Showing posts with label level up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label level up. Show all posts

Sunday

Practicing outside with crew hopefully!  Such a nice day!

Me and Devon getting good by ourselves again.  I thought I was tired of practicing with Devon, but the outdoor spot is soooo refreshing.  We both were forced into moves by the concrete but the only thing it really stopped us from doing was head power.  The real reason you practice on concrete is so you don't crash.  I never thought about it like that before, but if you practice in an environment that discourages crashing you will crash less.  I crashed once today. :)  Sloppy technique means skinned knees and bruises.

I saw something in Devon's footwork and based a style around it.  I'll call it lazy leg style.  You keep your legs as close as possible to the ground at all times (mostly talking about techs and footwork in back).  Whenever you want to hit a beat your step completion always needs to arrive to that point in the music.  No sharp movements.  To exaggerate the movement more, make sure each step covers more ground than you do normally.

People stopped by and moved on, I love that going on in the background!  The space is like 16 x 16 brick squares with cement running along the sides and benches on the side.  The benches are like perfect viewing distance for the space.  I want this spot to be the Sunday practice spot.

Friday

CMU practice.  I'm tired from last night.

Me, Devon, Daiji and Kyle.  Devon came later so before he arrived we were drilling power moves.  I got a chance to show both of them a few things so that was pretty cool.  I think Daiji is starting to get it.  There's less and less hesitation to ask advice of anyone. :)  I had a breakthrough personally in headspins (since I couldn't do anything else).  My hand positioning for taps was waaay too wide.  I found when bring my hands together (condensing mass, like all balance related power duh) that it was easier to do multiple taps.  Kyle started doing some slow headspins, his balance is quite good.  He'll have those soon.  Devon and I finished a routine and fleshed out another.  Glad that we really started on this.  It gives me hope that we'll be ready for the gallery crawl!

Sunday

Session where?

My house, all footwork we were constrained due to space.  This however was one of the more productive practices.  Really practiced listening and step variation and control.  I got Lays and an Arizona and was able to chill at home.  Prabu turned his game on today as well as Devon.  I think we got in a good hour and a half of straight cypher.  Pretty good aerobically for me, especially after going hard in NY.  Real kenjutsu, I can also lay the basis for a certain step and put some added funk on it.  If I can join that with the music related knowledge regularly that would be the next step.  Ended most of my sets clean and coming up in different poses.  I had a couple decent get downs, but way better on the way up.  Kinda random, but my crib is a natural footwork spot.  And we can always session here cause I live here.  Holla.

Thursday with an Early Show

Rocking a show with Extra and Stealth.  Hope to rock out some new power I've acquired.  I came up with two easy commando routines (Stealth in, X in).  I hope the space is dope!  After the show it's practice time son, hopefully.  If I get back in time, I'd work on mainly mill > shoulder > halo, airflares and popping.  Yes!

Oh man, the show was terrible.  I mean so bad that I needed to go immediately to practice without passing go; however I did collect $50.  If there wasn't a UC practice after that I would've been stewing for a while.  Practice was fun, because of my ill advised split at the show no air flare practice.  I did do mill > shoulder > halo, but I can't do it on command yet.  There was a good deal of popping too!  Matt Limm told me to get more out of each hit by maintaining the pose for a bit longer.  He also said for practice I double up on hits in the same pose and think primarily about the pose.

Thursday

CMU session to go over routines!

No one there but Lillian, SwifD, Bowser and I.  Then Chuck brought some of his heads.  I had a really good practice.  Warmed up with some tops and then went into further defining my routine ideas.  I'm really glad heads weren't there, it prevented me from teaching the material prematurely.  When I put my ideas into motion I realized that Devon can't yet do the movement required and that Teena is the logical choice as partner.  Really have my ideas together.  I got one full routine, a few commando ideas and an outline. OMG halo > headbridge tap > halo, an idea to keep.  But at practice, I focused on headspins and trying to get that shoulder > halo move.  I think I can get into headspins regularly from standing and that is helping with my headspin > 90 attempts.  I did it pretty decently today like headspin x2 > 90 :).  Still having problems with mill > headspin, I thought I had it down pat doing drills?  Good stuff though.

Saturday +2

Going to have practice sometime during the day.

Did a little partying early so I needed to even out a bit! LOL. So I told Dev and Prabu to hit Shadow Lounge to get down since SMI and Vex were doing something. Cody and I arrive and there's no one there. That seemed cool since we were like right at the beginning so we chilled until some tunes came on. I asked Cody to give me a combo...

1. 90 : complete
2. t flare > headspin : complete (2nd try)
3. swipes > mill > swipe > mill ... : complete
4. footwork > freeze > freeze > turtles > flare > swipe > 90 : sike nah

The thing about the last one is that it's definitely doable if I get my balance and speed on the turtles. Then I met this dude Chai ...

1. flare > headspin > mill : just kidding (flare > headspin > crash)

I believe this is a really important one. *note* I can practice quickly straightening my torso quickly out of the tail end of a flare without needing to worry about pushing myself into a handstand. Obvious implications for moves coming out of flare that require being on your hands (air power, 90s and halos especially). Then Dev showed up ...

1. Muujushin Kenjustu!
2. 90s > mills > headspin variation

Well the first one is my true style (probably will be explained later). I hit the second one like I wanted to advance to the semi finals; multiple 90s, 2 mills (kinda fucked that), about 6 rotations headspin with my arm cradling my head and other arm extended, and then I walked out of it clean.