Support notes, November 2024 Netherlands course.

For those who were there, and the casual reader.

Across the three days training my intention was to establish particular threads and give opportunities to put into practise a series of important principles in Wado karate. The objective being to enrich the understanding of how Wado works and hopefully demystify some of the misunderstandings going around.

Japanese names and concepts.

I try to avoid crowding the brain with a smorgasbord of Japanese terminology. I am convinced that there is a growing trend towards thinking that the more you can smatter your teaching with Japanese concepts, the more people are supposed to be impressed. I don’t buy it.

But, in Japanese martial arts the teachers in the traditions have a way of bracketing particular concepts to highlight their importance. Also, the wording of the concepts in the original language has its own logic, and doesn’t necessarily align with Western thinking; so it’s worth calling that out.

In this set of notes, I am going to keep the descriptions plain to help people to actually get a grip on what is meant. But that doesn’t mean I can totally avoid the odd Japanese phrase or two.

Body mechanics.

I think a few people were surprised about the articulation of the hip and pelvis area when deploying techniques of attack and defence. In a nutshell; what might appear circular on the outside is actually linear on the inside – a well-trained eye can spot it. It appears to greater or lesser degrees in some of our techniques. In the larger range movements it is more obvious, but in kata like Naihanchi and Seishan you really have to work hard to appreciate it.

At risk of sounding like a ‘stuck record’ I do find myself returning back to ideas mentioned in earlier courses, particularly that thing about ‘self-awareness’. It is important to understand your body operating as a whole, and not just in fragmented sections. To do this you have to track back into your connection chains and actively foster a kind of internal conversation.

The paired kata. Kumite Gata and Kihon Gumite.

Yes, we did get into the nuts and bolts of the techniques, but one of my main focusses was the enlivenment of the engagement between Tori and Uke. So many times students get permanently stuck in the ‘I’m just trying to get my feet and hands in the right position’ mode. There comes a point where the whole thing has to step up to the next level – what I call ‘engaging with the dynamic’.

Hence; we did look at what it means for Uke to really lay the pressure on Tori, and how Tori is not a passive presence. Distance and timing become crucial.

Another part of this was examining what happens when one or both of you break the pact (because the pairs work, as ‘kata’, have an agreed agenda as a teaching tool). If you are the senior person you might deliberately and subtly swerve the intention to see if your partner/opponent is able to think on their feet (or even point out a weakness). We did this through the example of Kihon Gumite, where a trap was laid (I still feel guilty about this) to see if one of the partners would fall for it. It doesn’t have to be something large; in this case it was a tiny adjustment in distancing.

The exercise was useful as it clearly underlined how the paired kata are utilised as a pedagogic instrument to get across subtle and deeper concepts rather than just how to kick and punch.

Fine tuning.

The other aspect was ‘Intent’ as aligned to an initiated attack. I was fortunate in that I had brought along with me Steve Thain 4^th Dan from my Dojo, as this is one of his specific strengths. It’s not that he uses power to overwhelm his opponent, instead he has an uncanny knack of instigating his technique with zero prior information, and, to look very closely for the ‘Suki’ 隙 the gap or interval in his opponent’s position. It’s a refined skill we should all be working on.

Jitte kata.

Across the weekend the seniors only looked at one kata, Jitte. (Kyu grades worked with Steve Thain on the first part of Pinan Sandan).

There were some specific questions about Jitte that needed to be put out in the open. And for me the kata is notorious for sending people down blind alleys. I was keen to avoid this and instead established connecting lines through to Seishan and Chinto kata.

The thing about Jitte is that the versions performed across the karate styles have obvious agendas running, and even within Wado, the opening section is wildly different between groups, but why? For me, the clues are there. What is it that operating so snappily into Seishan Dachi gives you? I will leave that question hanging there.

‘Attack and defence are one and the same’.

This is a Japanese Budo concept that is not unique to Wado; you will find it in most Japanese sword arts.

The techniques and line relays we worked with were an attempt to encourage students to instantly blend the ideas of protection and attack.

Basically, three ways:

1.       A defensive action blurs as part of an attack.

2.       An attack flips seamlessly into protection (and then back again if it needs to).

3.       And finally; where the attack itself IS the defence – e.g. this can be found in the last four moves of Pinan Nidan and other areas.

Crucially, this concept must be a mindset, and programmed in as a clear ‘attitude’ that appears in all of your kata.

Other pointers.

The ‘floating foot’. I used this phrase to describe how the footwork blends to enable things to happen all in one single beat (everyone remembers Otsuka Sensei’s ‘Wado mathematics’, i.e. ‘one plus one equals one’). Basically, you have to jam all of those component parts into a single beat; if you break it into bits, you are behind the beat (San Mi Ittai).

Progressive ideas on how to test your technique in an open environment.

For the Sunday training I had responded to a request from the hosts to have training in the free moving practice we call, ‘Ohyo Henka Dosa’ (‘Applied variation method’). They had experienced this before, and really wanted to dig further into it, under supervision.

Over the years I had designed a method of moving through five different stages where partners can create constantly changing challenges for each other. But, before the fuller ranges of free engagement can happen, sets of rules have to be established and then one by one they can be tossed aside.

The end point is to take it towards a free-ranging Budo sparring that allows for the full utilisation of Wado techniques. After all, senior practitioners have this wonderful toolkit of techniques, now here is your chance to use them. If you assiduously stick to the essential guidelines, it works really well.

For course participants who want to try this in their home Dojo, if you stay with the five steps and work on it regularly, you will notice a real change in your sparring. That is certainly the experience in my Dojo.

Budo and Bujutsu.

The ‘Do’ and ‘Jutsu’ debate keeps circling round for ever with Westerners typically overthinking it. The above practice is a concrete example of the Budo to be found in a free and respectful engagement, where both parties gain through sincerity, clarity of objectives and an appropriate level of humility.

Recently reading the writings of Shotokan master Yokota Kousaku, he talks about the narrow agenda and win at all costs, of modern competition karate (another version of jutsu) as compared to the all-embracing, collaborative and mutually enriching experience of training that is driven by the more wholesome Budo agenda. Hence ‘Budo sparring’ is a different experience, and (from my personal perspective) strangely liberating.

Rounding off.

As mentioned, we tend to work through a rota of techniques across the years (the Wado syllabus is too big to cover everything in a weekend). But places fill up very quickly, and for now it is our intention for the near future to remain at the Eemnes Kenkokai Dojo. The next course will be scheduled for March of 2025.