Aikido, 5/5/12

This week we practiced outside on the sloping driveway, and that always adds a new element to our training.

We started with walking, then tried it with an object in one hand (to simulate a knife). That always seems to change your awareness during the kata. We talked about how when using a knife, it's best to not put any of your body (hand, arm, etc) between your knife and your opponent.

Next we worked on Releases. We camped out on #3, then practiced moving from release 3 to junana 10, then to junana 12, and back again. Lastly, we worked in junana 3 & 4 to the rotation.

Pat showed me an extremely cool entry into a modified gedanate (junana 4) from release 3 that used more of the elbow and upper arm to create a structure. Pat talked about how it could be kind of a "structure game" in which we're not trying to out-muscle each other, but build a structure that makes the technique more stable and effortless. This particular modification reminded me a lot of the "fire" element Nick spoke about in this video discussing 5 conceptual "elements" that are possibly found in aikido.