Portrait of a Japanese Sword Maker

We found this video and it reminds us of a couple of things that are important to training, and maybe life as well:

1. You are always learning - never an expert - even after 40 years
2. When you teach people, you should be trying to make them better than you are

New venue - Fitness Junction, Aldershot

We've just opened a new class on Tuesday nights in Aldershot - it's a great venue.  If you've ever wanted to learn a martial art like ours - come along and say hello.

We kept it simple - a few simple wristlocks and pressure points to give people an idea of what they can learn with us.

We're looking forward to getting settled and meeting some new people


 

Defending yourself with wrist locks

This week we looked at kotegaeshi which is a seemingly simple but important wrist lock in Aikido

This is a great technique for beginners because it's not too hard to grasp the basics and give it a go, and you rapidly find why you don't need strength to defend yourself in Aikido.

For people who've been training a little longer, kotegaeshi teaches you about irimi (moving in toward your attacker), taisabaki (body management), using your entire body as one unit, and focus or ki.

Easter training

No training tonight - hope you're all enjoying the Easter break.  See you on Wednesday (27th) as usual

If someone threw a punch or a kick, would you move towards it?

We would - sometimes.  It's call Irimi (which sort of means, moving in directly when attacked).

This week we started looking at how this works, and getting used to the idea that when someone attacks you're often safer if you can move in towards the person and take control.

We looked at a couple of common attacks, including how to protect yourself from a kick if you have been knocked to the ground.

As always, we try not to use our strength which means anyone can use this against anyone else.

Tanto - dealing with knife attacks

This week we looked as some of the tactics you can use if you're unlucky enough to be attacked by someone holding a knife. We practiced with the wooden tanto - the knife used in traditional Japanese martial arts.