- Kiba dachi
- Zenkutsu
- Kokutsu
Then I walked twice in a kiba, zenkutsu, kokutsu progression (it allowed about 6 reps of each stance).
Combined, this gave me roughly 24 reps of each stance.
I "get" cat stance and crane stance, but struggle with seeing them as anything useful to know about at this point.
Next I practiced "punching the corners" from kiba for a while, focusing on keeping the chambered hand low, and keeping the punching elbow close to my body.
Cool. All of the stances are only useful when they are useful - and when they're not, they're just kung foo movie poses.
ReplyDeleteyou might try walking a line from right kokutsu to left kokutsu. when you pre-turn the front hip/knee you are in/passing through crane it is a transitory thing that happens when you switch which hip is forward.
you also might try, in that same walking sequence, as you step forward hovering the new front foot an inch off the ground, as if you might kick or change your mind about where to step - that is real close to nekoashi.
some folk (isshinryu for instance) call crane stance the karate kid one-legged thing and the thing that we call crane stance they call modified crane stance. you can sorta get a mental hold on gankaku by doing the above exercise - walking a line with back stances hovering the front foot (hovering that front foot makes it the karate kid crane stance). sometimes while hovering you'll get overbalanced backward and your hover foot steps back and you put your toes on the ground to help you catch your balance. That is modified crane (or what i call crane).
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