Renshusei: Thomas Heinlein Sensei

 

Thomas Heinlein Sensei (3rd Dan) from Sindelfingen, Germany, came for training between the eighth and eleventh of this month. In fact, this made him the first Renshusei from outside of Japan since the end of 2019. Accordingly, I’d like to congratulate him. 

Thomas was slightly delayed, due to the typhoon that hit Kyushu; however, it was only for the day and the schedule still worked out superbly. In sum, he completed four hours of private training, which covered 'the overall themes of Shotokan' as Budo/Bujutsu.

Specific kihon, all the forms of Kumite, and aspects of the Shotokan kata (including points from Bassai Dai, Enpi, Jion and Meikyo) were practiced and analyzed. Thomas Sensei also requested 順路初段 (Junro Shodan) and 順路二段 (Junro Nidan), which I taught in the original Asai Sensei method—along with the original applications. For Kihon, Kata and Kumite the focal point was optimal effectiveness, which is the essence of all the forms of Bujutsu.

Taken as a whole, he has plenty of things to share back in Germany and a lot of very useful ‘karate homework’. I must add here that away from karate, Thomas is a great guy and we also spent nice times socializing after the renshusei trainings. Again, and to conclude, I’d like to both congratulate Thomas, and wish him a very pleasant journey home to Deutschland.

 押忍! André

© André Bertel. Oita City, Japan (2022).