Cosine Thoughts

So, everything is officially in order for my 2-Dan Video Shinsa. Our dojo will be taking the videos in a little over a month. Not a ton of time. Obviously, I would like to do everything  as good as possible. But realistically, I need to focus on what I can fix or change in that time which will bring the most value. I think my biggest issues (for shinsa) are probably around a lack of polish. My personal hit list is: Timing Fidgeting Daisan to Kai  General Thoughts: From the IKYF website directly, 2-Dan testing should show: Both the shooting form (Shakei) and formal movement (Taihai) should have good arrangement with evidence of spiritual energy (Kiryoku) in the application of the shooting technique (Shajitsu). There should be less uncertainty in the placing of the arrows (Yadokoro). Compared to 1-Dan: The shooting form (Shakei) and the formal movement (Taihai) should be consistent with the standard form. There should not be disarray in the placing of the arrows (Yadokoro)...

Tonight I tried to work in my findings from yesterday. Not too many arrows though. I was a bit fatigued from the day before still and I already have some bad practices that I need to unlearn. The primary ones I was looking at today were where my DAISAN was ending before starting progressing the rest of the way into KAI and a bit on my release and TENOUCHI. The DAISAN point really seems to have improved a lot of things. By extending too far out with my YUNDE at DAISAN I'm pulling the METE in further along which creates a lot of problems. Some of them I may have been able to force my way through with the 10kg bow from before, but with the 14kg, I'm forced to engage other muscles to bring things back on track. On top of that... they may have never been right in the first place. By leaving myself more room in that extension the METE ends up still above my head, and I have room to bring the YUNDE into my body as I draw. It also means I can open more or less evenly with both hands, a...

A lot of cancelled classes for the next little bit and the weather was a bit nicer so I decided to try and clean up the garage a bit and see if I could fit some practice in there. Generally, it was successful. Looking for better places to capture video from so I can improve my form. But, the Steam Deck + a webcam is looking pretty versatile. I took notes on where SHAI needed to be (otherwise my URAHAZU hits the rafters). And did a bit of tweaking of my target so that it would give back my arrows a bit more easily. Currently my process is: shoot one arrow, watch the video, find things I know I'm doing wrong, think of something to try to fix it, grab my arrow, rehydrate and do it all over again. Right now I'm struggling with the YUNDE pulling my METE too far during DAISAN. I suspect that I'm extending too far into DAISAN. Once the METE has been pulled too far out, it needs to travel further using different muscles. I tested with my GOMUYUMI in the mirror and it is so much eas...

Just a bit of reflection and some insight into what I'm doing at the moment and what is working.  I started practice by taking a look at some notes I had made from a video posted over the weekend and I started to understand some of the feedback I was getting from watching it. My sempai, who was giving me advice was at a bad angle to see it, but noted that I didn't have the space left in my draw to open properly into kai. At his angle though, he wouldn't have been able to clearly see my mete elbow being pulled with the bow. This meant my mete ended up further left and leaving me with more space to cover during the draw.  So, I wanted to fix that, along with a few other things today: Keeping my arms relaxed while maintain the ensou shape. Breathing. I have a tendency to not breathe enough. I clearly don't know how to live. During my first shots my yunde wasn't pushing "along" the arrow. I went and took 2 more arrows. Observed that correcting the mete require...

Today was a good day at practice. A very good day. I had mentioned previously that one piece of advice I had received was that I was making too many corrections. I got to start addressing that in practice this evening and something weird happened. Actually, two things. First, I don't feel like I've fired more than 1 or 2 arrows despite firing more arrows tonight than I do in a normal practice. And second, I was actually able to find time to think about and apply feedback. That first point is unexpected. I just kept practicing and firing more arrows and never seemed to get tired. The best I can guess is that the act of making all of those little adjustments was causing me to tense up far more than normal and that the corrections themselves may have been doing even more damage to my form than I had thought possible and thus increasing the wear and tear on my body.  Honestly though, I think it is the lack of tension. I wasn't able to completely stop myself from making adjustm...

I find writing down my thoughts helps to internalize things and get the most out of things like advice or observations. So, here is the first post in my run-up to testing for Ni-Dan later this year. Internally we had an internal "mock" shinsa at out dojo to see who the instructors felt were ready to challenge for their respective Dan in either the upcoming video or in-person Shinsas. My result? After a pretty good result in an earlier internal shinsa, I regressed a bit. I still got the green light to go forward with a few areas of note that I need to work on. Some from their perspective, some from my own, and some from a pair of guest instructors from the day of the mock shinsa that likely saved me from failing out completely. I'll start with my own thoughts. I always need to work on rhythm and timing with a TACHI . I'm doing video shinsa, so that is less important to testing this time, but would be critical for any in-person shinsa. And beyond Ni-Dan all testing is i...