Student Reports

Yet another nail biting day for competitors and parents filled with nerves and excitement as the annual British open tournament in Ware commenced. All fired up to do better than last tournament, many students came at around 9am to get Kihon and stretches done as a whole dojo to loosen ourselves up physically and mentally.

The day begun with kata and the day begun with the 10-12 category. Tadhag O’Flynn, Yuya Shirai, Lucian and Aoi Fukushima all showed precision in their katas and were awarded with Aoi gaining yet another gold medal with Yuya and Tadhag coming 2nd and 3rd respectively.

For this competition, I based my training on Kihon, Kata and Combinations.

Last year, as I fully swung my roundhouse kick, I was penalised, therefore this year, in my basic training, I practised to pull back my kick. For my kata, I practised Yantsu in front of the mirror so that my kata was symmetrical. Tohyama Sensei advised me to use many kicks to the centre so the opponent concentrates on blocking their torso, then to kick to the head. So with this advice, I practiced with my body remember in both Euston dojo and at home.

The reason I was able to win in this competition was because I

Osu!

The final 2013 session for Tohyama Dojo was the 1,000 Punches and 1,000 Kicks event. Unlike normal training sessions, this session was far more a showcase for the discipline of the class as a cohesive group and a demonstration of our willingness to push ourselves beyond our comfortable limits than a typical class would be. The session was well-attended.

After some initial stretching, we began the count for 1,000 seiken chudan tsuki. The two most important things were to always keep the correct form and the correct count.