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This is just me doing some freeform thinking around my personal experiences in Wado Ryu karate training as well as the minute amount of sword work I have done.
Extracting the sword from the "saya", the sheath, has to be made up of three parts, similar to the approach of karate technique application in Wado Ryu. You cannot imply pull the sword out with one arm, unless it's short that it. You can to pull the saya back and then turn the body to apply the cut or thrust.
Wado Ryu karate has its San Mi Ittai. Every application of technique brings together various aspects, unless you want to stand there and trade punches, which is also an option.
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When you see "taisabaki" translated many people call it Body Shifting but it is more appropriately Body Management.
It's not just about moving completely out the way as ideally the movement that you make provides safety from an attacked, but also keeps you close enough to make your attack to. We try to avoid getting out of their distance and then having to come back into attacking distance. If you can move and counter attack at the same time, then that is great.
Taisabaki doesn't have to be all stiff and upright. The movement is caused by an urgency to react and be safe against an incoming attack, whether it is jodan, chudan or gedan. You can flex and move accordingly. For example, in Wado Ryu Kihon Kumite 4 and 8, your head is moving here and there in reaction to the jodan attack. The body is not bolt upright.
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There are a few people who remain exceptionally great at kicking as they grow older. There's no such thing as natural ability, just sheer hard work and practice.
For many of us our flexibility and capability can decline through old age or a bit of laziness like on my part. It does mean we have to think differently and perform more efficiently.
This video covers the lower kicks we can do and remain just as effective.
This is just in the context of dojo sparring and health through training. It's not meant to be an MMA beating or WKF championship strategy.
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For those that don't do Wado Ryu karate, and even for those that do, gyakuzuki no tsukkomi is a strange beast.
Nobody punches like that... people will say. What are we doing, punching midgets in the face?
Personally I think there is a lot more in it.
In Wado Ryu karate we have a range of basic punches that we practice which are related.
My feeling is that we start with Junzuki, then Junzuki no tsukkomi and then that leads to Nagashizuki.
Same with Gyakuzuki, Gyakuzuki no tsukkomi and then Nagashi gyakiuzuki.
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Well, it's not secret, just under-trained and undervalued in my opinion.
A lot of it is about hiding your movement, but also making an effective action and not to just take up a position in readiness for your first technique as it should actually be your first technique.
If you don't get the pun, "hiden" in Japanese means secret.
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We can make more use of our Wado intelligence to avoid unnecessary movements.
In many cases we don't have to actively pull back our arms when we can move our body so it ends up in between the hands. If we are going in that direction already, then it can speed things up.
This is how it can be applied to Pinan Yondan kata.
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We're always in a rush to get to the more advanced stuff, but there's no such thing.
We mustn't forget the core principles that are taught in the earlier techniques and pairworks that we are shown.
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When we first learn karate just getting ourselves into the right position is an order and kata is a puzzle we are trying to complete whilst everything around us is moving.
The sooner we learn to focus on moving our centre, our body first for everything, the better our karate will be.
Someone asked the question about how to do the first movement in Pinan Sandan as they were used to reaching with the foot first and then turning as opposed to initiating the turn with the body and then the foot follows swiftly.
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I won't lie, 2020 was a washout karate wise for me.
I had a really bad throat infection just before the 2020 Winter Course and didn't train, then I suffered gout, which was finally went to A&E and had it diagnosed. Thankfully I haven't suffered another bout of it again.
The church halls shut and whilst one tentatively opened up, with the changing tier levels, it's not worth opening back up again until things settle down.
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Just before the Wado Academy Winter Course I annoyingly, very annoyingly, sustained another ankle injury and had to miss out on the week's training in Guildford. I also had the same kind of injury in the other foot at the back end of last year and might have to look into things.
I did manage to make it down to Guildford for some beers and the camaraderie of others. That's still important.
On the Sunday, even though I had the foot injury I took a chair and sat in the dojo to watch the second lesson. Arthur Meek sensei was taking the brown belts and below down the bottom end, which gave me a close up view of their training.