rest were all going for second or third) who never switched off their leading foot. I force myself to start every round left foot forward (this is my blind side), and will switch off to right if I can't handle my opponent that way. I switched to leading with my right at some point, but it wasn't because I was forced to, it was out of habit. If I'd been in the ring with one of our Black belts, being at less than full health, I'd have been lucky to just defend myself; there'd have been no way I'd have dominated the match. That ring was mine. I felt bad for my opponent: despite not being in top form, I had it easy. For this, I'm glad. If I'd've had to spar in top form, I wouldn't have made it.

Taxing.

That's really the best way to describe the exam on Saturday. It was long, it was physically demanding, in waves, and it was a mental roller coaster. I did far better at the pre-exam, which was considerably harder, physically, than Saturday's exam, but I was also healthy for that one.

This afternoon when I show up for my regular stint as an assistant instructor, I'll be wearing Black around my waist. We both passed, but I could have done better. If this hadn't been me and Evan testing together, I'd have put it off till June. Evan was, as always, very clean, where technique is concerned. His speed and power suffer for it somewhat in combinations, but his forms always look amazing for it, and since forms are heavily weighted, this works in his favor.

I did my sparring part of the exam against a guy going for second Dan. I'm not more than a middle of the road sparrer by the standards in our studio, but I understand how Master Lightfoot got the reputation he has. I was still having issues with the sinuses (still am for that matter), but quite frankly, this guy never touched me during our free sparring rounds. I got to watch a lot of sparring rounds on Saturday, and the difference between training under a guy who was a professional K1 kickboxer became readily apparent. The students from all the other studios tend to stand squared up instead of sideways to their opponents, and they have a really bad habit of leading with their back legs. They don't follow up with multiple kicks or hand techniques very often afterward either. The end result is that they show a lot of target areas and their lead technique is slow and telegraphed, and once they've thrown it, they're moving to reset instead of continuing to press. Silly rabbit, if you're just going to throw a single technique, and a slow one I can see coming at that, I'm going to destroy you.

Everyone has a side they prefer to keep forward when sparring, but we're constantly told to switch off, to never go through an entire round with the same foot forward. This forces us to work on our weaker side and get better with it. I saw a lot of kids and quite a few adults (and I was the only one there above 15 going for first Dan on Saturday, the rest were all going for second or third) who never switched off their leading foot. I force myself to start every round left foot forward (this is my blind side), and will switch off to right if I can't handle my opponent that way. I switched to leading with my right at some point, but it wasn't because I was forced to, it was out of habit. If I'd been in the ring with one of our Black belts, being at less than full health, I'd have been lucky to just defend myself; there'd have been no way I'd have dominated the match. That ring was mine. I felt bad for my opponent: despite not being in top form, I had it easy. For this, I'm glad. If I'd've had to spar in top form, I wouldn't have made it.

Hey look, it's another Usenetter!

Say 'hi' to mcswan everyone. Those of you who are refugess from rasfwr-j will recognize him as Mitchell Swan (normally I wouldn't include actual names, but he's not hiding behind a pseudonym, so there you are).

Hey look, it's another Usenetter!

Say 'hi' to mcswan everyone. Those of you who are refugess from rasfwr-j will recognize him as Mitchell Swan (normally I wouldn't include actual names, but he's not hiding behind a pseudonym, so there you are).

Hey look, it's another Usenetter!

Say 'hi' to mcswan everyone. Those of you who are refugess from rasfwr-j will recognize him as Mitchell Swan (normally I wouldn't include actual names, but he's not hiding behind a pseudonym, so there you are).