jonathan on a path: day 156: practice and review

forms:

tantui
bagua 64 palms (A & B)

class started a little late today, with people filtering in slowly. i suspect this was because it was the July 4th weekend, and July 4 had been Friday, meaning that many people had been celebrating the night before and so were finding it a struggle to wake up Saturday morning.

we started class with more discussion about the tournament. Sifu had brought the entry forms and tournament pamphlet for both participants and judges, and wanted everyone to go through the documents. the entry forms included the tournament schedule and event rules, as well as information about hotel accommodations. i ended up joining Phunsak, Jonathan, and John Eagles for a 4-bed hotel suite.

there was some slight consternation in terms of rules and schedule, since the tournament pamphlet lists sparring and jian shu as being the same day, and a number of us are planning to do both. there was also some alarm at the sparring rules, which appear to be light contact with very short (30-second rounds)--which is not what we've been training for. Sifu didn't seem too alarmed with either issue, saying that the times could be changed to avoid conflict, and that he was going to talk to Tony Yang about the sparring rules.

Sifu said we'd need to figure out a way to get some school t-shirts made, since they're required by the tournament rules. he also said we would make a class trip for sparring equipment next week, since the rules specify what kind of equipment we're supposed to use. he reminded us to fill out the forms soon, since the entry and hotel discounts expire July 31, and to use his current address as the school address.

instruction today was largely all tournament prep, with review of 64 palms, both sides A & B. this was Ching-Chieh's last weekend until the tournament, and so Sifu wanted to make sure she and Phunsak got practice in with the form.

tantui

we warmed up with tantui. we haven't done this as a class in awhile, so it was good to do it as a group. i had reviewed it with John when he came back from his wedding trip, but hadn't done a very good job (turns out we both got lost in line 8, and needed some help remembering the left-hand part of it). not everyone in the class has learned tantui, and so a few were unable to join the rest of us, but the majority knew it, and so it served as as good group exercise.

bagua 64 palms (A & B)

we spent the remainder of class with 64 palms, first doing several repetitions of side A in a circle and then doing several repetitions of side B. during our break, i worked with John Eagles to review some of the palms, while Phunsak worked with Ching-Chieh on the 2-person form.

their 2-person form is becoming more refined. the tournament rules, however, required them to make some changes today, since they state a maximum 2-minute time limit for each form in the forms competition. as Phunsak and Ching-Chieh had been doing it, the 2-person form was taking around 5 minutes, which is too long. they ended up taking some time to excise parts of it so as to reduce it to under 2 minutes.

i ended up making a recording of one of their attempts at the tournament version of the form. you can check it out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6x0YHDbK2w4