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Those who read many of the US Martial Arts magazines will know what I am saying when I say that the focus within the general Shorin Ryu community is on the Hakutsuru kata (Crane forms).
This would be fine if this focus was directly proportionate to the place that Hakutsuru holds within our system.
Because the Hakutsuru is the last kata within our system, it is unfortunately considered the ultimate, and that by studying this kata one will become advanced much quicker.
Well in my opinion this is trying to run before you can crawl. (more…)
Every Tuesday and Thursday of this semester I would stay in my martial arts class after the last official session over for extra practice with my friends on katas and techniques. We enjoy going over and over different forms, as well as sparring during this hour. Once a friend and I did a long form continuously for a dozen times and we both got tired quickly, first because we have trained for almost 3 hours before that and second, we were trying so hard to completely imitate the movements of our Sensei.
We sat down on the floor. My friend were still examining his hands and making shapes from the kata. I, on the other side, was loosely moving my arms and body. Obviously, both of us were still going through the forms in our heads even though we were taking a rest. The friend suddenly said “Oh man I can’t get this right at all”. “Yeah, neither can I” , I quickly agreed with him. He continued “right! but you seem to pick everything up just fine” , I smiled and shook my head “Do you think you will ever do Seisan (name of the kata we were practicing) perfectly?”. My friend replied “If I practice hard enough and after more times I hope I will”, then he asked the same question in return, “How about you?”.
“No, I don’t really expect to ever do it perfectly,” . My friend looked surprised, but I continued with another question “How do you know when something is perfect?”. He thought for a moment then said “When all the movements we do in our kata are correct and the postures are right.” (more…)
Following is a selection from Dave Lowry’s essay collection, The Karate Way.
We have to admit that the popular image of the black belt is inextricably woven into the general perception of these arts we follow. While we may have a more comprehensive view of the belt, we need to see that in the population outside the dojo, in the world at large, it usually means something else. When a black belt is conferred upon a karateka, that has implications in the popular imagination. And we should consider some ramifications that perception and those implications have upon what people think about karate-do. (more…)
Final
Welcome to the final part of this series of articles on the Pinan / Heian katas as a fighting system. So far in this series we looked at the background of the Pinan katas and discussed that they are said to represent a complete fighting system that contains techniques for use at all stages and all ranges of a fight. We also discussed that whilst the modern order in which the Pinan series are taught is based upon the relative technical difficulty of the solo performance of the forms, the original order is based upon the progression of a live fight.
Part 4
Welcome to part four of this series of articles on the Pinan and Heian katas as a fighting system. In the first of this series of articles, we looked at the background of the Pinan / Heian katas and discussed how they are said to represent a complete fighting system that contains techniques for use at all stages and all ranges of a fight. We also discussed that whilst the modern order in which the forms are taught is based upon the relative technical difficulty of the solo performance of the forms, the original order is based upon the progression of a live fight.
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Part 3
Welcome to part three of this series of articles. In the first part of this series we looked at the background of the Pinan / Heian katas and discussed how they are said to represent a coherent fighting system that contains techniques for use at all stages and all ranges of a fight. We also discussed that the modern order in which the forms are taught is based upon the technical difficulty of the solo performance of the forms; whereas the original order (Pinan Shodan / Heian Nidan first) is based upon stages of a live fight. If allowed to progress, a physical altercation will generally go through a series of stages: Pre-fight (verbal exchanges, aggressive body language), limbs coming into range (strikes, attempted grabs etc), grips being established, and finally grappling.
