Shugyo! Sort of!

Shugyo, or austere practice, is a distinctive feature of martial arts practice. I do my best to train in an austere way as often as my old body will let me.

Our chief instructor taught the first hour of class yesterday. Every technique we worked on began with a tenshin step. It was a great learning experience to see how many different things we could do from that first step. Today my knees are killing me, because, while I only worked with two different partners, I left everything I had on the mat. As uke, I attacked quickly again, and again. I'd go in as soon as I could get up off the mat. As nage, I was throwing with as much intensity as I could muster. I worked as hard as I could until I went into oxygen debt, then I'd have to slow down, or even stop. This was no looked upon well by the instructor.

But here's the thing: Before I got back into Aikido, I did a whole lot of bicycling. I was riding to the tune of over 100 miles each week, with 50 mile rides on Saturdays. I rode with a group made up of a bunch of Cat-3 and even some Cat-2 riders. I remember riding down the road at 30 mph, with some sprints up to 40 mph. More than most (if not all) Aikidoka I know, I know how to manage my oxygen. I know the process of cellular respiration. I know what VO2-Max is, and how to manage mine. I know that I go anaerobic at about 164 heartbeats per minutes - although now that I'm older it's probably less. All my rides meant going on the road with a heart rate monitor strapped to my chest. When it comes to my endurance, I know what I'm doing, and I've learned to listen to my body and hear what it's trying to tell me. I also know that in order to raise my VO2-max, I need to push myself beyond the point where I'm ready to stop when I come to the end of being anaerobic. When my cells run out of fuel, I have to stop. It's only by pushing beyond that point again and again, can our bodies learn to go beyond. Granted, we are only able to push beyond just a little, but if we keep pushing, that limit goes up little by little. But that means that there are going to be times like yesterday when I've pushed myself past the limit, and once I've done that, I'll have to pull way back.

We'll see how that goes. Otherwise, I'm going to have to pull back my practice to a lower level. It's just that when I feel that spirit move me, I want to go all out.