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Sara Ford's WebLog : Karate
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The adventures of a karate student returning to the dojo after 8 years...
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Karate and injuries - hard to get back into training
Last year, I ?broke? my leg due to stupidity. Stress fracture + sprained IT Band + quad muscle atrophy = 1 year of physical therapy, and some insults to injury. Most people relax by watching TV, playing video games, reading a book, or whatever it is that normal people do. I relax by either going to the beach to soak up sunlight in the warm weather (thanks Seattle!) or exercising, in that order of preference.
I love doing karate, as it is the only sport that I?m exhausted after training. For example, I had to hire a personal trainer at the gym to ?tame? me, because I?ll just keep going and going, never getting tired. And to my complete surprise, I?ll get injured.
Tonight was my first karate practice that my knee didn?t hurt at all. Maybe it was an easy practice, but I?ll take it nonetheless. I tried to get back into karate earlier in the summer (before writing the book), but my knee was killing me. Then the book started, so practice went on hold until after the summer was over. Maybe it was fate?s way of getting me to write the book.
Anyways, I started hot yoga this summer. I wasn?t a fan at the beginning. It?s hard to do 90 minutes worth of stretching to never punch or kick anything. I was pretty reluctant at first, only going when friends would go. But after watching the Olympics where that one US Gymnastics guy had an injury and used hot yoga to recover, I found myself having respect for it. In fact, I?m seeing night and day improvements by going, and I?m even becoming exhausted from doing it.
Anyways, the one tip I want to share, because I cannot blog anymore without sharing a tip, is that if you?re ever going to take a punch, always, always, always exhale. If you get hit hard, you?ll won?t have the wind knocked out of you. Reflex says to tense and brace for the hit, but you don?t want to be grasping for air if you?re in a real world scenario. Anytime I have a partner, I practice exhaling, even if they are in complete control of their punches. It?s all about muscle memory.
I hope to continue posting karate stuff from time to time. Maybe it?ll be another motivator to get me going. Recovering from a serious injury is really hard emotionally. 
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Walking through the dojo door is the hardest part
That's why our Sensei and many other high-ranking black belts said to me last night. I torn my shoulder in Jan 07, then broke my leg in May 07, spending the entire summer on crutches. The irony is that we won a world karate tournament back in Oct 2006, but there's no way you would have known if you saw me last summer driving around conferences in a scooter. sigh. argh. (yes, each link is its own adventure) For those of you who just tuned into my blog via Tip of the Day, I've been practicing shotokan karate since i was 14, including both JKA and FSKA branches. And as a blogger, i started a karate feed to talk about karate, why i do it (for the art, not the martial), and what i get out of it. I have to stand during the opening and closing ceremony, something i've never had to do before, even. this is when everyone kneels, does a brief meditation, and listens to the instructor for goals for the class. But since my leg is only at 60-70%, i still have a long way to go, but just walking through that door was the hardest part. The most important thing i learned from last year is a saying by the Shotokan style founder (with my personal additions to it) that karate (or any exercise for that matter) is like a pot of warm water. You don't want to boil the water, because at some point nothing will be left and you'll end up with a broken leg and torn shoulder, but you don't want the water to get cold either. so you have to train using moderation, something i swear i'll learn this time. And now back to the day job... 
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Team Kata Karate Tournament Video
well, at least i got it posted to youtube in the same year as the tournament. This is the event that we trained for every Saturday morning at 7am for 9 months. Enjoy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVeHdvRBiLc 
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My Karate Kata Video finally Posted
Here's the link to my individual kata video. Note that this isn't the event we had been training the 9 months for. That's another video, which i hope to post, well, um, yeah, as soon as i can, considering this only took me 2 months to post =) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD_nhXbktyc Nothing like feeling the tape under your feet during the yame (final move to resting postion). 
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Karate Tournament Results
View Photos - I hope to have the video of our team kata and my individual kata posted this weekend. We took 1st place in the Women's Team Kata. It was really close, as the second place team did a fantastic job of Jion perfectly synch'ed. We did Gojushiho Sho, which is a more difficult kata, so it gave us a slight edge. i haven't seen the video yet. i can't wait to see the video. I took 2nd place in the women's black belt (age 28-35 category) individual kata. I did my kata more "martial" and the first place kata winner did hers more "art", but she had a lower stance and was more technically accurate than i was, and she trains at the main FSKA dojo (with Shihan), so I felt honored to tell her congratulations. The best moment for me the entire trip was doing the Yame (finishing move back to the ready position), feeling the tape under my feet (you are supposed to start and end on the tape), and hearing everyone from my dojo start cheering very loudly for me. A close second best moment was having Shihan (the title for the top ranking instructor in the FSKA style of karate) take a picture of me during my individual kata (as my karate team told me afterwards). Now that is worth any gold medal. =) Seriously though, it was an honor to be able to compete. It had been 12 years since i had competed in a tourament. And to train for 9 months straight, to be able to make a commitment to your team, to be able to follow thourgh injury-free, and to do compete among people from all over the world is why i love karate. I cannot wait to see the video. 
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