17th Leipzig Kendo Championship

Just came back from the 17th Leipzig Kendo Championship, which was a nice day out. I didn't prepare for it like I did last year, so I didn't have a particular goal and the pressure that came with it. It is important, however, that I attend Taikai occasionally, and I'm glad I did.

As a newly donned Yudansha I fought in the Dan division. I helped out with the refereeing, which was my first time in a championship. A valuable experience. It's very tiring to be a referee, because not only one needs to validate scores, there are so many things that can happen. If the binding of the armour is loose, for example. At the same time, the three referees need to maintain good relative positions as the kendoka move.

The whole day I fought only four matches, 1 in the Dan division and 3 in the team division. In the Dan division, I was very unfortunate to meet Tomowari Miwa Sensei (6th Dan Renshi) from Berlin, who is also the trainer of KenVO squad. I was overwhelmed by the pressure coming from him and myself, that when I watched the videos, I saw many passed debana moments. The fight was quickly over. I will let the video speak for itself.

In the team division, I was in the Dresden A team (with Stephan, Georg, Tino, and Partrick), fighting as Taisho. Normally Stephan fights in this position, but today we placed each person in order to win the Berlin team. And since Miwa Sensei is their Taisho, heh heh..., I'm the sacrifice (quite happily in fact, since how many people at my level have the chance to fight a 6th Dan sensei in Taikai?). We met them in the final match. And before that, I won my two matches against less experienced kendoka, so they weren't that difficult (no videos unfortunately). My match against Miwa Sensei was the last of the day. I changed my style from the first to the second fight.  I jumped too much in the last fight. Everyone told me afterwards that the first men should have counted (including one of the referees and Miwa-Sensei himself, which was comforting). Again I'll let the video speak for itself. (note: I lost to 1 kote-suriage-men and 2 Hanzoku :((.. )

In the end, our team won the second place. Our all-women team also won against all-men team, which was exciting to watch! In the other divisions, we also have good results. Lilli won the women's division and the third place in the Kyu division. She performed very nice and strong kendo today as well as all the other Dresden girls. Seeing the great performance by the Dresden kenshis inspired me to train harder. 

Here are some thoughts:

• Overcome the nerve and be more stable. In the past I could bring at least 70% to competitions, but this time only 50%... 
• Train the eyes.
• Some of my men strikes were good but the rest so so.  I need to be consistent.
• Train the eyes even more.

The other videos will follow shortly.