Kendo Blog

Shinkyu Shinsa - nikyu

I attended the Pacific Northwest Kendo Federation's semi-annual shinkyu shinsa, held in Kent, WA on August 13, 2005.  It was a family affair, with my wife and step-daughter going to Seattle with me.

We traveled on Alaska Airlines.  From Boise to Seattle was fine but the check-in procedure in Seattle was a mess.  Too few ticket agents (your bags have to be processed even if you have an e-ticket) and too many passengers.  All flights were oversold as well (in both directions).  I watched the John Wayne classic, The High and the Mighty the other day on AMC and I joked with my wife that even though the technology is better, the service has gone to hell since the mid-1950s. 

On arrival we picked up our rental car from Hertz and then checked in at the Silver Cloud in Renton.  The hotel had previously had a spa and pool but it had been torn out since my last stay there due to a water park having been installed across the street.   Otherwise the room was fine.  Good value for the price, morning breakfast was good and the room was clean.  Free high-speed Internet was available but you needed a cable (I didn't have one and they sold me one for $5.00).

We went to the baseball game that night at Safeco Field.  A very nice ballpark.  I grew up with the Dodgers and Angels and did my internship/residency in St. Louis so I am familiar with those ballparks.  None of them would hold a candle to this one.  I highly recommend the field.  Internet ticketing was a bit cumbersome.  You had to park your car, go to the ticket office, and then return to the garage and move your car to another location.

The Mariners and Angels played.  The Los Angeles (I can't get my mind around this nomenclature) Angels played a much better game and while the game was close, the Mariners were psychologically broken in the bottom of the seventh inning when they failed to score with the bases loaded.  The Angels zoomed away from the Mariners in the top of the 8th with 5 runs.  I like this Angel team, they play both the long ball as well as the small game, and the pitching that night, while not remindful of Drysdale or Koufax or Gibson, was more than adequate for the Mariners.

The morning of the shinsa I got up a little early (chili dog at the ballpark the night before - burp!) and had a nice breakfast at the hotel.  Went to the Kent Commons where the Kent Renton Kendo Club meets.  Good facility, although the floor had a bit too much tack for optimum kendo.

The format for testing was 2 keiko.  As a old kendoka I tend to draw the same age-ranked opponents and I fenced against the same 2 folks I have for every kendo testing.  I felt that my keiko went well.  Hancock-sensei told me afterward that my seme and kiai were very good.  Curtis Marsten-sensei, told me my footwork needed improvement (every fencing coach I've ever had has told me this - I guess you can't get too much kihon - and footwork is the kihon of kihon).  One of the judges wasn't pleased but I convinced the other 4 so I passed.

After kendo we all went out to dinner with my sister-in-law and her husband to Cucina, Cucina in Tukwila, WA.  Very good food.

Went to bed, got up, flew hope and took a nap.  Great weekend.

Maxims of Combat

I posted a review of Steven Pressfield's book on Alexander the Great (see left side of this blog).  Among the interesting things contained therein was a chapter listing Maxims of Warfare.  Here are some of the ones that resonated with me as far as kendo is concerned.

Download steven_pressfield_maxims_of_war.doc

Read and ponder them in relation to kendo if you want to.

Kendo and Harry Potter

OK, I admit that the title is a cheap attempt to run up my hit number.  :-) If you are really interested in the concatenation of these subjects, for which there is no obvious association,  then go here.

R.I.P. - Civil War Historians

Two of my favorite Civil War historian authors passed away within the past week. 
The first was  Brian Pohanka .
The second was Shelby Foote.  Both will be sorely missed.

William Shatner: Who is He?

This is a howler about William Shatner.  Enjoy.

Hat tip:  Jonah Goldberg.

You've Gotta Have Wa

A friend loaned me the book, 1989's, You Gotta Have Wa, the title of which is an obvious take-off on the song, You Gotta Have Heart, from the 1950's Broadway Play and movie, Damn Yankees!  The book deals with former major leaguers who travel to Japan in order to pick up another paycheck or two before hanging up their spikes for good, but more than that it is an interesting sociological treatise on what happens when disparate cultures move on parallel tracks.  As the most homogenous society in the world, Japan has had a long history of xenophobia.

The main lesson I got from the book is not the current state of US-Japanese baseball talent (it's dramatically different from the time the book was written) but the parallels between baseball training in Japan and the US.  As Bob Horner put it:

I'll tell you the big difference between Japan and the US.  In the US we believe that a player has a certain amount of natural ability and with practice he reaches a certain peak point, but after that no amount of practice will make him better - because after a certain point your ability reaches its limits.  But the Japanese believe there is no peak point.  They don't recognize limits.

It apparently boils down to doryoku (or effort).  Achievement in baseball is a matter of mind over self.  The practice that young Japanese boys underwent at the time of the publication was mind-boggling and probably accounted for a substantial number of young kids getting their arms burned out from over-using them.

The final question:  What about kendo?  While US kenshi can have all the will in the world, with major exceptions (So California, the Seattle area), the possibility for sustained practice for US kenshi is strictly limited.  How does one advance to the highest ranks of a sport which also stresses doryoku when the opportunities are just not there.  I have no answer for this generation except to grow kendo for the next generation to have better opportunities.

Kendo Practice -

My wife injured her knee doing kendo last summer and had to have knee surgery.  It has knocked her out of the sport for the foreseeable future (BTW, if any readers know of knee injuries - surgeries as a result of kendo please post up, the medical literature has no reported cases).  Anyway, she went to her orthopedist and he recommended that she lose some extra weight [I know, I'm getting close to dangerous ground here - fortunately she rarely reads my blog :-) ].

She came home and wanted to know what diet plans I recommended to my patients.  I told her either the South Beach Diet  or my friend Dave Heber's L.A. Shape Diet .  Both of these diets are based on sound physiological principles and if followed will produce sustained weight loss.

I was also trying out the FitDay software recommended by Neil Gendzwill on the Kendo World Forum.   Plan, combine diet with tracking and see what happens.  Began the diet last Thursday.  Friday kendo practice I nearly passed out.  But yesterday, a totally different story.  I had a ton of energy and my keiko was much stronger and faster.  I had lost a total of 8 lbs. on the diets by that time and I found myself moving much easier and quicker.  (The less you weigh the easier it is to overcome your inertia).

I had fenced at 180 lbs. in college but my weight had gotten to 235 lbs. at the time I started this diet.  I want to get my weight down to 200-205 lbs. and have a 3 to 4 month plan to do so.  If yesterday's results are any indication, I look forward to improving my kendo as I lose and maintain weight loss.

The only downside to kendo with this diet?  What do you do with the 16,000 Google hits you get with this search.

Thought for today - 2

It's important to ponder why one does kendo.  This is a good slogan to carry around. 

Coach John Wooden, a truly great man, gave his team life lessons which he summarized in his Pyramid of Success.  When I need some inspiration or a kick in the b*tt, I pull my copy of Wooden's Pyramid up and reread the important message which he had, not only for his Bruins, but for all of us.  My favorite Wooden book is My Personal Best: Life Lessons from an All-American Journey.

That's not to say he was wimpy.  A man's man, Wooden was a fierce competitor, as a player and a coach.  I remember that he would ride the refs at Pauley unmercifully if he felt they we're calling the game fairly, but he would do it sitting with a rolled-up program grasped in his hand.  No tantrums, screaming, or gesticulating for him.  He was awesome.

It's Not the Crime, It's Always the Coverup

Nixon tried the modified limited hangout and it didn't work for him, Jason Eason of CNN tried the same with the same result.  The MSM just doesn't understand the rise of the Blogosphere.

A New Flashman Novel!

Great news for Flashmaniacs (me included).  George MacDonald Fraser is publishing a new Flashman novel, Flashman on the March.  Here is the publisher's precis of the novel.

"Celebrated Victorian bounder, cad, and lecher, Sir Harry Flashman, V.C., returns to play his (reluctant) part in the Abyssinian War of 1868 in the long-awaited twelfth installment of the critically acclaimed Flashman Papers. Many have marvelled at General Napier's daring 1868 expedition through the treacherous peaks and bottomless chasms of Abyssinia to rescue a small group of British citizens held captive by the mad tyrant Emperor Theodore. But the vital role of Sir Harry Flashman, V.C., in the success of this campaign has hitherto gone unrecorded. Flashman's undeserved reputation for heroism renders him the British Army's candidate of choice when it comes to skulking behind enemy lines in Ali Baba attire. After all, who but the great amorist could contemplate navigating a land populated by hostile tribes and the lovliest (and most savage) women in Africa, from leather-clad nymphs with a penchant for torture to de-ballocking Amazons and a voluptuous barbarian queen with a reputation for throwing disobliging guests to her pet lions? "

Only published in the UK for now but many of us have been waiting for years for the next installment of the life of the late Victorian hero, Sir Harry Flashman, V.C.