The Sensei Curse

I got to the dojo about 45 minutes before class. Usually, whoever is teaching arrives about 15-20 til, but one of the other asst. instructors was already there-- Scott Sensei was running a little late. Got changed, and had a lot of time to stretch out. We had yet another new student tonight and another potential student who watched the class.

We practiced alot of rolling, forward and backward. (his classes always have a long warmup)
I was of course the last to make it across the room. Apparently my embarassment was obvious, because Scott Sensei said "it's okay to be the last one, it's not a race....and it's not always you" :)

What's funny is that I have a really hard time with the rolls starting out on one knee, but if I roll from a standing position, I really don't think about it. The more momentum I have, the easier it is. I won't even talk about how awful I am at backwards rolls during practice. (and yet if someone throws me, I can roll over my shoulder backwards without thinking about it O_o)

Practice consisted of a LOT of new techniques...new to me anyway. When I started to work on the back stretching exercise, I told my partner (a brown belt I haven't seen at the dojo yet) that I was still new and unsure about footing/technique--mainly as a courtesy, because I wanted him to be prepared for akward technique. He grabbed by arm with a bit of a death grip and said "just do what Sensei did"
Soooo I gave it my best shot, and surprisingly it felt right! My partner then corrected my footing... suddenly I felt off-balance. I said I felt my footing was still wrong, but he said it was right. A few minutes later, Scott Sensei walked over and corrected my footing again. I was right the first time. *sighs* I don't like correcting people who have been practicing for so long, but I found myself just a little frustrated that I *was* moving right, my partner corrects me, and sensei only saw my error. I've heard this call the "sensei curse" :)
Ah well, like he said, it's not a race or a competition, so no matter. Luckily, I am a patient person, and I really did enjoy working with him (even though my hand was purple due to the death grip on my wrist.)

Sensei demonstrated more techniques I had never seen, all starting with a katatetori or morotetori grab. I've been trying to find running themes in the class, but I usually come up short. I'm sure there's a method to sensei's madness, but I've yet to discover it. O_o Right now all the techniques still feel very random. I did manage to figure out the one theme for tonight--sliding in and turning to face the same direction as uke with your hands extended in front of you.

Towards the end of practice we did a throwing technique. We broke up into two groups with one person throwing in each group. We all took turns walking up and grabbing nage with a morotetori and being thrown forward into a forward roll. Whee!
One of the blackbelts in my group told me "just go slow... crouch down.... etc.." and would then stop the forward throw to let me roll. I muddled through... Finally, I told one of the students "just throw me" and I took a roll that for me was pretty good. After several throws, he said "very good!" I guess I was dubious, but he was adamant that I rolled well.

Woohoo! That was the highlight of the night.

New pain for the week: major cramp in my hamstring.