NightOwl

This post was originally published as an article in a dedicated KarateForums.com Articles section, which is no longer online. After the section was closed, this article was most to the most appropriate forum in our community. For those reading who have done martial arts, you’ve probably had a chance to be an uke, otherwise roughly simplified to the willing recipient of a martial arts move being practiced. Yes, it is a thankless job with short hours and a horrible health care plan, but in this economy, who can complain? Besides, it serves a noble cause as will be seen. Although the term "uke" is Japanese and applied primarily in martial arts originating from that country, the role itself is fairly universal. From Aikido, which usually forgoes sparring in favor of focusing solely on drill like exercises, to even the most nontraditional boxing gym, a non resistive receiver of a technique during practice can be found everywhere. In this sense, the "sparring vs. no sparring" debate is a fairly moot point, as both start off with training a technique in a non "alive" environment. The purpose isn’t to see if they can pull the move off against a resisting opponent, but if they can get the fundamentals of the move down in an idealized situation. After all, if they can’t pull it off on someone not resisting, how will they be able to progress on to where they can use it in a high pressure situation? The uke is there to receive, not fight back. However, it can also be said that a skillful uke can make anyone look like a master, although I would challenge the notion of that being a good thing. All too often I have seen times where the slightest touch from a small martial artist sends huge ukes flying like they were hit by a speeding truck. The ukes don’t so much receive the technique as much as they ENHANCE it. This can happen unconsciously - I am very much guilty of subconsciously, and slightly, lifting my foot when someone practices foot sweeps on me, and I have to watch myself not to. If I don’t then they aren’t even really sweeping my foot - I’m pulling it up for them. Is that move you are practicing really knocking down your uke or are they falling down just to make your technique "work"? Again, this is different from resistance. Resistance is actively trying to not let the technique work. However, if you are actively allowing their technique to instantly overwhelm you, you’re just as much if not more so interfering with your partner’s practice. Yes, sometimes they won’t be able to throw you - that’s why you are drilling the move! But, if you purposefully fall over every time then they have never really had a chance to throw someone. It is important to note again, however, that as an uke you shouldn't be actively fighting back either (unless called for). Yes, eventually the technique should be tried in a more high pressure situation, but you are there to help them learn the fundamental aspects of the move, not physically test them on it. While there is some merit to at times throwing someone "into the deep end," you have to have some idea of what to do first. As an uke, you are there to prepare them for when that time comes. Therefore, just as you shouldn't artificially help them complete a move, you shouldn't actively hinder them either. Sometimes martial arts instructors confuse resistance and passivity. Resistance is a conscious attempt to prevent or hinder your partner's actions, and as you are there to help them get the fundamental movements down, this is not helpful. But, when someone tries to put you in a wrist lock and it just doesn't work, just because you aren't completely immobilized doesn't mean you are trying to make the technique fail. It means that the fundamentals of the move are off (or you have really flexible wrists), and if you play into it working, you are not helping your partner truly learn how to do it. When this can really become a problem is when your partner is a higher rank than you or even your instructor! So what is to be done in such a situation? Obviously respect is key, but in the end you might have to decide personally if the cost of not pretending the move worked makes up for the face saving enabled by playing along. Thus the tile of the essay and some advice that I have heard multiple times: "Be an honest uke." You need to be a passive receiver; not actively fighting but at the same time not letting them get away with bad technique. Keep yourself and your practice partner honest and don't cheat just to get something to work. In that way, you will both get the most out of your experience.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196479/Pictured-The-battered-bruised-face-burglar-got-wrong-72-year-old-boxer.html This story made me all sorts of happy....don't mess with old people!

At least from that clip, real aikido looks like aikido without a gi or hakama. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but technique and training wise it looks almost the same to me.

While most throws that I see in other styles have a judo equivalent, this one looked unique enough that I wanted to try it out. Thus even though I couldn't see how I would use it in an active setting, I figured it'd be worth a shot to quiz the fine folks here on karateforums. I guess my initial impressions weren't too far off though...too bad. I am however liking playing with wrist locks like kote gaeshi in BJJ even if shiho nage doesn't enter my arsenal anytime soon.

In English the name means 'four directional throw'. It's a popular move in Aikido, but it's also found in classical JJJ. As a note, due to the nature of this throw I don't plan on using it during sparring since you can badly tweak the other persons arm if they don't take the fall correctly. That's true with any throw, but since you don't see this one very often I don't want someone to mess up and get hurt. Rather I want to be able to get to the setup in an active environment without executing the technique fully (sub wrestling, not judo).

1st thought on high kicks: The average person I've seen doesn't protect the head when fighting. Since people don't keep their guards up and don't expect it, a well executed high kick will likely yield at the very least a TKO. 2nd thought: If you miss and get off balance, go too slow, etc you are screwed. Personally I don't have flexibly or speed so I like nice, safe, and low roundhouses. 3rd thought: If you can get an opportunity- it's a risk/reward situation. If you are an expert kicker I don't see why not. But unless you are an expert I wouldn't recommend it. An expert like...HWANG JANG-LEE http://www.kungfucinema.com/hwang-jang-lee-1362 . If you try and take on a knife fighter armed with nothing but your fists and your nikes your personal mileage may vary. Final thought: I'm not as vehemently opposed to high kicks as some are. But I would agree that they in general are not nearly as useful as low or mid ranged kicks. Certainly they are overemphasized many times in martial arts. TKD is especially known for its high kicking, but under WTF rules you don't have to worry about grabs or punches and you are rewarded for kicking high. But that is a situation where what you use in one situation might not be what you use outside the gym. However I think that once you reach a pro level in mma with thousands of dollars on the line, you are careful about how you use your high kicks just as like you would be guarded about using them in a street fight. Is it the EXACT same? No, but it's still a big risk and if you are willing to risk it on a professional fighter with a quarter year's income in the balance, then kicking some drunk attacking you for looking at him wrong in the head might not be that big of a deal. ------------- On if martial arts can be useful in real life? I know a hapkido practitioner who has taken out multiple people at a time in street fights using his martial arts training...many times. But do I think that hapkido as many practice it will make everyone into Jakie Chan? No. You fight how you train and this guy was/is a true master who trains like a machine. In fact my personal opinion is that unless you have aliveness in training (as a good portion of MAs don't) the likelihood that what you train in will translate to actual fighting is slim. Thus most martial arts are not useful beyond providing exercise/general enjoyment in my opinion. Note I didn't say styles- if you have one guy training muay thai statically and one guy training eagle claw kung fu with aliveness on a regular basis; my money is on the eagle guy as the better fighter in real life. In other words training is generally more important than substance. Thus an 'unskilled' brawler who has 'trained' by getting in fights constantly will have an edge over a cardio kickboxer who knows techniques but can't apply them in a live situation. ------------ Of course this raises the question of why martial arts are so popular in the first place. If they are generally not useful wouldn't they have gone away? My thought is not necessarily. Historically speaking, martial arts are a a somewhat niche activity. Back in the day if a martial artist couldn't fight in real life, they either died or got publicly humiliated by loosing in a fight. In other words, what worked and who could use it were weeded out from those who couldn't simply by survival of the fittest. Starting a new martial arts style? Great. Now Chen down the street is angry about you taking away his students and is challenging you to a lei tai match (good luck!). As such who wants to get hurt and risk injury by fighting? It's much easier to take up another sport or game and avoid that barbaric 'martial arts' business all together. Thus when people are in a time where martial arts training is rough and constantly tested, you don't nearly have as many people signing up to get black eyes to bring to work the next day. Now however martial arts are more widespread and popular than ever. What was once mostly practiced by the military, the athletic, and a small segment of society now has its own separate book in the yellow pages. Go to any strip mall and it is likely that you'll find at least one martial arts joint. But look closer and you'll see that most of the customers are middle class suburbanites. These people have jobs, families, school, and many other activities that they are involved in and require attention outside of martial arts. Also they will very likely never face violence on a regular basis, and as such if what they are training works or not is highly irrelevant. In the meanwhile they can get the feeling of safety and power by doing martial arts without needing to go through the often painful and difficult process of refining it through rough training. Thus since Martial arts schools can make you feel like a deadly weapon without needing to prove it nowadays, for many that is good enough to take it up. Thus martial arts schools no matter how poor can stay in business.

A question for the aikidoka/JJJ people out there: What is your usual entry for this throw? I've been tampering with throwing in (no pun intended) some classical JJJ in class, but while I have been getting better with figuring out how to use Nikkajyo for instance during sparring, I can't really think of how to set this one up without the other person pulling or turning out, leaving me in a bad position.

IT certainly can be, but it isn't always. Taichi was largely transformed from a martial art to an exercise by the Chinese; largely in the past century. In fact you are probably more likely to find old fashioned taichiquan outside of mainland China if you are looking for martial applications. Taichiquan masters were gathered to create forms for exercise as China moved into the modern age, and as a result taichi is a hugely popular form of single or group calisthenics in China even to this day. The ultra slow pace and a lot of the wide movements are not from the original chen style, but were added on with no consideration for martial application at all. The very few times I have seen taichiquan in action, it has looked similar to grappling styles like shuai jiao. It is jarringly different from what you see in parks on a Saturday morning. ---------------- I would disagree that the vast majority of the Japanese arts people practice contain purposefully lethal techniques. Traditionally in japan to kill someone you'd stab or shoot them, preferably when they are not looking. As such older japanese martial arts styles favor just as much if not more armed as opposed to unarmed training. 'Yawara" (soft) or what later became known as 'jujutsu' started blooming after the warring states period and during the relative peacetime of the Edo era. In other words unarmed techniques were developed when civil as opposed to martial conflict became the norm. If you wanted to learn how to kill someone during this time, you'd study dueling with a sword and not how to put them in a lock as they were stabbing you. True a choke, break, or throw can be devastating and can be made deadly, but it's not the most efficient way to kill someone and it wasn't meant to be. Lethal unarmed techniques are foolish for a situation calling for such force unless you are caught unprepared. Thus there are some 'killing' techniques, but by and large you are threatening at the most serious injury. This holds for martial arts in other countries as well. Although Japan is a major exception, by and large most truly 'deadly' arts died out as cold weapons fell out of favor and modern weaponry stepped in. What resulted is that only the martial arts designed for civil life really continued to thrive. Many times these styles had weapons training included as well, but most kung fu or karate schools for instance (if they want to be practical for self defense) focus more on the unarmed stuff as opposed to staff or blade training. ---------------------------- To get to the original post- I would say that sparring or 'aliveness' is essential for good martial arts training in the truest sense, but if you are looking for just exercise/a cultural experience then I think that changes a lot of things. I wouldn't take wushu to learn how to fight, but as a form of exercise/gymnastics I think that it is awesome (and something that I would highly recommend). Another option if you want to go Japanese is iado or kenjutsu- lots of culture and pretty neat IMO.

Someone tried to use ura nage against me today during randori after I messed up a tai otoshi. I sunk my weight down and turned around to escape; ultimately ending back in the staring position. To dispel any illusions of grandeur, they got me shorty after with something else. : p It's a great throw though- I think that the gi makes it a bit harder to get in close enough as opposed to doing it while wrestling/no gi grappling; but for me personally I've found it really useful (along with the single leg) when either me or my sparring partner misses a technique and ends up within grabbing range of the other person.

Not entirely. I've seen a lot of aikidoka go into a pin after a throw as well. The biggest differences I have seen is philosophy and movement. I don't have a youtube clip of it, but I've gotten to see aikido and classical jujutsu versions of moves such as shiho nage etc demoed by someone who has extensive experience in both. In a direct comparison the aikido entries to techniques definitely have a larger range of movement in general- for instance one example is that a lot of aikidoka spin/turn the uki multiple times before applying something which aikijujutsu doesn't seem to do as much.

From my limited exposure and what I have gleaned from other martial artists: Aikido techniques pretty much all come from aikijujutsu; Morihei Ueshiba took the techniques from the curriculum that he liked, tweaked them, added in his own religious philosophy, and ended up with aikido. As such the philosophies of the two arts are very different, as is the 'style' in which they carry things out. Aikijujutsu is a lot more direct, aggressive, and doesn't mind using some strikes to hurt the opponent. From what I have seen techniques tend to be fairly tight when compared to the more flowing movements of aikido, and there is more of a martial/combat oriented mindset to it.. Aikido on the other hand is much more passive/responsive when applying its techniques, and the movement range tends to be wider and more '\flowing. Meanwhile as opposed to aikijujutsu combative philosophy, more or less your goal is to harmonize with your opponent's energy to incapacitate them as opposed to 'fighting'. Here are some examples of aikijujutsu and aikido that I think give a pretty good comparison: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6Y3WZuUtVo&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_wFJDbaJyw

I would add Ouchigari if it is not in there...if you get the placement right size isn't too much of a factor.

From what I have read and heard from interviews with famous martial artists that worked with Bruce Lee (like Gene Lebell and Joe Lewis ), Lee was a showman first and a martial artist second. Thus he gained his fame mostly from his movies as opposed to focusing on martial arts. He even told Gene Lebell that he liked some other martial arts styles for what they offered, but they didn't film well for an audience ( http://www.genelebell.com/stories.html#11 ). Had he lived longer I'm sure he would have picked up more and more, but I think legend of Bruce Less tends to get mixed with the life of the actual man....something he probably would have been proud of

Wrestling is a bit too much of a loaded term for me. In general it refers to western grappling, which in turn usually means freestyle/folk wrestling in the US. This style of wrestling is old to be sure, but it was predated in the past century by catch wrestling. In fact when judo was formed, catch wrestling was the predominate grappling style in America (why they eventually took out the submissions and changed it to freestyle wrestling I don't know). The other style is Greco-Roman which is not from Ancient Greece but rather comes from France. As for calling what everyone else has done throughout history as 'wrestling', I suppose you can but I'd prefer the term 'grappling'. Wrestling as we know it in the West is fairly recent, but grappling in its various forms (up to modern day wrestling) has been around forever. As for wrestling (freestyle) being a traditional martial art or not, the term 'traditional' has a sort of warped meaning in martial art circles. In the truest sense of the word 'traditional', I would say it is since it has been along for so long. But nowadays when people say traditional they mean a way of training. However this is of course a misleading label- traditionally many martial arts trained as 'modern' martial arts do (especially grappling styles). Add in that some martial arts which are often label traditional are actually fairly young (Aikido, Shotokan, TKD), and the 'traditional' martial art label is rather meaningless IMO.

Judo judo judo. Wrestling is great for standing grappling, but judo will help you learn at least the basic submissions from the ground/ working from your back. Arm bars, chokes, shoulder locks...it's all in there. Just be aware that stand up grappling generally makes up the majority of judo's focus like wrestling.