We have been working more and more on how to switch between nikyo, kotegaeshi, sankyo, yonkyo, kaitenosae, and shiho-gatame at will and on demand. For example, Ben Sensei might say to do shomeuchi sankyo omote by way of nikyo. Tonight I asked him how we can include ikkyo and gokyo to make it a complete practice routine. He responded.

I won’t write the exact details because the movements are foreign and have not been described previously by me. Instead, I will write the key points – the principle, if you will – so hopefully I remember when I read this again in the future.

Imagine Tori being beside Uke in mirror stance just like at the end of the tai-no-henko (irimi tenkan) exercise we start most classes with. Tori is in migi handmi and Uke is in hidari hanmi. Uke should twist her left wrist clockwise so her palm is facing outward. Tori should then capture the thumb so both Uke and Tori’s thumbs are pointing in roughly the same direction if Tori were to give a ‘thumbs up’ at this point. If Tori grabs Uke’s thumb with the other orientation, this won’t work.

Assuming no one has moved and both stances are unchanged, Tori can then guide Uke’s thumb under Uke’s own arm. The way to do this if for Tori to twist his thumb-grabbing hand by 180 as well as draw an arc that guides Uke’s thumb toward Uke. Tori should guide her hand under her arm so that his te-no-hira is resting on the back of Uke’s te-no-ko and her wrist is bent like in gokyo. Tori should then rest Uke’s elbow on his own solar-plexus or some anchor that makes sense. This will cause more pressure on her wrist and may even cause her hand to go numb!

Police have a similar control technique called a gooseneck. This is probably because the suspect’s hand looks like the neck of a goose when bent.

I’ve practiced this two ways and I one feel more natural. For ura techniques, the footwork is similar for both Aikikai and North American styles. Omote is another story so I will focus on ura here.

Both in gyakuhanmi hidari katatedori.

Atemi is important and helps the whole body move. Rotate the hips as soon as you are grabbed so your right arm has more reach toward and through Uke’s head (but don’t snap or hit). This hip rotation helps the body into position for your left leg to slide out and back, while your right leg slides left and forward. Your hanmi should have changed into a solid migi handmi.

Here is the interesting part. Some people pull Uke into themselves, others don’t pull at all. Pulling and extending are two different ideas. I prefer not to pull because when I am pulled I tend to keep going in that direction (think of a bull in a china shop). Instead, it feels right to, when in migi hanmi and out of the line of attack, to extend Uke’s arm by lowering your weight onto his bicep then elbow crease in a sliding motion. This way Uke’s only momentum is down and not hurling into you. Ben Sensei does this beautifully.

Block/Stop Ukes’ striking hand before it has a chance to get to past his center.
So if uke strikes with right hand. Tori blocks with both hands, one close to wrist and one close to inside of elbow (this blocking is supposed to take Uke balance since his hand will be kept back while his body still wants to move forward, hence, upsetting his balance). The Tori does a switch grip and performs and ikkyo Ura movement and takes Uke to the gorund.

Then finish with a Gokyo pin.
For this pin the transition from the Ikkyo pin is to keep hold of uke right elbow with your left hand and slide the Ukes wrist with your right hand so the Ukes’ hand makes a vertical Z like shape. The back of Uke’s palm will be on the ground completing the pin.

Working with Andell, we figured out to make the final gokyo osae when Uke has his arm locked straight out. Ben Sensei did this to me once months back and I remember the pain I caused myself from resisting (at his request).

Since Uke has his arm straight and locked as in the ikkyo osae, why not hyper-extend his elbow first by pressing on his elbow and raising his wrist? His wrist will leave the ground by a few centimeters. Suddenly, if you pull up on his sode and push inward on his wrist toward his elbow, his arm will surely bend.

If Uke reluctantly goes into gokyo, but maintains a fist and locked wrist, you can simply push on the wrist, or pop it, and it will collapse.

Consider this instant in the technique: Nage has a proper grip on Nage’s wrist and elbow, and Uke’s arm is slightly bent and rolled forward with Nage being slightly behind Uke and about to rotate Uke down.

For the test, the committee wants to see you extend Uke’s arm a bit forward then draw a generous spiral to the ground behind Uke.

As a variation, if Uke has locked his elbow, or you are thinking to yourself “why not?”, you can simply extend Uke’s arm and slightly behind him in the direction of his shikaku, or dead angle. He will naturally start to fall backwards and you can continue the ura technique from here as well.

Nage does a Shomenuchi Ikkyo takedown but the pin is different. The hand closest to Uke lifts the sleeve of the pinned arm at the elbow and the other hand guides into the gokyo pin where the back of Uke’s palm is on the mat with fingers pointing outwards. This pin is painful so take care when practising.

From An Inquiry into Application of Gokyo (Aikido’s Fifth Teaching) on Human Anatomy, Perceptual and Motor Skills. Olson, 1996 vol 82.

Using a cadaver/anatomist-observer model, the authors observed that the tissues manipulated by the technique were primarily on the dorsal side of the wrist, proximal to the second metacarpal.

Apparently, “with additional pressure or uncontrolled hyperflexion to the (wrist joint), Nage has the ability to tear the ligaments away from the bone … when this happens, the joint will dislocate”.

The Aikidoist could “break the styloid of the ulna (also involved in the nikyo pain mechanism) or fracture one of the carpal bones.”

It is interesting to note a law-enforcement variation called a “gooseneck” which is similar to the gokyo of Aikido; instead of hyperflexing the wrist, they hyperextend it.

Uke attacks with yokomenuchi to the side of the head. Nage enters with atemi and simultaneously blocks at the attacker’s elbow to off-balance Uke. With the hand that did atemi, Nage then grabs the inside of the wrist holding the knife and performs ura tenkan taking Uke to the ground. Nage secures the gokyo pin by grabbing Uke’s sleeve and raising the elbow, with the back of Uke’s palm on the mat. The knife is then taken from a pinned Uke.

Today was seminar, but as soon as tantodori came up, I ran across the room as fast as I could to find Ben Sensei as my aitei. He really knows his knives so I wanted to be with him for this.

When he does sotomawari, his initial block consists of three hits – the real block, the second hit to the wrist with a grab, then the hit to the hand with a grab on the knife-wielding hand.  He also moves deeply off the line of attack.

No one does this at Aikikai, so this is one unique credit to Ben Sensei.