Surrender

http://youtu.be/DIEQ8A8Z65w

Something I personally struggle with is this idea of surrender. I have a lot of time for what GT talks about, some of it touches on the religious and that is something I find hard after a Catholic education for the first 18 years of my life and finding my own path there after.

Towards the end he talks about oneness and that is something Martin talked about when sparring and being in the moment with another human where only the moment matters. 

The reason I have time for Geoff Thomspn is the seminar I went on in the late 90's that was hosted by the wing chun organisation Martin used to belong to. They seemed to have an open mind and would get guest instructors down. At the time GT was big in the martial arts media and was pushing his type of training: real, fear based, 3 second fighter. So I know from a martial perspective there is absolutely no bullshit. I also had the pleasure of a Brian Jacks seminar.

Perhaps in training we need to surrender to what will happen in sparring; to us and by us?

Ultimately he is talking about being a good person, giving more than taking and being responsible for all our actions and choices. Seems like sound advice to me!

Certainty

Re-found the work of Geoff Thompson and watched / listened to his talk on certainty. Sounded really good and resonated with me and what I want to achieve in my own training.

Week 36

Pad training.
Holy crap the hall is cold. Therefore we jumped straight into pad training. Began working the same initial punch combo as last week.

Footwork:
It is basic but I find it tough and quite enjoyable. Simply 'stepping' forward to a count. I do not think that 1 step I have ever done is identical to the last which makes this simple practise one that should not be overlooked for more sexy and exotic training methods. After-all, if we can't control our legs how the hell can we expect to survive that fury and chaos of street combat? Martin R gave me a fantastic tip; make sure the standing leg is under your ass at the end of the step. This made me much more mindful of all my legs and what they should be doing. My problem before tonight was my focus was on exploding forward with the lead leg, I almost assumed that the rear leg would catch up and take care of itself. Thankfully not so. No short cuts, no oversights. Crack on and control that rear leg.

More pad training:
Working a few simple combos; 1-2-3-4, solo practise of 5 and 6 ending up with 1-6-3-2.

Wrestling pummel:
Working the drill with Slippers, needed to have a solid and accurate structure to maintain my position. From the roll we looked to clinch the neck or take the hips. As we were working independently and alive it kept our posture more alert and not sloppy. Also looked at the neck clinch defence which is ultimately the palm push to chin move.

As always, great session tonight. Sorry that there was no sparring tonight but the thirst must wait until next week...