Yeah he doesn't really have more advice than that, except that practicing it more helps. (He doesn't have an issue with falling over, especially, but he has a tendency to hit the kickpad with his toe sticking out and bruise it, and sometimes he fails to hit it at all, though so far he's managed not to hit Alfirin.) 

After roundhouse kicks they can do front kicks and knee strikes and then punching. The instructor wanders around the room between various pairs, correcting technique. 

Marian is in a really bad mood and, for once, not especially worried about stressing her partner out by Seeming Aggressive, she's pretty sure that someone who can stab a dude with a sword will not be stressed out by a woman fifty pounds lighter than her no matter what she does. She hits the pads as hard as she can. She's not nearly as strong as Iomedae, but she has pretty good cardio and does not at any point suggest they take any breaks. 

Iomedae’s understanding of breaks is that you take them if you’re weak. She is not bothered by aggression on a training field - she couldn’t get better than her brothers at sword fighting until she could actually get them to fight her for real - and has missed Marian’s bad mood entirely. They can practice kicking things hard enough to stop them!

Alfirin's partner does not have exceptionally good cardio, but he's stronger than her by virtue of being an adult man and much taller, and he's mostly trying to be careful rather than hit very hard and risk his hand or foot accidentally going somewhere he hadn't meant it to, and thus he's not actually getting very tired. He also won't be the first one to propose a break. 

Alfirin is not under the impression that she can ask for breaks.

Well, in that case hopefully she can make it through 25 minutes of practicing various techniques before the instructor calls a two-minute break for everyone to go drink water. 

After that they're going to learn, and drill, a new technique for if someone unexpectedly grabs you from behind! It involves pivoting on your feet and whipping your elbow around to whack them in the head. ...They are not going to drill it with actual headwhacking, someone will get hurt if they do that; they're going to drill it as realistically as possible by having groups of three, and the third person will be there to hold a pad up for the elbow strike to actually hit. 

This is Marian's fault, because sleep-deprived Marian in a bad mood is APPARENTLY cannot be trusted not to actually elbow people in the head, and it's mortifying. 

Marian will look around for a third partner. 

The instructor is encouraging people to trio up in groups of around the same height, for this, rather than around the same fitness or experience level. Alfirin will be sent to pair off with two tiny, extremely fit young Asian women. Marian and Iomedae are close enough to the same height, and can be joined by the older woman who had been having a private lesson before, who's a little taller than Iomedae. 

He reminds them to go slowly and carefully the first few times they try it! And pay a lot of mindful attention to it. They're trying to teach their brain a new way to move their body; they're not, yet, trying to perform the technique in a way that would work in real life. 

MORTIFYING. 

Marian offers to be on 'grabbing from behind' duty first since she kind of deserves an elbow to the head probably. 

That works for her! Though she's confused about why not just elbow each other in the head - right. No magical healing here. That must make it very hard to practice self-defense.

(It really does! You have to try to train the right reflexes for a real-life violent situation where you have to make decisions instantly and won't be able to think very well, and somehow do that without actually seriously injuring anyone! ...To be clear, Marian has never considered the alternative where they had magical healing. Mostly just the alternative where everyone else minded bruises the amount she does instead of apparently more than that.) 

She's done this lesson before (in the intermediate class, not the beginner one, she eventually made an arrangement with the instructor where she just sort of comes to whichever class fits into her schedule and if it's the advanced class has a bit of a bad time), and will helpfully do her best to give Iomedae tips on how to hold her weight so she can spin around quickly without risking losing her balance. 

That seems really useful! Iomedae is unusually strong; she is not actually unusually agile, and if anything is a little worse than average at it because of how she is built like a truck and trucks aren't known for their agility.

(Marian has similar problems, if to a lesser extent. She's rarely limited on strength unless she's fighting a 200lb man and she's approximately never limited on cardio, but she has terrible balance natively and had to practice it a lot, and she's mildly uncoordinated and also definitely compensates for being an average-sized woman by applying MORE AGGRESSION, which does not help with agility or control. She wonders if Iomedae would appreciate tips on the exercises she did at home to improve her balance and control, but that seems like something to discuss after class.) 

She will give lots of tips while she's on grabbing-from-behind duty, and make sure Iomedae seems to have reasonably good control of where her elbow is going before she suggests that she do it at full force and hit the pad that their third partner is holding. 

Alfirin's partners are not especially patient with her, and have also clearly done this lesson before and know each other. They suggest she can hold the pad first. They are not actually going to hold back much on how hard they hit it. 

She will follow their recommendation and not make trouble. She doesn't think she'd get injured by them elbowing her through the pad. When it's her turn she'll hit it as hard as she can (which is still not very).

The instructor makes the rounds again and gives Iomedae some more tips on how to place her feet. "You want your weight forward a bit - on the balls of your feet, knees a little bent - move your hips more when you turn, don't just twist around at the waist -" 

Iomedae is sometimes stubborn but not when she is being taught how to kill things. She will diligently try to make all the requested adjustments, hampered only a little by her limited English, and then she will elbow things even harder. 

After a while they switch! Marian doesn't go as hard as possible on her turn, because their third older partner is holding the pad. She tries to focus on the speed of her reaction to being grabbed, rather than raw force. (She is also, at this point, genuinely getting pretty tired. She was up at 6 am to make it to the hospital on time, and it's been a very long day.) 

Third partner, on her turn, doesn't hit as hard as either of them but is actually very fast, and quite graceful. She has dance training. 

(Marian is jealous. At least krav maga is a martial art where it matters less if you're capable of moving gracefully.) 

The partner exercise takes them until 8:30 pm, at which point the instructor gives everyone a minute to grab a drink of water, and then has them line up along the punching bags. 

"You're going to spend the next five minutes punching the bags - pick a pace you can maintain that long. Eyes forward. ...And if you're unexpectedly grabbed from behind, do what we just practiced." 

He puts on one of the padded headgear for sparring - he doesn't care about getting elbowed in the head that much, but with a class of nearly a dozen people, it adds up - and then sneaks around behind the row of students and tries to grab them in as surprising a way as possible. (And harder. If they don't react quickly enough or hard enough, he will, in fact, just try to pin them.) 

Iomedae likes her fighting class. She will punch the bags and try not to pay too much attention to when she'll be grabbed, as that's not really the point of the exercise.

Iomedae is unexpectedly grabbed three times and does pretty well for herself! Alfirin is also grabbed three times and the instructor will definitely pin her arms and pick her up if he can get away with it, it's not doing students any favors to go easy on them just because they're smaller and brand new to the class. 

They take a water break after five minutes so people can catch their breath from all the punching.

As a treat, the last twenty minutes of the class are for sparring! Not totally freeform; this is the beginner class, and there are some rules. No strikes aiming for the head or groin; this probably goes without saying but no going for the eyes; no chokeholds; no biting; if either you or your partner hasn't yet attended one of the classes that covered grappling, the fight ends if you end up on the floor. Running away, or otherwise strategically moving around the room, is allowed, but please, for the love of god, try to be vaguely aware of your surroundings and not run headlong into another pair. He'll set a two-minute timer and stop everyone after that duration. 

Everyone should go gear up from the bins at the back of the room; there are chest pads that strap on. Shin pads are optional but recommended, clashing your shins into someone else's if you both try to kick each other at the same time will hurt like hell. Headgear are optional; accidents do happen, and if you would be very upset to be accidentally punched in the head you should consider wearing it. 

He's going to randomize the partner selection a bit, which means it will not necessarily be a very fair fight. That's life. Iomedae gets paired with one of the Asian girls; Marian gets paired with Alfirin. The instructor checks everyone's gear, has everyone spread out around the room, and then whistles for them to start fighting. 

Marian loves sparring. The donning-and-checking-gear meant a five minute break to catch her breath, and her feet really hurt from all the standing at work today but that's really just another reason not to stand around in one spot. She will run at Alfirin and try to knock her over; she is pretty much expecting to get punched in the process but she does not care. 

Sparring is great. Iomedae thinks she would ideally spend about half her waking hours on it. It makes more sense than anything else and makes everything else make sense, and you can't pretend to yourself about anything or you'll get instantly punched in the face about it.