I've started looking at the Japanese Tomiki school. I like it. Going to give some effort in learning what they are doing. A lot of what they do, leads up to Competitive Randori. So their practice is more on the physical structural side. It deals with timing. I have said that it deals with speed and Physicality, and that's just a failed attempt at description. Japanese Tomiki Aikido doesn't try to obscure its trees in a forest. Tomiki in his description and labeling of techniques and concepts was very literal, very concrete. Japanese Tomiki is Timing based, and structurally based.
It uses judo concepts to classify things, but it doesn't necessarily use Judo concepts in practice. Randori to them is a moving train. Everything deals with being able to jump on a moving train, and understanding when a train slows down enough in order to attempt the jump. A lot of Randori is running along side a empty boxcar and either jumping in, or losing ground.
Aikido is really about dealing with someone who is attacking at a distance and wants to maintain that distance. It's not a judo concept in that judo players want to take away all the distance. I think that Tomiki Aikido includes some of the counter judo studies that Shishida sensei has speculated about. A tomiki aikido player wants to avoid a grip, or allow a very unbalanced weak grip outside of the power zone/shoulder frame.
If you look at the 7 forms of kuzushi of Japanese Aikido, the first 7 of Yon kata. You may see them as just another way to do the releases. I think we dismiss it, because its at the far end of the Geis-ryu curriculum and its been done from week one. But I feel that our releases teach a different lesson than the 7hon kuzushi.
The major difference in the 7 and our releases is an intentional rotation of the hand before a grip is made. The kuzushi/tsukuri is derived from a weakened grip taken out of the normal power frame for gripping. The Kuzushi/tsukuri literally traces the half circles traced in the Tegatana Dosa/ walking kata. The palm up/palm down half circles. The Tegatana Kata, 7hon kuzushi are the same thing.
Look again at my favorite most comprehensive style of Tegatana Dosa. The Senta Yamada Walk. You will see the rotational movement that is seen in the first 14 of Yon kata. The last set of techniques in Nage no Kata Ura detail the kito ryu aspects. The kuzushi fall followed by a rise.
Geis-Ryu( I call it Geis-Ryu because that is the most honest label for the school) starts with the notion that you are working with two attached central nervous systems. I think the heart of Geis Ryu is in the Nage no kata Ura (8-14). It's a kito ryu driven, an Uke driven system. The nage no kata Ura take years to train because you have to train yourself to feel signals past the the noise of your own central nervous system. Here is an example of two fellows doing the Yon kata movements while putting the emphasis on the body rise and fall. Randori in the Geis Ryu is about signal reading.
The difference is that Japanese Tomiki aikido sees things as two bodies in motion in terms of who has the strongest, most direct structure attached to a weaker more collapsed structure. It's Tori driven. Timing based. Hit the guy as he bends his knees and attempts to draw. Hit the guy when the sword is up. Hit the guy after his sword swings down and fails to hit. The 7hon kuzushi emphasizes the half circle movements in relation to the down swing. Uke has to settle for a grip he didn't exactly want while attempting to recover and deal with the consequences.
Here is the concept of weakening the grip. The 7hon kuzushi/ Tegatana dosa illustrates this through the half circle movements. Nariyama is showing the concept with body movement.
The differences are even present in Atemi Waza. Japanese Atemi waza are based on a different offbalance ideas. Shomen ate and Aigamae ate are based on the notion of taking a sword out of center. Its a sheer one way or the other. Aigamae ate has an additional idea of an attempted joint manipulation that leads into the ate. Gyakugamae Ate is executed with the idea that no balance break is present. Gedan ate proceeds from a failed Gyakugamae ate. And ushiro is an idea that plays off of a bent arm almost in the country of 2nd release or gedan kuzushi. It is assumed that Ukes body is stiff.
The Tomiki School that I study is basically taking all its lessons from Nage no kata Ura. Or 8-14 Yon kata. I always had a mind splinter about what we did, especially when it seemed that there was absolutly no relationship in our Tegatana Dosa( the walking, and our releases/kuzushi. well, I can now be pretty confident in saying that what we call our 8 releases is more of a Ura form than an omote. The 7hon kuzushi relate to the standard tegatana movements. I used to think that what we were doing was Judo based, the fact that maybe someone ( Geis) filled in the blanks with Judo stuff. I wrote about problems with Judo based Aikido. Well after some thinking and head scratching, its not really Judo based but it takes most of its key principles from Nage no Kata Ura or Yon kata 8-14.
The thing is what kind of Tomiki Aikido are you working? Is it omote based, or Ura based. What ideas from Yon kata are you emphasizing? Its taken my about two years of technical archaeology and Aikido comparison to figure out why Geis-Ryu Aikido seems patently different. Its not different, it just interprets it through the kito principles in Yon Kata. Its an Obvious statement, but nobody has really looked at where we get our movement ideas from specifically.
No comments:
Post a Comment