I figured out where the nerves on the forearm arm. In fact, I’ve dug out anatomical papers on how Aikido’s yonkyo works.¹ I’ve practiced on drunk roommates to see if they can still feel it, and I have practiced with friends in the dojo. It hurts!

I don’t want to hurt to my friends when we practice. That is why I choose to do yonkyo a couple inches higher on the inner forearm – there is muscle there to protect the nerves better. I try to think about my partner when doing this technique and follow the Golden Rule. Some people out there can put their whole body weight on my fragile nerve if they get upset and it is their turn to do yonkyo.

1. See http://wazajournal.com/techniques/yonkyo/yonkyo-pain-mechanism-explained.html [↩]

Zagi Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

Zagi Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

Zagi Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

Zagi Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

Zagi Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

Mr. Tissier does a hand switch similar to how he does the standing sankyo ura version. This is a very elegant sankyo ura.

These are excepts from Stefan Stenudd’s Aikido Dojo – How to Run One, November 2006¹

1. Beginner’s Stage

I’d say it’s the first year or two, depending on how intensely the student is training and how talented the student is.

2. Intermediary Stage

It starts at the time when the student has a comfortable ukemi technique, and can do many of the basic techniques in Aikido without much hesitation. From this point the students usually develop very quickly, and need to train often and with vigor.

The most common rule for dojos outside Japan is to allow hakama when the student reaches the grade 3 kyu. If later, I fear that the good influence the hakama can have on posture and circularity of movement is lost.

This is a very intense period in anyone’s aikido development, and it is full of intense memories that we keep forever on.

They still need to work on their basics, certainly, but they also need to discover how much they have already learned – even to show off, occasionally. They will sneak in such moments, whether the teacher allows it or not. Anyway, the teacher must work hard to keep these students challenged, or they will get bored – or quit at a later time.

The intermediary student might be able to teach others some Aikido techniques, but rarely has the patience to do so, and misses important aspects when doing it.

3. Advanced Stage

It commences at the level usually associated with shodan, or right before that. The grade itself is not a trustworthy indicator, but the student has reached an ability that is unquestionable. The student also has a level of authority in his or her Aikido. The advanced student is familiar with most of the Aikido techniques, and comfortable also in teaching them to others.

Maybe that’s the best indication of the advanced student: the ability to teach others the Aikido techniques.

For a continued development, the advanced students need to reexamine their techniques.

The refinement of Aikido is done by revision. Advanced students should question what they have learned. They should dare to let go of solutions they have trusted this far, so that they are open to continued improvement even when it means a change from what they know well into something that makes them feel like beginners anew.

Of course, it takes an advanced teacher to make advanced students continue to learn, to challenge and inspire them.

4. Teacher Stage

This arrives when the student is quite competent to have a dojo of his or her own, become its head instructor and take responsibility for the development of its students from the beginning to the advanced level. The competence signified by the grade 4 dan is probably where this stage commences, but again – grade alone is no guaranteed measurement.

1. http://www.stenudd.com/aikido/aikido-dojo.htm [↩]

I was looking for something unrelated to this, but I know friends are thinking about making a dojo in the future, and one person I know already has one, so this is good background information from someone who has gone through the experience of setting up several dojos and is kind enough to share his insights. His writing was very long so I only took key points from his experiences and omitted the colourful anecdotes to use as a quick reference.

Excepts from Running an Aikido Dojo by Stefan Stenudd, November 2006.¹

“You must have a broader perspective than just the next class, but as the bottom line: you must want to train in the dojo and long for the next class, or something is wrong.”

“If you prefer a certain style of Aikido, allow the dojo to be devoted to it.”

“The more the dojo agrees with you, the more you agree with it, and you will be an inspired leader of it.”

“If for some reason the dojo develops into something that doesn’t suit you that well, don’t hesitate to leave it.”

“When a dojo is started from scratch, its first generation of members is of the greatest importance. They set the character of the dojo.”

“Don’t change your Aikido or the dojo system to attract a lot of people who would never want to train Aikido the way you want to. That only leads to trouble and conflict.”

“Consider carefully how to advertise for your dojo. Don’t stress the self-defense aspect if you’re not personally into that. Don’t use media or forums that mainly attract people of an attitude that is far from yours. In demonstrations, try not to show a way of doing Aikido that differs much from what you like the trainings to be.”

“Those who can’t take the heat you don’t want as members, anyway. Anybody who expects just to pay the fee and then be served is not fit to join a dojo.”

“I recommend you to make grading a fun event at regular intervals, but not give it an importance as if it were the goal of the training. It is not. Training is the goal of training.”

“If your dojo is a club, … a good general rule is to search for a Chairperson among those members who do not want to be one, and to make sure not to elect one who is eager for it … or else that person might get an attitude.”

“If senior students are involved in the teaching of newcomers, they will surely do all they can to make those people stay and continue their training.”

“Maybe you’re left without any yudansha, black belt, and quite probably you will not have members with which to train on the level you were used to. … You have to give your dojo a second chance, for the sake of the members remaining, and those yet to come.”

“If there is a big gap, so that almost all of the remaining members are of a much lower grade than the first generation, then you need to start by admitting to yourself that you didn’t take proper care of the regeneration of the dojo. You didn’t do enough to make newcomers welcome, or to assure that they were given a good enough training to develop as they should. You have to think of ways to improve in this respect.”

“You need to ensure that the most senior members of the ones remaining in the dojo are regarded as the core of the dojo, just as much as the first generation was before them. The trick is to make them feel that way. When the present seniors of the dojo feel like its seniors, they will help you to keep the dojo going.”

“The main inspiration in training Aikido is the learning process. Students practice towards perfection. Without the perspective of improvement, training is mere body exercise.”

“The teacher needs to feel that he or she is improving, or it’s just a job – with no or little pay, at that. So, who teaches the teacher? The students do.”

“Invite other teachers to give classes in your dojo! It has the same benefits for you as when you travel to seminars elsewhere – and then some. You get a chance to be a student like the others, in your own dojo.”

“Any teacher’s ideal is that the students should surpass him or her. But make them work for it, by your own continued development, at the same time as you do all you can to assist and inspire them in their progress.”

“(As a teacher) watch out for two things, though: pride and laziness.”

“Pride makes you avoid teaching techniques of which you don’t feel sure. Instead, you fill too much of your classes with the stuff that you excel at. Since practice makes perfect, you will surely improve on the techniques you already know well, but the rest of your Aikido risks to deteriorate.”

“Laziness is a slow-working poison. At the start it works much the same as pride: you avoid techniques that you are not comfortable with, for one reason or other, and spend excessive time on other techniques that you find easy to perform… A lazy teacher also avoids going to seminars or inviting other teachers to the dojo. Again, you don’t learn much.”

“A better goal for an Aikido teacher, if there should at all be one, is to cultivate one’s students until they can become teachers – to be a teacher of teachers.”

1. From http://www.stenudd.com/aikido/aikido-dojo.htm [↩]

In his Book of Five Rings, the famous samurai Miyamoto Musashi wrote:

“The teacher is the needle, and the student is the thread.”

Stefan Stenudd interprets this as: “As a teacher you lead the students on, in a spirit of their improvement being the reason for it all. The needle goes first, but the thread remains.”

Sometimes Tori takes Uke straight down and it is awkward for Uke to reposition himself. For example, in nikyo ura both Saito and Tissier like to take Uke straight down instead of letting him get back up and doing another ura tenkan then taking him down again (inefficient). I first saw Dzung Nguyen Sensei take low ukemi similar to this years ago. I don’t see this much these days so I thought I would a make a quick-and-dirty example of what I was talking about. This is still a work in progress.

The first two falls are awkward on purpose as a reference. The rest are simulations of going straight down comfortably. There is no audio.

I guess what I am trying to do is to throw my body up and let my torso touch, then my stomach and finally my legs in a soft manner.

This video has been posted as a reference point when looking at recent clips of Doshu to see how his techniques have changed, stayed the same, or just as reference for my own training.

“Happiness is not the pursuit. Happiness is where you are right now.”

- Steve Erickson

Yokomenuchi sankyo ura

Very fancy, Mr. Tissier. Still, original! This is from 1985 and predates Steven Seagal doing it on the silver screen. By the way, this is a still from his video about how to so all the kyu techniques.

Shomenuchi Sankyo Ura

This is the same shomenuchi sankyo omote from a later series by Mr. Tissier in late 90’s.

Yokomenuchi sankyo ura

Yokomenuchi sankyo ura

Nikyo ura (1985)

Nikyo ura (more recent)

On ura, I like how he takes Uke’s wrist very low to the ground (Uke’s center is lowered and he is bent over), and he does the Aikikai footing style of having his inner leg bracing against Uke’s forearm. Other styles brace Uke’s wrist against the back leg.

Nikyo ura continued

He was right beside Uke for the wrist change, and he still is. When he goes to execute the nikyo mechanism, he stays beside Uke. This is smart. The alternative is to face Uke and risk him shooting your legs into a takedown. By staying beside Uke it seems like you have better control of his arm and joints, and he is less able to move his body to alleviate the pain. It also looks like many of the pros stay to the side too. Check out Saito Sensei also.

Update: I should point out that Tissier has both hands near Uke’s wrist and can use the leverage of his elbow if Uke is stubborn or big. I believe Doshu does this also and is considered the fundamental way.

Nikyo ura mechanism

If Tori stays beside Uke, where else but down can Uke go?

Note to myself: If someone, even a 5th-kyu shihan, says you have to do something a certain way, remember who is giving you advice and feel free to reject it if you can find several examples of pros (or Doshu!) doing it a different way that makes more sense, is safer, is smarter, and is cleaner. Aikido is not a paint-by-numbers art so please don’t move as if it were, Eric.

Here is the alternative nikyo ura where Tori faces Uke. I invite you to decide which is smarter.

Alternative nikyo ura