Shaanxi Strength Training (11/24)

Today I was feeling it in my hamstrings.  Those two weeks off of wushu due to travel and sickness had really lowered my physical condition and now I was having to start back up from scratch.  AGAIN.

I got to the wushu guan a bit early just so I would have a few more minutes to warm up and get myself stretched out.  I was dreading doing basics and kicks, but it turned out I needen’t have worried at all.  Today wasn’t a wushu training day.

The Front Gate

After everyone came in to the wushu guan at 3:00 PM we did our customary joint warm-up and then played some wushu tag.  Can I just say that playing wushu tag against professional athletes half my age is not exactly a walk in the park?  The first few I was lucky enough to swap out quickly, but then I got a string of bad luck and it wasn’t until Yuan Ming helped me out that I was able to tap out.

My left knee was also acting a bit funky today, probably due to yesterday’s practice, so for the most part I took it relatively easy.

Walk between springs (11/24)

After our warm up we stretched.  And after that the coach grunted some stuff and our group made their way in to the small weight room next to the wushu guan.  It turned out that today was a strength and conditioning day, or at least the afternoon was.  I didn’t mind though.  I need more strength and a better condition.

The first exercise were pop squats with the big bar and weights.  You go slowly deep and then when you get to the top you pop it up a bit.  We did 4 sets of those with increasing weights from 20kg up to around 50kg.  Of course, I’m probably a good 50kg heavier than most of the kids that were there, so for me it wasn’t a huge weight bonus.  I actually managed okay.

After that we did some plyometrics, again with the weight bar on our shoulders, this time back down to 20kg.  About 3 sets of these.

Yuan Ming (11/24)

Then we went to the carpet and did those round-about things with the big round weights.  And also the jumpy quick push things with the weight bars.  Its hard to describe it, but if you have ever seen wushu athletes strength train, then you know what I’m talking about.  I was tempted to take a break and take some photos/videos so that I could catalog it, but I’m sure I will have an opportunity to do that again in the future.

After that was a small break.  While I was sitting there I talked a bit with Yue Xiao Yu, asking her why she wasn’t training with us.  She said her knee was having some problems.  We talked about her taiji competition too (she got a lot of deductions, but said it made sense since she had only trained taiji for 3 days before the competition).  She asked me a few questions about studying English too.  I would say her English is probably the best I’ve seen on the Shaanxi Wushu Team so far, but almost no one speaks English so that isn’t saying toooo much.

Sunset (11/24)

The rest of the athletes had started additional conditioning, but all of the things there were doing were knee-intensive (burpies, broad jumps, sprints) so I sat out.  I did manage to put in a few good wall sits, but with the quad training we had just done it didn’t take much to tire my legs out.

At the end of class I was able to capture some video of their stretching and some of the kids’ conditioning on the next carpet.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT2ssUIcopg