Mistr Rocks Randori

[Mistr]

Mistr rocks randori - Challenge #23

 

The main event for this challenge is a 4-day randori intensive over Labor Day weekend. For those who are wondering what on earth aikido randori is, there are videos here.

Short form: multiple attackers - 5 attackers for open hand or 3 attackers with weapons. I might have to stay on the ground and work from kneeling with the attackers upright (hamni handachi).

 

The title of my challenge is totally inspirational. I am terrified.

 

Goals:

• Interval training twice a week for the next three weeks. 6 sessions, 20 minutes each.

           I might get killed in randori because my skills are lacking. I should not die because I get winded.

 

• Meditation - sit at least 10 minutes every day, more is better.

           Maintaining focus in the eye of the storm is an essential skill

 

• Sleep - get at least 7.5 hours a night

          Being tired will not help me deal with stress. I need to keep reminding myself of that. The chores can wait.

 

• Cook vegetables and travel food. Cumulative total of batches made.

           Eating healthy will help me feel better and keep my weight down, which will make it easier for me to move quickly.

 

For those just joining this saga, the cast of characters in my household are given here.

 

Oh yeah, just to spice things up a bit, I have a dance demo at a local music festival a week from Saturday. I'm the demo coach. I expect I will have to be dancing because I don't have enough dancers. I will count it a success if we all keep smiling and no one gets hurt. Especially me.

 

As icing on the cake, friends are coming from England to visit for a week. They are flying in the same day that I leave for the randori intensive. Dumbledore insists that he told them I'd be out of town, those were apparently the dates they could get vacation time and cheaper flights. Our house is not in what I would consider clean-enough-for-guests condition. More like

 

We are going to have a party so that they can see all our mutual local friends. That means I need to get my part of the cleaning done over the next two weekends.

 

Did I mention, I'm going to an aikido seminar with a 7th degree blackbelt from Japan? This weekend? At a dojo 90 minutes away? No?

 

It looks to be a calm and relaxing next several weeks.

 

 

 

[Mistr]

Week 0

 

Giving myself credit for what I've done so far.

 

Sunday:

• 9 hours sleep.
• Biked to the dojo for Zen. ~8 miles round trip. More like endurance training than intervals because I have 21 speeds and I use them.
• Meditation 2 x 30 minutes
• Dance demo practice and co-taught class. Some dancing. Not aerobic for more than a couple minutes at a time. I tried to teach a complicated new dance and it fell apart. I pride myself on getting the class through complex dances so I was disappointed in myself. Afterwards I mentally reviewed what I did and how I could do it better. I'm teaching again next Sunday, so I'll get to try again.
• Put together meatloaf, which Dumbledore baked while I was teaching.

Monday:

• Biked to work and back because Elf was on a road trip with my car and Dumbledore's car had to go to the shop with a disturbing noise. 24 miles round trip. More endurance training. I felt much better than I expected from the limited amount of biking I've done this summer. My legs did not complain the next day.
• Met with the new trainer at work. She reviewed my exercise plan and gave me several things to do to progress. One of which is the twice weekly HIIT sessions.
• Prepped chicken thighs (removed skin and put in brine)

Tuesday:

• 7.5 hours sleep
• Knee exercises
• Put a bunch of chicken in the crockpot to cook overnight with sesame oil, garlic and soy sauce. Also went grocery shopping.
• Not so great - stayed up late trying to figure out hotels for the trip. Frustrating dealing with online booking sites.

Wednesday:

• 10 minutes meditation
• 20 minutes HIIT

That is going to be pretty much it for today. I'll be teaching aikido tonight. That leaves a little time for cleaning up at home and not much else. 

 

Family update

Spoiler

My loyal readers have figured out by now that my family is non-traditional. "It's complicated" as they say on FB.

 

I am bi and polyamorous, as is my primary partner Dumbledore. Over the last year he and a friend have been discussing bi issues and discovered they were interested in each other. After a certain amount of drama earlier this summer, his friend is no longer in another relationship. As soon as the dust settled he asked Dumbledore for a serious relationship. Dumbledore has been walking around giddy ever since.

 

I was comparing notes with Elf on the whole situation yesterday. Elf said that Dumbledore is concerned that I might have reservations, even though I have reassured him that I approve and am okay with it. I allowed as how it is a good thing that Dumbledore is checking and is concerned that I might be quietly freaking out. I told Elf that I am freaking out, but not about relationship issues. I'm freaking out about doing randori for four days in a place I've never been. Admittedly, sensei tells me that the instructors at the host dojo are lovely people, I've been to a weekend seminar with the guest instructor, and I know two people who are attending. STILL FREAKING OUT.

 

Back to the family gossip.

Elf has done two road trips in the last month. The first was to see his ex-boyfriend for a few hours during a layover. He went dressed in his usual - skinny jeans, tank top, high tops, fabulous make-up. His ex didn't recognize him. They went out for coffee and talked. His ex is going to a conservative college and is not planning on coming out to his parents. That confirmed for Elf that his decision to stay with us was the right move.

 

The second road trip was with his very-close-but-not-serious local boyfriend. They spent four days and had a great time. His boyfriend graduated from high school this spring. This was his first trip out of town without his parents ever. Elf said it was kind of like having a puppy, he was so excited by everything. The rest of us are placing bets on how long this relationship stays "not serious".

 

Elf is working on getting declared an independent student for financial aid. That means he does not have any financial aid for fall. He will probably take one class and keep working as many hours as he can get. Hermes is registered to go back to school full time. He remains happily polyamorous with two girlfriends. Between school, work and his social life, I rarely see him. We have been making an effort to have family meals once a week to maintain contact.

 

[ChrisWithaStick]

That's my style of house keeping.   At least in the kitchen.  

 

Good success with the randori training and weekend.  I kept waiting for the shidachi to pick up a weapon from a person thrown.  Interesting that it's throw and move on without arming.  I'd have grabbed the jo or tachi (assuming I didn't get stabbed, cut or thumped, which is a massive assumption). 

 

Nice to see the family is getting along, too!

[Mistr]

6 hours ago, ChrisWithaStick said:

Good success with the randori training and weekend.  I kept waiting for the shidachi to pick up a weapon from a person thrown.  Interesting that it's throw and move on without arming.  I'd have grabbed the jo or tachi (assuming I didn't get stabbed, cut or thumped, which is a massive assumption). 

 

Actually, it is perfectly acceptable for nage to disarm one of the ukes. That is a good strategy if you have enough space to do it. I managed it once in randori practice. The attackers are much more cautious when nage is armed.

 

The problem is that throwing takes more time than just avoiding an attack. My sensei says that in a good randori she will throw maybe one encounter out of five. The rest of the time she blocks and weaves but does not take the time to throw. It seems to work best if nage disarms one of the attackers as the first move, when the other attackers are still far away. After that they are too close. By the time you throw one person, the other two are on top of you.

 

In the video there may have been explicit instruction not to disarm the attackers. We practice weapons take-aways quite a bit. My first response when someone comes at me is to get in their face and disarm them. Not doing that might have been the point of the exercise.

[RES]

Following along of course, I love seeing everything you accomplish in your challenges and hearing the household stories  

 

 

[Fitness Padawan]

I am looking forward to seeing how your challenge goes. Good luck!

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Padawan_Ronin]

Hi Mistr,

I'm new to the forums but I've already read quite a few of your posts. Began reading them because you're an aikidoka (like myself) and discovered your "saga" with a very interesting cast of characters

Looking forward to learning about your adventures doing randori and everything else!

[Solunaria]

Your challenge looks great, Mistr! I'm listening in.

 

Best of luck!

 

::bow::

[Teirin]

Hope it was an awesome seminar!

 

Do you like granola for travel food?  Maybe some homemade stuff? 

 

As always, following to watch you get epic stuff done :-)  Glad everyone in your family is doing well.

[Xena]

Loved your update, especially the part about how, yes, you are indeed freaking out...about Randori!

 

Have no fear. You will rock it :-)

 

Hope the weekend seminar was great. Sounded like a really good opportunity.

[Solunaria]

Looking forward to hearing how your sleep and such has been the last few days! Continued good luck, Mistr. 

 

::bow::

[RisenPhoenix]

On 8/18/2016 at 10:03 AM, Mistr said:

 

The problem is that throwing takes more time than just avoiding an attack. My sensei says that in a good randori she will throw maybe one encounter out of five. The rest of the time she blocks and weaves but does not take the time to throw. It seems to work best if nage disarms one of the attackers as the first move, when the other attackers are still far away. After that they are too close. By the time you throw one person, the other two are on top of you.

 

This is an interesting take on randori.  But it makes PERFECT sense.  Dodge and weave and strike when the opening is nigh perfect.  Our dojo wants throws every time, but the more advanced stuff is toted as tossing uke into other attackers.  Which is great when done properly.  Like the time I was used as a human shield during someone's nidan exam as she held me in sankyo, and then threw me into a maki otoshi towards another guy.... yup.  Good times.

[Mistr]

Weekend Report

 

The aikido seminar was AWESOME!

 

I got to train with a 7th dan instructor in a dojo with about 20 people. Most of whom were yudansha that I know from other seminars. There were only about 5 white belts on the mat on Saturday. One of the 7th dans from our organization (and one of her senior people) came to pay her respects. I got to train with both of them.  

 

Not to say that I don't also enjoy training with newer students. I just appreciate training with people who can give me feedback on whether what I'm doing is working or not.

 

For the last three years the sensei has been focusing on fundamentals in his seminars. How to stand, how to move the arms and hips, how to interact with your partners. I asked him about it at the party on Saturday. It seems that I misunderstood something he said last year. His home dojo has been doing these things all along, he just started showing them in seminars three years ago. He decided to shift to fundamentals because techniques vary so much between dojos. He felt that teaching another version of ikkyo was not doing much good. Getting people to work on things that apply to any technique is a better use of time.

 

One thing sensei said that I think is key was "Research in your body". 

Whenever we try to learn a physical movement, we are clumsy. Gradually we figure out how to move smoothly, with power, with sensitivity. The key is in being able to look at yourself and figure out what to change to do that. Maybe I need to relax my shoulders. Considering all the corrections from my zen teacher and aikido instructors, I need to keep my head up and back. My sensei is on me to keep my hips forward. It takes persistence and patience with myself to keep noticing that I am in the wrong place and fixing it.

 

[RisenPhoenix]

27 minutes ago, Mistr said:

 

For the last three years the sensei has been focusing on fundamentals in his seminars. How to stand, how to move the arms and hips, how to interact with your partners. I asked him about it at the party on Saturday. It seems that I misunderstood something he said last year. His home dojo has been doing these things all along, he just started showing them in seminars three years ago. He decided to shift to fundamentals because techniques vary so much between dojos. He felt that teaching another version of ikkyo was not doing much good. Getting people to work on things that apply to any technique is a better use of time.

 

One thing sensei said that I think is key was "Research in your body". 

Whenever we try to learn a physical movement, we are clumsy. Gradually we figure out how to move smoothly, with power, with sensitivity. The key is in being able to look at yourself and figure out what to change to do that. Maybe I need to relax my shoulders. Considering all the corrections from my zen teacher and aikido instructors, I need to keep my head up and back. My sensei is on me to keep my hips forward. It takes persistence and patience with myself to keep noticing that I am in the wrong place and fixing it.

 

This sounds wonderful, and makes me sad that I missed a seminar two weeks ago.  I really need to up my seminar attendance, and hopefully I can find someone who'll teach something similar.

 

Or, you know, next time you want a house guest and this sensei is teaching, you have my number... <.< >.>

[Mistr]

Challenge update 

 

Thursday:

• 7.5 hours sleep
• made granola (I go through a batch a week in the summer)
• shoulder/core exercises
• retrieved Dumbledore's car from the shop.
• Stayed up late talking. Worked out some important communication issues.  Note to anyone with starry-eyed ideas about relationships: The challenges do not stop after X amount of time. You keep working on things and overall things get better. The minute you think all your problems are solved, you are headed for disaster.

Friday:

Day off work to get things done before the aikido seminar

• I wanted to sleep in but my brain would not cooperate. Silly brain.
• Cleaned laundry room
• Dishes blitzkrieg with Dumbledore
• made chicken curry with vegetables
• grilled turkey breast
• 2 hr aikido

Saturday:

• 7.5 hours sleep
• 4+ hours aikido
• 14 minutes meditation

Sunday:

• 7.5 hours sleep
• 2+ hours aikido. Turns out there was dan testing after class. Sensei asked if we could all stay, and of course we did. Everyone took turns taking ukemi for the three randori sessions. This was different than randori in my organization. There were only three ukes, even for the nidan test. The chief instructor kept rotating fresh ukes in so that the ukes never got winded. Nage was expected to throw almost all the time. It looked more like fast giawaza rather than real randori - the ukes did not overwhelm the nages. It seemed that the goal was to see how nage moved when exhausted.
• Napped for 45 minutes, would have liked more
• Dance demo practice and class

Good things: I do have 8 dancers for Saturday not counting me. One of the dancers emailed me after I made my set list and I forgot to add her name. That makes my life much easier. I have to MC for the performance in any case. Not my favorite thing to do, but this is not the first time I've done it. It is much easier to talk to the crowd when I'm not out of breath from dancing. If we have a crowd at all. This is the first time this music festival is being held in Madison and we are the first dance act on Saturday.

 

The second good thing was teaching the dance that fell apart last week. Everyone agreed that they wanted to try it again. We did an easier dance first to practice one of the confusing figures. Then I implemented one of the teaching steps to get people to practice the transition into the tricky figure. By the end they had it perfectly. 

 

Bad thing: My knees were seriously cranky after dancing. The aikido might have contributed too. And all the time driving. Still, my knees were a lot better Saturday night after more aikido and the same amount of driving. I am working up my resolve to quit dancing after the performance next weekend. I am not on the teaching schedule for September, so now is as good a time as I'm likely to get. I still love dancing, these are my friends, and I'm getting positive feedback on my teaching, but I hate being a zombie at work every Monday. My doctors have been clear that the problems with my feet are directly caused by this type of dancing. Aaaaaargh. 

 

Monday:

• HIIT 20 minutes. I reduced the recovery time from 60 seconds to 45 seconds. High intensity time is still 30 seconds. I was pleasantly surprised how well it went. My breath was not quite back to normal at 45 seconds, but I had plenty of energy for the work intervals.
• Meditation 10 minutes
• Spinning - I went to the monthly spinning group because a friend was hosting. I realized that I have not done any spinning or knitting in the last month. Or playing piano. I'm glad I went because it was a small group. I got a button sewn on a pair of shorts for Hermes and did some spinning. Win. I even left early so I could get to bed on time.

[Mistr]

1 hour ago, RisenPhoenix said:

Or, you know, next time you want a house guest and this sensei is teaching, you have my number... <.< >.>

 

That would be great! He comes every August, the third weekend. This was his 13th or 14th year. Let me know.

[Lou_be_Lou]

Yay for an amazing seminar!  It sounds inspring - and really useful having consolidation about the fundamentals. 

Superb!

[RES]

15 hours ago, Mistr said:

Stayed up late talking. Worked out some important communication issues.  Note to anyone with starry-eyed ideas about relationships: The challenges do not stop after X amount of time. You keep working on things and overall things get better. The minute you think all your problems are solved, you are headed for disaster.

So true...wish more people realized this!

[RisenPhoenix]

15 hours ago, Mistr said:

 

That would be great! He comes every August, the third weekend. This was his 13th or 14th year. Let me know.

 

Well I do need to visit Madison to visit all the Nerds there, so it'll be good to have a reason besides just general harassment.  

[Mistr]

Week 1 - Tuesday & Wednesday

 

Tuesday

• 7.75 hours sleep (counting the part where I lay there awake before taking ibuprofen)
• bonus weapons practice session. Getting better with boken kata 9 and jo kata 6.
• Cooking - made cheesy baked cauliflower. The recipe was for zucchini ricotta cheesecake. That sounded promising, but I wanted to use cauliflower. Somehow I missed that it called for 2 cups of shredded zucchini and used about 10 cups of cauliflower pieces. Not cheesecake-like at all, but still tasty.
• Cooking direction: I asked Elf to turn the cucumbers into salad. I gave him a set of recipes to choose from. He made one that also used up two of the tomatoes. I get partial credit because it is obvious that neither Elf nor Hermes will cook vegetables on their own initiative.
• Adulting - worked on finances. Aargh, such a mess. I need to keep on top of this.
• Meditation - 10 minutes.

I am glad I put just 10 minutes of meditation a day in my challenge. I can sneak that in at the end of the day and not feel like I am taking too much time away from getting to bed. More would be nice, but 10 minutes can really happen more often.

 

Wednesday

• 7.75 hours sleep
• 10 minutes meditation

That is likely to be it for today. I got to work and found out that someone had called in sick, leaving us five people down after the previously scheduled time off and the unexpected paternity leave. Eeep. I had great plans for getting stuff done today when I got in. So not happening. I also found out that our second open position will not be approved for replacement any time soon. And I know one of the team members is looking at other departments.

 

To top it off, I have a cold from too little sleep for too many days. I was stuck at my desk helping someone for half my lunch hour. Instead of working out I just took a short walk outside and rested/napped in my car for 15 minutes. Enough to feel a little better.

 

Tonight I am taking at least 30 minutes down time between work and aikido. I've done my share of the cooking for the week. The cleaning can wait and everything else can go hang.

[RES]

22 hours ago, Mistr said:

everything else can go hang

Proud of you for saying this!  

[Lou_be_Lou]

How was the go hanging?

[Mistr]

On 8/28/2016 at 2:55 PM, Lou_be_Lou said:

How was the go hanging?

 

I spun silk for 15 minutes. Hermes came home as I was eating dinner and I talked with him some. Our schedules don't overlap much so I take advantage of all the chances I get. Spinning was lovely. My wheel is now behaving. Last month it was throwing off the drive band for no discernable reason.

 

I had just three people at aikido Wednesday night. One is brand new. I think it helps to have a small class. One of the other people is our developmentally challenged student, who is still struggling with rolls. The new person could see that she is not the only person learning these. None of the senior students showed up so class was done after an hour. I actually got to bed early for a change.

[Mistr]

Week 1

Thursday

• 8.33 hours sleep
• HIIT 20 minutes. Started feeling easy and ended feeling hard. So far, so good.
• walk with Dumbledore
• 10 minutes meditation

Friday

• 7.75 hours sleep
• 15 minutes meditation
• knee exercises
• grocery shopping

By the end of the day at work I was out of steam. Luckily things weren't busy. A whole week of being overly shorthanded got to me. I decided that I needed downtime more than aikido. On Thursday Dumbledore reminded me that I had asked him to go to a music festival on Friday. Yeah, I do remember saying that. I don't remember him saying yes, but I certainly didn't want to argue the point. I asked him if he would be willing to go to a coffeehouse with a classical guitar player instead. He was fine with that plan.

 

I got to the coffeehouse first while Dumbledore finished up things at work. That gave me a blissful 30 minutes of sitting outside on the deck looking at the lake. Just what I needed. We went inside as it started to rain and compared notes for the upcoming weekend. Good thing, since it was clear our paths would barely cross. He went home to make chocolate chip cookies and I did the grocery shopping. Part of me feels guilty for skipping aikido, but the rest of me knows I made the right decision.

Family update

Spoiler

 

I was too beat to do anything else after putting groceries away. I sat at the kitchen table and kept Dumbledore company while he baked cookies. Hermes and Elf came home and joined us. We sat around drinking and talking. I had a grand time. Dumbledore's new partner joined us about halfway through the evening. Since he clearly will be a continuing character in this saga, I'll call him Faunus. Slim, young, curly hair, wicked sense of humor. It was his first time hanging out with the whole household at once. For that matter, it was the first time in months that the four of us had just hung out and relaxed. Faunus did just fine.

 

 

Saturday

• 7.5 hours sleep
• 11 minutes meditation (last thing before bed, but hey, it counts)
• put up curtain rods and cleaned windows in the family room
• vacuuming
• made chocolate-hazelnut custard for ice cream
• dishes

The big event on Saturday was the demo by my dance group. All the dancers showed up so I had a full set of 8. We met at a school a block from the event site to practice before the demo. After two full walk-throughs of the performance, they were ready. We were the first group up in the dance exhibition. That and scattered rain showers meant that the audience was thinner than it might have been. Even so, everyone there was actually watching, unlike our usual demos at the farmers market.

 

The dancers did great. I saw just a couple times when someone forgot where to go. They kept smiling and dancing, just like we practiced. The group after us were the Irish step dancers. Lots of girls with curly wigs and fancy costumes. We were all glad we went first. Dancing for regular adults can't compete with cute little girls for crowd appeal.

 

[Mistr]

Week 2

Sunday

• 8 hours sleep
• 60 minutes meditation at the dojo. Does it count as a class when just one other student is there? Having her there gave me the motivation to sit longer than I would have at home.
• walked to the farmer's market and the co-op to get veggies
• cooked veggies: green beans and onions, fresh tomato sauce and spaghetti squash
• made chocolate-hazelnut ice cream with Elf (his favorite flavor)

I ran the demo team through another rehearsal. They have another performance this Thursday, and one person was not at the performance Saturday. Not surprisingly, they looked good after running through the dances three times the day before. After that I taught what may be my last dance class. I still haven't told the other teachers that I am going to take a break. I'll wait until I get back next week. Yet another night of achey knees and getting to bed late confirms that I need to quit.

 

Hermes is helping me with this decision. He used to be a champion-level Irish step dancer until he landed wrong and broke his foot. His foot will never be completely okay again. He understands exactly how I feel about giving up dancing.