Hi Rob -
He walked on the tips of his first two or three toes - they were a little bent - but no part of the rest of his foot was touching the ground. He took 5-6 steps on the floor of the dojo. Mr. Yonamine is not a young man. I suspect at one point in his life he could walk further. It was impressive.
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Workout #10 - Monday Evening
Monday Evening a few of us were headed for Mr. Nakamatsu's dojo. Others went to the Chatan Dojo, the Ginowan Dojo, and the Tobaru Dojo.
Mr. Nakamatsu's dojo is very well appointed. It has a austere quality - but it is still inviting and beautiful. Four of his students - including his son Tai'ichi were present.
After warming up we started with sanchin. Stand perfectly straight with your hips in a natural position. Now turn your heels outward. Now twist the heels into Sanchin - this will make enough tension in the legs, make a natural bend in your knees, and bring your hips underneath you to the correct position.
Keep the chest open. If you close the chest too much it becomes more difficult to move your arm at the shoulder. Your arm and shoulder should be very relaxed when you move. The power will come from your waist - not your shoulder. You must try to coordinate all your body movements with your waist. {When Mr. Nakamatsu is talking about your waist he's talking about everything below your navel to the inguinal crease on the front and to the end of the glutes on the back. When I talk about "compress the body" this means tightening everything that doesn't antagonize the movement you're about to do. So if you're going to strike with your arm - you'll compress your legs, torso, glutes, back, stomach, lats - everything except the arm.}
Drill 1)
Stand in a neutral stance - bring your elbow back and down to the retracted position, now drive the hip forward with the elbow, when the elbow clears the bodyline forward - forcefully compress your muscles and snap your hips under. Alternate left side, right side. Don't worry about making a full strike. Just let your snap bring your elbow to sanchin. Go ahead and let your hands be relaxed. You're trying to coordinate the movement of your waist and time the transfer of power from the explosion of your waist to the forward progression of your elbow.
We did this for about 10-15 minutes. Then he invited us to watch his students do the training for a couple of minutes. It was impressive. They did the same drill - just striking to post position. I thought the explosion was impressive then. However - when they started doing full sanchin strikes my jaw hit the floor. I couldn't see their hands move. I'd see them retract - then I'd see their body start to compress - and then like magic their arm was fully extended. Honest to God. I've got pretty quick eyes - and I just couldn't see their hands move. When Tai'ichi did the drill I could barely see his waist move. This to me is the magic of the exaggeration training. You start big, figure out how your body moves, and then slowly over time reel the movements back in until they are imperceptible. {Are my biases showing?

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Drill 2) Circle Block
This is not going to translate well into text, but I'll try.
Stand in a neutral stance and have your arm out in front at a 45 degree angle. In a very relaxed motion bring your arm up and across your body until your arm is almost shoulder height with your palm facing outward. You can use your other hand as a guide by holding it straigt out from your shoulder. The arm doing the circle block comes up to the height of the arm you're holding straight out. Then compress the body and drop the elbow into Sanchin. Your elbow shouldn't move much and should stay well within your bodyline. Mostly the compression of your waist is bringing your forearm up to post position. You'll finish in the flat hand post position but a little higher than usual. Don't worry about the strength of your block. Just try to coordinate your waist with the arm. The waist makes the power.
Drill 3) Single Sanchin Arm thrust - but only to post
Stand in Sanchin dachi.
You're basically doing the same drill as #1 but now you're in sanchin and you've got your hand open and fingers straight. To help keep you rubbing your elbow close to the body try twisting the palm of your hand away from your body. Later - when you can keep the elbow close to the body you won't need to turn your hand. Let the arm swing back and forth loosely and naturally a few times to feel your natural swing. Now coordinate the swinging of your arms with the movement of your waist. Finally - add the compression of the body and snapping under of your hips. Start by only striking to sanchin position - this keeps you from putting too much strain on your elbow. This also keeps you focused on the connection between your waist movement and your elbow/shoulder instead of focusing on the target for your hand. Later - when you've coordinated your waist, body, and your arm - then you can do full sanchin strikes and work on your targeting. For now - just work on coordinating your body.
When you first start doing this kind of training you're going to have tons of extra movement. It takes awhile for your body to learn how to coordinate everything to make the explosion. It takes an equal amount of time for your body to learn how to stop after the explosion. Try not to worry about everything moving too much when you start. Once you can make the explosive power - then you can learn how do it without the extra movement.
Drill 4) Double Bushikens
Stand in Sanchin. Let both your arms swing back and forth in a natural way with no power. Try to feel the rythm of how YOUR arms swing. Now begin to coordinate the swing of your arms with the compression of your body. Just like the single thrusts - when your elbow clears your body line - snap your hips underneath as you compress. At first, don't worry so much about the targeting of your arms - just strike until your elbows are in sanchin. When you can coordinate your whole body with the double strikes, then let your arms extend out and work on your targeting. Targeting is secondary to building your coordination. This same drill can be used for the double sanchin arm thrusts.
Drill 5) Side Thrust Kick
If anybody else can describe this drill - please do. Basically we'd do a slide step up - as you pick up the kicking let you use the power of the slide step to twist your hips up and away to get ready for the kick - and then you'd thrust. I was honestly terrible at it and I'm not really sure what was going on. Sorry.
After these drills we were asked to do Sanchin and then a few Kanshiwa kata so he could see how we were implementing the body movements into the kata. Mr. Nakamatsu would demonstrate movements he felt we should work on for better timing. Just like his son - I couldn't see his hands move. He'd retract in a very relaxed way and then BAM! - his strike would be out there. Again - very impressive.
I think we finished up with Seisan - but I'm not sure.
Afterwards the dojo was cleaned and the food was brought up. Mrs. Nakmatsu joined us for the dinner. We had wonderful sushi, yakitori, and very tasty cake. It was a wonderful evening. And I have much to train - I can still see my hands when I strike.
The next morning the vans were going to pick us up and take us to the famed Shureido Martial arts supply store and then shopping on Gate 2 street. Tuesday evening would be our visit to Toyama's dojo and Miyagi's dojo.