Entry #352

George and I drilled techniques in a tennis court at the high school. It's actually a very adequate space to be left unbothered in. We began with defensive momentum drills that consisted of reacting and moving to the opposing direction of whatever the leader goes with. Text alone doesn't do justice to the extensiveness of what we did with this. George led with TKD in mind, but the value lies in the universal applicability of quick footwork.

Thereafter, it was my area to drill. I had him don the 16 oz. gloves and attack me at around 50% intensity. My role was to bob and weave. I've eradicated the habit of closing my eyes, but my movement is still far too sporadic. I managed to escape the first blow, only to lose track of where his fist concluded; from there, I'd dodge randomly in hopes of getting lucky, waiting for him to pull back and reset. It's in my best interest to keep his hands within peripheral vision, at the very least. On the other hand, I can safely say that my head movement is nothing short of fast.

I realized a flaw in this, however. Getting inside guard through dodging leaves an extremely vulnerable opponent. Instead of capitalization, the drill forces unnatural retreat. I would never back up in such a situation. We somewhat overcame this by limiting the combination length to no more than a few attacks, but this resulted in much predictability when the attacker stops the offensive. Next time, a more suitable approach would be enabling counter~attacks for the defensive man.

This session ended on my calves cramping out. It was, nonetheless, most efficient while it lasted