NWMAF Winter Update – March 2016 News for Our Members, Friends, and Supporters Trainer announcements for the Tri-Alliance Gathering (TAG) coming soon! Trainer applications were due by the end of February, and the Trainer Selection Committee will have its decisions made and notifications of acceptance sent to trainers by March 31. Announcements of the trainer line up should be available soon after. Don’t forget! - Save these dates: July 20 through 24, at North Central College in Naperville, Illinois. This is a campus we have enjoyed several times recently, with a fabulous modern gymnasium, excellent classroom facilities, and near enough to “downtown” to walk for a special meal or your favorite coffee stop. You will have a special opportunity to experience the collaboration of NWMAF with the Pacific Area Women’s Martial Artists (PAWMA) and the Association of Women Martial Arts Instructors (AWMAI). This is a camp you won’t want to miss! Remember to have your NWMAF dues paid before registering for camp, as member rates are significantly lower than non-member rates. Join or renew on line today at www.nwmaf.org/join Buy and sell at the Tri-Alliance Gathering The bazaar held at Special Training a offers a fantastic opportunity to pick up hand made jewelry, weapons, bags for weapons, artwork, t-shirts, books handcrafts, cookies, videos, shoulder massages, and any number of other possibilities. The Tri-Alliance Gathering will be no exception! Tables will be available to vendors at $30 for one table, $55 for two tables. See the camp registration form to make your vendor table reservations. TAG Skill Demonstration Invite your friends and family to the TAG demonstration at camp this year! All TAG camp registrants attend for free; tickets for non-registrants are very reasonably priced. See the flyer at the end of this newsletter for details and links! This year the event will be held in the beautiful concert hall on the campus of North Central College, with the bazaar open before and after this stellar event. Camp Registration Now Open The registration is up and live on both the NWMAF.org website and the Tri-Alliancegathering.org website. The direct link to register for camp is: http://www.nwmaf.org/event-2124506 There will be a Tri-Alliance scholarship application going up on the website soon where women and girls belonging to one of the three organizations can apply. Alternative Accommodations for TAG Participants We have reserved a block of rooms at the following hotel for our women who prefer larger, more comfortable accommodations: Special rates for TAG Guests: $82 King, $92 Double Queen, $102 King Suite All rates include complimentary shuttle service to North Central College and other venues within 10 miles of the hotel, free Wi-Fi and full hot breakfast buffet with rotating menus. Indoor pool, 24-hour fitness room, microwave & refrigerator in all guestrooms. Fireside Lounge open Mon- Sat, 5-10 PM. Within walking distance to numerous restaurants. Call for Reservations: 630-505-3353 and ask for the Tri Alliance Gathering room block - or book online: http://www.countryinns.com/naperville/tag Photo credits from Special Training 2015: Tih Penfil Left: Jaye Spiro coaches as My Tien Duong seems to be having too much fun executing an elbow strike against Carol Middleton Center: Tih Penfil applies a successful Arnis takedown Right: Arnis practice on the lawn Target Heart Rate Made Simple by DiAnn Stasik - Founder/manager of W.O.W. (Women Only Workout, LLC) (reprinted by permission) What’s in your wallet? Is it a list of New Year Resolutions? Perhaps one of your Christmas presents was a diet book or the latest guide to fat loss, spot reduction, muscle maximization or whateverthecleaver marketing title is out there. With this in mind, I am writing to help you make healthy & informed decisions on how to determine your target heart rate. First you should know that for health benefits, your workout time should average about 150 min per week, which breaks down to 30 minutes on 5 days a week. The recent research shows that the average person does not have to get it all at one time and can break it down into 10 min segments if that is what works for them. The key to attaining aerobic benefits is reaching your target heart rate (THR). More than likely you’ve probably heard about THR, seen posters on THR in health clubs or even have a piece of fitness equipment that has or calculates THR info. Be CAUTIOUS HeRe. These charts are not tailored to your specific needs and should be considered as guidelines. The good news is that you can calculate your own THR. You’ll have to do some homework, but you should be able to follow the example that I have prepared for you based on my fictitious student, Marilyn J. Student … About Marilyn: She is 36 years old, has no existing heart conditions and is considered healthy but would like to lose the weight she put on between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. Marilyn leads a moderately active lifestyle but would like to increase her workout time to three times a week. She records her resting heart rate for three days to find that her 3-day average is 72bpm. As a personal trainer, I have decided that Marilyn is fit enough to train at an intensity level of 60-70%. Definitions/Equations: • Resting Heart Rate (RHR): Average of 3 days heart rate in beats per minute (bpm) upon waking & before getting out of bed. • Maximum Target Heart Rate (MHR) = 220 – Age in beats per minute (bpm) • Target Heart Rate (THR) = (MHR-RHR) x (Intensity) + RHR. Application: Given that Marilyn’s RHR = 72: Marilyn’s MHR = 220 –36 = 184 THR Range for an intensity level of 60-70%: 60% THR = (184-72) (.60) + 72 = 139.2 65% THR = (184-72) (.65) + 72 = 144.8 70% THR = (184-72) (.70) + 72 = 150.4 Therefore, Marilyn’s heart rate during training should be between 139 – 184bpm for 4 – 6 weeks. After this, she should recheck her RHR & recalculate her THR if necessary. When deciding upon an intensity level, you need to consider your current physical activity level. It is better to start at a lower level and then increase the intensity level after two to four weeks. In Marilyn’s example, I selected the intensity level of 60-70% because of her current fitness level, her motivation to lose weight and her time commitment. As always, consult with your physician before entering a new regime or if you have any questions. Please remember to take your own needs into consideration when using fitness guidelines. As Ralph Waldo emerson once said, “Without the rich heart, wealth is an ugly beggar.” Why I Love and Support NWMAF – and How You Can Too By Wendy Lathrop Way back in 1983 just after earning green belt in the karate style I was studying at the time, one of the senior black belts (a man – as 99% of the students were in that school) handed me a martial arts newsletter called “Fighting Women News.” He had opened it to a page with a small paragraph announcing an all-women’s martial arts camp to be held in Lawrenceville, NJ, just a 15-minute drive from my house. His simple statement: “You need to go to this.” Those six words changed my life. The camp in question was Special Training, featuring (as usual, I now know) a host of highly accomplished women martial artists. Because of the traditional nature of the school I attended, I had to ask permission of my instructor (Grandmaster Jae Chul Shin, who had brought Tang Soo Do to the US with the encouragement of his top student Chuck Norris during his Air Force days in Korea). This was not easy for me, being introverted and painfully shy, and my heart pounded as I knocked on the office door asking to talk with him. Grandmaster Shin asked me questions about the instructors, focusing on quality of instruction, and said he thought it would be good for me to go but that I should report back to him after returning. I went home to register immediately. The camp was held on the campus of a boys’ prep school, and I had a small room to myself where I could hide when all the newness became overwhelming, or collapse when the workouts totally exhausted me. As a side note, this was in the days of mandatory pre-breakfast workouts, with someone banging on each dorm door and yelling until we came out to do either calisthenics, running, or swimming. No sleeping late; no exceptions. So collapsing was only available between classes and at night, since I never miss a meal (the only other option). But the experience of camp was so inspiring that it didn’t occur to me to do anything but expose myself to as many new things as possible, presented so differently from what I had ever experienced before. And I met such wonderful people right away, one of whom became one of my best friends for the next thirty years and others who adopted me as part of their local school during camp and afterwards. Dara Masi and Melanie Fine present… HMAF West Coast Gasshuku June 9-12, 2016 | Placerville, CA 4 DAYS ALL INCLUSIVE | DAY PASSES | DETAILED INTENSIVE TRAINING | POOL/HOT TUB CAMPING & LOCAL HOTELS | FABULOUS HOMEADE MEALS INCLUDED Shihan Dara Masi, the head of Hakko Densho Ryu Jujutsu, is nationally noted for her popular hands-on, detail oriented teaching style that encourages students to discover a deeper understanding of the core principles, and the application of these principles to martial arts technique.