I had several good ideas in the midst of an endorphin rush on the way home. But I lost them in the crash afterwards, I think; ah well. In any case, recently I'd been feeling somewhat lost in my martial arts training - I was kind of asking myself, 'What the hell am I doing anymore?' Which seems a bit odd in retrospect for the amount of hours per week I've been putting in, which is probably more than ever before. I don't think tonight was a complete turnaround, but at least it might get me out of my slump.
      Basically, we tried to approximate full-contact, no-holds-barred fighting as best we could. We used grappling gloves, makeshift headgear (chanbara helmets), and a slight modicum of restraint. The dynamic of this kind of fighting from the usual sparring of traditional martial arts is a world apart. Range takes on an entirely different meaning, and I found myself having to correct all sorts of bad habits (pulling strikes short of their targets, slowed down pull-backs based on courtesy, giving up grappling position for the sake of training escapes) on the fly. High kicks went from a staple to rarely used strikes based on opportunity or strategy, as I quickly found out that in this context they are horribly easy to catch or lead to having one's 'tree chopped down' with a kick to the supporting leg; I was only able to pull off one clean roundkick to the face after a series of feints and switches (ironically slapping my instep on the hard face-guard of the mask - ow). And strategy in turn played a bigger role than I've been used to - there doesn't seem to be any room for half-way choices. It's just strike, strike to create opportunities for grappling, or clinch and grapple; trying to switch strategies in the middle of things required too mental acrobatics for me to handle at this point in time, at any rate. Regardless, there is a huge amount of self-analysis that's going to be occurring for the next few days, most definitely.
      Random notes: grappling gloves actually aren't as bad of cushions as one would think; they do great job of protecting one's wrist and hand, and while they aren't exactly boxing gloves, they diffuse the bone-hard feeling of a fist at least. Chanbara helmets - hmm. Great cushioning job, which makes sense considering they're for fighting with weapons, though one's neck better be conditioned to check the yanking it'll still take. Having them pop off during grappling, or pretty much cancel out one's vision in a clinch were big hindrances; even ranged fighting suffered the obfuscation of the bars across the face (hands and feet are a lot smaller than the sword and staff-length weapons they're designed for, I guess).
      And now, off to nurse the tennis ball sized bump on my ankle, so I can start running again this weekend to build up my cardio. And possibly so I can get a shoe on tomorrow for work. Damn leg blocks...as a post-script, low shin-roundkicks to the thighs were only slightly less dangerous to use than high kicks.

interesting article on on joints that go snap, crackle, pop