This year's Senior National shiai will be held in Winnipeg, MB, May 20th-21st, at the Convention Centre.

Present: Me, Herb, Alex, Marc, Carlos, Yan (first night).

Warmed up, did some standing uchikomis with Carlos. Herb got Yan working on breakfalls.

Herb and I did kata without throws (we only had half the mat area). Things are clicking into place. Things to concentrate on: sasae's kuzushi is upwards; when doing uchi-mata as uke, go onto my toes as I climb the hip.

Did ne-waza randori with Alex and Marc. Both of them are developing their skills, and I have to work to keep ahead of them. This is a Good Thing.

One-armed entry for sasae-tsurikomi-ashi

From Monday's training diary entry:

If you're fighting for grips, and your opponent snags your lapel, you can reach around behind to take a grip on his far shoulder. This puts you in a cross-grip (ie, same-side lapel) position, and it will fold his arm and keep it tight. Feint as though you're trying to snag his free arm with your hand. If he pulls back (which he probably will), step across, facing him, hook his armpit with your elbow in a rising, lifting motion, pull his lapel-side arm across and around, and block his lapel-side foot with yours in a classic sasae move.

Easier to show than to describe, no?

Present: Darcy, Mike F, Herb, Carlos, me.

Did: moving uchikomis, then Carlos demonstrated a couple of very slick techniques.

• Sasae-tsurikomi-ashi—If you're fighting for grips, and your opponent snags your lapel, you can reach around behind to take a grip on his far shoulder. This puts you in a cross-grip (ie, same-side lapel) position, and it will fold his arm and keep it tight. Feint as though you're trying to snag his free arm with your hand. If he pulls back (which he probably will), step across, facing him, hook his armpit with your elbow in a rising, lifting motion, pull his lapel-side arm across and around, and block his lapel-side foot with yours in a classic sasae move. It's really hard to describe it in words; you've got to see it—to do it—to understand.
• Uchi-mata / o-goshi—Take a normal grip, but then move the lapel hand to the back hip area (a little like Silvio's hip-throw grip). Take a short step to the side, turning your foot, and then pull with your hip hand to load uke onto your hip. This lends itself very nicely to o-goshi, uchi-mata, harai-goshi, hane-goshi, etc.

Herb and I did kata. Need practice.