Hi there,
I currently train in Xingyi, Mizong and Taiji. However, between the age of 15 and 23 I also learned something called Ryukai kenpo from a fellow named Rick Delaney in in Toronto.
I know virtually nothing about this art's provenance. Delaney claimed it was Okinawan; it has 3 recognizably Okinawan katas along with a version of Seisan that does not resemble anything else, and a kata called Kennin/Genin (more about this in a second). Classes were outdoors or at his home. He never charged any money except for a one time request to borrow 40 bucks to put down rent in a house big enough for us to train in.
Delaney did not know who his teacher was before he was taught by a person named Noriyuki Tanaka. I researched city archives in Toronto's Metro Hall in the early 90s and determined that a Noriyuki Tanaka did in fact live in the area Delaney claimed. According to Rick, Tanaka passed away in 1987 after a brief illness.
Rick was a talented martial artist, but I was prepared to write the whole thing off as his invention due to the unsystematic training style and the fact that he openly used texts from other arts as teaching aids. However, Tanaka aside, I've researched a few things that seem to indicate he learned *something* -- I just don't know what it was. For instance, he referred to the initial kata as "Genin" in his writings. He translated it as "perseverence." Looking it up, the Romanji is actually "Kennin." As Rick did not speak or read Japanese, this means that he acquired this information orally.
There were no belts and no real order to the techniques outside of general categories until something he called the Seigan or "petitioning" stage. This was the only test he required, which consisted of an oral examination, kata performance and full speed and power defenses against multiple attackers. He let us know that he considered this to be acquiring the equivalent of a shodan. After this point, he encouraged us to study other arts. He particularly reccomended American Kenpo and Hapkido as being similar arts (AK for movement, Hapkido for power generation). Some odd traditional skills were taught in a peicemeal basis, such as escaping from bonds
Ryukai is effective; I've won fights with it and have matched shodans in a couple of other arts when it came to controlled sparring. The system is structured around "five sets of five," which are supposed to contain all of the technical knowledge necessary:
1) Five Techniques: Upper, Lower, Inner, Outer and Crossing
2) Five Elements/Movements: Earth (Set Sannce), Air (Slip), Fire (Pivot), Water (Roll), Void (Sidestep)
3) Five Animals: Antelope, Bear, Tiger, Panther, Crane
4) Five Requirements: Proper Posture, Torque/Flow, Breathing, Gaze and Timing
5) Five Energies: Linear, Coiling, Circular, Spiral and Formless.
The curriculum also included bo, jo, tonfa, chain, kama, sai and nunchaku. Rick did demonstrate skill with a bo and jo, particularly with entangling and grappling. The art supposedly had 5 katas: Kennin, Seisan, Naihanchi, Bassai and Empi, along with something called Eiki-Gainen, which was a moving meditation/throwing set. I know Kennin, Seisan, Naihanchi and Eiki-Gainen. I started Bassai (which matches up to orthodox versions) but didn;t get a chance to finish it, as I moved out of town.
I have not trained in it in a regular basis in 6 years or so, but now that I'm back in martial arts I'm curious again. In 1998 I emailed the Tracy's website contact email asking for help (the site said they would help trace people's kenpo lineages), but I heard nothing back from them.
My current thinking is that Rick Delaney did train with someone in a Japanese art in an extremely informal fashion for perhaps 6 years, and that a process of "broken telephone" between himself and his instructor (and later, us) led to where I am now.
I would be interested to hear any information or speculation.
I currently train in Xingyi, Mizong and Taiji. However, between the age of 15 and 23 I also learned something called Ryukai kenpo from a fellow named Rick Delaney in in Toronto.
I know virtually nothing about this art's provenance. Delaney claimed it was Okinawan; it has 3 recognizably Okinawan katas along with a version of Seisan that does not resemble anything else, and a kata called Kennin/Genin (more about this in a second). Classes were outdoors or at his home. He never charged any money except for a one time request to borrow 40 bucks to put down rent in a house big enough for us to train in.
Delaney did not know who his teacher was before he was taught by a person named Noriyuki Tanaka. I researched city archives in Toronto's Metro Hall in the early 90s and determined that a Noriyuki Tanaka did in fact live in the area Delaney claimed. According to Rick, Tanaka passed away in 1987 after a brief illness.
Rick was a talented martial artist, but I was prepared to write the whole thing off as his invention due to the unsystematic training style and the fact that he openly used texts from other arts as teaching aids. However, Tanaka aside, I've researched a few things that seem to indicate he learned *something* -- I just don't know what it was. For instance, he referred to the initial kata as "Genin" in his writings. He translated it as "perseverence." Looking it up, the Romanji is actually "Kennin." As Rick did not speak or read Japanese, this means that he acquired this information orally.
There were no belts and no real order to the techniques outside of general categories until something he called the Seigan or "petitioning" stage. This was the only test he required, which consisted of an oral examination, kata performance and full speed and power defenses against multiple attackers. He let us know that he considered this to be acquiring the equivalent of a shodan. After this point, he encouraged us to study other arts. He particularly reccomended American Kenpo and Hapkido as being similar arts (AK for movement, Hapkido for power generation). Some odd traditional skills were taught in a peicemeal basis, such as escaping from bonds
Ryukai is effective; I've won fights with it and have matched shodans in a couple of other arts when it came to controlled sparring. The system is structured around "five sets of five," which are supposed to contain all of the technical knowledge necessary:
1) Five Techniques: Upper, Lower, Inner, Outer and Crossing
2) Five Elements/Movements: Earth (Set Sannce), Air (Slip), Fire (Pivot), Water (Roll), Void (Sidestep)
3) Five Animals: Antelope, Bear, Tiger, Panther, Crane
4) Five Requirements: Proper Posture, Torque/Flow, Breathing, Gaze and Timing
5) Five Energies: Linear, Coiling, Circular, Spiral and Formless.
The curriculum also included bo, jo, tonfa, chain, kama, sai and nunchaku. Rick did demonstrate skill with a bo and jo, particularly with entangling and grappling. The art supposedly had 5 katas: Kennin, Seisan, Naihanchi, Bassai and Empi, along with something called Eiki-Gainen, which was a moving meditation/throwing set. I know Kennin, Seisan, Naihanchi and Eiki-Gainen. I started Bassai (which matches up to orthodox versions) but didn;t get a chance to finish it, as I moved out of town.
I have not trained in it in a regular basis in 6 years or so, but now that I'm back in martial arts I'm curious again. In 1998 I emailed the Tracy's website contact email asking for help (the site said they would help trace people's kenpo lineages), but I heard nothing back from them.
My current thinking is that Rick Delaney did train with someone in a Japanese art in an extremely informal fashion for perhaps 6 years, and that a process of "broken telephone" between himself and his instructor (and later, us) led to where I am now.
I would be interested to hear any information or speculation.