Independent Blog Post 8: Black Belt Classes

     Being a black belt comes with its perks and disadvantages. A black belt class is both. Black belt classes are extremely strenuous on your body, but on the plus side you are learning advanced concepts. The typical black belt class begins with a warm up. This warm up feels as if it was designed for spartans. You begin with the basic stretching, and go into 100 pushups, and follow up with 300 sit-ups. If that's not enough you do various exercises to ensure the legs are dead before the class starts. After the gauntlet known as the warm up, we do one of three things. We practice katas (forms), we learn advanced combos, or we spar. Although these sound fairly normal, they aren't. They are intensified versions of what the colored belts do. The forms are perfected to the tee, the combos are extremely hard to keep up with, and the sparring has much more contact. Like I said before, black belt classes are supposed to be one of the perks of being a black belt, but cause you suffering instead. After the suffering though, you only benefit. You become better as a martial artist, and one step closer to becoming greatness.