Kicking and Flexibility workshop with Aaron Gassor
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Shaftesbury TKD was lucky enough to host a 5 hour kicking and flexibility workshop with the exceptionally talented Aaron Gassor – By 9:30am the floor had been fully matted, the pads were ready to be kicked, and people were starting to arrive.

The junior session kicked off at 10am; after a quick burst of exercise, everyone was soon trying a variety of challenging stretches. Assisted by Sam Pupic and Aaron Rose, Mr Gassor had the group performing some impressive flexibility routines which some of my students are going to practise everyday - so I’ve been told! The workshop moved at a quick pace, covering as many things as possible – leg control was the next focus point, and a whole host of fun and effective drills were demonstrated. Just in case anybody wasn’t suitably impressed, Mr Gassor took on the ‘pick a move’ challenge, which basically saw him demonstrating some really impressive aerial kicking techniques, flips and freestyle moves! The autograph hunting which followed confirmed how much everybody had enjoyed the session!

The adult session was underway by 11:30. Throughout the stretching session, Mr Gassor gave key tips on how to improve gradually, highlighting common stretching mistakes and how to keep motivated. Some fantastic methods of improving balance, leg control and speed were tried and tested by the group – if any drill was too easy, you could guarantee Mr Gassor could make it harder and harder so that everyone  was pushed to their limit! The group was split up into teams according to skill, and an element of competition was thrown in as we tried ‘the add on game’. Combinations of kicks were built up until one person in the group  couldn’t perform some of the kicks – this was a really good way of discovering which kicks work well consecutively.

After a quick lunch break it was straight into sparring. Everybody gloved up and no time was wasted, attacking combinations and drills were used to get the group warm – Mr Gassor demonstrated a really simple and effective way of defending which he called ‘turtling’, many participants found this improved their confidence and took away some the fear of being hit. Some of the new skills were put into practise as we sparred with as many people as possible. The day was brought to a close with ‘the 3 minute challenge’ – 3 minutes of very intense exercise which made sure that everybody went away feeling like they had worked hard!

This was a fantastic session, thanks to all those who supported the event from Shaftesbury UK-ITF, Wirral UKTA, Wirral TAGB, Manchester UKTC, Morley UKTA and IM Marsh Kickboxing. On behalf of everybody who attended – thanks to Aaron Gassor, Sam Pupic and Aaron Rose, all from Gassor’s Taekwon-Do.

Written by: Michael Carr - 24th June 2013

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