Randori based Koryu Dai Ichi

 Randori concepts in Ichi Kata ( can you find more?)

Suppression

The first thing in ichi kata is really psychology.  Its stimulating a guy into an unconscious reaction of some sort.  Making him take an action that he doesnt want to take.  A hand to the face does the trick, but so does a foot sweep.  In randori it is some sort of mini panic or rush which can be anything from a hand raise, a foot step, or a reactive turn or twist out of a wrist lock.  It's shown as an Ikkyo.  But it can be anything. Proactive attacking is based on the philosophy that certain attacks cant be stopped once they have reached concrete form.  Things should be suppressed before they get to concrete form.  blocking is a reactive idea and a bad idea.  Anytime, a hand is used for a blocking function it is placed in a state of tsukuri or preparation.   Here the bad guy has just attacked a loved one or an innocent bystander and you know what he is about.  Don't allow attacks to become concrete.  This is a question of maai.  Walk into judo distance and footsweeping may suppress your movement.  

Deflection and spiral

  Techniques can be accomplished by deflection.  When you recognize an opponents tsukuri/preparation movement or he recognizes yours and pushes against it with strength the attack is deflected.  Again you can't stop attacks once they have reached concrete form or a state of kake.  You can only deal with tsukuri.  Things in aikido tend to be deflected into a spiral.  

                                                                       

Collapsing (into center)

There are times when  tsukuri is in the form of overwhelming strength and things must collapse.  When the unbendable arm collapses the outer defense collapses.      Yonkyo is an ugly technique and is reflected in the amount of pain potential. Standard aikido techniques take on more aggressive forms.  This can also be called judo distancing.  Things are stationary and movement is in the form of rotation.  

  

Aikido techniques in collapsing form.  

1.  Goju ryu kakie 1 

2. Goju ryu kakie 2

Release

This is when you being held in place by overwhelming force.   One guy holds you down. the other hits you.  One man does the tsukuri, the other the kake.    Your attacking hand is held while the enemy uses his attacking hand.   In judo it can be seen as a sacrifice fall.  The fall to set up the rise.  Dropping Uke into a hole is the tsukuri movement. 

 

 

 

 Koryu Kata contain concepts and  not just techniques.  Folks tend to look at the kake, the execution of specific techniques.  But they should also be looked at from the tsukuri (set up) that leads to the kuzushi that allows the technique.   .  It's about recognition and execution of Tsukuri and refining kuzushi.  It's all randori friendly.  Tegatana no kata contains tsukuri movements to study. How to prepare your self, how to prepare the other guy.  That sort of thing.  If you have any other ideas feel free to share.       

                                                                                  

Randori informed Koryu Kata

The one thing that we don't practice is the nikyo technique.  So i figured I'd suck at it. 

First I was thinking about was that  how sweaty the hand was, how I probably aint gonna get the control spot,  how the hand change into the grip was a problem.  I was pre loaded with potential problems.

We started out slow partnering up finding a grip.  I found out I had more flexible wrists than most of them.  Probably alot of randori panic putting my self in nikyo for some other guy.   I was paired with a guy who couldnt find the sweet spot, but I tried to tell the guy that he had control of my posture which was the point.  Didn't seem to connect with him. 

 1st release, hand change, the whole lock the wrist bowing in thing.  I still saw it as a problem. They go all the way to the ground in a on the knees three legged table posture after a release action    I figured I needed something to pin the guys hand to while I did the hand change so i used my far leg above the knee. That's how it is in san kata, the hand is pinned by something.  I did the wrist roll kinda based on what we do in san kata with that kaiten nage looking move.  But I controlled him by spreading my legs and stretching his arm out  via horse stance. I got that from our standing pins in the 17.    A guy told me that he didn't know how but it was really effective. I got the tap outs no trouble, no fishing,  but no ritual or ceremony either.  It wasn't the way you are supposed to do it. 


I have been to an Morty-ryu seminar and attended maybe 7 or 8 classes that I see as mini-seminars.  I guess my goal was see techniques in a different environment, and look for different people to Uke/Tori for.  What I got was an education about my education.

When you deal with a Morty -ryu bunch you start to realize that many of their ideas are also in our koryu kata.  In fact, all of their ideas are in our koryu kata.  You may get the impression at first look that they are more informed than we are about things.  You may get the impression that because of their high flying ukemi that they are better than we are.  That's not the case. 

     They don't see the world in terms of problems. Randori based problems.   

   Original koryu kata's  were a way to preserve aikido techniques that were deemed not so randori friendly.  That is, competitive randori friendly.  I'm starting to look at tying koryu dai ichi and ni to randori practice.  The thing about the controlled randori practice is that it opens up the possibilities the way competitive randori doesnt.  The Ichi and Ni kata on the windsong site are basically informed by randori.  You can tell by the explanations.  I think that's the key to the koryu, making them fit randori, making them testable,  making them where everybody can play with them.  They can be an air show for the people that can handle it, or they can scale down to something simpler. 


     
                                                                                                                                                                                                                       


                                                                       




                                                                                                                                                                                 




                                   

Senta Yamada, How deep is your Hineri, and Tsukuri no kata.

My frustration the last few months is that my repetition time hasn't synced up with the concepts that I have identified.  I suppose that's the modern martial arts condition of  downloading information and motor patterns at a rate of 2 to 3 hours a week.  A lot of my writing on this blog is trying to identify concepts and origins of concepts.  A majority of my posts are dead ends, but make good fertilizer for something else to grow. 

Anyway,  a lot of my lightbulb moments here lately has been looking at whatever I can find on Senta Yamada.  This guy is the Rosetta stone of Tomiki Aikido. Yamada was a student of both Morty and Tommy.  He was a pre-17 kata, pre tanto randori student of Tommy.   There are basically 3 resources that I have found on the web that relate to Yamada.  

1.   The first is his style of walking/tegatana which is the closest I've seen to our style.  There are some telling differences.   Notice especially the posture of his feet how they are prepared to to turn.  Also his 180 degree turning movements are related to the first two hand motions and are not separate ideas.  Who knows why our version is different.   Occam s razor says that somebody got it wrong, or  maybe that our modifications were an attempt to wed a specific action to a specific technique.  We also trace an X pattern, and this has been described as judo extending footfall kuzushi but there is also ample evidence that this manner of movement can be seen in mainline aikido as well. ( see later)

2. The second resource is a booklet:  http://www.aikido-aid.com/aikido-a-dialogue-of-movement/
Looking at this with the film provides a pretty clear interpretation of the tegatana walking movements.  And really, given the source, they are exactly the movements detailed in the tegatana/walking. 

3.   This is a film( a larger version can be found) of  Yamada providing further  technical details.  

Yamada is showing is sweeping motions of the tegatana kata.  He is doing hand sweeps that distort his ukes posture into a hineri bent forward/of gaeshi bent backward.  He shows the sweeping functions, and then the hand grabs with first and second releases.  Also, He shows the prototype for our sheering off-balance.  Which could be interpreted as an ikkyo offbalance.  the mirror off balance is interesting because it travels down and circles back as if to trap/capture ukes other hand. 



What is the tegatana/walking kata?    I would say that it is the tsukuri motions of aikido, it could very well be called tsukuri no kata.   Our diagonal stepping aligns with our sheering offbalance, but it is also the footwork on an ikkyo omote technique which also happens to be a form of off balance.  Our oshi taoshi can actually be interpreted as a counter move to ikkyo resistance.   

 Here is morihiro saito performing shomenuchi techniques.  Most of these techniques key off of a hineri state of kuzushi.   Notice the diagonal stepping( its especially apparent on shomenuchi nikyo omote where i'm guessing that nikyo functions better the deeper the hineri posture is).  The diagonal stepping produces an intial offbalance, but it also opens up a lane of movement, and it exposes the elbow to control.   This is one of my dumbass epiphanies but I was bitching about the sheer offbalance a couple of weeks ago,  I got a lot of this related to judo insight, but really it cal be filtered through aikido as well.   also, want to point out that tomikis stiff arm uke approach is a way to maximize reps, and highlight offbalance.  It cuts to the chase by getting rid of the ceremonial/ demonstration friendly/ daito ryu sword stand in/  shomenuchi and yokomenuchi.  Saito is basically doing the same as Tomiki here. 

Mainline aikido teaches the  Ikkyo, Nikyo....1, 2, 3, 4 frame work.  Yoshinkan calls their sets ikkajo which is first control and so forth.  Much like our sheer off balance tsukuri,  they provide a framework of counter actions(what to use,when, why).  Really they all key off of the question how deep is your hineri?   Its especially apparent in the ura waza.    ikkyo operates off of forward extended stepping/diagonal stepping.  It controls the wrist, elbow, and rolls the shoulder.  notice that Saito's foot is turned to anticipate resistance(look at yamadas footwork) and a step through foot to supply power(so much for same hand same foot principle)  This is the frame of reference.  Nikyo focuses on a deep hineri that uke stops short of the pin, rolls out of shoulder control and attempts to stand up.  Sankyo is a shallow hineri where the shoulder didnt roll into ikkyo control. (look at yamadas hineri) and  uke possibly turns to face tori,  Yonkyo is also a shallow hineri where possibly uke turns away from tori.  Gokyo is a shallow hineri raised high.   The iriminage, shihonage, kote gaeshi are where balance is broken between hineri and gaeshi and cycles into gaeshi offbalance.   Any way all the tsukuri motions can be seen in Yamadas walking/tegatana in some form:  from feet pronation/supination, turning, offline movements,  sweeping functions.   Mainline aikido can be seen as omote( the mechanics of a technique) and Ura( the mechanics executed with aiki).

Here is yokomen uchi.  Reference Yamada applying the mirror hand off balance.  Also notice the sweeping motions of the walking/tegatana kata.  The sweeping motions are illustrated in the dialogue of movement book,  but when you perform the walking you have the second and third hand motions.   You have sweeping ideas from above the attacking arm and below.  

When Tomiki said that the Tegatana kata contained all the movements in aikido he wasnt blowing smoke.   If you perform your Tegatana from a ritualistic stand point you'll never see it, but when you start to combine ideas from the walking then it becomes clearer.  The tegatana no kata are the basic tsukuri motions of aikido.  

Kuzushi is highlighted in Yon kata or in what we call the 8 releases except the eight releases cuts out the first two critical motions for some odd reason. 

Here's Dr. LOI  showing Yon kata kuzushi:   skip to about 34:00.  What the Yon kata kuzushi ideas illustrate is two hineri, two gaeshi, two in between, and seventh idea.  What people pick up on is the throws, which have absolutely nothing to do with the real ideas here.  These postural distortions are where aikido techniques arise.  The Tegatana no kata are the tsukuri movements whether grabbed or not grabbed that lead to the kuzushi.  The 17 kata or any other technique(Ikkyo, or whatever)are the kake.  I think we try to put a little bit of everything in our basic kata.   Its just the mechanics. 


I think a lot of what Tomiki tried to lay out for everybody got lost in the shuffle.  I blame Tanto randori.  My mistake in watching Aikido Kyogi was that this was Tomiki's way of doing things.  If you look at his tegatana development, its clear he shortened it up so that it could apply to tanto randori.  That's basically smaller circles, less turning.    We aren't modeling classical aikido the way the Yamada tegatana is doing.   It's adapted ideas.    I think the shift screwed with everybodies bearings.   You have a lot of ritualistic practice done solely for promotional purposes that within two generations of instruction you have very few people that can answer why anymore.   You have ideas that were adapted to tanto randori intermixing with ideas from classical aikido, and sometimes it just seems like a mess.  Its an interesting mess, though.   But I think tegatana should be called Tsukuri no kata. 




  
  

The Mirage of Principle

Essentially there is no wrong or right way to teach or learn something.   If you can find an acceptable process then things usually have a way of teaching themselves.  To speed up the process, you can attempt to isolate  so called principles. These can be an instructor framing the  key features of a motion or identifying underlying skills to be practiced.  They rest is a matter of focused repetiton and exposure to permutations of movement and counter movement.

You have a process:  what are  gross motor movements,  How do you practice them to maximize reps?  What are the fine motor skills if any?  How do you practice in a way to minimize their usage/maximize their success rate?   How is each movement applied against resistance?   What gross motor movements lead to tsukuri, what actual techniques arise from various states of kuzushi?

 In aikido you have observer driven principles where one guy watches a corrects things that don't look right.   Or Uke driven princlpes where uke turns to tori and says," that felt like it might work."   Basically most principles that are discussed focus on start points and end points. 

The monkey wrench is the  need for standardization.   That things need to look/feel the same to an observer and produce the same effect.  That they look cool when wearing a hakama. 

   Take a movement like shihonage and kote gaeshi.  They both twist the wrist the same and they both put a guy on his ass.  A guy like Morty Youshiba probably didnt see the difference after a bazillion reps.

 His students needed to see the difference, or else they couldnt learn anything.

He keeps doing that thing, what is that thing, how's he doing that thing?   Why is he doing that thing?   

Once principles are internalized they are forgotten.  That's the point.    Legitimate success means you internalized something that isn't easily identifiable or repeatable. success=hard work, patience, and luck.  If a cop puts a resistant crackhead on his ass, pins him facedown, cuffs him, without keeping his hand in his center, using unbendable arm, or using same hand same foot how do you explain that?   How can Tai Chi guys have the same damn moves as Aikido yet work off of different principles? 

What people call principles I tend to call taxonomy of failure.   You didn't get asked to the prom because you are ugly and your breath smells.  Now go practice not being ugly and buy some Scope.

 Hey, you got sumi otoshied because you didn't keep your hand in the center.  Wow, thanks man.  Did you have to practice 30 years and meditate on a mountain top to glean such heavy wisdom?

Here are two guys who define internalization of principles.  The first is a Cristano Ronaldo doing soccer randori and shooting soccer goals in the dark.(watch this even if you hate soccer, Especially if you think Morty was as good as everybody says he was)  The second is Mifune doing judo.   If you try to identify  tangible principles that allow both these guys to move the way they do then great.  You should be on their level in six months.  You can only identify the starting points and the stopping points.  You can label their techniques. But what happens  before the start, during the  muddy middle, and after?  

Real principles are internalized and fluid.  The people who have internalized principle come off as arrogant pricks(like ronaldo), or confuse the hell out of you with shinto and ki digressions.  Or they don't say a lot at all.  The problem is that a lot of people can fake arrogant prick, or pseudo zen shinto bullshit to draw in enough suckers.  The real folks tend to not say a lot, because they are too busy practicing to get something right.  They are constantly thinking they need a thousand more reps. 

And I'm thinking real heavy about taking up judo.   

Aikido, Counter Judo Theories, and Tactile Disinformation

A lot of my Aikido thinking comes from sitting in the dark drinking Coffee in the morning.  My mental processes are like dry peas in a Folgers coffee can rattling around.  Every once and awhile I'll tilt my head and slap my ear until a pea falls out the other ear.  

Here's the most recent pea to fall out:

How much does the development of Aikido have to do with Judo?  What I"m driving at is if Judo never existed, that is Jigoro Kano didn't do what he did to develop and propogate it, could modern Aikido have developed?  Even Simpler,  If Morty didnt have such good UKE's who were primarly Judo players, or at least Judo exposed, could the Ki master have laid it all out for us.  And here's the big question:  How much of aikido is one man's (Morty Youshibas) way of countering Judo. 

.  Here's the article I read that got my peas rattling.     Its a shishida article thats been floating around for years. 

It's was hard for me believe that Aikido was a Judo countering method because Judo Guys tend to eat my lunch.  They are used to one armed distancing,  and they are patient enough to just let you walk into their distance.   The other day I was working some Yon Kata with my friend Sam who is a Judo Player.  I was trying out some iriminage ideas, and when I didnt do things quite right he could judo counter me in some way.   When I was experimenting with my off hand, trying to cradle his neck, or place it on the small of his back, or contacting hs chest with my irimi arm, he'd have me in some sort of judo set up.

He told me he was getting tactile feedback from my hands and my arms and it was essentially telling him where I was at and allowing him to set up an counter technique.  However, a couple of times(out of maybe 20) I just swept my arm at his head and eyes and didnt give him anyother tactile points of reference.  The technique seemed to execute it self when I was sweeping at air(eyes) than with anything else.  Just like morty did it.  

 Then this pea hit:  I read how Nariyama charaterized judo as throwing from two points of contact and Aikido was throwing from one point of contact.  I could reword this as throwing from one point of contact while denying the uke any type of orientating feedback.  If you can throw your free hand towards Ukes eyes so much the better.  One point touching,  light contact, sweeping contact, constant movement.  Or the unnamed principle of Tactile Blindness, or tactile disinformation. 

Then I looked at the shishida article. I think the emphasis here is on the word tries.   

 1) All of the techniques except No. 36 are standing techniques. Many of the techniques applied instantly to case of attack, because skilled judo practitioners break an opponent’s balance as soon as they grab their opponent’s clothes somewhere. We can see the instantaneous nature of most counter techniques in the following expressions: as soon as an opponent tries to touch the collar and sleeve (No. 9 and 26); both sleeves (No. 13 and 23); right sleeve (No. 20); tries to touch with both hands extended (No. 14). Granted that when fighting against an excellent judo practitioner, balance breaking is required just before grasped at the collar(s) or sleeve(s).
 
Then I got thinking about this old school shirata video.  a lot of movement and one point throwing.

contrast this type of movement with what you see in daito ryu.     If you take daito ryu and then replace the daito ryu uke with a Judo guy what do you get?  How would you have to move to nullify his attacks, and deny him close tactile contact.  Or how do you blind a judo guy? 

I was watching this clip recently.  Its a Nishio style Aikido.   Shoji Nishio is a good study because his Aikido was very karate and judo aware.    Sam, My judo friend,  told me one time that he didn't like Sumi otoshi because there wasn't any counters to it.  I take that to mean is that there are no sacrifice throws as well.  Its a very uncomfortable throwing area, the back corner.  If you notice in the clip, The Tori here is throwing Uke into a backfall.   Air fall kote gaeshi/sumi otoshi rely on a give and take set up and the positioning is different and possibly open to a counter.    Where these  backfall ideas separate into either Tori easing up to allow a softer fall, or asshole mode.

  I have been told that iriminage without another contact hand either on the neck or supporting the lowerback is also asshole mode, according to the Morty-ryu folks.  ( Morty was fond of the horse collar approach or no contact sweeping towards the head/eyes).  Safer methodology means more stylin' throws that chicks dig but it also means more tactile feedback which is what Judo folks dig. 

While a lot of this maybe obvious to some of you guys with a lot more experience,  If you look at Aikido outside of the restraint and pin basics(ikkyo, nikyo, sankyo,)  most of the other ideas take you into a either a sumi otoshi type, back corner relationship, or a gyaku gamae ate, iriminage type arrangement that are attacking the eyes to provide an attack that has minimal tactile feedback.    I

Look at  Senta Yamada, The guy who I consider to be the Rosetta stone of Tomiki Aikido,   What people don't know is this guy studied with both Morty and Tomiki.   You'll notice in this clip right out of the chute he does two sumi otoshi type, back corner type throws, and they he turns around and throws from the back corner.  Also, notice he's doing the Atemi waza from the 15 kata.   His shomenate is shomen ate, but his other two are akin to gyaku gamae ate/ aigame ate. The aigamae ate is actually more like an iriminage.  Yoshinkan aikido classifys both of these too movements as iriminage: sokumen iriminage( gyaku) and shomen(irimi/ aigamae ate).   You notice that he attacks the head/ eyes with both. All movements deal with sweeping a hand away into a setup position while providing visual startle reflex.  

But what the man is showing here is pretty much the whole basis of aikido.  The arm is going to either two positions and techniques swing back and forth from these two positions.  There is a lot of backcorner positioning. Either to or from.   

Anyway,  my whole point on this is to say that Aikido may owe more to Morty's counter judo movements and ideas than a lot of folks want to own up to.   The turning and keeping the feet moving, the hand changing, the one point of contact throwing, the backcorner positioning and techniques, atemi waza movements towards the eyes, principles and philosophies that cut down on the amount of tactile feedback, or the principle of tactile disinformation.  These aren't restraint and pin ideas.  They come from somewhere else.   Is the heart of aikido actually Morty's idiosyncratic Judo counters?    If anybody knows something more, I'd like to hear about it.  

Shut Up, do it, wonder why. Rinse. Repeat. (Renshu Filters and Mind Splinters)

                                                             

                                                   When you hit Shodan you have a about five minutes or so of an ego pump and then, If you are like this hillbilly, you realize that you still don't know this shit very well at all.  All a shodan means it that you've taken the tour(of the system as handed down) and got a T-shirt(the black belt).   You start paying attention to your Sensei again on the basics, you reevaulate why something isn't  working for you, and you start connecting with other folks to look at things at different angles.   You study some history of your system to see how things initially started, where they started to diverge, and why.   

Tomiki Aikido is a Renshu(learn by repetition) school.  Renshu schools have to be technically spare. It may not feel your need for constant variety, but variety is an illusion.  Visit wal-mart sometime.

 The strength of a Renshu model lies in its perceived problems. I've done the walking kata so many times that sometimes I don't see any improvement in my Aikido.  When you are told repeatedly that all the principles of Aikido are in the Walking Kata, and that the walking Kata will improve your aikido and you don't make connections and improvement things start to bother you. Things that bother you and frustrate you tend to stick with you.  Rattle snakes tend to collect more rules of thumb, concepts, and principles than kitty cats.   Buzzing clouds of Mosquitos more than lightning bugs.  These things tend to cause mind splinters.  

Keiko is talk about it, explain it, justify it.   In a renshu art, the keiko is often student centered.  It's about 50% Eureka, I've found it, and 50% complaining about the mind splinters.  The instructor usually say's that's okay when its a Eureka, but you need to be aware of this, that, and the other. With the mind splinters they usually say, " maybe you should figure it out yourself, or shut up and practice."   The key is to not allow the talk to override the practice.

If you want to talk about an Art that has 25 movements, then that's your deal.  You are going to eventually run out of things to talk about.  If you practices an art that was based on the 10,000 movements of the Gods, then you might find plenty to talk about.  

When I was starting out,  there were people who would do two forward rolls, then critique mine while I knocked out 20 or so.  Some people think talking is going to get them there. 

There are times when you may get frustrated with your training and begin to doubt it. Doubt is another type of Mind Splinter.  A renshu trained Aikido dude looks at the heart and origins of his own system.  While I've visited an Aikikai affiliated dojo here lately, its really to understand what I see on Youtube, and I like to sweat.     I've seen a couple of things that connect to a koryu kata, and I saw something that helped me figure out what Tomiki is doing in his four Kote gaeshi's,  I'm not going to really see/integrate something unless my renshu training allows it. 

I've gotten more insight from watching Senta Yamada clips, looking at the jugohon kata, reading aikido: dialogue of movement. , and mail ordering this book: 

 

This is because they align more closely with my renshu training.  You are more likely to get a "why the hell do we not do it like Ohba,argument, than why don't we do it like Akikai, Yoshinkan, Daito ryu argument.   Someone may punch me in the nuts, but I think that the circular junanahon interpretations are a cave in to " the why don't we do it like Morty-ryu" does it".   I'm not saying it sucks, but as someone who actually goes to an Aikikai dojo on occasion to see what the neighbors are up to, thats what it reminds me of.  Someone taking thier renshu and attempting to Mortyize it.  . Like everything else in life I'm probably wrong.    

Anyway, Here is what I call renshu filtering its from the karate world.  Four katas all from the same source, the final products the result of what the founders of the styles renshu training allowed.  Who is doing it wrong?  Be my guest and tell those two 70 something year old Okinawans that they are doing it wrong.( Take your insurance card with you) That their versions have something missing.  Or maybe they picked up on movements that coincide with what their renshu and principles are telling them.  If they decided to go back and do it more Chinese(or Mortyize it) are they idiots?    

Here is our primary form of Renshu:  The walking Kata.   Yamada' s version is our version.  However, we  may do a couple of things different.   Was someone a dumbass and took bad notes? 

  

Here is a crazy movement that causes a mind splinter: a lot of people do it in a weird hand out of center chopping off the head action.   Nicks doesn't do that, but I think I may know why it got choppy.    I

Here's an interpretation based on my renshu filter:  The choppy swing is trying to replicate a set-up and completion of an iriminage movement.  Yon kata is basically an advanced study of the walking kata, somebody might of keyed in on that fact and changed it.  Then some jonny do it right made it into a Domiarigato Mr. Roboto routine.        

  

That bad thing about repetition is that you may be repeating ignorant ass movements.  Or a renshu dojo may be hiding a "Sensei with no clothes."  The shut up and do it is a great insulation for not knowing what the hell you are doing.  On the other hand, There is supposedly a major style of Karate whose founder didnt know karate.  He stopped a robbery and the newspaper identified him as an Okinawan Karate master.  He was beset with people who wanted to pay him money to learn from him.  Being a poor guy with nothing to lose, he went in the morning to take lessons from a real karate master and in the evening he simply taught what he learned in the morning.  He must have had a knack for teaching, because after a few years of Renshuing his students, his students, not him, brought legitimacy to his "Style" of Karate.  

                                                   

Stupid horses, Welding, and Calf Frys. (or Zen, Connection, and Confict)

  I realized a long time ago, I was never going to be the most interesting man in the room.  I also realized that I was never going to be the smartest either. My Aikido adventures have also ruled out the most skilled. I used to read Zen Mind ,Beginners Mind a lot. It has a story about four kinds of horses.  The first horse gets going when he sees the shadow of the whip.  The second horse gets going on the cracking sound of the whip.  The third horse needs a pop on the backside.  The fourth horse needs to be beat half to death before he moves on down the road. 

Fourth horses suffer a lot  from I dont trust you or the shit that your selling syndrome.  The less you talk to us the better. We like renshu(shut up and do it) and only trust in your keiko( talk about it, explain it.) if you have actually used it in a fight or used it to impress chicks.   But eventually if you give us enough renshu to where we lose 30 pounds and can get up off the floor without moaning we'll listen to some keiko.  .

   
The Tomiki system as we know it has basically 25 movements (8+17),  a walking kata, plus Randori.  Its a renshu model,  We don't complicate things with ura and omote, irimi and tenkan.  Those are issues to be figured out in randori.  When I do an Ikkyo(what I call #6 neighborhood) on a Morty-ryu guy, I get corrected alot because I go ura when its supposed to be omote.  It's probably because I've been trained to feel for resistance and head the other way. or I'm just stupid. 

The thing about our school is that we are more renshu than we give ourselves credit.  We have 25 movements.  25 movements can be separated and repeated pretty damn easy.  That's why I'm a fan of doing everything all the way through 3 or 4 times. (It's only 25 movements, folks.) Then back tracking and doing reps on some trouble spots.  With this type of training it doesnt take long to integrate something new.   This is why the koryu kata should be practiced, all of them.  The koryu show the morty ryu side of things, the basics are there to figure Morty out. 

A bitchy digression: Nobody seems to know why everyone just dropped the koryu kata.  I think everybody went to KooKoo for Tanto Randori in Japan, and Judo Guys with Bad Knees couldnt handle the seiza and Knee walking.  But where its left us is that people have to guess(real bad), make shit up(worse than bad), relate everything to judo(Thank God Tomiki was a Judo guy), or pray for ten years worth of good randori partners. 

Anyway, to get back to that zen and the stupidest horse thing.  The notion is that anything that finally sinks in stays in, and the fourth horse knows it better than anybody else.   It was beat into his bones.

I was having a discussion with Jack about how people throw around the word connection.  How a lot of Aikido types throw it around but they have no idea what the hell it means in concrete terms. I got the best lesson on connection from a morty-ryu beginner who was trying hard to be a first horse.  He told me not to allow my palm to separate from his wrist, so when he did his fourth release I was double bent trying to keep connected.  He tried to get me to choke up on his arm so I could stay connected better but I wanted to be a stubborn fourth horse and stay welded to his wrist and see where that took the situation. What he got out of it was double kuzushi points.  

Check out Crocodile Dundee doing the fourth release.  He talks about Ki, but the trick is really in the Fu Manchu dude keeping his palm welded, if Dundee curls his wrist and Fu keeps the weld on then his balance is broken.  If there is a pocket formed between Fu's palm and the Dundees hand then it doesn't corrupt the other guys posture so much. 

This is where we get our wrist curling ideas from.  Only we dont expect the Uke to stay welded.  I think we work on matching speed and blending to keep the weld. It may also explain why Daito Ryu hand work is more proactive than reactive. Its hunting the weld, and if the weld isnt formed they tend to clock the guy with something else.  Reminds me of those first two dumb moves in Yon Kata.      

I suspect now that this connection business starts out as UKE driven.  It's simply a matter of keeping your palm welded to the guy, and not allowing a space to develop.  Grab your own wrist and allow some space between your palm and the back of your hand. Now raise the back of your hand into your palm and perform a tegatana/daito movement.  When I randori with Jack I get the tori driven connection/welding.  I try to get away but I can't.   Hell, I dont' want to connect but I'm forced to stay welded to whatever is going on.  I suppose you can call it Ki if it makes your hakama fit better.

A thought experiment with this is applying atemi and maintaining tori generated connection.   Check out Aiki Guy here.  I was thinking that if you shomenate the guy and keep the connection with his other hand as he reflexively pulled back and away with it.  You could do # 3 release and the hand change in mid air and keep your maai a bit better, instead brushing your hand down, fitting in and  bowing in, you could shomenate, follow/weld to the the reactive gripping hand/change into Kote mawashi and back out or turn your whole body weight into it.

   As a side note, if the UKE had a knife in his off hand, then that would present some problems in the Calf Fry department for Aiki Guy.   

Anyway, In the 8 releases it may be instructive to do a rep or two where Uke welds his palm to Tori.  It makes the wrist actions make sense.  Then do a few reps where tori trys to maintain the weld, with hand action and footwork.