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Yesterday I had a chance to practice with the small light girl who's size belies her speed and strength of attacks. It's always challenging working with her and I seldom do as she's good with beginners and partners one of them usually in the first class.
There is definitely something wrong with my ikkyos from a shomen attack. More omotes than uras although even for uras I'm stepping in too deep so that they're less effective. Was working with superfast shodan girl yesterday and realised that at her speed of attack, my much slower reflexes mean it's hard for me to enter fast enough to throw her off balance before her arm comes down. Anyway, practising with her was an experience...it's always super intense for a full hour and last night I was wondering if I was actually going to last. But when we shifted off the ikkyos I got my breath back .
I did notice though that she does her shihonages very close into uke's body. I tended to move further out. I think staying close andn using hip is better for omote but not necessarily for high speed ura versions. At that speed it doesn't really matter whether I'm close or far, just as long as I get offline first . Although I should have tried staying in closer to see what the effect of that was...I've found it actually doesn't matter much with bigger guys and in fact gives me more room to get them off balance.
I tried to slow down her falls as she kept going down but realised that her style of uke almost guarantees she'll slam down as she doesn't adjust along the way...it's a very uncomproising uke style and hard on the body for her but well she's young still at 22 so she can deal with that. IT's sure not a style I'd want to adopt simply cos my body will not take that much punishment.
I'm slowly learning to do the fall from irimi nage by dropping down onto the inner knee but it doesn't come naturally and I have to think about it. I have to practice it to the point it comes without thinking.
The second session was with one of my favourite girl partners and usually I find her more resistant but after dealing with superfast strong attacks from a girl smaller than me, this was a cinch .
05-30-2006 12:25 AM 
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