Yamashima sensei video study.

This month Yamashima sensei is coming to West Europe again so I thought it would be nice to study a Youtube video which demonstrates a lot of usefull principles.

The video was shot at a seminar in Germany in 2014.

 

 

What are the principles at work?

 

- At 0:40. Yamashima sensei touches his belt with his free hand to show the use of hara. He uses his hip joint of the back foot. This is similar to the movement of a sword strike where both hip joints are used at the moment of the cut to maximize power. He is also heard to use a short burst of kokyu power.

- At 1:42. Use of whole body power istead of only hand and arm movement.

- At 3:02. "I turn my center". The arm stays in a relaxed but slightly extended state. Similar to the "unbendable arm" excercise.

- At 3:14. Use of whole body power and mainly by usage of "koshi" or hip joints.

- At 4:52. Turn shoulder and hand to connect to hip joints.

- At 5:12. Demonstration of opening and closing movements.

- At 5:54. Connect hip joint to shoulder in hanmi handachi waza.

- At 6:34. Soft connection excercise using palm to palm feeling or "barbarella lead".

- At 8:20 and 8:54. Barely visible. Attacking of center with second hip joint and hand from underneath hara of partner.

- At 9:03. "Figure out how to bring in koshi".

- At 9:53. Yamashima sensei closes the distance between his hara and his partner so technique is more powerful.

- At 10:42. "Enter and attack"

- At 11:00. Once again both hara almost touch due to the movement of Yamashima sensei.

- At 14:04. Correct use of arm in Aikido showed through shomen uchi strike. Whole body strike with minimum folding at the elbow joint.

So use hips, not hands seems to be the leading subject in this clip.

Enjoy practice.

 

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Laziness is good?

Researching Youtube video's I encountered this very interesting clip of Benedetti sensei. Although quite a "long" clip for today's standards there are a lot of Aikido principles to be seen and learned. The aspect I like most about his Aikido would be the use of "lazy" movement. Relaxation used in a way that's very interesting to me.

Few points to study:

- Uses warmup swings in his Aikido practice.

- Walking is used as basics for Aikido, natural movement?

- Small hip movements coordinate with hand movements.

- Hands in the center and use of body axis.

- Upright small stance which I like.

- "You forget walking...". When tori tries to force a technique.

These are just teaching moments from the first 10 minutes of this clip, so enjoy and study...

Stéphane lives in Barcelona and teaches Aikido across Europe. He brings his inimitable Corsican style and his superb understanding of Aikido to every encounter. "Aikido is scientific laziness - and laziness must be very precise, not sloppy!"

Born in 1951, Stéphane Benedetti started judo when he was five and discovered aikido in 1966 under the direction of Asai Katsuaki Shihan during judo training in Germany. The meeting with Nakazono and Tamura Shihan in the same year proved decisive.

Enjoy practice.

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Slow and relaxed?

Aikido practice can be done in multiple ways. Hard and fast, slow, moving, basic etc. Why I enjoy the practice used by Yamashima sensei would be the following:

- Relaxed, not focused on "reality" scenarios.

- Feeling and practicing the movements is done better when moving slow and relaxed.

- Soft touch reveals principles like unbalancing and tension problems in uke and nage.

- Room for experimenting with movements.

- Creativity will enhance during these methods.

- There's no use of pain induced movements, which I think is always based on competition and superiority.

- It's not lacking in substance, although to outside observers it may seem that way.

- Cardiovascular training is done without really thinking about it.

- Internal sensations like hip rotation and hara movements are better felt and studied.

 

Humor, nice practice and softness is shown in the next clip.

 

" It's a lot like Tai Chi". Yamashima sensei in Düsseldorf seminar 2014.

 

 

"Why you study Aikido?" "Enjoy" at 2:02 of the next clip.

 

 

Enjoy practice.

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Hiroshi Ikeda: Foundation.

Ikeda sensei uses small spiral movements of his hips expressed by his hands. The "building" of this body and it's use he calls the foundation. In my view aikido's practice is not to move the partner but let the partner be moved by your own body structure which is balanced, responsive and sensitive. Enjoy this next clip in which he explains training the foundation and the need for different uke's.

 

Enjoy practice.

 

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Jo nage principles.

Aikido throwing techniques done with the jo, or short staff.

 

 

 

 

What are the principles involved?

 

- Relax shoulders.

- Use hips, not arm strength.

- Extend whole body power into the tip of the jo.

- Use on/off principle in dealing with resistance.

- Use leverage and free movement of the whole jo.

- Feel!

- Move around point of contact with jo or body movement.

 

Jo nage is a training tool which I think is not practiced enough to explain and get used to Aikido's main principles. Following I have found a few jo nage clips from Ki Aikido's curriculum.

 

 

 

Enjoy practice.

 

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Gleason sensei

Gleason sensei is an American Aikido instructor ranked 7th dan. His main teacher would be Yamaguchi sensei, which shows in his approach concerning Aikido and sword like movements. What I like about his style of Aikido would be a that it appears a feeling sensitivity based learning environment. Also added are the theories behind the movements. One's techniques are empowered by this way of teaching and learning. In recent years he also studied with Dan Harden and those principles are recognizable in his recent clips on YouTube from Aikido Sydney.

In the next clip a lot of things can be learned. He explains spiral movement and it's components. Here the six directions theorie, expanding the fascia of the whole body, can be observed. Aikido movements and experience combined with insights from other fields of interest is the way I like to study body movements and feeling sensitivity in my Aikido practice.

 

 

Enjoy practice.

 

Technique based training is low level, principles based are medium level and high level would be knowing, using and feeling one's fascial body tissue to create Aiki.

Thoughts?

 

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" Hands and hips separate"

 

 

In Aikido movement one should pay attention to the principle which involves separating the movement directions of hip and hands. A human body is balanced because of this principle but also connection and power distribution will be able to arise.

 

In this slow motion clip of a baseball swing watch the relation between hips and hands. Notice the hip joint is not the waist. Hands and waist movement usually are the same whereas hip joint movement is in opposite direction. The moment of ball contact the arms and waist go in the direction intended while the hips stay stationary or counter turn. This creates power through whole body use in connection to ground strength.

 

Now study the next clip of Yamashima sensei and his subtle use of " Hands and hips separate".

 

 

To improve your natural movement abilities and power transfer possibilities in a relaxed manner study the whole body connection between hips and hands and their respective directions.

 

Enjoy practice.

 

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