class was awesome tonight. We got some new focus mits and muay thai pads so I put them to good use.

Ran through breakfalls 1-6, and 8.

We then shifted to boxing. 4x2min rounds, jabs, crosses, hooks, upper cuts.

Using the thai pads, we did front kick both legs and knee kicks.

We then worked bear hugs from the front, over and under arms, and lifting.

I then got Colby and Trevor doing hip throws. Once the hip throws were flowing relatively smoothly, we started with uke throwing a hook, tori defends with a high forarm block, steps in for the hip throw, knee drop, stamping kick, and then into the supine arm bar.

Full house tonight! Kyle, Trevor, and Sensei Krista were present for the adults class. I ran them through skipping, medicine ball throwing and tossing, focus mitts (jab, cross, hook, upper cut), groin kicks, and shin kicks. By the time that was done the juniors class was over and I had Kyle and Sensei Krista work with Sensei Mariedke while I worked with Trevor to review techniques for his up-coming yellow belt exam. We worked through all of the yellow belt hold escapes: wrist grabs, bear hugs, double rear arm pin, 2 hands on throat arms bent as well as from the mount.

Overall a great class.

No adults showed tonight (again) and only one junior was present, so Sensei Mariedke and I worked with Jonathan. I reviewed breakfalls 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6 and then we did a bit of stretching. Worked the first 8 movements of te waza and catchblocks, shin kicks, groin kick, front kick, and roundhouse kicks. We did one child defense when the attacker picks the child up and puts them over his/her shoulder. defense is for the child to use the attackers clothing to pull themselves down their backside while yelling "this is not my parent"

side note: I saw this news item yesterday. My initial impression is that Curtis punched Hiel and caught him on the button and dropped him. Heil's head probably bounced of the concrete (several times?) which caused the head injuries that he died from. It'll be interesting to see where this case goes from here.

Trevor's back was spasming, so for the adults it was just Colby and me again. During the warmups, I helped Sensei Mariedke with doing breakfall 4 and breakfall 8 with the juniors and adults.

After, Colby and I did a portion of the high stress warm up. 2x skipping, 2x overhead medicine ball toss, 2x standing medicine ball into the abs, 25 supine medicine ball drops, and then finished with 2x10 front/groin kicks and 2x10 shin kicks on the medicine ball.

We then reviewed wrist grabs: one hand on each wrist straight and across, 2 hands on 1 wrist, 1 hand on each wrist high and low.

We finished off with a ground defense technique: 2 hands on the throat while in the full mount. We worked in some anterior femoral strikes with the elbows after tori gained release and turned uke over onto his back.

Weight training session at lunchtime today. I'm not as sore as I was when i resumed on Friday. I worked on a lot of jiu jitsu-related exercises also: bridging, kicking, and other core exercises along with the usual weight training.

Tonight was a somewhat disappointing class: it was the first class after the Easter break and I was really pumped to work with the guys on some new techniques. Only two of the juniors showed up tonight. I worked with Sensei Mariedke with the juniors reviewing breakfalls, knee and front kicks, wrist grabs, and 2 hands on the throat (close).

After class was finished, we washed the mats and called it an evening.

Today I held a basic intro to self protection seminar for my co-workers. We had about 18-20 people attend. The lesson plan was as follows:

Date March 19, 2008
XSensor Technology Corporation

Introduction of Instructors:
Tim Gorjanc, 1st Dan Jiu-Jitsu, 8 years experience

Other Instructors in attendance:
Mariedke Dalman, 2nd Dan Jiu Jitsu, 8 years experience
This one hour class will be considered a: SELF-PROTECTION SEMINAR!

SEMINAR: Short intense course of study.

SELF DEFENSE Vs SELF PROTECTION
SD: allow attack to happen before reacting
SP: be proactive in preventing the attack from happening – i.e. not walking down dark alley

• In the real world attacks happen in a split second and can be random and unprovoked (on drugs, etc). You must act with confidence and conviction.

• We use the principle of commonality of techniques - one technique for everything. this prevents “brain stalls” when you are in a high stress situation.

• Difference between martial art and martial sport. Embrace “dirty” techniques. No Rules, Only Results. The techniques you will learn are man-stoppers

• Being alert at all times will prevent you from being caught off guard.

• Learn to use your eyes and ears. Trust your instincts.

• Don’t be a victim – physical and mental state of mind and body.

• If attacked, use the mentality that someone has just assaulted your child.

Cooper Colour Code of Awareness: white-yellow-orange-red
White: unaware
Yellow: aware & relaxed <- should be in this state
Orange: in danger, threat evaluation, decision to take action
Red: in a conflict, fight or flight, carry out decision.

Be aware of your surroundings (exit paths) and potential threats – not paranoid.

You will practice gross motor skills: hands, knees and feet to specific anatomy targets which are proven to be effective maximum effectiveness. These are large targets that do not require pinpoint accuracy which you will not have under a high stress situation

The 3-minute rule:
If I can’t teach a technique to you in 3 minutes or less and you can’t emulate it in 3 minutes or less.


Techniques
1. Defensive stance.

2. Moving in the defensive stance.

3. Shadowboxing using jab and cross with open hand strikes.

4. Open hand slaps to the side of the head & palm heels to the jaw (with partners – touch pressure only!)

(break class in half and then switch)
5a. Open hand slaps on interlaced hand pads (Let Me Go Now!!!!)
5b. Open hand jab and cross on focus mitts (Let Me Go Now!!!!)

(break class in half and then switch)
6a. Front kick on medicine ball (Let Me Go Now!!!!)
6b. Shin kicks on large shield (Let Me Go Now!!!!)

7. Knee kicks on large shield (Let Me Go Now!!!!)

I hope you enjoyed yourself and have learned some self protection principles.

I hope that you never have to use any these techniques, but if you ever do you will have the ability to nullify the situation and escape unharmed.

Questions/Comments

Small class tonight; I did the warm-up with Mike and Trevor. Both were new students. The usual skipping, medicine ball, front kick and shin kick exercises in the warm-up. Went over defensive stance and how to get in it. Moving in defensive stance.

worked on parrying and side-stepping a straight punch and then getting into an arm lock:

Uke punches with right hand. Tori steps diagonally left and parries with the left hand. Right hand grabs uke's wrist and turns it away from uke to move elbow into the up position. left hand slides to just above the elbow. Left hand pushes down, right hand pulls up. arm bar. Transition into a wrist-lock to the front.

worked on 1 hand on lapel:

drop to defensive stance, slap to the face distraction with hand opposite to side being grabbed. follow thru and grab the back of uke's wrist and reverse, putting uke into a front wrist lock.

variation: get into defensive stance/shin kick/grab wrist with hand on the same side as the lapel grab. with free hand, execute a thumb lock.

variation: get into defensive stance/shin kick/grab wrist with hand or elbow on the same side as the lapel grab. with free hand, jugular notch take-down.

variation: shuto strike with hand on the same side as the lapel grab to uke's elbow to collapse the arm, step forward with left leg so uke and tori are shoulder to shoulder, right hand palm heel to chin to push chin up and head back. ears off the hips and step thru with right leg to perform takedown.

Sempai Mark did a quick 10 minute stretching warm up. I then got the next 45 minutes to run through the standard warm up: skipping, overhead toss, standing abdominal, supine abdominal, boxing with focus mitts, shin kicks and front kicks.

After, Sempai Mark worked with Brad and Candice. This was Brad's second class and Candice's first class back after 1 year. We picked up where we left off on Monday's class with Orange Belt techniques:

1. Side Nelson: basic and variations
2. one hand on each wrist from behind, held close: basic and variations
3. one hand on each wrist from behind, held far: basic and variations
4. Kata: right hook (& block), left hook (& block), right hook (& block), try to shoulder throw & fail, turn inwards, left hook (& block), drop in front of uke and do: (a) a modified ankle-knee take down, (b) strikes to the anterior femorals and an ankle-knee pickup, (c) tori hooks upper (right) leg behind uke's knees and scissor's uke's knees, forcing him to fall forward.
5. Showed the basic takedown to the rear. This seemed to be a modified version of what they were calling a crab takedown where the body positioning is essentially the same, but tori pops his hips forward and twists his arm backwards to bring uke off-balance. The basic rear takedown has now been adopted as the "basic crab takedown" and the previous crab takedown is now the "advanced crab takedown." the feedback from Dan and Kyle was that the takedown to the rear involved almost no effort at all and was more effective than the advanced crab takedown.

#2 basic: drop body weight into defensive stance, punch across the front of the body to break the wrist grab, elbow to solar plexus, groin slap, elbow to bracheal plexus origine, knee-ankle takedown.

#2 variation: open palms, facing backwards. left leg side steps beside uke as tori raises his right hand over uke's head and moves his left hand behind his back. Tori then arcs his right leg around and steps slightly behind uke while bringing his right hand over uke's head and behind him to bring him off balance and take him down. also showed variation with grabbing wrists and more forcefull takedown.

#3 basic: back kick to groin. drop kicking foot to the ground approximately between uke's feet and step back with support leg to re-center yourself and balance. FUWAT.

Tonight I led the adults through some breakfall review and kicking exercises to work on their balance and technique.

Breakfalls
Breakfalls 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, and 10.
With breakfall 6, added in a blow with a baton after they recover from the roll and turn to face their attacker. Gave some advice on how to make breakfalls 9 and 10 a bit smoother, and how to do breakfall 8 properly i.e. not to go sideways on the roll, but to tuck the head and kick with the rear leg to go forward.

Kicking exercises
1. Front kick to the medicine ball from a defensive stance, both sides, time on target is emphasized.

2. Advanced shin kick to the medicine ball from a defensive stance, both sides time on target is emphasized.

3. Roundhouse kick from a horse stance using your partner for balance & targetting, both sides (targets: chest, abdomen, solar plexus, thigh, groin, etc).

4. Side kick from a horse stance using your partner for balance & targetting, both sides (targets: floating ribs, lateral femoral, knee, etc).

5. Side kick from defensive stance using rear leg. For this exercise we kicked into a shield and used more than touch pressure.

6. Roundhouse from a defensive stance using the rear leg. Partner would hold the focus mitts with one mitt out as a target. Tori kicks the focus mitt, drops his kicking leg and re-adjusts while uke steps back and holds up the other focus mitt. Now tori kicks with the non-dominant leg. Repeat as uke and tori go across the room. When the wall is reached, we do the same drill, but this time uke advances on tori and forces tori to step backwards to re-adjust. By doing this, tori is forced to constantly re-adjust his distance to the target.

For 3 & 4 I emphasized bringing your non-kicking leg in such that the heel points towards your target. I had them do this and compare it versus just stepping in and not orienting your foot. Everyone agreed that when they point the heel it feels more natural. Also emphasized keeping the hands up to protect the face & not swinging the arm back as you kick as it off-balances you.

After class, I spent a few minutes reviewing Sanguineous #5 (knuckles to carotid) , #7 (rear naked choke), and #9 (pull lapel down and sidestep to get uke's head in a scissor-type restraint between uke's forearms).