Training Log
May 1, 2008 7:37:03 GMT
Post by Deleted on May 1, 2008 7:37:03 GMT
Having recently taken up an interest in medieval swords, my experience in this area is limited, but I have decided to take some of my training lessons from my police department training days and put them into practice with swords. Specifically I am talking about detailed training logs.
As a SRT team sniper I trained at various sniper schools and one of the lessons that was universal was keeping detailed training logs. Of course the instructors talked about the importance of these logs if we ever had to go to court, but a major aspect of training logs was in making forward development in our training.
We were told that we should never fire a round in training or when the SHTF without logging every detail. Anything that has any effect upon our shooting was detailed in that log. Ultimately, we would develop better consistency, while identifying problem areas. We could look back through the log and find out what went wrong (or right) in a specific situation. If we needed additional practice, our log would tell us which problem areas were to be our primary focus.
We can do the same thing in any martial arts training with similar effect...
Keeping a detailed log of what we did during training, the specific conditions, where we trained, how we felt, who we trained with, which weapons we trained with, how long we trained in each specific form and any other details you can log will create a clear understanding of where we came from, and the progress we have made. The more detail, the better the result.
After some time you may find yourself leafing through the log and noticing specific areas that need attention. I was looking through a year and a half of log book material from my Shorin-Ryu classes and I noticed a pattern that had never occured to me before because it only occasionally created any problem for me. It seemed that I always logged that I did not feel that I had trained well on nights that we practiced certain kata. I also noted that I logged a similar feeling when training at home when I worked through that same kata. It was not a specific feeling about anything I was doing wrong during the kata, but I had logged an overall feeling that I did not get as much out of that specific night as I did other nights.
I delved deeper into the specific cause of the problem and it became obvious that there were specific problem areas that I needed to work on. I worked extra hard, asking others to observe me, and found that there was a certain difficult turn that was causing me a slight balance problem, which lead me to pause immediately after.
I brought it to the attention of Sensei Burdick and he smiled and said, "I knew you would discover the problem eventually." I asked why he had not said anything about it and he replied, "It isn't as much a matter of you doing something wrong, as it is your lack of confidence that you can do it the right way. I could have told you, but you wouldn't believe it was merely and issue of confidence until you worked it out yourself." I was a bit confused at first, but once I did work it out for myself I realized he was right. I would have gone on thinking it was an issue of skill.
So I have begun my sword log this week. I log any and all training including general sword handling, cutting, material I am reading, new discoveries (they are all new right now), and the dates I do any sword maintenance and what that specific maintenance was. Again, the more details go into the log, the better the end result.
Some advice if you decide to log training:
Details - I have said it repeatedly...details makes the difference
Emotions - Many are afraid to put these details into a log, but this information can reveal more than you expect
Conditions - Log details about the conditions..temperature, time, sunny, cloudy, indoors, outdoors, weather and other specific details may show you a pattern you did not expect. (I always seem to get more from training in the cold)
Checklists - Creating a page that has details that are in a checklist creates a faster and cleaner log. Just remember to write out anything that strays from the list. Applications such as Word, Excel or Access can help in these areas.
Video - If you have video of any training or cutting sessions, create a file naming system then log the specific video that goes with that log entry. It will help you quickly find videos that you have saved. Naming files using the date is probably the easiest way.
I am not sure if any of this will help anyone here, but I thought I would share. If you have anything that you can add that might also help, please share. There are new ideas popping up all the time and I will use any advantage I can get.
As a SRT team sniper I trained at various sniper schools and one of the lessons that was universal was keeping detailed training logs. Of course the instructors talked about the importance of these logs if we ever had to go to court, but a major aspect of training logs was in making forward development in our training.
We were told that we should never fire a round in training or when the SHTF without logging every detail. Anything that has any effect upon our shooting was detailed in that log. Ultimately, we would develop better consistency, while identifying problem areas. We could look back through the log and find out what went wrong (or right) in a specific situation. If we needed additional practice, our log would tell us which problem areas were to be our primary focus.
We can do the same thing in any martial arts training with similar effect...
Keeping a detailed log of what we did during training, the specific conditions, where we trained, how we felt, who we trained with, which weapons we trained with, how long we trained in each specific form and any other details you can log will create a clear understanding of where we came from, and the progress we have made. The more detail, the better the result.
After some time you may find yourself leafing through the log and noticing specific areas that need attention. I was looking through a year and a half of log book material from my Shorin-Ryu classes and I noticed a pattern that had never occured to me before because it only occasionally created any problem for me. It seemed that I always logged that I did not feel that I had trained well on nights that we practiced certain kata. I also noted that I logged a similar feeling when training at home when I worked through that same kata. It was not a specific feeling about anything I was doing wrong during the kata, but I had logged an overall feeling that I did not get as much out of that specific night as I did other nights.
I delved deeper into the specific cause of the problem and it became obvious that there were specific problem areas that I needed to work on. I worked extra hard, asking others to observe me, and found that there was a certain difficult turn that was causing me a slight balance problem, which lead me to pause immediately after.
I brought it to the attention of Sensei Burdick and he smiled and said, "I knew you would discover the problem eventually." I asked why he had not said anything about it and he replied, "It isn't as much a matter of you doing something wrong, as it is your lack of confidence that you can do it the right way. I could have told you, but you wouldn't believe it was merely and issue of confidence until you worked it out yourself." I was a bit confused at first, but once I did work it out for myself I realized he was right. I would have gone on thinking it was an issue of skill.
So I have begun my sword log this week. I log any and all training including general sword handling, cutting, material I am reading, new discoveries (they are all new right now), and the dates I do any sword maintenance and what that specific maintenance was. Again, the more details go into the log, the better the end result.
Some advice if you decide to log training:
Details - I have said it repeatedly...details makes the difference
Emotions - Many are afraid to put these details into a log, but this information can reveal more than you expect
Conditions - Log details about the conditions..temperature, time, sunny, cloudy, indoors, outdoors, weather and other specific details may show you a pattern you did not expect. (I always seem to get more from training in the cold)
Checklists - Creating a page that has details that are in a checklist creates a faster and cleaner log. Just remember to write out anything that strays from the list. Applications such as Word, Excel or Access can help in these areas.
Video - If you have video of any training or cutting sessions, create a file naming system then log the specific video that goes with that log entry. It will help you quickly find videos that you have saved. Naming files using the date is probably the easiest way.
I am not sure if any of this will help anyone here, but I thought I would share. If you have anything that you can add that might also help, please share. There are new ideas popping up all the time and I will use any advantage I can get.