There are some on this forum that have expressed the view that sequential movements in kata may not be effective. And these folks have plenty of good reason to believe this. There is a remarkable amount ineffective bunkai practiced today that is based on sequential movements. So if there is so much that is ineffective, why would I, and hundreds of people who have trained with me, recognize that sequential combinations make up hundreds of remarkably effective applications. It is a great question.
First, let's discuss "bad" bunkai. It is my opinion that the reason most bunkai is ineffective is that it is based on fundamentally flawed ideas about what is typically needed to subdue a much larger, aggressive, motivated attacker. If you don't understand what is your sequential movements from kata are unlikely to be effective. If, however, you have a more realistic understanding of what is needed to subdue a larger opponent, and then you look to the sequential kata movements for answers, then you will find kata is filled with a nearly inexhaustible supply of effective applications.
It is my opinion that the fundamental problem with the way many karate systems approach self defense is that it is built around the notion of ikken hisatsu (one strike, certain death). A much larger opponent launches a crushing right hook to your head. You block, counter with a reverse punch to his solar plexus, and the fight is over.
Let's consider this further. First, in the attack above, (the opponent twisting on a strike) it is my contention that the solar plexus is a very difficult target to hit. And if missed, the surrounding targets don't have much value, at least on an opponent much heavier than you. (pectorals, rib cage/breast bone, abdominal muscles.). So against a good number of natural strikes (those that attempt to bring the body mass into play by twisting), the target is not all that easy to hit. It is generally covered, so when moving, there is a bit of guesswork in locating it. A moving covered target.
Poor target selection is the first issue. But this isn't the real problem. For many in non-karate martial arts, the reliance of a single counter to drop a much bigger opponent is simply not an effective approach. Muay Thai certainly doesn't buy into this. Some PMA systems don't rely on a single counter. And plenty of Chinese systems respond with more of an overwhelming barrage than a single strike.
From a pure physiological perspective, dropping a much larger opponent with a single strike is a remarkably difficult thing to do. Can masters with many years of training do this? There are many that can. Can we lesser mortals who have work-a-day jobs and families, and students to teach, and many karate combinations to master, (and lots of other things in our busy lives) ever truly hope of getting there. I speak for myself and most of the vast community I have trained with. It is highly unlikely.
How important from a self defense perspective, is it to develop "ikken hisatsu" power? I would argue that the kata give you an abundant toolset that can enable you to finish off an opponent, but not with one single strike while he is standing. As I have pointed out in other posts, the best place to deliver killing power is when you are standing and your opponent is on the ground. If the strike or stomp goes to his head, the head can't bob back as it does when the attacker is standing. On the ground, the target much more fully absorbs the energy of the impact, causing more extensive damage. And instead of the larger attacker having an advantage in mass when he is standing, you now have the advantage in mass. You can bring your hundred or hundred-fifty plus pounds directly down to a vital zone that will absorb much of the energy.
So how does the opponent get on he ground? He must be thrown or swept. And how do you get an unwilling opponent to let you throw him? You typically have to counter (strike/kick) two to three times to stun him long enough to do the throw. And how do you stun him? You have to attack vital zones. And are there mechanisms to expose difficult to reach vital zones, such as the head on neck on a taller person, or the back of the neck on an attacker? Yes, there are a variety of locks, as well as knee and groin kicks that bring vital zones into your zone of power (in front of your own abdomen).
So I start with the primary assumption that we want to put the opponent on the ground, and that it might take several counters, as well as joint locks to set up the throw.
Is it always necessary to put an opponent on the ground to finish him, Absolutely not, and I have an example below that might finish the attacker before he put on the ground. However, there is another critical reason why we want to put the person on the ground. Against multiple attackers, we want to throw the opponent in the path of another attacker. This is the reason that of the 200 techniques I have developed, all include takedowns.
Back to the initial question that started this thread: the surprising amount of bunkai that is "bad" or ineffective. The important questions are the following. How common is it for systems/students to use only a single (or two) counter strike(s)? And how common is it to follow up with further techniques including takedowns? The unfortunate answer is that much bunkai employs but a single counter.
So let's assume that good fighting techniques don't rely on a single counter strike. They rely on a series of counters. And in many cases, the opponent will be thrown to the ground where, despite their greater mass, he can be at a great disadvantage, and not just to finishing strikes and kicks. In the case of a lone attacker, where the risk of the defender going to the ground is much less, there are scores of submission locks and chokes.
An underlying assumption of much of the good bunkai practiced today is that against a large opponent aggressively striking, the response of a single strike counter is not effective. Best to put the big guy on the ground where his mass is not an advantage. If not that, then best to utilize locking techniques that can bring hard to reach vital targets into your zone of power. In comparison, bad bunkai often relies on a single strike, perhaps two, or maybe a kick-strike combination. There is no follow up.
How have we gotten here? How has the rich Okinawan fighting art "lost its teeth"? I will argue that the answer is really very simple. Let me first state that this is complete conjecture on my behalf, and so I am making the disclaimer that I have no written evidence of this, and I have never been taught it. It is based on several assumptions that I will describe below.
One factor that has influenced my thinking on this is what I believe is a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose of turns. In system after system, the ikken hisatsu method works as follows. In the kata, you turn to face an opponent, you execute a brief block/strike combination, and you proceed to the next opponent who you must turn to face. If the ONLY reason for a turn is to face another opponent, then the only thing you have in your arsenal are the movements in a given direction. Therefore, I view the primary reason why so many systems practice bad bunkai based on sequential movements is that they use turns ONLY for facing an opponent. That completely restricts their kata movements to those in a single direction. I call this the "unidirectional" approach to kata. As I will show below, it is not only generally ineffective, but in some cases, it is meaningless, as there are just not enough movements in a direction to have any meaningful response.
Let's look at what the unidirectional approach gives us in Pinan Shodan. I will describe the motions in each direction. The first will be assumed to be a block (against a right or left head strike), or also against a kick (last two directions.) The movements to the back (block/kick/strike, block/kick/strike, supported block) will, for this analysis, be assumed to be three sequences, not one. Many systems practice them that way.
1st direction - block, two arm movements
2nd direction - (mirror image) block, two arm movements
3rd direction - block, one kick
4th direction - block, three arm movements, one each while stepping forward three times
5th direction - block, one arm movement stepping forward
6th direction - (mirror image) block, one arm movement stepping forward
7th direction - block, one kick, one arm movement
7th direction (sequence 2) - (mirror image) block, one kick, one arm movement
7th direction (sequence 3) - by one arm movement stepping forward
8th direction - block, one arm movement moving forward
9th direction - (mirror image) block, one arm movement stepping forward
For those that practice the "unidirectional" approach, since they only can make use of the movements from a particular direction, ikken hisatsu is pretty much the only alternative. Of these 10 combinations, six have a single follow up movement that could be a counter. Four have two follow up motions that could be used as counters, and one has three follow up motions that could be considered counters. And a number of systems have bunkai to the first two directions where the second arm movement is a second block, so therefore, they also rely on a single strike, a hammerfist to the neck. Which gives us 8 single counter strike responses, two kick-strike responses, and one longer response to the front. Bunkai for this longer combination to the front often involves an attacker stepping backwards while striking, something I would call a very low probability attack. To see some Shotokan single strike (and kick-strike) interpretations of the movements described above, you can view Heian Nidan videos at : (
http://user.netomia.com/srsi/jm2.html). Some of these applications do have takedowns, which is not that common in a lot of Shotokan bunkai.
If we agree to the assumption that the single (and in many cases, double) responses may not be enough to drop the large attacker, how can we respond effectively to the attack.. The obvious answer is that we can add more techniques. The initial direction is viewed as just that, an INITIAL sequence, to be followed up with more techniques. Many systems do just this. One common approach is the practice of bunkai oyo, which adds follow ups including more counters, locks and throws. Much of the bunkai oyo I have seen is independent of any kata. It is a "blank slate" approach in that the followup techniques are not generally fixed but come from the repertoire of skills of the practitioner. There are lots of ways to take a person down or lock a joint, and anything is game. If a throw is involved, there is often a follow up with a finishing strike to the person on the ground.
In this forum, there has been much discussion regarding a different approach to bunkai oyo Here, additional techniques come directly from the kata, but again, are to some extent up to the student.
The bunkai oyo approach is superb approach to the issue of follow-up techniques needed after the initial counter. It opens up the attacker to a wide range of counters. But one challenge, especially for beginners, or those new to the intricacies of locking and throwing, is a lack of techniques to use. This, in my view, is the fundamental problem with karate today. The grappling has been left out in many schools. Students aren't taught joint locks, and pressure point strikes and throws. They are not taught to kick to the groin and strike to the neck. These techniques are not trivial and as any good student of Judo, Aikido or Ju Jitsu, these these grappling techniques have many, many not-so-trivial-to-master details that take years before they are effective.
This is a tiny scratch of the surface of basic grappling ideas that are all but absent in so many karate dojos today. And without these basics, the students are hamstrung. Unless they cross train in grappling systems, they don't have the tools to effectively analyze the rich technique in kata. But there is a way, that with a few basic principles any student can discover for himself great grappling techniques within the kata, and that is simply through a careful analysis of the movements that come from sequential directions in kata.
This is an alternative to the bunkai oyo approach. It simply uses the movements of the next direction in the kata to continue the combination against the attacker. I have done this 200 times and the results are convincing. The second direction (and sometimes the third) work with the initial directions as an integrated unit. I have much to say on this later.
I am somewhat surprised that when karateka look for additional technique to complete a unidirectional kata sequence, that such an obvious source is so rarely considered. It is the very next direction, and it is a vast untapped resource. The whole question that started this thread is such a good one. For follow-up to an initial directional sequence, how many systems look to following directional sequences for the follow-up movements needed to get the opponent on the ground. I have looked extensively and although I have found a couple of bunkai-oriented schools with an application or two, there are very few schools that make much use, if any, of the next direction for follow-up
Since I have documented so many brilliant combinations that are predicated on the multiple-direction approach, it is rather surprising to me that so many great karateka don't consider this deep reservoir of technique. (They are brilliant not because I have created them. They are brilliant because they are so incredibly elegant. I use that term in the engineering perspective of a solution that does much with little, or with great simplicity.) And after finding 200 of these follow-ups, all with takedowns, I am thoroughly convinced that the kata must have been designed with them in mind. It is simply a coincidence on too massive a scale that mere chance would have included all these effective follow-up strikes locks and throws that flow from a multidirectional approach to bunkai analysis.
I have two examples, that follow (just one percent of what I know is there). To help the reader to understand why I believe the multidirectional approach is a proper way to analyze kata. I will compare two kata sequences from both a multidirectional and a unidirectional "ikken hisatsu" interpretation.
In the first, I will describe the technique carefully and discuss the need to do the striking on a bag. It is my deepfelt conviction that for a person to appreciate the effectiveness of a complex striking sequence, they need to hit a resistive object (makiwara, wall-mounted pad, or heavy bag.) To make a complex combination work a person must hit the bag thousands of times. But just to accept whether it works, you need to hit the bag to feel if it is effective. For locking and throwing techniques, you have to do it on partners, preferably much larger ones if you can find them. Again, we are talking about massive repetition, perhaps hundreds of times. So as I describe my initial technique, I describe the need do the strikes against a heavy bag. (Shields or pads can be a substitute, but a bag is best.)
Let's imagine an attacker, not more than 4 or 5 inches taller than us, is striking with a powerful right hook to our head. (For argument's sake his right foot is forward. And our feet are in the ready stance that begins a kata, or equidistant from the attacker.) Now most of us are right handed, and despite our years of balanced makiwara and bag work, most of us have the preference of blasting him back with our right hand. Now imagine we are in close (a hook means he is in close.) Let's leave aside the block for just a moment, so for argument's sake assume we successfully blocked. You are in very close and now crank hard to your left and plant an elbow in his neck. If it lands, most of us would agree that there is not a much better initial counter, because, at least for us right-handed folks, an elbow coupled to a big twist is enormously powerful and the neck is loaded with good targets. There are an abundance of nerves and blood vessels relatively unprotected by muscle. If this is a good counter, and I believe many of you would believe that to be the case, we should do it on the bag many thousands of times, after which, it gets really effective.
Why is this technique so powerful. It comes from body rotation. But after completing the pivot, I am in a less advantageous position. So I want to hit him again, and need to rotate back to my right. This is the way boxers both train on the heavy bag, and hit in the ring. They use their body rotations side to side. Now instead of hitting with my left on the second strike, I am going to hit again with my right. A shuto with my right hand to the other side of his neck. Again, I want to practice this combination against the bag thousands of times, back and forth, until my pectoral muscle (supporting the elbow) and outside of my arm/deltoid (supporting the shuto) are conditioned to keep the elbow and arm in place relative to the body. Once you start hitting the bag, you immediately realize how ineffective the shuto can be if it isn't coupled to a pivot of the body. But practice against the bag enough, and you learn to link your arm to your torso, so that you can strike with great force, but with essentially no arm movement at all. Twist left, right elbow, twist right, right shuto. You use your body to generate power, back and forth on the bag.
Now imagine that these two actually connect. Unless the attacker outweighs you by 100 lbs, or has a massive neck, this is likely to daze him. And that is all you are looking for, as it gives you the opportunity to set up the finishing strike. To do that we are going to use an arm bar to weaken his stance, and then another arm bar to set up the finish. Remember this hook had the right foot forward, and therefore his stance is strong to his right (your left) and weak to his left, your right.
But before we do the lock that will bring his head down, we have to understand the simple block that we skipped over before. Go to the bag and practice it. Raise your left hand to your right ear, palm to the head. Go to the bag and rotate as hard to your left as possible, striking the bag with your left forearm, and WITHOUT moving your left arm more that six inches relative to your body. Smash the bag over and over with the flat top of your forearm (radius/ulna combined) using just your counterclockwise turn to the left for power. Even if it initially feels relatively weak, it is amazing how much just 100 strikes to the bag (all with the body) lets your body know which muscles need to be flexed to hold your arm firm as you deliver your body mass to the bag. In actual application, the left hand will extend slightly on the block, but to learn how to leverage the mass of the body it is simple. Raise the left to the opposite temple, rotate to the left, and hit the bag as hard as possible with no or minimal arm movement.
Remember you have your feet in the ready stance of the kata, which in many Okinawan systems have the toes out, relative to the heels, which are shoulder width. You will pivot on the ball of your right foot, which moves the heel to your right about 18". You then shift your weight almost completely to the right leg, sitting back a bit, while blocking. By shifting your weight to directly over your right leg, you pull your head further off the line of attack. And since this is a hooking strike, it tends to follow you on your path. But your block, which leverages your body mass, effectively intercepts this powerful strike and requires minimal hand movement after raising the left hand to the right temple. The right leg is slightly bent, because it has to spring into the next technique. (The shorter the attacker, the more bent the back leg can be. Your elbow has to reach his neck, so if his is 6" taller and you drop 6" into your stance, you have just about put yourself out of range.) A summary of the turn. The twist, 90 degrees to the left, first gets your head off the line of attack by pivoting the heel out and sitting back on the right leg.). The rotation also adds power to both the left block and right elbow to the neck which are simultaneous. Remember the left block begins against the attacker in front of you, by passing past your right temple. Then both the block, as well as the simultaneous elbow benefit from this pivot to your left.
Once you have fully rotated, (and blocked and countered), you are poised to do your second counter, with the reverse rotation, and here you will do two things at once. You have your left forearm in contact with his hooking forearm. In addition to striking his neck with your right shuto, you are also going to simultaneously attack his striking arm with an arm bar using your left arm. You are going to wrap it and pin it to your neck. All you need is to drop your left hand far enough down so it clears his right arm (no more than a foot). Your pivot to the right (right strike to the neck and arm bar) will be preceded by a shift of weight from your right leg to your left, which brings your center of gravity under his striking arm. The bent right leg in the first stance helps you to spring into this shift of the weight. You need to shift your weight towards the attacking arm because the arm bar is most effective with your hara (center of gravity) directly under it.
During the twist to your right you will raise your left elbow up and use upper part of your left arm to trap his forearm against your neck.. The left hand which raps up over the top ends up around your own temple. The crook of your elbow his upper arm, or perhaps just around the elbow. The closer to the elbow the better. If the attacking arm is very bent to start with (it was a hook), you need to make the wrap more of a strike of your forearm (and crook of your elbow) against his elbow, pulling his arm hard against your own neck, which ensures it is straight so the arm bar can continue. The power for this lock comes from the hard rotation to the right., which also generates power for the right strike to the neck. The strike to the neck is a strike, followed by an extension of the arm which is a push. With his right arm locked, a push to the neck causes the head to drop down perhaps a foot on a large attacker, (more on a smaller person).
Now you will attack the weak point in his stance, his left side. You will drive your left foot forward, in a deep stance and take advantage of his bend to your right by driving your left hammerfist/ulna, which is wrapped over his arm, down hard into the juncture between his shoulder and his triceps. This will cause the body to flatten out and break the continuous body-arm plane. You will use your weight which is dropping down into this front stance to do this. Once you feel the shoulder/arm plane weaken, (the arm bends upward, relative to his body, which is flat), you can continue with your right hand. Your right forearm is going to rake the triceps tendon, pinning it to your chest. Remember, you need to hit that shoulder joint hard on a big guy to get this to work. Your right ulna is striking, raking, and squeezing his elbow to your torso, leveraging your rotation to the left. Your left hand maintains pressure at the deltoid/triceps connection.
Remember you have a left foot forward. You have used this lock to expose a vital target, the back of his neck, but it is out of reach. You are going to step forward again (right foot), driving your right leg under his head. (Against a smaller opponent, you can usually drive your knee right into the side of his head. But against a taller one, it generally slips right under.) The counter is immediate. The right arm (but not the left) releases the lock on the elbow, and then in you raise your right hand straight up, before dropping your right elbow (and some weight) directly down on the back of his neck. His head can't drop, at least not more than a few inches, because it is on, or slightly above your right thigh.
Let's review what we have. A strong turn to your left to generate power for the block and elbow strike, and shift off the line to sidestep the strike (tai sabaki or body shifting). Then a strong turn to the right to generate power for the right strike to the neck and the armbar. A drop of the weight coming forward with the left foot for a very effective arm bar using both your arms to attack two different points on the arm after the opponents' stance has already been weakened. Finally, a finishing technique with one more stance coming forward.
Pivot left, pivot right, step to the front (long) step to the front (medium to long). Two seconds no problem.
We're not done. You have hit him three times. One or more may have missed. You have taken all the time you can with this opponent, as your two seconds are up. That is about all we can allow ourselves before assuming a second attacker has launched from behind. So you have to protect your flanks, as well as get this guy to the ground if you haven't finished him. You need a takedown. You still have his arm against your chest. You will do four things simultaneously. First, for a great number of throws you want to move your hara up against the where the throw is occurring. So here you bring your left foot (back) up to your right. At the same time, you pivot hard clockwise (to your right) nearly 180 degrees. At the same time, the right hand, after completing the elbow attacks the neck further by pushing down and pulling in towards you, with a ridge hand. This is a vigorous pull in towards you. Lastly, your left hand, while continuing the pin of the opponent's right arm, grab the crook of his elbow (grabbing the forearm works in many cases) and drive it out directly opposite the angle your right hand is pulling towards you. Just like as strike you push and with one hand and pull directly back with the other.
This takedown inserts him in the path of an attacker from the back right. The first four movements are nearly precisely the opening four movements in Pinan Yondan. (The last strike with the elbow is a very modified outside block with a huge arc that gets the arm straight up in front of you just before the downward strike of the elbow, but the end position is just about the same.) The fifth step for the takedown doesn't include a rotation in the kata, but the hand moments and final stance are very similar.
You can see a good version of Pinan Yondan by downloading Pinan IV from the Copenhagen Matsubayashi site. (
http://www.shorinryu.dk/html/indexe.htm). The only real differences are the trajectory of the initial block, and the second counter strike, which is a mirror image of the initial block. (as well as the big spin on the takedown, noted above). In virtually all systems the block is lower (to protect the solar plexus, perhaps), and it has a more abbreviated path directed to the direction of the turn. But it is a very minor modification to extend the circular hand motion so that your left hand passes your right temple on its path to the final position. (And the same in the turn to the right).
Please note the direction of the right elbow in Matsubayashi Shorin Ryu. Like Kobayashi, and Shobayashi, it points forward, an obvious counter strike. Many other systems (e.g. Shotokan and it's derivatives Wado Ryu and Kyokushin, Shito Ryu, the Toyama derivatives of Shudokan and Koeikan, and at least some Nakamura derivatives, and the Hohan Soken derivatives) have the right elbow pointing not forward but pulled far back towards the defenders right ear. This position "hides" the elbow strike to the front. You can see this in the Shotokan version (Heian Yondan) at: (
http://www.ctr.usf.edu/shotokan/kata.html) Also note the slow, deliberate opening hand movements, pretty unique to Shotokan. Perhaps more hiding? Who knows.
Let's compare this multidirectional approach to bunkai with the unidirectional approach in the ikken hisatsu community. There is a big hole here. In the "traditional" method of turning to face your opponent, he is not in front of you, but directly to your side. He steps in to strike, and you pivot 90 degrees to face him and block with your left shuto raising your right hand, palm out to just next to your right temple. There is no tai sabaki, as you don't step off the line of attack. You don't get near as much power in the block from this twist, as compared with an attack from the front. And with this simple movement, you're done. The technique is over because the next move in the kata turns to the right with a mirror image of the technique to the left.
As a result, many systems have had to add some bunkai oyo to make this work. One approach in a few systems is to use the right raised hand to strike out with a shuto to the opponent's head. One approach is to use this movement to escape a variety of grabs (I do this too and there are plenty of ideas.) But for many systems, the unidirectional approach often means they ignore this movement in kata and don't practice bunkai for it.
This opening pattern is repeated in the openings of both Kusanku/Kanku Dai and Sho, (minus the initial movements to the front of Kusanku Dai) as well as Matsukaze/Wankan. The hand motions are slightly different but there is a block to one side, then a mirror image block to the other. These all can be seen at: : (
http://www.ctr.usf.edu/shotokan/kata.html)
Still, good analogy.
) and taking legal action or playing it safe, giving the students a good "workout". 
