Well, this is embarassing. In two hours our third session will begin, and I still haven’t described the second! Well, it has been a busy week. I’ll try to write up on a session every time, but it can take a few days. However, I’ll make every attempt not to go over 1 week after.

So, last time we established what ringen was, and we studied some universal wrestling basics. Things did not change too much this time.

A good warm-up is again how we started the session. We will never skip it, as any type of wrestling is dangerous from the beginning. If a sword student who has his first class is in little danger of facing injury while learning footwork and guards, a student of wrestling will face pushing, falling, and a lot of exercises that can lead to bad stuff happening to joints and muscles which are not prepared for it.

After the warm-up, again with the pushing. One girls only this time, but there was also a scrawnier guy, so she managed to face all types of structure, which I think is extremely important. While competitions may and perhaps should have weight categories, training should be all around. Facing someone stronger or someone weaker (and heavier vs lighter) teaches a lot.

We elaborated on the pushing exercises with answering to the question: What happens to the back hand when the forward one is pushing? If one hand is pushing, the other can either struggle to follow it, or pull. If you push with both hands, they both follow the intent, but pushing with one and straining the other leads to bad biomechanics. So the forward pushes and the back pulls, while still keeping control on the opponent.

Pointing out such small details is important. Wrestling is relatively simple – you push, you pull, you turn and twist, you lift and you hit. Actions are natural. But there are always better ways to deliver them, and the devil is especially in those details.

We continued with break fall practice, this time from both lower and knee position. Things are looking good, people are falling more naturally, although some still have problems. It is a long process, learning to fall. It is not a perfect technique in and itself – if someone is throwing you with intent, it is practically impossible for the fall not to hurt. It is also hard psychologically. This is the reason it is easy to learn it when you are younger, as I did.

We spent a lot of time on falling exercises and talking about different options and situations. Sasho, who had has some experience in Aikido, assisted me quite a lot. I could demonstrate on him what a real throw does, and he took some vicious binding with the floor to help me explain the point. It is almost impossible to teach wrestling on your own, without having someone at least capable of breakfalling properly to demonstrate on, so he was a big help.

The last thing for the session was the first Fiore and Auerswald technique. Not the upper jey Fiore shows, or the pulling down lock Auerswald has. No, the first thing is the check – someone has grabbed you, and you use you arm to gauge the bind – to feel if he is weak or strong, soft or hard. I call it a check. Fiore calls it Dente de Chingiare. God knows what Fabian calls it.

Oh, yes, “the short winding”. Still, it is a very basic thing. I demonstrated what could be done from it (both in Fiore, Auerswald, and other options not present, but implied in the MSs), but I urged the students to just use it as a gauge and a basic “control and feel” tool.

We ended or practice with two sparring sessions, 1 minute each. First, it was against Pancho, again on the basic rules – just pushing each other around. It was fun, but I still could not throw him full force – I have seen his breakfalls, they are good, but not perfect… So he has to learn.

The second one was with Sasho. to demonstrate what we do when locks are allowed. Things were much different, as you can imagine, and we have created the second ruleset – locks and keys allowed.

So, what new stuff did we have this time?

Breakfalls on medium level – on the knee

The first winding, or check

The sparring rule set with locks and keys allowed.

Well, time to go to training.