Aikido Fall Bridge Seminar - Day 2

The second day started off with Chi Gong class at 7am, a class I didn't make because of the late night dinner and drinks from the night before. After breakfast, classes started at 9:45 am.

The first class I attended was Prescott Aikido's Rafa Sensei kumijo class that was held outside. We started off with an ikkyo style tori technique where nage takes uke's jo. The second technique was shihonage tori. The third and final technique was an irimi style tori.

Heiny Sensei taught the second class indoors. Heiny Sensei spoke about the founder of Aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, intention that Aikido is for internal improvement of oneself and not an avenue for victory over an opponent. Leading into the technique, Heiny Sensei wanted the focus to be on yourself and your own movement. We spent the class working on kosadora iriminage and kosadora tenshinage omote.

After lunch I attended Ikeda Sensei bokkon outdoor class. We worked in pairs and after we practiced some cuts, Sensei shifted the focus of the class. He must have seen too many of us flinching when blocking a shomen bokken cut because Ikeda Sensei then had us practice on not flinching by first having uke do a shomen cut stopping at nage's forehead. The goal of nage was keep the attention and focus soft and see through the cut. Ikeda Sensei then had nage raise the bokken cross-wise and grab the blade which provided an horizontal blocking surface. Uke then cut with a full-speed and power shomen cut onto nage's blade, with the goal being the same to avoid flinching. After a bit that practice, we continued on some straight bokken katas and exercises for the rest of the class.

The second class of the afternoon was an outdoor bokken class taught by George Ledyard Sensei. He started class by saying that the focus would be irimi applications to Keiko from practicing with the bokken. He repeated a couple of exercises from his DVD that apply to nage being engaged and extending attention to stop uke before uke and nage even engage with the bokken. He then pointed out how many people who practice the kumitachi number 4 are not being realistic in their ability to surprise uke in a more realistic engagement. Ledyard Sensei showed the proper way to shift the legs while keeping uke engaged allows for the types of cuts, especially the first cut to the knee in kumitachi 4, by shift the feet in preparation for the full movement of the cut. His class was really great and I very much enjoyed it.

The final class of the evening was taught by Sakakibara Sensei from Arizona Aikido. Sakakibara Sensei also has a judo background, and the katatetori sumitoshi involved a an elbow drop and engagement that reflected his other martial arts training. I had a hard time hearing him but the class was very enjoyable.