Friday, September 18, 2009

9 x 8 = 72

Besides being able to do basic math (I'm sure when I was in 4th grade my mom thought I would never be able to), that's how many people were in class last night. We had 9 rows with 8 in a row. It was the first time I had ever seen the instructor stop people in the middle of the line up and squeeze the lines in a little bit tighter. I'm sure there were more people in my 1 class than there are in whole schools. What's even more amazing is that there are several people at my belt level that weren't there. This number also doesn't include the 1/2 dozen or so instructors that were there also.

The classes at the school are divided by color belt groups with my class (called the advanced class) going from brown to cho-dan-bo (the last belt before black). The red executive and cho-dan-bo class are on a separate test schedule than the rest of us where they test twice a year slightly off cycle in May/October. The end result is that there are certain times of years where the class is biggie-sized until we hit that off cycle test where the cho-dan-bo belts test for their black belts and then move on to the next class for black belts only.

As a result, the main instructor had us doing a lot of basic drills that didn't require a lot of space. They mostly consisted of working on our stances and holding them for a very long time. My legs are feeling it this morning and I know they are going to just keep getting more sore as the day wears on.

My lower back is still sore but I'm able to cope with it and still do everything I need to do with TKD. "Better living through chemicals" as the joke goes. I'm constantly getting up and trying to stretch it out which seems a little odd considering that I'm more limber than most people I know. Not like the instructors in class but definitely more limber than a lot of the people in class.

1 comment:

Bil Repenning said...

You are almost a master. A fearsome force to be reckoned with!