By Mads and Bjørn Thon, Members until 2012

This was our first long course we were going on, we had mentally and physically prepared for it, so it was a surprise that it was more in the mind and the small movements with power discharge that we had to work on. We had to learn to walk in real zenkutsu back and forth, with all the little subtleties that are like cross tension and hold it until it has to be released until the step is forward and e.g. the tsuki is beaten. We tried all the other basic positions to see which one stood best if you were pushed from the sides, front and back. The conclusion of that was that people stuck best in shiko-dachi, and worst in Heikosu-dachi. We found that there was a connection between all the positions from heikosu-dachi to mosubu-dachi etc. We transferred our knowledge from the standing positions to the walking ones. We found out how important it is to be able to walk correctly, with a small reaction exercise where we faced each other and one had to stand in zenkutsu and the other in heiko-dachi. The person standing in zenkutsu had to hit the other's chest with their front hand. Where you then had to manage to parry the blow. If you didn't stand with your heels up in the heiko-dachi, you were too slow to parry. In the zenkutsu, you had to stand with a cross tension in a correct zenkutsu to make it work. If Kimu Sensei didn't think it worked completely, we had to go back and forth in zenkutsu again to remember all the little things we needed to get better at the reaction exercise.

The camp started and it was, as usual, a good camp, we have been there for a few years.
When we got home and thought about the 17 hours of training we had received, we only found out how good it had actually been.
Thank you for a good camp and good course.
Mads and Bjorn