Karate, 8/1/15

After stretching and going through kihon, we took another look at my heian shodan. Here are the tweaks my instructor suggested this time:

• My wrist is bent on my rising blocks. I need to straighten it out.
• I'm still fighting old muscle memory when it comes to my hip direction during blocks. Need more work on that.
• My back stance is still all jacked up! I don't know why it's so elusive to me, but I'll keep at it. 

Earlier this week, my instructor said he wanted me to test for yellow belt later this month. During class yesterday, he suggested I test for orange on the same night.  I'm pretty confident in the yellow belt material, but nervous about the orange belt stuff. 

He showed me the 3-step sparring stuff I'll need for yellow belt, and the basics demo I need for Orange. In a couple of weeks, he'll show me the 3-step I need for orange. He also showed me the rest of heian nidan. I really like the kata but the second half is totally new to me.

I have a lot of work to do in the next couple of weeks!