This was so beautiful. This irimi was so deep and the principle was very clear. It follows closely with a principle of axial alignment that I have noticed in several techniques. To be fair, there are three plausible ways to ikkyo ura from yokomenuchi – first either blend with the strike and grab Uke‘s wrist, or irimi into the strike (this waza), or duck under/slide past the strike. All have their pros and cons.

The one worked on was the deep irimi kuzushi, followed by stepping behind Uke, and performing a spiraling ikkyo ura with two ideas I love: one I figured out on my own a while ago, and the other is a new idea. I figured out that ikkyo ura should be done with one hand grasping the triceps and not the elbow, and was confirmed by my seniors. This only works if Tori‘s mijiku is close to Uke‘s mijiku.

Note: If Tori is not beside Uke for the ikkyo ura, then Tori is tempted to grab Uke‘s elbow and pull. Is there a way to make this better? Grabbing the triceps is not even critical as ikkyo ura can be done with one hand hooking onto Uke‘s wrist and twisting into a spiral.

Interesting Point: Actually, just after writing the above notes, I discovered that Tissier does yokomenuchi ikkyo omote with uchi mawari blending, and his ikkyo ura is very similar to how we were doing it tonight (except for his inner hand placement). In the video posted below, I am interested with his ikkyo ura at [0:39] for this entry.

Something I noticed in the slowdown of this clip is exactly when Tissier makes contact with Uke‘s strike. Hint: it is not while Uke has his arm cocked. Watch slowly. This gives me another idea which I would like to explore and discuss later.

Update 2010.09.11 – Here is a still of Osawa Sensei showing the hand placement I was talking about at the USAF 2010 Summer Camp.

Ikkyo ura entering