Denver Colorado Karate Classes Blog

Today is the tournament and I signed up for sparring. At this karate tournament, I wanted to focus 100% on my sparring techniques so I didn’t enroll for the Forms contest.

After warming up for about 20 minutes by doing some roundhouses and hook kicks, I was ready to go. In my belt class, there were a total of seven competitors and I was the first to be paired off. My first opponent quickly scored a point on me to my head. That’s all I needed to quickly assess his strength and his weakness. I ended up winning the round 3-2 by scoring a point to the head and 2 points to the mid-section using some kicks.

I sat down to watch 3 more sparring sets and took the time to assess each ones abilities. At the 5th match, I was invited back into center ring to spar off again with my first opponent. Before this match began, the Sensei asked me if I ever took martial arts before. “Not until 9 months ago.” I replied. The match ended in less than 60 seconds and I won 3-0. All with kicks to the mid-section.

After watching another bout. I was invited back in again to spar off with another undefeated opponent. I knew this was going to be my toughest match because he was about 4 inches taller and 50 pounds heavier than me.

Beginning the match, my opponent quickly scored a point to my head. Again, that’s all I needed to gauge his hand speed. I retaliated with a right leg round house squarely placed to the top of his forehead. Now it’s 1-1.

He snuck in a small jab to my midsection and now it’s 1-2. By now I noticed that he likes to move in all the time which puts pressure on me with my back to the edge of the sparring ring. So this time I decided to throw a right handed fake and then I sprung up and did a stepping stool kick. This left his head wide open and by the time I landed on the ground, I scored my second point by bopping him on the top of his head, now it’s 2-2.

The judge makes the announcement that it’s 2-2 and I decided that I am not going to lose. I let my opponent come at me, I saw a small patch of his side ribs exposed so I squarely landed a spinning reverse right side blade to his mid-section and scored my 3rd point.

At the end of the 3 matches that I sparred in, I was 100% in the zone and felt like I was in a plexiglass dome that just encased the sparring ring. I heard no outside noise nor did I see anybody in my peripheral vision except for my opponent.

This evenings class consisted of doing our forms and sparring techniques one last time prior to Saturday’s tournament. Nothing but practice, practice and practice.

Monday, April 18, 2005

This evening first started out with the usual warm-up exercises: 50 jumping jacks, 45 push-ups, 25 crunches, etc… Then we lined up about 8 people in a row and ran about 7-8 wind sprints back and forth inside the dojo. It was a leg killer. Wind wise, it was a piece of cake. After that, we went into the sparring routine using judges and sparring for 3 points. I am developing my hook kick and will try it out in Wednesday’s adult karate class.

Hand to hand combat, grappling, ground fighting, death blow strikes to stop the heart

Saturday, April 16, 2005

Saturday’s Sparring Class

Today I was trying to use some more presses against my opponents with limited success. The trick is to follow through with a strike immediately after the press and I wasn’t doing that. What continues to be effective and getting close to the opponent and then using multiple hand strikes in a rapid manner on various parts of the upper body.

Hand fighting, Wrestling, Self Defense Techniques, Death Blow Techniques

Monday, April 11, 2005

This evening again focused on preparing for the April 30 tournament. The first part of the class was performing our forms inside a make-shift ring in front of other students acting as judges. The balance of the karate class was focused on our sparring skills and techniques for points. My last opponent was a Green Belt and I really flowed against his moves and countered back rather well.

Karate Self Defense, Sparring, Kick Boxing, Ground Fighting - Highlands Ranch, Colorado Karate School

Saturday, April 9, 2005

Saturday from 11:30am to 12:30pm is devoted to sparring techniques. Nothing really new to report back on except to note that even though sparring is under a controlled setting, sparring in the ring still helps you develop good reflex and reaction skills. So the more you do it, the better the body will react even under street fighting terms.

Wednesday, April 6, 2005

In preparation for the April 30 tournament, tonights adult class focused on sparring. It consisted of sparring to get one point and then you rotate into another position (maybe as a judge) and then we sparred going for two points to win the match. It teaches you to be aware on how you spar when you are either up or down one point.

For my first sparring partner, I picked the biggest guy in the room. He stood at about 6′4″ and probably had at least a 6 inch reach advantage on me. My tactic was to get inside and use hand speed. I had the opportunity to spar with my son who is a brown belt and while we sparred, the Sensei said to us by saying, “Hey, tone it down, this isn’t at home.” After he said that my son clocked me in the face right under my left eye. It was a stinger.

I then sparred with a few other people and one person I nailed in the head using a right roundhouse kick and I did it too hard. I am not used to kicking a target with my feet under control. I used the same tactic on another person and landed a point. Then did the same move again but not with the intention of scoring a point on the side of head but to get their defenses high above the chest and then quickly follow-up with a side blade kick to the ribs. Worked pretty good.

On Friday, I am taking a 30-minute private class devoted just to learning some new sparring strategies and tactics.

Saturday, April 2, 2005

Today is our karate sparring class and today we learned a couple of self defense techniques to counter attack an attacker. First was “pressing” the attackers arm away from the body which exposed the attackers entire face. Once exposed, you can quickly land a back fist punch to the nose. The second technique was practicing counter-attacks against an attacker who is throwing multiple punches/kicks at you.

At the conclusion of the class, we sparred twice against different people for three minutes each. I haven’t sparrred in a couple of months and my sparring style has dramatically changed since I first started sparring last September.

My original style was using a decent boxing stance and jabbing style and using maybe 10% kicks. During today’s sparring, I was probably throwing at least 50% in kicks, some being crescent, side blade and roundhouse kicks using the right and left side of the body.

Now I just need to put the punch/kick into some combinations and counters which should make for an adequate style of fighting.