The Event

Great tournament over at the Academy of Kung Fu today.  It was amazing to see all the students on the floor going for it.  Thanks to the helpers for making it such a smooth event.

It was fun and many students walked away with medals but to me as a teacher the real purpose of these events is to see what needs to be worked on.  To be clear then, the comments that follow are constructive criticism of my own teaching and aren’t meant to be criticism of the students.

We need to talk about range, reach and kicking.  Many of the taller students are unaware of the fact that they have a huge advantage in sparring simply by being taller.  They need to be made aware of this and play the game accordingly.  Likewise, many shorter students don’t realize they need to get closer in order to land strikes and they end up throwing punches and kicks that are way out of range.

Several times I saw in the grappling portion that one student had their partner’s back but they didn’t know how to “put their hooks in”.  This involves slipping your ankles inside your partner’s legs to secure a hold so they will have a much trickier time turning around.  It seems so obvious a thing to do (to me) but when I thought about it I realized that I’ve never taught this technique to the kids!

Finally, we need to hit the pads when we do forms.  I think it would add some spark to movements and make it look more like the students were actually hitting something when they presented.

Great work everyone!  Good lessons.  Tomorrow we get back to work.  Until then, check out the photos here.