wushuzilla

Archive for November 25th, 2009

It was my third day back training after my recent break, and as is customary on such occasions, my body was totally hurting when I woke up.  I even made sure to sleep a few extra hours to give myself a chance to heal.  I even did some extra stretching in the morning too.  My left knee was all tweaked out too.  Every fiber of my body was telling me I should take a break and just go the next day.

After all, I had told my coach that I might not be there on Wednesday. If I called in and said I wasn’t able to make it I wouldn’t exactly be surprising them.

But I also know that I need to really commit to this process if I want to expect my body to get in any better shape.  These are the times when I have to work through the discomfort and develop a higher level skill.

So I went to class.  Dreading the wushu.  Fearing for my knee.  But I went anyway.

And when I got there and 3:00 rolled around … no one showed up.

Actually, that isn’t totally true.  The kids from the other carpet showed up to train.  I was sitting on the carpet stretching out and Qi Peng Hui came up to me and said “They’re not here today.  They’re running.”

“They’re running?  Outside?” I replied.

“Yeah, today they don’t train here.  They are running on the track.” he said, pointing out the window.

“Hmm .. no one told me…” I said.

Then I stood up to contemplate my situation and one of the little boys in the group came up to me and said “Hey!  They’re running outside! What are you doing here??”

It was pretty cute, actually.

So I gathered up my things and went out to the track.

In the middle of the field a group of about 25 male and female sanshou athletes were playing a rousing game of soccer/football.  A half-dozen or so rhythmic gymnastics girls were running as a pack around the track, and there were my fellow wushu class-mates also running in pack-formation around the track.

My coach walked up to me saying “We’re running today”, like it was common knowledge.  I asked if it was okay for me to run on my own and he said sure.  So I put on my iPod (about half of the wushu athletes had simliar mp3 players hooked up to their ears) and started puttering aorund the track.

I ran a couple 400′s and then sprinted a few 100′s, with some walks in between each run/sprint.  I managed to do about 7 laps around the track, in a combination of running and walking. Not too bad considering I haven’t run since the spring time.  I didn’t even feel any tightness in my calves or shins like I usually do.

After I finished I talked to Yuan Ming who was on the side of the track stretching.  Emilio had asked me to find out a bit about their conditioning vs. wushu training schedule so I asked Yuan Ming a few details.

It seemed that I had started training with them during their off season.  They were focusing on strength building, stretching and conditioning.  I asked if there was a standard schedule for each day and he says that each day is a bit different, depending on what the coaches have planned. I also found out that this period of conditioning training is only going to last a few more weeks or so (“pretty soon” was the term he used for when it would end) and then more focus would be put on wushu again.  Their next competition isn’t until April so they would start training forms about 3 months before that, or around January.

It looks like December is going to be a good month for conditioning!  Actually, that is pretty good for me, because it is exactly what I need right now.  I have to build up my strength and physical endurance before I get back in to the full swing of wushu again, so it is just what the wushu doctor ordered.

After the athletes had finished their 16 laps of running (!!!!) we all went back to the wushu guan for stretching.

This was a more focused stretching routine than they might normally do.  Bar stretching for a while, and then some stretching with pads (just like back home!) and then some athletes paired up to focus a lot more on their various stretches. Since I’m sort of the lone wolf of the pack I just did my own thing, trying to get a good stretch on.  I was able to get a few videos this time around so here is the first of some athletes stretching:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAbkwZ_CKPo

The kids who were in the wushu guan earlier had spent the majority of their time in the weight room, but after a while they came out and started doing some conditioning exercises.  Lots of frog leaps, sprints and what not.  It looked like a good workout.  Here is a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xlC5Edxy7Y

I also saw Xin Rue being taught the compulsory nanquan form.  I remember him saying that he had only switched to nanquan about 3 months ago, and that he didn’t have a form yet.  In fact, during practice all he ever did was do combinations over and over again.  Lots of nanquan basics too.  So, I suppose they decided to start him off on a “beginner” form, i.e. the old international compulsory (or the new 6 duan form, maybe?).  I got a bit of video of him working on the 2nd section.  Keep in mind he had learned this about 2 seconds before I started rolling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wH4RLDyRhrA

Yue Xiao Yu was also on the side doing her own thing.  It seemed she was focusing on figuring out some changes to her nanquan choreography.  I suppose that makes sense.  It is during the off season that you would want to make those changes so that you can have time to prepare them prior to the first competition.  I snapped some video of her doing her thing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9WTcyJ_3ko

After class had ended and most of the people had left, I saw Xin Rue looking at a piece of paper on the wall.  I walked over and asked him what he was looking at.  It turned out to be a complete schedule of the workout plan for our group for the week.  I felt like a brick had just hit me in the skull.

All this time I had been wondering what the heck was the training schedule, and here it was right in front of me.  As you can see from the schedule, there was actually no training tomorrow afternoon, which means if I hadn’t seen this piece of paper I would have shown up and sat around like a goober.  It also looks like we have strength training again on Friday, which is also good for me.  I need to work on that stuff.  Anyway, I’m going to be sure and look at the weekly training schedule from now on. Yay for an organized coaching staff.

So, since tomorrow I don’t have to train, I can rest a bit and get some extra work done at home.  We are also going off to meet James (a local Friend of Ruhi’s) for dinner so that should be fun too.  I met him once in Hong Kong and he seems like a nice guy.

I’m almost tempted to go for a run with them again on Saturday, as I could use the exercise, but I am meeting with my Chinese tutor over by Shi Da Lu and Chang An Lu on Saturday so I will be training the old noggin’ instead.  Just as well, I could use the rest …