Present: Herb, Jeff P, Mike, Lawrence, me.

We worked on nikyu (blue) and ikkyu (brown) throws. My blue-belt throws felt really good, even o-guruma, which I haven't done in a while. Even the brown-belt ones, some of which are a little unfamiliar (though not completely alien) felt good.

Points to remember:

• Remember the difference between sumi-gaeshi (kind of a behind-the-knee tomoe-nage) and yoko-guruma ("around the tree").
• Ura-nage: Be sure to lift the hips skyward during the kake portion of the continuum.
• Hane-makikomi: Don't wrap the elbow up with the lapel-side hand; instead, bring the hand up high and around, in the arc you want your body to make.
• O-soto-guruma is rather like a cross between o-soto-gari and o-guruma. It's not just "clip both legs"; it's got the high-kick and lifting elements of o-guruma.
• Yoko-gake: the feet should stick together all the way through. Kind of like a mis-timed de-ashi-barai, where uke's foot is planted before the sweep, and you just keep… on… sweeping. And fall to the side.

Good practice. That crashmat is a brilliant purchase, esp. for knocking the rust off of things like makikomi and yoko-gake.