teaching ideas for a "too hot" day

Hi all:

I am looking for some new ideas for teaching on a day when it is so steamy in the dojo that no one feels like moving too much. (and probably shouldn't move too much) Any great ideas?

e ya later
Jill.

Shorten warmups to the most essential.

Practice techniques with least energy-consuming ukemi, preferably not involving forward rolls.
For example, things like yokomen uchi hiji-ate kokyunage should be out of the question.
Shomen uchi iriminage, out of the question too.

Katate Tori or Shomen uchi Ikkyo/Nikkyo/Shihonage should be fine.

Just my $2000.02

We have hit a good hot spell here as well. I find that people concentrate on their kumitachi, kumijo and jo-ken waza well in the heat. (I think they are glad that the ukemi is minimized)

Hard, physical and exhausting training

mark johnston wrote: Hard, physical and exhausting training

We'll sometimes do this, with frequent water breaks. We'll also balance it with entire classes where we discuss history, principles, philosophy and whatnot.

Bronson

Train outside on the grass, if possible.
We've done standing and movement work, avoiding rolls, as green dogi look weird.

Keep some shoes on, cause the outside environment you can't control as well as a dojo.

Be prepared for curious onlookers

Two words: no randori.

Well, maybe a little bit of randori. But if you value people NOT getting heat stroke, no randori kyogi.

Other than that, the sensei here don't seem to have too much pity for us poor students. And in the Japanese summer heat and humidity, people get tired and sweaty extremely quickly.

BTW Jill, are you guys located in Kitchener or Waterloo? I'm just curious because back when I went to UW, I knew a few people who were doing aikido off campus.

Haruo wrote:
>>BTW Jill, are you guys located in Kitchener or Waterloo? I'm just curious because back when I went to UW, I knew a few people who were doing aikido off campus<<

We are in the old Lang building at Victoria and Charles, the north end of Kitchener I guess you'd say.

>>Other than that, the sensei here don't seem to have too much pity for us poor students. And in the Japanese summer heat and humidity, people get tired and sweaty extremely quickly<<

Maybe I'm just an old softie, but I don't like to risk having any of my students suffer heat stroke, so I do take it easy on them on hot days. I like to play along with what we are doing, so I don't ask my students to do something I wouldn't be able to do safely.

Jamie wrote:
>>Train outside on the grass, if possible.
We've done standing and movement work, avoiding rolls, as green dogi look weird.<<

We do some of this too- I love practicing outside. We usually do weapons work, or walk through techniques without takedown.

Thanks for all the ideas- keep em coming!
e ya later
Jill.

Bring ice-cream.
Lots of it.

It gets hot in Canada. You should be in Texas-we have been in the high 90s low 100s since about May here.

If it's really hot and humid (most of the summer), our sensei has us start off doing really energetic stuff like iriminage and then tapers off later on in the class. Forward roll techniques in lines are very welcome! Or bokken/jo work. Or getting-uke's-balance exercises that don't require strenuous ukemi. Other than that, he doesn't seem to change much of the class due to heat. Our dojo is on the third floor of a non-air-conditioned old industrial building, so it gets really stifling sometimes. You don't even want to put that heavy gi on. Bleuch. I'm in TX right now visiting my family. The dojo here isn't AC-ed either..............my mom said she was sweating just watching class, she couldn't imagine how WE felt flying around the room for two hours!

I wonder if Aikido is evolving differently in areas of different climate?

mark johnston wrote: Hard, physical and exhausting training

i second that notion

My sensei is a proponent of training physically harder in hot weather

On the other hand, at the end of our gasshuku last weekend Pete Trimmer sensei did a great class: knowing how exhausted everyone was at that point (it was a long, hot seminar), he did an entire two hour class in which every technique ended with nage massaging uke. It was awesome

train on the beach

moderate training, plenty of breaks.... and beer afterwards

I would say to do a soft beginning work out, doing plenty of stretchs, and other warm-ups that help center breathing(kokyu.) Then doing some light techniques, and then gradually let them become more vigorous(how vigorous depends on how hot it is, hotter=less, of course,) with drinking breaks within. And then you should end the class with Kokyu Dosa.

I prefer to continue as normal. But you can always do breathing, meditation or Ki tests.

Aye! The weather outside has nothing to do with your practice. You practice hard to the best of your ability and when necessary you take breaks.

Jill Nielsen wrote: Hi all: I am looking for some new ideas for teaching on a day when it is so steamy in the dojo that no one feels like moving too much. (and probably shouldn't move too much) Any great ideas? e ya later Jill.

I think that a word like "steamy" or "hot" will mean a lot of different things to different people. In the dojo I previously was a member of, we had an air conditioner but the sensei couldn't afford to turn it on. We trained on the upper level of a two story building that had a flat roof with the bottom side being metal. What I am trying to say is that it was really "hot" in there! It was an oven. Between June and September, the temperature ranged from 105 to as high as 118. Once, when our Shihan from Japan came to our school, he said, "Only crazy people would train in this kind of heat!"
In really hot weather, we trained pretty much like normal, except that we gave water breaks every five minutes. We used large fans or air movers and that actually helped a lot. Everyone was encouraged to pace themselves and we were given instruction on the symptoms of possible heat stroke. I was there five years and did fine but I saw many people that could only train a few minutes and had to rest. Once, at our cool noon class (90 degrees), we had a young man feel faint and since he was not sweating and was feeling mild chills, we called the ambulance. That was his last time (to my knowledge) at the dojo. There were numerous incidents of people feeling faint but I never saw anyone in a serious condition other than that one exception. In that kind of heat, Gatorade is a necessity. Its not fun and it takes a long time to get used to. After the third summer, I really started to tire of it and I began reducing my days and training on the side in dojos where it was cooler.
Today, I train in 70 degrees of air conditioned comfort year around. In my school, we do have members that complain of the heat and a few that want to wear T shirts instead of their dogi jacket because of it! You can imagine how I feel about that! My son has returned to Houston and has joined our dojo and the first three or four times he was here, it was difficult for him to train because he felt so cold!
I was taught though, by Akira Tohei sensei that Aikidoists are all weather people that train with nature and it is generally that way in Japan. I heard stories of him in the Midwest Aikido Center in the winter when it was snowing wanting to open the windows and Mrs. Tohei wanting to shut them! Maybe Robert Cronin can help us confirm or deny those rumors.
Best to all,

For those of you worried about heat or cold, I would like to HIGHLY endorse: Under Armor line of athletic clothing.

A member of my dojo wears an under armor shirt every now and then. It got my attention, so I looked it up on the internet. http://www.underarmour.com/ua2/ua/default.asp

After getting one saturday afternoon, I wore it that evening in an advance class that lasted between 2 and 3 hours. Wearing this thing is like wearing a fan... it really breaths! Check out the site, Under Armor really lives up to its claims, imho.

Wearing a light Gi and this shirt will help keep you cool and feel a lot better while on the mat. It moves easily and after a bit, you really DO forget you have it on.

Training in Texas, we get 100 degree weather a lot! And when the humidity comes in, like in Houston (/wave Jorge!) the heat index really gets up there. Drink lots of fluids, increase your salt and potassium intake, eat fruit during the day upto an hour before class, wear lighter clothing, do aerobic exercise to get your endurance up... but most importantly: Know your limits. If I feel I'm hitting my barrier of "too much aikido, etc." I will excuse myself and let the instructor know I need a break.

That's my 2 cents.

Hi, here some tips to avoid your "too hot" teaching day.

1. Change your Sched. Instead of daylight try Dawn or Evening. Less heat comming from the sun, less problem, concerning your students health.

2. Prapered some Cold Juice or Lemmonade to refresh there thirst and do it for "free" for them to come back

3. lessen your warm-up exercise.

4. And lastly, try to locate them some place that is more air and cool to there feeling. like, beaches, backyard with trees, or just do it in out door then try some fun open ur hose with sprinkler to do some rain affect

bye, and Have fun under the sun

Get a big air conditioner. One thing I like about our new dojo is that it has a really good air-conditioner, which is great for hot days, because we also have two BIG HUGE glass skylights.
Which tends to heat things up a bit.

We never used to have a/c. Not that it bothered me much. But Canada is not as hot as say Portugal or Florida.

Jorge Garcia wrote: I think that a word like "steamy" or "hot" will mean a lot of different things to different people. In the dojo I previously was a member of, we had an air conditioner but the sensei couldn't afford to turn it on. We trained on the upper level of a two story building that had a flat roof with the bottom side being metal. What I am trying to say is that it was really "hot" in there! It was an oven. Between June and September, the temperature ranged from 105 to as high as 118. Once, when our Shihan from Japan came to our school, he said, "Only crazy people would train in this kind of heat!" In really hot weather, we trained pretty much like normal, except that we gave water breaks every five minutes. We used large fans or air movers and that actually helped a lot.

Having practice there at the sauna with you and experienced the sweat flowing before bowing in my respect for you Shihan has gone even higher!

One of my Iaido students upon visiting another dojo in town that is fond of the fans rather than AC, remarked that it's actually worse to use fans if all you are doing is moving hot air around. He's an M.D. but I am wondering if anyone else has heard of this or something like it and why?


Craig
HKS where the AC is used.

Too hot to work hard? Try 'TE' sabaki. Create imbalance in uke by redirecting their energy using your hand form and direction - minimum body movement required - its a bit like chi sau (sticking hands) but from ai hanmi and gyaku hanmi. This can be extended to using your unbendable arm fully, changing the attacks to Kata/katate tori etc and so on. Its only form and circles!!
Set the level to suit the heat.