Worry Worry

I'm a bit worried about my upcoming iai grading. First of all, it's in a couple weeks, and I haven't practiced much. Practices in Tokyo were cancelled, and now that I'm back in Beppu, Sensei called me and said that there wouldn't actually BE any practices until AFTER the grading. What the...? So, I will have to go in "cold" -- of course I can practice on my own, but I won't get any specific corrections to work on beforehand. So I'm thinking there's a good chance I will flunk it. I just wonder how much of my grading fee I can get back.

The second thing is my knee. I was doing a very light practice the other day, which included some tate-hiza practice (squatting on one knee). I didn't feel anything at the time, but throughout the day, my knee started feeling worse and worse. By the time I went to bed, I was really in pain and didn't sleep well because whatever position I was lying in, my knee was keeping me awake. The pain faded over the next couple days. Today, I felt back to normal so I did a bit of practice. That was 4 hours ago. So far so good ... but it doesn't bode well!

I have heard that knee problems often stem from unbalanced muscular strength on the front and back of the leg. I know my hamstrings are weak, so I should probably get into the gym more often. (I should probably do a lot of things.)