The first class this morning was taught by Jud Blitzer Sensei from Boulder. Her focus today was a continuation of the communication theme and she had us do a number of different exercises, including one where uke and nage are in seiza facing each other. Uke raises up on their knees and collapses on nage, essentially a bear hug and then nage turned and gently guide uke to the ground. The pace of the class was slow and easy, good for the early morning.
Choate Sensei taught the second class of the day. While he did bring out the chain again to illustrate a couple of points, the main focus of the class was about nage's movement and response to uke. During a katatetori kokyunage for example, Choate Sensei emphasized that it uke that determines the technique by their attack and nage needs to response by where the movement and technique is taking both. He also made the point that we shouldn't be afraid to "kick them when they are down" meaning that nage should use their feet or legs for short kicks if uke is already down in that area. We also practiced a shomenuchi kotegashi and shomenuchi ikkyo.
The third class taught by Doran Sensei continued his emphasis on nage's movement that will naturally disrupt uke's balance. After tenkan and irimi exercises, we worked on yokomenuchi shihonage omote and ura with variations. We then worked on yokomenuchi iriminage variations including a blocking variation that Doran Sensei's point was not directly block but slide out and atemi to create a space to throw uke. Nage's striking hand then goes underneith uke's arm and extends out to create space for nage to step into and then throw uke. Doran Sensei reiterated the three principles of Aikido that he teaches all of his students at the dojo which all techniques much have to be Aikido. 1. Aiki (blending, not struggling) 2. Kosshu or breaking uke's balance, and 3. Posture, nage shouldn't lose their posture in the techniques.
Saotome Sensei's class started off with uke holding a jo with both hands in front of them while nage put a hand in the middle and moved an open hand to either side. Saotome Sensei then had four uke's stand behind each other and he threw all of them with the same motion. He did another multiple uke technique with two jos, with both jo's end touching other and nage had to extend through the jo into the leading uke's jo to throw the entire group. Another multiple uke technique involved nage extending a hand and the leading uke extends their hand to throw the group. The final group technique was a tenkan kaitennage, where uke steps back leading the front uke and hopeful the rest around and then thrown. Saotome Sensei then demonstrated a couple of kutsumi ("no touch" techniques) kokyunages. Saotome Sensei said some interesting things that Martial Arts training is learning about human anatomy and finding the corners to disrupt uke's balance during movement.
Hofmeister Sensei taught the fifth class and his theme was developing ukemi that was not complacent or disruptive in the technique being done by nage. Hofmeister Sensei made a point that Aikido is not something you do to people, or is done to you but is an activity that requires active participation and presence by both roles; nage and uke. The first technique we worked on was surwazi ikkyo with uke leading the movement while nage just directed. We did a few surwazi techniques and worked on the uke's ukemi not being passive or overly aggressive. Uke is not a sack of meat but a very essential part of Aikido practice.
The final class of the night was taught by George Ledyard Sensei. Ledyard Sensei's focus was in bringing to a full circle many of the major themes from other instructors at camp to basic kihon-waza Aikido. We started off with tenkan exercise and then went on to practice katatetori kokyu-ho omote and ura, katatetori sumitoshi, tsuki sumitoshi, and tsuki kotegashi. Ledyard Sensei talked about nage needs to bring uke into the negative space that opens up by shifting from the engaged hip to the neutral hip, this shift creates a lot of power and opportunity for nage to not force uke's action and movement through force but through nage's body mechanics and positioning. At the end of class, Ledyard Sensei asked if anyone had any questions and someone asked how to "float" uke as taught by Ikeda Sensei. Ledyard Sensei said that nage first connects to uke center through nage's hara and extends ki through the hands and into uke. Nage then shift the energy or focus to the uke's back foot and then straightens nage's posture and push nage hara slight forward (or as Ikeda Sensei says, clinch the posterior muscles). This lefts uke up and then nage can shift the balance to the neutral hip "floating" uke. Ledyard Sensei finished class with some interesting and positive things about the future of Aikido. The focus of the seminar has been on self-resilience and moving yourself either as uke or nage. This growth and positive energy, the hunger of this summer camp's students to learn new things will help Aikido grow in the next twenty years as it is a positive feed-back loop (demand for quality Aikido instruction encourages senior instructors to develop, expand, and evolve our Art)...if this desire for learning is not there, Aikido will be shell with a few quality instructors but the overall state of Aikido will be less.
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