It's certainly been a long while since my last post, but been busy trying to get the academy right and other projects of the ground. But now we are back so follow us as I will post once a week.
 This weeks post is about sparring.
  So what about sparring, a part from the obvious trying to strike or score a point on your opponent, trying to keep your distance using good combinations, keeping your guard up, we know the basics in anything tends to be the best. But what about timeline in sparring, feinting, double feinting, not going back in a straight line, defensive sparring, bobbing and weaving, moving your head when to and when not to.
 These are all part of the sparring process and many more.
So how do we improve these skills, like all martial arts training, by doing it!! A lot of students train but with all the aspects in their training , Patterns, forms, combinations, self defence drills, shield drills, focus pads drills, fitness drills, weapon skills, as you can see it all takes up time so how do we get round this.
 One answer is to do workshops specific to one area of the students training. Why this format? simply it is purely more focused on that area so it makes more of an impact on the learning time, the skills practised need to be kept up so follow up workshops are great, but the beauty of this type of way of training is not all attend a specific workshop, and it tells on the dojo floor in normal lesson time the people who go to workshops and those that don't, The difference can be dramatic in some cases.
  Without realising it students who do workshops on parts of  their training like sparring, learn and adapt  into their style and get great benefits from it. They gain confidence therefore relax more and efficiency of movement starts coming into play for example, students new to sparring will bounce around on nervous energy while experienced students will glide around with an ease that can only be learnt by doing the skill in a focused environment ie like workshops and seminars.
Sparring is great fun when done right, and it builds great confidence in students, so go to our face book page
http://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=100002850375303
   Become friends and watch out for future videos about workshops,improving your training, how to do certain techniques etc all to do with martial arts training.