Sensei is back

Today was the first class sensei has taught since a week ago. He attended a summer seminar, but now he is back. :O) Iaito class went well. There were more people there then usual, which was quite nice. We only worked on three things: Shohatto, iwanami and batto. By the end of class, I was more then feeling the burn in my theighs! My technique is horrible and I have much to work on. My shoulders are doing alright, but we shall see how it goes. My knees on the other hand... are still sore. If I have knees that hurt this much at 25, then I hate to think how they will feel 30 years from now! I guess it doesn't help that I have a worn miniscus in my left knee from dancing. It was doing great until I started training 8 1/2 hours a week. I guess I just dove into too many hours too quick!

Aikido class went alright. We worked on several things. Sankyo, kaitenage, iriminage and several other things from shomenuchi. My kaitenage and iriminage are getting better, but my sankyo is still horrendous from shomenuchi. I tend to grab too high on the wrist for sankyo, which of course makes it difficult/impossibe to get sankyo! Realizing my mistake is the first step to fixing it though right? Ah.. and I have to work on my shomenuchi attack as well. I tend to move forward as I lift my hand up over my head and attack, which is how I was trained to do in my previous style. Here, they want me to raise my hand above my head, then move forward as I attack. To me, that shows what I am about to do, which I certainly don't like. It is however, what they want, so it is what I will strive to do.

Class was a great workout today. I don't usually sweat, but my t-shirt was soaked by the end of class. One thing that this dojo has in common with my last dojo is that there is no air conditioning. The good thing about the west coast is that there is no humidity! I had no idea how bad humidity was on the east coast until I got away from it. To me, heat here is nothing. People are complaining about it and I am simply thinking it is gorgeous outside! I am hoping that I don't get used to the no humidity thing though.

Well, that is all I have to report. My blogs will probably get more in depth as I learn more of the terminology. :O)