This week in Aikido

So went to Aikido with eldest daughter this Saturday. She had fun in the Youth class and then I attended the beginners class that comes after hers.

It was... interesting. The warm ups, basic exercises, and weapons practice were all what I'm used to. For the weapon portion we stuck with bokken and basic front strike.

The open hand technique was the odd part, to me at least.
Cross wrist grasp - o.k. standard opening I remember those.
Elbow power #1 and then finis breaking their grip with your off hand - hard to explain, but again nothing new
Cross step, step-in-throw - interesting, in "the old days" I don't know if that would have been a 6th kyu technique but memory fades.
After throw move in for Achilles tendon pin- and my head when waaaaa??? I don't recall any leg pins from back in the day, let alone having a pin off a throw be on something as low as 6th kyu. Wow....

Talking with some students after class (brown belt, and a shodan) found out there are now choke holds, some sort of cross body pin, and a host of other things. Plus more is being added.

So yeah post split in the 90s Yoshokai has gone in an interesting direction imo. My current feeling is they are trying to go more into the pre WWII style of Aikido. We'll see though.

But overall class was good both daughter and I had fun. Still like it. :-) (oh and the brown belt I worked with had wrists as big as Mr. Bedor's!)

Diet and Exercise update

So... After the Jan 1 Polar Dash 5k I got on the bike twice this week. Too short 30 min. rides. The basic routine is 10 min warm up (big ring/19) than 3 sprint/intensity things (forget the formal name). Essentially start in big ring and 19 than over 30 seconds keep shifting gears till I'm in the 13 in back. Trying to "sprint" during that and shooting for a solid 10 seconds of being in the 13. Then a 30 second rest and repeat.

Overall a decent work out, and I'm way out of shape.

Diet has been going so so... trying to cut calories and succeeding most days. Weight is slowly coming down.

Finally... yes we got a Wii with the balance board. I'm using it to track my weight and having fun with the balance and reaction games. Not so big on the aerobics but that's because I'm picky on that front.

So overall feeling pretty positive... next post, a return to Aikido.

Polar Dash Jan 1 2010

Started out the New Year with a 5k (no where near ready for a 10k). Time was slow as expected, walked parts of it, and finished in 38 minutes or so.

But, as usual, Team Ortho organizes a good event. Temp was around 4 degress F (-15 C), sunny with a very light breeze. As usual once the run started I warmed up pretty quickly.

So avg HR was around 130, peaked on hill at 166. Not bad, but not good...

Later today I'll set up the bike, and try to ride the trainer today.