Thursday, July 28, 2011

Training at Maharlika Martial Arts (MMA). July 26

I made the drive up to train with Guro Bob Shin's class at MMA. The first part of class we partnered up and worked on Transitional drills. I got to work with Ryan. I think he's been training about a year now. He wanted to work on TD 3. Once Ryan got TD 3 down, we started working on TD 4. The last part of class Guro Bob showed us stickgrappling material that Tuhon Tom Kier had demonstrated in the past. It was a good class to be visiting. I remember watching Tuhon Tom's presentation in a Sayoc stickgrappling dvd and was thinking that you have to be able to take some pain to be his demonstration partner. Great stuff though!

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Sayoc Kali Sama-Sama 2011


I attended this year's Sayoc Kali's Sama-Sama. Sama-Sama is a Filipino (tagalog) name for gathering or coming together. This happens once a year. I had a good time at this year's sama-sama. I felt honored to be a part of this art that Pamana Tuhon Sayoc has shared. I will offer my thoughts on what you can expect if you attend one in the future. Also, a good article to read is called Family by Guro Joey Marana. He writes about his experience at this year's sama-sama.

Sama-Sama is a good time to see old training partners and make new ones. Sayoc Kali is an evolving blade art and each year SK presents an assorted training material. Most information is new that helps facilitate our training. You can expect testing of skills from transitional drills to quick draws or projectiles. There is also a blade simulator tournament where only head shots or heart thrust will end the match. Sometimes there are melee blade fights where they split people into teams to test our group dynamics.  Each year SK also invites a guest speaker to share their art. This year's guest instructors were Guro Victor Gendrano Jr and Guro Mike Pena. Guro Victor G. is a instructor under Guro Dan Inosanto who shared a stick drill with us. While Guro Mike P. who runs the Bayani Warrior Group from New Jersey, shared a single-stick flow drill and also a stick n' dagger drill. The Atienza Kali tribe also shared their Bolo Evolution 1 material. Every day there is material being presented. There is even night training. Also during the night, there is a sayaw that is performed.

Sayaw at this sama-sama was a satisfying experience for me. Sayaw translates to 'dance'. It is done with a long blade in hand (usually a trainer) dancing around a fire pit with drums as the beat in the background. Everyone is encouraged to perform. No one is judged on how good their technique or fluid their motion looks. It is a dance that reflects you and your training. Each one's blade dance is different. It is always beautiful to see how the master instructors (tuhon's) and higher guro's perform in the sayaw. It was also great to hear from the tuhon's and guro's what sayaw meant to them. To some, it was a way to show respect to the warriors and instructors who kept the filipino martial arts alive. To others, it was a way to bond together as a family unit and support each other as warriors in life.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Class: July 24, 2011

Attendees:  Bryant, Lem

Notes:  Reviewed 3 of 9 template, 3 of 9 RH/LH templates (RH before LH; and at the same time), true left, and left defeats right.  Smoking knife and 2 of 12 templates.  Worked on TD1 level 3 isolations.

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Class: July 17, 2011

Attendees:  Rax, Lem

Notes:  3 of 9 template (right/left), 3 of 9 right and left template at the same time, 3 of 9 template with tapping.  Counters to reflexive holds i.e. over-under/under-over. Discussion on blade awareness.  Reviewed TD1 with level 3 isolations.  Free-flow. AK hourglass footwork.  Worked on upward deflections: count 1 and 2.  Discussion about anchor points, long slash vs short slash.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Class: July 10, 2011

 Attendees:  Lem, Kristis D.  (new student)

Notes:  Discussed blade protocol.  Blade passing.  Importance of the blade rig for training purposes.  3 of 9 template.  3 of 9 feeder and receiver.  Worked on cross-tapping/cross-body parry (pendulum and corkscrew).  Ended class with Free-flow.
If you would like to read more on cross-body parry, Guro John P. from Sayoc NorCal training school wrote a good article on this subject: Cross-body parry.