2009 Aikido Summit

I drove to Denver yesterday afternoon, stayed overnight in a hotel, and then drove the Denver Buddhist Temple for today's Aikido Summit.

The first class was taught by Susan Chandler Sensei of Denver Ki-Aikido. She spent most her class going through ki exercises while we warmed up. We did the unbeadable arm where she had us use three types of visionalizations to keep your arm straight even with uke trying to bend your arm. Picturing your arm as a firehouse shooting ki out the of your gi, the second was to point with your hand, and the final way was to think of your arm as totally connected. This was my first Ki Aikido class and the differences were subtle from my previous practice with other styles. I am too much of a skeptic to believe everything she said but while practicing with other students during the day, I was interested in hearing that Ki Aikido rarely does atemi (strikes).

The second class was taught Kei Izawa Sensei of Aikikai Tanshinjuku in Lafayette. He was a student of Kanai Shinhan, who Izawa Sensei mentioned died four years ago today. At the end of his class, we sat for a minute of silence in memory of Kanai Sensei. Izawa Sensei started with shomen techniques and threw uke with a lot of different break falls. I worked with one of his local students and spent more time flying through the air, most of my brusing from the day's training came from this class and all of the break falls I took. Izawa Sensei's Aikido was more familiar than the Ki Aikido class.

Yasumasa Itoh Sensei of Aikido Tekko Juku in Boston taught the third class. He trained under Kanai Sensei and his Aikido was related to Izawa Sensei and showed that influence with harder break-falls and atemi.

We had lunch on the mat (a bento box that all I really knew was the rice and smoked salmon, the rest was good and not too heavy) during lunch the Mirai Daiko Taiko Drummer group provide traditional Japanese drumming.

After lunch, Seiji Tanaka Sensei of Hyland Hills Tomiki Aikido taught the forth class. Tomiki Aikido is usually thought of the black sheep of Aikido because they hold competitions and also the founder of Tomiki Aikido, Tomiki Sensei, was also a student Kano Sensei, the founder of Judo. Tanaka Sensei told us that this past year he had been teaching Aikido for 40 years and it was also his 70 birthday. He is a direct student of Tomiki Sensei so that was really cool to be on the mat and take his class. Tomiki Aikido has elements of Aikikai Aikido and Judo. Some of the throws Tanaka Sensei demonstrated were more Judo throws and he even ended up one demo doing an arm bar. Tanaka Sensei told two interesting story about Tomiki Sensei who spent years in a Russian prison and developed a series of kata exercises distilling Aikido and Judo movements within a small space. I don't remember much of them, but I do want to learn them. The second story was that Kano Sensei said that the purpose of a martial art is not to defeat your opponents but to improve your balance and your self.

The fifth class was taught by Cyndy Hayashi Sensei of Aikido West. She had us do randori and simulated randori practice while replicating a battlefield where multiple opponents are attacking. During one of the practice sessions, I was working with two students from other marital arts (Takamura Jujitsu and I think Hapkido or Karate student) and a small female Aikido beginner. Hayashi Sensei came by and she pointed out that I was focusing on the two other student by extending and grabbing them while ignoring the potential attack from the back. It was good to be reminded to focus on the lesson of the class and not get caught up in my ego.

Toby Threadgill Sensei of Menkyo Kaiden / Takamura ha Shindo Yoshin ryu jujitsu opened the sixth class with (what I assuemd) was an ancient Japanese prayer before talking a lot about Takamura Jujitsu. He is the head of this traditional jujitsu and demostrated and and us practice a drop throw that you ended doing both a choke and arm bar simulatiously, vicious (and really cool) technique. Threadgill Sensei demostrated and talked about how the samuri walked by pulling their feet with their toes instead of pushing off with back foot. This type of walking forces you to be more balanced. The final element I took away from his class was the about the larger development of budo in modern times. His practice focuses on a traditional Japanese jujitsu and his general comments about Aikido, Judo, and Jujitsu are that these are different expressions of the underlying concepts that came from the development of budo on the feudal Japanese battlefield.

Ikeda Sensei taught the last class of the day and we worked on disrupting the balance of uke. Ikeda Sensei talked about the core of our balance and as part of our spine. Ikeda Sensei talked about how we need to develop as martial artists and move beyond rote training in gym. The martial artist develops balance internally to be able to disrupt the balance of uke or an opponent. Ikeda Sensei had us work on disrupting our partner's balance and during his demonstration of katatedori ikkyo, he showed how to do ikkyo even if you arm is injured through disrupting the core balance of uke. I wish I had more time to explore this concept of alternate ikkyo based your particalarly physical condition at the time of the technique. Injury and physical limitations are part of living but working on our internal balance and being able to disrupt uke balance will allow nage to better adjust to the particular circumstances of the situation. A more direct and practical learning point for myself is that I need to continue to work on my own awareness of my balance and finding how to better disrupting the balance of my partners in practice without resorting to pure physical exertion.

At this Aikido seminar I was exposed to much richer Aikido ecology that exists in Colorado and I am fortunate enough to be able to experience this diversity of practice and movement that reflect different perspectives of the modern budo.