The ‘Japanese’ Mawashigeri.
A personal perspective on the story of a kick that continues to evolve.
This was something that used to be talked about years ago, and, as we know, trends appear and disappear. I think originally it came out of M. Shiomitsu Sensei’s personal hallmark, his angled jodan mawashigeri; this was seen as the archetypal ‘Japanese’ mawashigeri and was always contrasted with what some called the ‘European or Western’ mawashigeri. The western version was very much a fuller opening of the hip, which was reliant on an equally huge pivot on the supporting foot. The Japanese version was less opened and, in some ways, more direct. Shiomitsu Sensei pointed out that the Japanese version had the advantage of cutting upwards through a kind of blind angle. I later discovered that this type of attack, not always a kick, was sometimes called Shikaku, literally ‘dead angle’. I know of other kickers who used to employ kicks into areas that either cannot be covered or cannot be seen. One of the early western Wado fighters successfully employed a sneaky maegeri that was too low for chudan and too high to be described as a foul low blow; he would power it into a kind of defensive no-man’s-land; an area his opponent wasn’t used to defending, and it worked!
The dynamics of the Mawashigeri, Wado style.
There has been much debate about how the founder of Wado Ryu Otsuka Hironori influenced the style of mawashigeri that the early Wado Japanese pioneers used. We knew that the Wado kick was identified by its set-up and delivery. We’d seen enough Shotokan mawashigeri kicks to know that the hips came in with a different timing. In Shotokan the hips came in like a wheel; with Wado the set-up, to all intents and purposes, was the same as our maegeri, and then, when the power generation was needed, it snapped in at just the right time to set up a coordinated relay of energy – for us, the Shotokan kick was too easy to read. I am sure they would totally disagree with my interpretation.
Otsuka Sensei’s Mawashigeri.
Otsuka Sensei’s mawashigeri was sneaky, it was more about the angle of delivery and contact than just swinging your leg at your opponent like he’s a bag of sand. As it is used today in paired kata (kumite gata) it is like an exercise in geometry, or physics; the angle and trajectory are such that the opponent is struck at the point of maximum weakness. Structurally he is compromised – add to that the position that the person delivering the kick is in, usually subtly off-line in a position of relative safety, the opponent is scuppered in a three-dimensional arms race. It is so clever. It has been said that this kicking dynamic came to Otsuka Sensei from Shindo Yoshin Ryu Jujutsu not Okinawan karate. The mawashigeri that comes from an on-the-floor position in one of the Tanto Dori comes to mind, and The Tanto Dori clearly have their root in Otsuka’s Shindo Yoshin Ryu or Koryu background.1
When the third grandmaster of Wado Ryu recently introduced the Ura no Kumite based upon his grandfather’s earlier teaching, the mawashigeri employed in these paired kata is clearly delivered in an identical manner to how the first grandmaster performed them.
Modes of delivery.
In a significant number of mainstream Wado organisations the kick is delivered both with the instep and the ball of the foot. Within Shikukai we reserve the instep for sparring but use the ball of the foot in syllabus-related performances.
The western version of mawashigeri had the advantage of reach, but needed more work to set up and to really get good at recovering from that huge extension and rotation. Historically, the mawashigeri was a lesser used technique and in my early days of competition, was hardly used at all (maegeri was the favoured kick). The Japanese also had an aversion to high kicks, which some considered too risky. But if you wanted to show off though, a jodan mawashigeri was your ‘go to’ technique.
Certainly, I developed my jodan kick very early on in the 1970’s, when I was at the Mansfield Dojo, mostly out of a need to survive. To explain; most of my contemporaries were much bigger and stronger than I was, they were working either in the collieries or in heavy industry, and therefore it wasn’t a good idea for me to tangle with them at close range, so the long-range kicks sometimes saved me from getting a battering. I realise that this somewhat contradicts the above-mentioned Japanese reticence regarding jodan kicks, but I can only add to that argument that the execution of my jodan mawashigeri once saved my neck in a street altercation.
For competition, the western version was originally worked to keep the body back and capitalise on reach so that a gyakuzuki counter was harder to make. But, as with all things, the fighters of that generation soon found a way round it and capitalised on its weakness. They then had to relearn a more up-front, in-your-face style of mawashigeri that closed the gap rapidly.
Longer-legged westerners were able to develop variations that the Japanese had never been seen before. Geoff Thompson (World Champion 1982) used his long legs to great effect; he had a mawashigeri which was sometimes delivered high and chopped downwards to the head, which nullified the standard guard - such an unexpected angle to have to deal with.
Welsh Wado fighter Ritchie Noblett also developed skilful and inventive ways of using a high mawashigeri.
The modern competition mawashigeri.
Today’s mawashigeri in modern competition has been redefined, and the power of the rotating hip has all but disappeared. The fighters typically stand with hips fully opened out to eliminate the need to turn at all (much faster), but… hips open equals groin unprotected and the hip has minimal involvement in the kick, which becomes a very fast flick. This ‘open hip’ position also means that the uramawashigeri can be deployed as easily as the mawashigeri, giving the opponent double the worry. Swings and roundabouts really.
An open groin was an anathema for some of the early Japanese Sensei who came to the UK, it was an open invitation for a groin kick. Many western students learned that lesson the hard way.
Mawashigeri was French?
There is a theory that the Japanese karate mawashigeri was stolen from the French art of Savate. Savate was a French foot boxing sporting system, still popular today, (as much as any minority sport can be). It is heavily influenced by traditional fencing and, being French, uses a similar vocabulary. Some say it came from French sailors and used in street fights in French ports. They say that the use of the kicks may have been because the sailors needed to hang on to something to remain on their feet when seas were rough, so the easy way to give someone a slap during stormy weather was with your foot. How this migrated to Japan nobody has ever really been able to pin down, it’s just a theory.
In conclusion:
Shiomitsu Sensei was once asked if his distinct mawashigeri risked kicking someone’s elbow on the way up to jodan? The questioner then regretted asking the question as Shiomitsu Sensei insisted on demonstrating it on him, and clattering him round the ear. We could all see it coming… but he couldn’t!
See Ben Pollock’s excellent article, https://jkfwadokai.org.uk/f/origin-of-karates-mawashigeri?fbclid=IwAR1q6qUEy46IQzBtb3RkMJOXPA7gNbblTLtVPxvRCYxtly_jeYI6xypkEto