Size in Aikido
(Extracted from Aikido-L)
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002
13:16:00 -0400
From: Frank Keller
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
As I am very close to the same size as Bartman, I wanted to weigh in with a
comment here.
IMHO, the efficacy of my technique has much more to do with limiting what I give
as bio-feedback
than how much my uke weighs, how tall they are or how much experience they have.
For example,
even though I am 6' 4" and 295, if I am working with a 5'0", 105 pound woman, I
want to feel like
I am the same size or smaller than her (or if I am very lucky, like I wasnt
there at all :) )
It seems to me in aikido, that size, strength, speed, whatever physical
attribute you have, is simply
a changer of the uke dynamic of the technique, not the technique itself.
I did want to add here, that whether I am working with a beginner, or an
advanced person, off balance,
fit and throw will cause specific effects to a person, be it a wonderful
breakfall or stumbling and
falling on their face the first couple of times as a beginner. I guess what I am
trying to say, as a big
man, that being a big man doing aikido doesnt matter at all.
>Perhaps because of your size, you have a hard time believing in your
>own technique.
Unless I get an uke close to my size, yes. When someone who weighs half as
much as me, or less, goes down, was it because I did things properly,
because they were afraid of getting hurt if they didn't, because they just
think you should go down at that point, or what? When I'm working with
senior students I have some confidence that it's because I did at least
something right, but much of the time I'm working with people below 3rd
kyu, or even in their first few classes and you never know.
Frank Keller
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 13:59:48 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
At 01:16 PM 4/25/02 -0400, Frank Keller wrote:
>IMHO, the efficacy of my technique has much more to do with limiting what I
give as bio-feedback
>than how much my uke weighs, how tall they are or how much experience they
have.
No question on that, but the size/strength/weight of the uke does have an
impact on whether I can tell if I've limited my "bio-feedback" or not.
With a big/strong/heavy uke I know whether I'm using my
size/strength/weight against them or not...if I do it's pretty obvious to
both of us, as it isn't easy for me to move them that way at all, but it is
easy if I'm doing the Aikido properly. With a small/weak/light uke I can't
tell as easily, since I can move them either way.
There's also, as I mentioned, the "intimidation factor". No matter how
nice you are, or how much you try to make a person feel safe and
unthreatened, some people will react to a nage who is half again as big as
they are, and that reaction can take the form of "tanking" on the
ukemi...going down when there really wasn't a reason to.
Beginners sometimes do this for everyone, as they are more worried about
getting the ukemi right than anything else, so they dive into it at the
first opportunity. I've done that in the past myself. :^)
As I also mentioned, I have better luck with more advanced students, no
matter what their size/strength/weight. They don't dive for the ukemi at
the first chance, they aren't as easily intimidated by big nages, and they
can often tell whether I've used strength or proper technique, even if I
can't. It's still best if the advanced student is largish though...that
way I can tell on my own. :^)
>I did want to add here, that whether I am working with a beginner, or an
advanced person, off balance,
>fit and throw will cause specific effects to a person, be it a wonderful
breakfall or stumbling and
>falling on their face the first couple of times as a beginner.
Yes, but how did you get them off balance? That's the critical question.
Was it good technique, or just overpowering them...without noticing much in
the case of smaller ukes? That's the crux of where my original comments on
this came from.
>I guess what I am trying to say, as a big
>man, that being a big man doing aikido doesnt matter at all.
I disagree. It's not a barrier at all, but it can be an obstacle at times. being aware of it is the first step to overcoming it IMO.
-- Mike "sounds like we should partneer if we end up at a list seminar sometime"
Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 15:31:00 -0400
From: Frank Keller
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
<No question on that, but the size/strength/weight of the uke does have an
<impact on whether I can tell if I've limited my "bio-feedback" or not.
<With a big/strong/heavy uke I know whether I'm using my
<size/strength/weight against them or not...if I do it's pretty obvious to
<both of us, as it isn't easy for me to move them that way at all, but it is
<easy if I'm doing the Aikido properly. With a small/weak/light uke I can't
<tell as easily, since I can move them either way.
I disagree on this method. For myself, working with a big, strong , heavy uke
teaches
me nothing new. It only enforces my normal bio feedback. I think my teachers,
Steve Duncan and Chuck Clark would call this working within your comfort
zone. For me or you, getting each other off balance is a very inefficient
learning method. But I have to admit, working with other big guys is a
novelty and quite fun... Remember, the inverse of this is an aikidoka
who is small and never works with big people. In my years of aikido, this
symptomatically manifests itself as yanks on my appendages by tori (because
it takes strength to move something big, right?) or doing a technique on me in a
blazing whir of speed like a tornado (because I must move fast to move something
slow, right?) The trick here is learning and matching other size uke, whether
they
are big or small. And another point, if the "easiest" way we can learn is
against someone our size, and we are in the 99th percentile in size, how
often are we going to meet someone of that size in the dojo and it will
probably take us 35 years just to get our blackbelt for lack of partners. :)
<There's also, as I mentioned, the "intimidation factor". No matter how
<nice you are, or how much you try to make a person feel safe and
<unthreatened, some people will react to a nage who is half again as big as
<they are, and that reaction can take the form of "tanking" on the
<ukemi...going down when there really wasn't a reason to.
I totally agree on the intimidation factor, that is a problem. Here I know I am
doing
right when the person gets up saying, "wow, you are so soft and you didnt hurt
me."
<As I also mentioned, I have better luck with more advanced students, no
<matter what their size/strength/weight. They don't dive for the ukemi at
<the first chance, they aren't as easily intimidated by big nages, and they
<can often tell whether I've used strength or proper technique, even if I
<can't. It's still best if the advanced student is largish though...that
<way I can tell on my own. :^)
I love working with my sempai, but you run into problems there also. I have
been doing this long enough to know that some reactions by seniors are
very "canned". Over the years, we retrain our bodies to think reactively
within the system of aikido we are working. A new person renews your faith in
aikido by allowing you to see that techniques work because of sound universal
principles. For example, I love working with guys who have never taken aikido
but have taken other martial arts. No feinting or fawning here and it allows one
to see how effective his/her technique is while working way out of your comfort
zone. Did this at a Huk Planas Kenpo seminar just several months ago and it
was amazing watching these tough little kenpo guys falling from koshinage, kote
gaeshi
and irimi nage just like dominoes. :)
<Yes, but how did you get them off balance? That's the critical question.
<Was it good technique, or just overpowering them...without noticing much in
<the case of smaller ukes? That's the crux of where my original comments on
<this came from.
Mike, the issue here is that off balance is off balance whether you are 4 foot
tall
or 7 foot tall. As big guys, our quest is to train our bodies to deal with an
uke whose
reaction time is normally much faster than ours. Steve Duncan Sensei used to
show this all the time by using me and one of the little (4'10") college girls
that used to
work out at our dojo. He would do eight direction off balance on both of us in
front of
class, demonstrating that we both had the same off balance characteristics as
the other
(loading to the front of the foot then the big toe, weight distribution,
falling) just at
different speeds and heights. That brings me back to the original question...How
did I get
them off balance? Let me explain this with a concrete example, say opposite hand
grab
irimi nage. 5 ft tall uke grabs my hand for the technique. Their gravity drop in
stepping
is the same and should feel (just faster and shorter) the same as a big person.
The load
against you as you allow them to come into your space and tuck them into your
body
is the same, again just shorter and faster. Execution is the same also.
Remember,
as I was taught in the Jiyushinkai, we treat off balance, fit and throw as
seperate issues
in a technique. And I firmly believe that given the initial off balance, the
technique just
happens.
Frank Keller
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 16:11:25 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
At 03:31 PM 4/25/02 -0400, Frank Keller wrote:
><Yes, but how did you get them off balance? That's the critical question.
><Was it good technique, or just overpowering them...without noticing much in
><the case of smaller ukes? That's the crux of where my original comments on
><this came from.
>
>Mike, the issue here is that off balance is off balance whether you are 4 foot
>tall or 7 foot tall.
Sigh. Does somebody else want to try? I'm not sure how to get my point
through, and I've tried twice now. Am I really being that obscure here?
Ok, one last try:
>That brings me back to the original question...How did I get
>them off balance? Let me explain this with a concrete example, say opposite
hand grab
>irimi nage. 5 ft tall uke grabs my hand for the technique. Their gravity drop
in stepping
>is the same and should feel (just faster and shorter) the same as a big person.
Should yes. How do you know if it was? You can take them down by force,
or you can take them down by proper technique. They go down. Was it
force, or proper technique?
If they are too big for you to have forced, you know it was proper
technique. If they are small enough to force, you don't know...unless
you've got huge amounts of experience that tell you your technique was
good. I don't have that yet, and I never have it in the early stages of
learning a new technique...that's why I like big ukes when I can find them. That's a small percentage of the time, so I get plenty of practice on
smaller people...at least as a percentage of training time...which isn't
"plenty of practice" in any other sense, unfortunately.
Other techniques, like tenchinage from a rear two hand grab, make the
problem even more obvious as there are more opportunities to succeed
through muscle.
-- Mike "several people at the dojo aare too strong for me to muscle without
noticing...none are taller and most are lighter" Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 14:05:59 -0700
From: Tara Cazaubon
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
I'm a beginner, and I'm small (5'2", 102 lbs). Is it helpful to you bigger
guys if I resist going down until you actually take my balance and make me
go down? I have done that upon request for a couple of guys at my
dojo. They ask for sincere resistance, so they can actually be forced to
do the technique correctly. But I'm not sure if that's helpful to most
people or if I should just concentrate on doing my ukemi properly and being
in the right place at the right time for nage to execute the technique.
Tara C
-----------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:03:33 -0400
From: Frank Keller
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
<Should yes. How do you know if it was? You can take them down by force,
<or you can take them down by proper technique. They go down. Was it
<force, or proper technique?
I will try to answer this question. First, if you cant tell the difference,
my guess is you are using force. Quantitatively, even though I havent done a
study on it, forcing someone elicits different physiological reactions
(balking, pulling back, resisting) in an uke than from proper kuzushi and
technique. If you cant feel the difference, no matter how small uke is, you
are using too much force because your own muscular feedback (from your
muscles firing like crazy) is overwhelming the biofeedback that uke is
giving you. Secondly, you say that more experienced or larger people wont
let you get away with force because they stop you in mid stride... Have you
felt the smaller, lesser people? Maybe they are giving the same signals and
you are going so strong you just cant feel it. I think Clark sensei that
this is a sense that we all have even in the beginning of our aikido
journey, most of the time we just dont pay attention to uke (especially big
guys).
As to your second point that new white belts just fall over in ukemi and it
is difficult to tell the difference between force and technique. Well you
are right. However, in that circumstance, you arent doing aikido, you are
just learning the forms of aikido and how to do ukemi.
Frank
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:27:05 -0400
From: Simon Watkins
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
size and strength dont off balance people. it can off balance boulders but
boulders cant move themselves. to off balance a person needs leverage or
timeing, it needs technique.
Simon
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:33:55 -0400
From: Simon Watkins
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
Hi Tara
Just do the ukemi. Resistance is futile. go down gentle and lightly. and
one day opportuinities will start to appear.
Simon
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:45:15 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
At 02:05 PM 4/25/02 -0700, Tara Cazaubon wrote:
>I'm a beginner, and I'm small (5'2", 102 lbs).
I'm not a beginner so much anymore, but I'm certainly not very advanced, so
take the following with a block of salt, ok?
>Is it helpful to you bigger
>guys if I resist going down until you actually take my balance and make me
>go down?
Yes, that's helpful to everyone who's learned the basics of a technique.
You should adjust the amount and kind of resistance to both your ukemi
ability and to the ability of nage, but in general you don't help nage
learn anything if you don't wait until you are actually thrown before you fall.
> I have done that upon request for a couple of guys at my
>dojo. They ask for sincere resistance, so they can actually be forced to
>do the technique correctly. But I'm not sure if that's helpful to most
>people or if I should just concentrate on doing my ukemi properly and being
>in the right place at the right time for nage to execute the technique.
There may be some teaching style differences, so I'd ask your sensei and do
what he/she says, but as long as your ukemi skills are up to it, and if
nage wants it, I think resistance is useful, within reason (i.e. keeping in
mind nage's skill level and what forms of resistance are helpful to him
learning the technique). Falling down whether nage did anything to require
that or not is generally a waste of time...except for practicing your
ukemi, and you can do that alone, right?
Changing the attack as a form of resistance isn't useful at lower
levels...a different attack warrants a different technique, and in class
you should be doing what you are being taught. Senior students do more
randori and changing attacks so that nage has to change techniques seems to
be a good part of that training, but I'm not there yet, and I'm guessing
you aren't either. :^)
-- Mike "basically, wait until you are thrown before you fall" Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 19:00:55 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
At 06:27 PM 4/25/02 -0400, Simon Watkins wrote:
>size and strength dont off balance people. it can off balance boulders but
>boulders cant move themselves.
Ever notice how beginners have "nailed foot" syndrome a lot of the time?
They may be able to move, but they don't, so you can push them over just
fine. :^)
Falling over isn't the only place where strength helps in a technique
though. Take the two-hands-wrist-grab-from-behind tenchinage technique.
Step one is to get your "heaven hand" aimed upward and rising, while
keeping the other one down to act as earth hand when you do the turn for
the throw. How do you get the heaven hand up, when uke is holding onto it?
Well, you can use proper technique and uke won't be able to stop you, or,
if you are strong enough, you can just move anyway. That's the sort of
thing I'm on about... ;^)
-- Mike "I can do it wrong, and stilll succeed, with most folks, but not all"
Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:56:31 -0400
From: Mike Bartman
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
At 06:03 PM 4/25/02 -0400, Frank Keller wrote:
>If you cant feel the difference, no matter how small uke is, you
>are using too much force because your own muscular feedback (from your
>muscles firing like crazy) is overwhelming the biofeedback that uke is
>giving you.
This is very likely a factor, and I agree that it's a problem. Until I
overcome it to the extent that Clark sensei has, and Simcox sensei had,
there will be ukes I can feel resisting, and some that I can't. I'll get
better practice feedback with the ones I can feel.
It's a matter of which thing are you working on learning I guess. When I'm
trying to learn how to do a technique (where and how to make contact, where
to move, etc.) it's best if I get strong feedback from uke when I'm doing
it wrong. When I've learned the basics of it, and am trying to perfect it,
I've got more attention to put on not using force and feeling uke more. It
would be nice if I could do both at the same time of course, but I haven't
managed that yet. When I'm learning the basics with an uke I can't feel
resisting when I do it wrong, I tend to learn the technique incorrectly...I
do it wrong, and uke goes down anyway, so I don't know I did it wrong so I
don't know I need to fix something. Sometimes sensei notices, but many
times sensei is working with someone else at the time, has his view blocked
by other students or whatever. When sensei does notice, I still have to
"unlearn" what I learned incorrectly before I can start doing it right.
The bigger the size/strength discrepancy between me and uke the more wrong
I can get it without knowing it.
-- Mike "until I'm a lot better, biggger ukes are more useful for basics of
techniques" Bartman --
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 15:53:37 -0700
From: Cindy
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
Simon Watkins writes:
>size and strength dont off balance people. it can off balance boulders but
>boulders cant move themselves. to off balance a person needs leverage or
>timeing, it needs technique.
No, I know what Mike's talking about (being one of those lightweights
he talks about). When one of the big guys really get going but is a
little off in execution, I may anticipate the ukemi rather than get
mowed over -- because they *can* mow me down -- and ukemi hurts less
than mowing :-). But I usually do tell them that they need to work on
the technique ... And sure it's possible for a big guy to tell when
he's mowing down. When he has experience. How does he gain that experience?
Conversely, I like working with big guys because I can't take them down
*unless* I do it correctly :)
--
Cindy "of course, most guys fit in that category..."
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 16:06:49 -0700
From: Tara Cazaubon
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
BTW, I neglected to mention that I've only done this (provided sincere
resistance when requested) to yudansha. I've actually had some fun "play
sessions" with yudansha who were doing what you describe below, changing
technique as a counter to my resistance, but of course I wouldn't do that
with anyone unless requested and appropriate.
Mostly I try to wait until I'm thrown before I fall, like you advise, but
when I practice with other beginners, many times it feels like I'm just
falling down because that what comes next in the sequence of events, not
because I'm compelled to. Perhaps some more subtle resistance would be better.
Tara C
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 22:55:31 -0400
From: Katherine Derbyshire
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
From: "Tara Cazaubon"
> BTW, I neglected to mention that I've only done this (provided sincere
> resistance when requested) to yudansha. I've actually had some fun "play
> sessions" with yudansha who were doing what you describe below, changing
> technique as a counter to my resistance, but of course I wouldn't do that
> with anyone unless requested and appropriate.
If your sempai asks for resistance, provide it. Presumably he both knows
what he is doing and how to protect you from the possibility that your
ukemi might be inadequate.
> Mostly I try to wait until I'm thrown before I fall, like you advise, but
> when I practice with other beginners, many times it feels like I'm just
> falling down because that what comes next in the sequence of events, not
> because I'm compelled to.
That's probably true.
>Perhaps some more subtle resistance would be better.
This one is tricky. Once you have more experience, subtle resistance can
help beginners start to figure things out. On the other hand, ukemi is a
fairly complex art in itself. It takes time to learn how to resist while
still giving a sincere, honest attack and keeping yourself safe.
Without getting on the mat with you, I have no way of knowing whether
you can do that or not. You might ask the yudansha you've had play
sessions with. They'll also have a better idea of your dojo's ukemi
etiquette, and also of what the specific students you're thinking of can
deal with.
Katherine
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 15:11:34 -0600
From: Jun Akiyama
Subject: Re: Question of the day...
Simon Watkins wrote:
> I presume you do the, "gather uke to your bosom" type of Ura
> irminage, rather than the, "give the fool his head" type, yes Jun?
You'll have to describe what these are, since I can't say I know them.
As I wrote before, our iriminage ura consists of nage entering deeply,
breaking uke's balance to his rear balance point to take them down and
around, and then throwing them in the usual "hand/arm doing the
cresting of the wave" thing at the end...
Jun
------------------------------
Last updated on 13 Sep 2002