Aikido hate

Gerry Seymour

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I think I agree with that. But, by one punch, what I mean is that I'm looking for that "one punch" where they guy comes out of his shell and is trying to deliver a bomb. It doesn't matter what type of punch it is, anything from haymaker, uppercut to straight lead jab can be overextended and compromise the other guy's balance/posture/structure. And, by overextended, I'm talking about him doing it, not my magically causing it to happen with clever footwork or whatever. ... hmm... though... it is interesting to watch what happens when a bomnb-thrower misses and he gets a finger poke in the shoulder which is at right angles to his line of attack.

When overextension happens is where I'd call it Aikido, and the close stuff I'd call judo or jujitsu since that's what I do. It probably looks a lot like other stuff I don't know the names of in other arts. Based on your tactical thoughts in other threads, I'd wager you do the exact same type of thing, i.e. slip, close, clinch, lock and control.
That's actually the way I refer to it, too. I often teach an "Aikido" version of a technique and a "Judo" version. They operate on the same principles once they start, but they tend to be at different distances, and start differently. On some techniques, I have a personal preference for the "Judo" version (not necessarily actually anything to do with Judo, but more in line with the Judo "approach").
 

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That's actually the way I refer to it, too. I often teach an "Aikido" version of a technique and a "Judo" version. They operate on the same principles once they start, but they tend to be at different distances, and start differently. On some techniques, I have a personal preference for the "Judo" version (not necessarily actually anything to do with Judo, but more in line with the Judo "approach").
Tomiki called his aikido, "Judo from a distance." So, I'm not surprised you see that stuff.

Lots of aikido people have never even heard of the word kuzushi, unfortunately. Bill posted in another thread about his taking of the opponent's balance to improve the efficacy of his karate and I almost jumped out of my chair (metaphysically speaking, sort of in an internet fan-boy way). Here's a simple one, and I bet our most fearsome strikers on here (whoever they are) know this is a fact.

Guy launches strong right hand at you, which you slip tot he left, now you're behind the arm. Light right hand pressure on the back of his right arm as it goes by and there's a nifty hole in his defense where your straight left or left short hook should go to meet his head/face/chin. Bam! Caught.

That's aikido to me. Personally, anymore I'd probably take the guy's head into control rather than hitting him because heads can hurt hands, but that's just me.
 

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I think I agree with that. But, by one punch, what I mean is that I'm looking for that "one punch" where they guy comes out of his shell and is trying to deliver a bomb. It doesn't matter what type of punch it is, anything from haymaker, uppercut to straight lead jab can be overextended and compromise the other guy's balance/posture/structure. And, by overextended, I'm talking about him doing it, not my magically causing it to happen with clever footwork or whatever. ... hmm... though... it is interesting to watch what happens when a bomnb-thrower misses and he gets a finger poke in the shoulder which is at right angles to his line of attack.

When overextension happens is where I'd call it Aikido, and the close stuff I'd call judo or jujitsu since that's what I do. It probably looks a lot like other stuff I don't know the names of in other arts. Based on your tactical thoughts in other threads, I'd wager you do the exact same type of thing, i.e. slip, close, clinch, lock and control.

Tactically it becomes a big depends. If I see the shot coming in time to move my whole body to counter it. Then yeah I can start getting crazy counters.But moving a body takes a bit of time in fighting terms.

Mostly I am happy to get a hand up to it which is safer.

My hands dont have to be very far from my face for very long to eat a fight ending strike.
 

Gerry Seymour

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Tomiki called his aikido, "Judo from a distance." So, I'm not surprised you see that stuff.

Lots of aikido people have never even heard of the word kuzushi, unfortunately. Bill posted in another thread about his taking of the opponent's balance to improve the efficacy of his karate and I almost jumped out of my chair (metaphysically speaking, sort of in an internet fan-boy way). Here's a simple one, and I bet our most fearsome strikers on here (whoever they are) know this is a fact.

Guy launches strong right hand at you, which you slip tot he left, now you're behind the arm. Light right hand pressure on the back of his right arm as it goes by and there's a nifty hole in his defense where your straight left or left short hook should go to meet his head/face/chin. Bam! Caught.

That's aikido to me. Personally, anymore I'd probably take the guy's head into control rather than hitting him because heads can hurt hands, but that's just me.
Interesting, I'd always assumed kuzushi was a common concept in Aikido. Though now that you mention it, I don't think I've ever heard it used in the dojos I've visited. It's a central concept in NGA, and I guess I just assumed it would be so in our cousin art. I personally have a heavy emphasis on it in my teaching for both striking and grappling - so much so that I'll fail a student for not "taking structure" (how I usually refer to kuzushi these days), and am more lenient about flaws in the movements of the technique.

I like that comparison by Tomiki. It has all sorts of implications about how the art should work that I don't see enough in some of the Aikido dojos I've visited.
 
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Gerry Seymour

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Tactically it becomes a big depends. If I see the shot coming in time to move my whole body to counter it. Then yeah I can start getting crazy counters.But moving a body takes a bit of time in fighting terms.

Mostly I am happy to get a hand up to it which is safer.

My hands dont have to be very far from my face for very long to eat a fight ending strike.
I don't think of this as an "either-or" situation. I move and get hands up. If the movement gets me what I want (I end up in a usable position against an over-extension), the fight is over. If not, it's the hands' job to keep things under control (or end it if a big strike opening shows up). Hands don't move far from the face except to take structure, which (mostly) eliminates the openings for a fight-ending strike.
 

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Tactically it becomes a big depends. If I see the shot coming in time to move my whole body to counter it. Then yeah I can start getting crazy counters.But moving a body takes a bit of time in fighting terms.

Mostly I am happy to get a hand up to it which is safer.

My hands dont have to be very far from my face for very long to eat a fight ending strike.
Same page. Same book.

As stated elsewhere, I don't want to eat much of any strike. I like to just slip a bomb, too, makes for easy entry (granted you don't F it up and end up eating the thing) and enter for the grapple-game, starting with standing as my judo standing game is way better than my BJJ. I usually just do judo on the ground too. Judoka can do cool things with arms, too. But, I digress.

If the bomb is coming in, I'm moving. Granted, with everything I've done, movement is key so I'm (trying to) always moving. Getting completely out o the way, i.e. El Toro! doesn't really happen much with a skilled guy, but "more than a bit" happens easily and all the time.

Convert my above tactical to this. Guy throws left jab, followed by straight right, for which he's got to slide a bit forward to get the right to you. You use head evasion as everyone does , combined with hand guard to keep the jab off your head, but you use some kind of inside-out block with your right arm to block the straight. This turns the guy.... and the exact same hole is created over his right shoulder to his chin/face/head and you drop your left in/on it. Same thing. And, guess what, you didn't get off his line, you changed his line to go past you. To me, still aikido.

Most people don't agree with my idea of "aikido" by the way. Sometimes, I don't myself. It's actually more of a judo principle, "maximum effect from minimum effort.
 

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Interesting, I'd always assumed kuzushi was a common concept in Aikido. Though now that you mention it, I don't think I've ever heard it used in the dojos I've visited. It's a central concept in NGA, and I guess I just assumed it would be so in our cousin art. I personally have a heavy emphasis on it in my teaching for both striking and grappling - so much so that I'll fail a student for not "taking structure" (how I usually refer to kuzushi these days), and am more lenient about flaws in the movements of the technique.

I like that comparison by Tomiki. It has all sorts of implications about how the art should work that I don't see enough in some of the Aikido dojos I've visited.
When I first ran across it, the absence of fundamental understanding of what they were literally doing when things "worked," it struck me as odd, too. For some reason (this is my perception of what I've personally experienced), in (some, most?) traditional aikido schools the breaking of balance, posture, structure whatever you want to call it is performed, but not discussed. I visited a dojo about 20 miles away once and while there watching, I never once heard anyone say anything about kuzushi, posture/structure changing, moving the person to hwere they didn't want to go, nothing.

I grant you, the upper rank couple of guys were "doing" it, and their stuff seemed OK, but the students were trying to mimic and not understanding what they were seeing. I asked the jr. instructor who was sitting and talking with me how long the guys out teaching had been in aikido, and he told me 12 and 15 years respectively. Then, a big fall off to the student base, as the next ... eldest student had been there about 6 years. The guy next to me had been there about 8. I sat and watched and discussed the entire class with him, getting more and more technical. He finally asked me who I was, so I told him. Nice guy. He smiled, "Oh, you're that guy. We've heard about you." Which, I didn't know how to take, but it did sort of let him to know the next question.... "Well, how long have you..." etc. etc.

You can walk over and pick someone up, and drop them. If you have the strength to do so, you can tilt them so that they won't land on their feet when you drop them, and I suppose that, technically, that is a throw. Trying to do that to someone who is not interested in complying with the effort is the trick. Unless I'm able to get kuzushi, in one of its myriad forms, I won't be able to throw them. That simple. In what I teach, right after "Get your hands up and get out of the way," it's the next talked about thing.
 

Gerry Seymour

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When I first ran across it, the absence of fundamental understanding of what they were literally doing when things "worked," it struck me as odd, too. For some reason (this is my perception of what I've personally experienced), in (some, most?) traditional aikido schools the breaking of balance, posture, structure whatever you want to call it is performed, but not discussed. I visited a dojo about 20 miles away once and while there watching, I never once heard anyone say anything about kuzushi, posture/structure changing, moving the person to hwere they didn't want to go, nothing.

I grant you, the upper rank couple of guys were "doing" it, and their stuff seemed OK, but the students were trying to mimic and not understanding what they were seeing. I asked the jr. instructor who was sitting and talking with me how long the guys out teaching had been in aikido, and he told me 12 and 15 years respectively. Then, a big fall off to the student base, as the next ... eldest student had been there about 6 years. The guy next to me had been there about 8. I sat and watched and discussed the entire class with him, getting more and more technical. He finally asked me who I was, so I told him. Nice guy. He smiled, "Oh, you're that guy. We've heard about you." Which, I didn't know how to take, but it did sort of let him to know the next question.... "Well, how long have you..." etc. etc.

You can walk over and pick someone up, and drop them. If you have the strength to do so, you can tilt them so that they won't land on their feet when you drop them, and I suppose that, technically, that is a throw. Trying to do that to someone who is not interested in complying with the effort is the trick. Unless I'm able to get kuzushi, in one of its myriad forms, I won't be able to throw them. That simple. In what I teach, right after "Get your hands up and get out of the way," it's the next talked about thing.
Agreed. As I think back to classes I've watched or participated in while visiting schools, and seminars I've attended, I don't recall a specific discussion of the concept. I recall seeing some good kuzushi. I recall seeing (and feeling) some students struggling because they weren't doing it. I now know what I'd focus on if I were doing a seminar for Aikido folks.
 

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Same page. Same book.

As stated elsewhere, I don't want to eat much of any strike. I like to just slip a bomb, too, makes for easy entry (granted you don't F it up and end up eating the thing) and enter for the grapple-game, starting with standing as my judo standing game is way better than my BJJ. I usually just do judo on the ground too. Judoka can do cool things with arms, too. But, I digress.

If the bomb is coming in, I'm moving. Granted, with everything I've done, movement is key so I'm (trying to) always moving. Getting completely out o the way, i.e. El Toro! doesn't really happen much with a skilled guy, but "more than a bit" happens easily and all the time.

Convert my above tactical to this. Guy throws left jab, followed by straight right, for which he's got to slide a bit forward to get the right to you. You use head evasion as everyone does , combined with hand guard to keep the jab off your head, but you use some kind of inside-out block with your right arm to block the straight. This turns the guy.... and the exact same hole is created over his right shoulder to his chin/face/head and you drop your left in/on it. Same thing. And, guess what, you didn't get off his line, you changed his line to go past you. To me, still aikido.

Most people don't agree with my idea of "aikido" by the way. Sometimes, I don't myself. It's actually more of a judo principle, "maximum effect from minimum effort.
Your discussion of what is and isn't "aikido" is similar to mine. There are times I contradict myself, because there are things that aren't "ideal aikido" to me, but fit with a broader interpretation of aiki principles. A jamming block into something is an example of the latter. There's not much "aiki" in a jamming block, but sometimes it's still the right choice, and more often it's what you're doing so you don't really have a choice. Fighting against that occurrence and trying to make it "aikido" isn't very "aiki" to me. And that latter statement is confusing and clarifying to me, all at the same time.
 

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When I first ran across it, the absence of fundamental understanding of what they were literally doing when things "worked," it struck me as odd, too. For some reason (this is my perception of what I've personally experienced), in (some, most?) traditional aikido schools the breaking of balance, posture, structure whatever you want to call it is performed, but not discussed. I visited a dojo about 20 miles away once and while there watching, I never once heard anyone say anything about kuzushi, posture/structure changing, moving the person to hwere they didn't want to go, nothing.

I grant you, the upper rank couple of guys were "doing" it, and their stuff seemed OK, but the students were trying to mimic and not understanding what they were seeing. I asked the jr. instructor who was sitting and talking with me how long the guys out teaching had been in aikido, and he told me 12 and 15 years respectively. Then, a big fall off to the student base, as the next ... eldest student had been there about 6 years. The guy next to me had been there about 8. I sat and watched and discussed the entire class with him, getting more and more technical. He finally asked me who I was, so I told him. Nice guy. He smiled, "Oh, you're that guy. We've heard about you." Which, I didn't know how to take, but it did sort of let him to know the next question.... "Well, how long have you..." etc. etc.

You can walk over and pick someone up, and drop them. If you have the strength to do so, you can tilt them so that they won't land on their feet when you drop them, and I suppose that, technically, that is a throw. Trying to do that to someone who is not interested in complying with the effort is the trick. Unless I'm able to get kuzushi, in one of its myriad forms, I won't be able to throw them. That simple. In what I teach, right after "Get your hands up and get out of the way," it's the next talked about thing.

Can't speak for all Aikido dojos but we talk about structure, kuzushi, and breaking structure all the time. Our head Sensei spends a great deal of time talking about this. Not so much for beginners, but definitely for 4th kyu and up.....really starts exploring smaller movements, and disrupting someone's balance and structure in order to effect techniques.
 

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Your discussion of what is and isn't "aikido" is similar to mine. There are times I contradict myself, because there are things that aren't "ideal aikido" to me, but fit with a broader interpretation of aiki principles. A jamming block into something is an example of the latter. There's not much "aiki" in a jamming block, but sometimes it's still the right choice, and more often it's what you're doing so you don't really have a choice. Fighting against that occurrence and trying to make it "aikido" isn't very "aiki" to me. And that latter statement is confusing and clarifying to me, all at the same time.
What you said.

One of my instructor folks, a judo-aikido-arnis lady named Carla Martin, trained with Hiroaki (Riki) Kogure, long time student of Tomiki's. They'd do randori here at Karl Geis' place back in the 80s, and there were strikes and foot sweeps all the time. Carla told me that it was a rare class that she'd leave without a bloody nose from him, as he was trying to drive the woman off of the mat as martial arts were for men only. To her credit, she's a very tough lady and it only made her more determined.

Anyway, in class Sensei Kogure would perform a technique, always talking about first kuzushi, at which point he'd do a hand strike or foot sweep, and then the aikido technique would flow from that.

And, since I'm assuming that Riki paid attention to what Tomiki did and said, and likewise with Tomiki to O-Sensei Ueshiba.. I can only conclude that to drop a strike on someone, while perhaps not being "aiki" is still "aikido."

That's another thing. It is WAY easier to double foot sweep a guy whose eyes are watering from a jab that caught him in the nose than one who just took it on the forehead.
 

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I don't think of this as an "either-or" situation. I move and get hands up. If the movement gets me what I want (I end up in a usable position against an over-extension), the fight is over. If not, it's the hands' job to keep things under control (or end it if a big strike opening shows up). Hands don't move far from the face except to take structure, which (mostly) eliminates the openings for a fight-ending strike.

Show me what you mean by not far from the face.

I mean I can find some positions where you are gonna have a bad day if you actually tried that stuff.

 

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Can't speak for all Aikido dojos but we talk about structure, kuzushi, and breaking structure all the time. Our head Sensei spends a great deal of time talking about this. Not so much for beginners, but definitely for 4th kyu and up.....really starts exploring smaller movements, and disrupting someone's balance and structure in order to effect techniques.
Excellent. To my way of thinking, the other lines of aikido will get the kuzushi part in their own art, eventually. It's just that it ought to be specifically discussed, and "put out there" so that people can be thinking about it as the initial goal - then techniques can happen.

Much better than trying to snap a moving wrist out of thin air from someone who doesn't want it caught. That's akin to trying to catch a fly with chopsticks. It is possible to do... but it might be pretty hard.
 

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Show me what you mean by not far from the face.

I mean I can find some positions where you are gonna have a bad day if you actually tried that stuff.

Of course you can find positions that can defeat other positions, Drop. Are you trying to say that the way that you hold your hands in guard is impervious and impossible to penetrate? I'd bet not, you've got too much good sense for that.

Hands held high, close to the face, closed so as to protect the fingers... leaves the body more open than it would with a lower hand position. But, then you trade-off, by lowering the hands, a much higher probability to get popped in the grape. Vice-versa. There are no perfect attacks, no perfect defenses. It's a rapid, 3-dimensional chess game and He wins who can make the other guy make the first mistake. In the above I'm somehow doubting that Gerry is going to stand still while you change your position to take advantage of his.
 

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When you are in your opponent's front door (between his arms), you have to deal with both of his arms.

In the 1st clip, he only deal with his opponent's left arm.


In the 2nd clip, he deals with both of his opponent's arms.

 

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Of course you can find positions that can defeat other positions, Drop. Are you trying to say that the way that you hold your hands in guard is impervious and impossible to penetrate? I'd bet not, you've got too much good sense for that.

Hands held high, close to the face, closed so as to protect the fingers... leaves the body more open than it would with a lower hand position. But, then you trade-off, by lowering the hands, a much higher probability to get popped in the grape. Vice-versa. There are no perfect attacks, no perfect defenses. It's a rapid, 3-dimensional chess game and He wins who can make the other guy make the first mistake. In the above I'm somehow doubting that Gerry is going to stand still while you change your position to take advantage of his.

There are movements that are inherently more risky. Like that video I posed.

The argument isnt whether anyone has a perfect guard. It is whether you can engage without compromising your saftey.

Specifically whether it is an either or situation.

That video would be an either or.

There is a lot of misconception about how much time you have to do stuff in a fight. Which references back to your idea of a rapid 2 dimentional chess game.
 

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Show me what you mean by not far from the face.

I mean I can find some positions where you are gonna have a bad day if you actually tried that stuff.

You'd probably keep your hands closer to your face than I do, as a general rule. I keep my hands closer to my face than this guy does, as a general rule. There are definitely positions where you are open to a second strike, and those should only be used when you're out of range of a second strike or have eliminated (by structure) his ability to deliver it. The video shows a position that should only be used if you've covered those bases. If you use it on a strike without that, the other hand is probably going to end you.

The better the other guy is at pressuring, the closer my hands will stay to my face. For someone just trying to put in an all-or-nothing punch, I'd prefer my hands further away from my face (because they may move on contact), my weight moving either directly into the path (as a jam) or off-line (to diffuse).
 

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Excellent. To my way of thinking, the other lines of aikido will get the kuzushi part in their own art, eventually. It's just that it ought to be specifically discussed, and "put out there" so that people can be thinking about it as the initial goal - then techniques can happen.

Much better than trying to snap a moving wrist out of thin air from someone who doesn't want it caught. That's akin to trying to catch a fly with chopsticks. It is possible to do... but it might be pretty hard.
Agreed. In fact, I teach my students that, early on, the techniques aren't even the point. Kuzushi/taking structure is the point. If we get halfway in and the technique fails, but we've done our job well at the beginning, there are lots of openings for striking and other techniques. If we get halfway in and the technique fails, but we've skipped the first job (taking structure), we're hosed.
 

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no perfect defenses.
The perfect defense is to

- put your fists as close to your opponent's face as possible.
- not giving him enough space to generate his fast and powerful punch.
- interrupt his attack in the initial stage.
- separate his arm away from his head and body.
- ...

The question is "how to achieve that?"
 

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You'd probably keep your hands closer to your face than I do, as a general rule. I keep my hands closer to my face than this guy does, as a general rule. There are definitely positions where you are open to a second strike, and those should only be used when you're out of range of a second strike or have eliminated (by structure) his ability to deliver it. The video shows a position that should only be used if you've covered those bases. If you use it on a strike without that, the other hand is probably going to end you.

The better the other guy is at pressuring, the closer my hands will stay to my face. For someone just trying to put in an all-or-nothing punch, I'd prefer my hands further away from my face (because they may move on contact), my weight moving either directly into the path (as a jam) or off-line (to diffuse).

I Am trying to think how I would make that work. Maby an answer the phone block straight after?
 

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