I visited the Blue Leaf Dojo today for the first time. One of my kouhai has been regularly attending it lately since it is near his home and having heard a little about it, I decided to take a look. The dojo uses the gymnasium/hall space at The Hills Sports Highschool, just on Best Road in Seven Hills. The floor space is the same as a normal sized basketball court with a stage also and some bathrooms next to the stage. The floor is relatively clean, firm but not too hard, but does have some groves/lines and metal plates in it.
The session was led by a guy called Dave Dingelstad, and the sessions used to be led by Payne Sensei. We only had four people there today, excluding Dave, with three of us from my club and one person who was a Blue Leaf member. He was partially in bogu, having not yet got to the stage of putting his men on.
We started with some warmup stretches and then some suburi with Jogesuburi, Nanamesuburi, Sayumen cuts, Men cuts and then Hayasuburi. The four of us paired off and then started waza training, with three cuts per person before rotating. Kihon Men, Kihon Kote, Kihon Dou, Kihon Kote-Kihon Men, Kihon-Kote-Small Men, Harai-Waza, Uchigomgeiko, Kakarigeiko, Kirikaeshi then finishing with Jigeiko.
Dave explained things pretty well also. I think that having small class sizes really helps and makes a big difference with the time to think through and do. Three cuts may sound really little per rotation, but I found today that with my concentration in the cut, and making good cuts, I was really tired after three cuts. Perhaps there is a mental thing in that if there is more cuts, I have to pace myself to make more cuts, but with less cuts, I can go harder?
Jigeiko against Dave was interesting. He is very tall, and also very fast. He hits quite hard too, to be expected from higher level players, and it made things very challenging. I got a few good cuts, a lot of missed cuts, and a lot of blocked cuts. My arms and shoulders were killing me by the end from lifting to cut the higher men. After we finished, he told me that I had to stop leading my cuts by not leaning into the direction, and my eye contact also pointing the direction I was trying to cut. I had to watch my maai more also but overall I did well. It felt pretty good to be told that for once.
I think their training and structure for someone at my level, and beginners works quite well, if you can keep it small. During our waza, Dave walked around and watched everyone individually, and then broke it down on what we had to work on for the next three cuts as we rotated through. In large groups, this just isn't possible, and also means whoever is teaching/leading loses out on training also. Misfortunate if that was the case.
I may visit more, but that depends on my work schedule as my part-time work is sporadic in terms of when I work, as it depends on the students when I am needed and other factors. The downside for the Blue Leaf is that they start at 5pm, and for anyone working not near them it is neigh on impossible to get to in time. For me, in good traffic it still took about forty minutes to get there from home since I wasn't working today. It would take well over an hour easily to get there from work. Unfortunate indeed.
They are also an Iaido club, but at the moment, I will resist the temptation in picking up something else because I already have much on my plate with Kendo without adding to it with Iai.
Thanks to my kouhai, and to Dave Dingelstad for the good session today.
The session was led by a guy called Dave Dingelstad, and the sessions used to be led by Payne Sensei. We only had four people there today, excluding Dave, with three of us from my club and one person who was a Blue Leaf member. He was partially in bogu, having not yet got to the stage of putting his men on.
We started with some warmup stretches and then some suburi with Jogesuburi, Nanamesuburi, Sayumen cuts, Men cuts and then Hayasuburi. The four of us paired off and then started waza training, with three cuts per person before rotating. Kihon Men, Kihon Kote, Kihon Dou, Kihon Kote-Kihon Men, Kihon-Kote-Small Men, Harai-Waza, Uchigomgeiko, Kakarigeiko, Kirikaeshi then finishing with Jigeiko.
Dave explained things pretty well also. I think that having small class sizes really helps and makes a big difference with the time to think through and do. Three cuts may sound really little per rotation, but I found today that with my concentration in the cut, and making good cuts, I was really tired after three cuts. Perhaps there is a mental thing in that if there is more cuts, I have to pace myself to make more cuts, but with less cuts, I can go harder?
Jigeiko against Dave was interesting. He is very tall, and also very fast. He hits quite hard too, to be expected from higher level players, and it made things very challenging. I got a few good cuts, a lot of missed cuts, and a lot of blocked cuts. My arms and shoulders were killing me by the end from lifting to cut the higher men. After we finished, he told me that I had to stop leading my cuts by not leaning into the direction, and my eye contact also pointing the direction I was trying to cut. I had to watch my maai more also but overall I did well. It felt pretty good to be told that for once.
I think their training and structure for someone at my level, and beginners works quite well, if you can keep it small. During our waza, Dave walked around and watched everyone individually, and then broke it down on what we had to work on for the next three cuts as we rotated through. In large groups, this just isn't possible, and also means whoever is teaching/leading loses out on training also. Misfortunate if that was the case.
I may visit more, but that depends on my work schedule as my part-time work is sporadic in terms of when I work, as it depends on the students when I am needed and other factors. The downside for the Blue Leaf is that they start at 5pm, and for anyone working not near them it is neigh on impossible to get to in time. For me, in good traffic it still took about forty minutes to get there from home since I wasn't working today. It would take well over an hour easily to get there from work. Unfortunate indeed.
They are also an Iaido club, but at the moment, I will resist the temptation in picking up something else because I already have much on my plate with Kendo without adding to it with Iai.
Thanks to my kouhai, and to Dave Dingelstad for the good session today.
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