Inspiring kata ... at last ...(some from other arts)

Firstly, I would like to request moderators to leave the clips below in this subforum even though they are not jûdô kata. All kata in these clips are performed by a young female karateka by the name of Usami Rika, a 1.59 m (5'2") tall 27-year old 3rd dan karateka from the Tôkyô area, who has been practicing karate for 17 years, and who graduated from Kokushikan University.

My purpose of posting these clips here is because I believe there are some inspiring things in these kata performances that are applicable to jûdôka interested in kata.

There is some powerful breathing and kiai, rarely seen in female jûdô kata performers. She 'lives' the kata which even though reflecting sophisticated choreography and smoothness, is never at the detriment of speed and effectiveness. It's everything but dead kata. Every movement is an upload and release of elasticity with great biomechanical efficiency. It's the contrary of merely replicating mechanical conventions. Neither is what she's doing gymnastics, something we increasingly see in medal-winning Western female jû-no-kata performers. There is no doubt that would she does is the product of timeless practice, while she remains critical of her own skills aware of the need to practice more, the same words so often uttered by the late Fukuda Keiko.

If jûdôka could again engage in practising the kata of Kôdôkan with the same attention for ki, and effectiveness of fighting movement, stance, release of power it would be great. For now, please, enjoy watching the clips.

Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

But there are women in judo, who show the same spirit in their kata.

wdax wrote:Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

But there are women in judo, who show the same spirit in their kata

You point out an important matter, I agree with. In karate there are of course imaginary adversaries, but then again the luxury of that might be that you can 'imagine' their distance and how fast they act/react.

Another interesting point might be the value that other arts have to add to the person studying this or that art. We know that Kanô towards the end of this life advocated a return to koryû arts, and recently Professor Shishida Fumiaki published another interesting article about this. Then again, there is a difference between practicing multiple arts and actually reaching proficiency in multiple martial arts which must be very difficult given the sort of commitments people have today (job, family, finances, etc.). Nevertheless one now and then sees the definite value of this. People who have reached proficiency in a koryû sword arts totally deal differently with the sword in kime-no-kata, just the way they move their hips, strike or walk. Same with someone who studied an art that still practices in yoroi. There is a transfer of those skills, but it does not always transfer properly either. One needs at least to intrinsically know what the other art is doing. For example, I have also seen someone with a very high rank in aikidô and a decent rank in jûdô (can't remember exactly how high, maybe 5th dan) perform Itsutsu-no-kata, and it was not good at all. Then again, that is perhaps not so difficult to understand as we are then dealing with an esoteric matter of another art, not something that is simply aimed at kihon, randori, or shôbu.

wdax wrote:Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

But there are women in judo, who show the same spirit in their kata.

With respect there are two points here. One is she did have a partner, one may not see him or her but to tori he or she was certainly there.

Point two, kata is not only the physical but much more important the mental aspect. The spirit and concentration shown in the kata. Ki and zanshin flowed from that tori one could taste it so could the audience. I agree with CK Sensei that in an awful lot of todays judo kata the life is drained out of it for the same of performing some sort of choreographed set of actions without a hint of ki or zan shin.

Judo kata are difficult. You are correct in judo we can have a partner but not in ALL judo kata. I have seen KDK Goshinjutsu performed solo and it was spectacular not to mention some of the other less well practiced kata.

Breath control in ju no kata is as vital as maiai. Get one wrong and the action becomes flawed.

The kata shown here by this karateka is superb. on that point we can all agree. Why? It can be seen and even felt. How many judo kata do we see performed with the same ;level of 'life'?

Many kind regards to you Dax Sensei,

Mike

Cichorei Kano wrote:

wdax wrote:Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

But there are women in judo, who show the same spirit in their kata.

You point out an important matter, I agree with. In karate there are of course imaginary adversaries, but then again the luxury of that might be that you can 'imagine' their distance and how fast they act/react.

Another interesting point might be the value that other arts have to add to the person studying this or that art. We know that Kanô towards the end of this life advocated a return to koryû arts, and recently Professor Shishida Fumiaki published another interesting article about this. Then again, there is a difference between practicing multiple arts and actually reaching proficiency in multiple martial arts which must be very difficult given the sort of commitments people have today (job, family, finances, etc.). Nevertheless one now and then sees the definite value of this. People who have reached proficiency in a koryû sword arts totally deal differently with the sword in kime-no-kata, just the way they move their hips, strike or walk. Same with someone who studied an art that still practices in yoroi. There is a transfer of those skills, but it does not always transfer properly either. One needs at least to intrinsically know what the other art is doing. For example, I have also seen someone with a very high rank in aikidô and a decent rank in jûdô (can't remember exactly how high, maybe 5th dan) perform Itsutsu-no-kata, and it was not good at all. Then again, that is perhaps not so difficult to understand as we are then dealing with an esoteric matter of another art, not something that is simply aimed at kihon, randori, or shôbu.

Your post hit a real nail on the head for me. During my first 30 years of judo training I had instruction from three pre WW11 DNBK sensei who where budoka. All of them had high rank in several of the budo also some bugei, koryu. As pupils it was expected that we learn not only judo but also practice a lot of the other budo and bugei. I fought my sensei tooth and nail over this as I refused to accept I was capable of spending even more time in a dojo learning more budo other than judo. In my ignorance I thought better be decent at one rather than poor or average at 4 or so.
We where expected to grade not only in judo but also one other budo. I hated this and come ?1990? this was held against me when I took my judo rokudan? Only in the past few years have I understood what my various sensei where trying to pass on.

Atemi waza have always come natural to me as they where taught as normal training parts of a lesson. Goshinjutsu or self defence where also taught and many of the gokyo where first learned as judo then retaught at a latter date as a goshinjutsu waza.

Use of the hara as apposed to the shoulders, breathing and zanshin where also taught from very early on. I recall vividly one exercise where we would have to lie on our backs and our partner would sit on our tummies and we had to move our partner up and down using breathing not muscles per sey. deep abdominal breathing was a key to hara control and also not burning out early on in shiai when fear caused that rush of adrenaline that makes one fatigue so quickly.

This is now important to me as like you I can also appreciate the kata of the tori in the above clips and see much deeper into what she is actually performing.

Mike

wdax wrote:Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

As the father of a very promising shotokan karate student and someone who has studied karate to support his development I must disagree with wdax-sensei here.

It is true that the image most people have of kata in karate is one of solo demonstrations, what is perhaps less well known, but hugely important to deriving benefit from kata training in karate is bunkai.

Bunkai literally meaning "analysis" or "disassembly" is a term used in Japanese martial arts referring to the application of fighting techniques extracted from the moves of a kata. Bunkai is usually performed with a partner or a group of partners which execute predefined attacks, and the student performing the kata responds with defences, counterattacks, or other actions, based on a part of the kata. This allows the student in the middle to understand what the movements in kata are meant to accomplish. It may also illustrate how to improve technique by adjusting distances, time moves properly, and adapt a technique depending on the size of an opponent.

Karate kata practice coupled with bunkai is as challenging as any judo kata.

Very interesting - thanks a lot!

From the point of view of training methods, I think it´s obvious, that we need a balance between kata (predefined) and randori (free) excercise. This should be the same in judo, karate of any other system.

BTW: Tandoku-rensho is one of the standard excercises of the leading kata-competitors in judo. But of course not shown in public...

Ma-ai, kizeme, zanshin and precision! in Kendo no Kata

budoitaly wrote:

Ma-ai, kizeme, zanshin and precision! in Kendo no Kata

Thanks!
I've actually seen this kata performed live by some Norwegian kendo-ka (there's two clubs or so in the entire country lol), and I was... shall we say... "less than impressed"

This however, was pretty nice

wdax wrote:Impressing.... but in Karate kata you only have to move your own body. No timing problems with an attacking partner, no need to fit your movements to the measures of your partner, no need for correct distance, no effect on someone else´s body, no need to really avoid an opponent´s attack etc. But again, this is impressive and sure world-class.

But there are women in judo, who show the same spirit in their kata.

Hmm, thats a nice example to show what the problem with the judo kata is...
The "spirit" of Tori is not in my focus now...
But if we look carefully at Uke - why in hell he stops nearly all of his attacks as soon as Tori starts
her movements?
E.g. look at 3:53: Uke draws his "knife", Tori begins to manipulate Ukes not armed arm, Uke stays there and forgets that he has a weapon
in his free hand, not even an attempt to use it...
Next kata (04:06) the same: Uke tries to stab Tori an misses the target, Tori delivers a punch to Ukes face and Uke freezes with long outstretched arm (04:08)
What would be a normal reaction: i'm sure at least a desparate attempt to draw back the arm especially because of the punch to the head
most people would would try to dodge backwards such uppercut instinctively (i don't say successfully ;-) )

The same at the grabbing attacks in the beginning: Uke grabs Tori, does a few steps maybe, be it looks like that he has no
clue what to do with tori even if she would not defend ;-)

At this competition level (european gold medal) i would expect a little bit more realistic/natural behavior of the attacker...

So i'm afraid it would not be too attractive for a public audience