Survived First Class

So the first class came and went. Eight brave souls turned up and we had a great time.

We got the bokken out and used them to practice movement - the extended reach and harder edge of the wood encourages more avoidance and awareness. It was noticeable how quickly people lost their posture and self control. Even with only a single attacker striking slowly and straight, shomen, it was not long before people were leaning around and forgetting to move their feet.

When we introduced a second attacker it became overwhelming. Some people found themselves stuck in a spot. Some moved but only enough to avoid the swipe of the first strike, the lack of movement left them open to the second attacker. Others moved well but found that moving between the attackers was a risky option as it gave the next attacker an easy route through therefore putting defender under more pressure. That being said, going round the outside all the time, tended to cause a bit of circle running where the attackers seemed to be happily stationary in the middle while the defender exhausted themselves running round and round. A compromise between going round the outside and cutting through the middle, with an awareness of the risk, seemed to be a reasonable strategy. Of course, if the defender was allowed to do more than just avoid then they have more options and this simple strategy needs to be modified but at least it provided a starting point for discussion.

I wanted the bokken avoidance to provide the majority of the aerobic activity of the class but as it was really quite hard to avoid without getting overwhelmed we weren't able to increase the pace to a level that would really get people's blood moving. In the end it was more of a mental and emotional workout.

We played also with some techniques that showed the connection between the techniques of empty handed and sword based aikido. I find that the sword helps with posture, particularly keeping centre: it is difficult to let your arms drift out if they are attached to a sword. We also looked at how the movements in tandoku undo related to sword movement. For me, the most important is the last of the tandoku undo where there is a one hundred and eighty degree turn, which I related to a kaeshi men deflection followed by a turn and cut.

I forgot to take my camera along so no pictures but will certainly put some up after next week's lesson. Thanks to all those who turned up. I am interested in any feedback from those who were there.