Flow Drills

[Wado Heretic]

Unfortunately, no. As I only have a handful of students I don't tend to put videos out except for Kata, which I only do as I am trying to preserve them as I was taught them by Aragaki Sensei. Plus, as my drills are based on my teacher's creation of the Rolling Bunkai, and he has a DVD out of the Rolling Bunkai, I do not like to put the material out there for free as Karate Instruction is his livelihood. Plus, although I see the benefit of putting the material out there for advertisement, at the same time I do want people to come to me for the material, not just get it off YouTube and potentially misunderstand and misrepresent it.

With that said, some of my students do take footage as a memory aide regularly so I can ask and see if I can get anything to share here. If nothing else I can try and put some together that demonstrates the logic.

Hate to say it, but I’ve gotten some great ideas from the KU system as well.

You have inadvertently mentioned one of the names I was not going to mention. I have a teacher who really enjoys that material, and when I have been shown the drills during courses I and my students have really enjoyed them, and we have stolen a few that fit in with what we already do.

I find the the eight flow drills I have based on Pinan Nidan from level one to seven, along with students learning the standard Rolling Bunkai for the other Pinangata, my escalations and kanren-waza varitions of the Pinan Nidan Rolling Bunkai, and my competency requirements in Renzoku and Kakei Kumite are more than enough for most students until Purple Belt.

If I break down my basic "syllabus" and I use quotation marks as it only really exists in my head and is subject to regular review:

Yellow Belt: Pinan Nidan and Pinan Nidan Rolling Bunkai (Eight Applications). Pinan Nidan Flow-Drills Level 1.

Green Belt: Naihanchi Shodan and Sanchin. Pinan Nidan Flow-Drills Levels 2-3. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Nidan Deflection competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan Nidan Grip Release Competency.

Blue Belt: Pinan Shodan and Pinan Shodan Rolling Bunkai (Seven Applications). Pinan Shodan Flow Drills Levels 1-4. Pinan Nidan Flow-Drills Levels 4-5. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Shoidan and Nidan Deflection competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan Shodan and Nidan Grip Release Competency. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Nidan Counter-Striking competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan Nidan Trapping/Position Competency.

Purple Belt: Pinan Sandan and Pinan Sandan Rolling Bunkai (Six Applications). Pinan Sandan Flow Drills Level 1-3. Pinan Shodan Flow Drills Levels 4-7. Pinan Shodan Flow-Drills Levels 6-7. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Shodan and Nidan Counter-Striking competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan Shodan and Nidan Trapping/Position Competency. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Nidan Attacking Competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan Nidan Take-Down Competency.

3rd Brown: Pinan Godan and Pinan Godan Rolling Bunkai (Seven Applications). Pinan Nidan Rolling Bunkai - Escalations 1-3/Ushiro Waza 1-3/Five Ura Variations/Kanren-Waza 1/Dojo Bunkai 1. Introduction to level eight flow-drills with Pinan Shodan and Nidan. Renzoku Kumite Pinan Shodan Attacking Competency. Kakei Kumite Pinan ShodanTake-Down Competency. Bogu Kumite Defence Competency. Kakedameshi Positions, Grips, and Releases Competencies.

2nd Brown: Pinan Yondan and Pinan Yondan Rolling Bunkai (Ten Applications). Pinan Nidan Rolling Bunkai - Escalations 4-5/Ushiro Waza 4-5/Kanren-Waza 2/Dojo Bunkai 2. Pinan Sandan Flow Drills Level 4-7 Bogu Kumite Striking Competency. Kakedameshi Take-Down Competency.

1st brown: One three Kata: Seisan, Fyukyugata Ni, or Jitte. Level Eight Flow-Drills including Pinan Shodan/Nidan/Sandan. Pinan Nidan Rolling Bunkai - Escalations 6-7/Ushiro Waza 6-7/Kanren-Waza 3-4/Dojo Bunkai 3-4. Pinan Sandan Renzoku and Kakei Kumite Competencies. Bogu Kumite Wrestling Competencies. Kakedameshi Striking and Kubi-Sumo Competency. Introduction to Jissen Kumite.

Thus, by the time one of my students has reached the point of Grading to Shodan they will have only learnt 21 Flow drills, and only really focused on 8 of them to the fullest extent. In that sense I do not think you need a menagerie of flow drills as long as your core has depth and breadth to it.

I shall explain some of my lingo as I suspect some of it is otherwise obtuse:

Escalations - These are variations on the basic Rolling Bunkai where I have changed the attack to something similar but it is much faster paced and closer a "realistic" attack. I usually have two points of escalation for each Rolling Bunkai Drilll.

Ushiro Waza - Technically Ushiro means back but I use it colloquially to refer to versions of the drills where the Seme starts in a position of disadvantage such as against a wall. It is part of contextualising the techniques in self-defence as none of us are ever politely attacked in a huge space prepared and ready for a fight.

Ura Variations - As the phrase Ura implies it just means the exercises are done off the opposite side to the basic version.

Kanren Waza - Alternate finishing throws and holds to, or variations on, the ones implied in the classical kata to practice sensible adjustments when confronted with resistance.

Dojo Bunkai - This is just short hand for applications I developed myself for the Pinangata on top of the Rolling Bunkai for my Dojo. Some of the Rolling Bunkai have some mirrored applications where the Kata repeats itself, and those are the instances where I have added an additional application for my students.

What I mean by competencies just means I am looking for a student to be competent in that area when they have reached that level. For example, when a student is defending, I want to see that they are adjusting their distance suitably, aren't flinching or just reacting, but actively making wise defensive choices.

In our version of Renzoku kumite, we take it in turns to be attacker or defender, or play a "tag" version, and we restrict ourselves to using material from the kata we are working in. So the attacker uses strikes from the Kata, and the defender the deflections and trained applications. Our Kakei Kumite follows the same model in that we focus on a specific kata and its content for our practice.

But again, in spelling this out, the point was that as good as flow drills can be as a device, and all the effort I have put into developing mine, they are a small part of the picture.

I will try and find a video or maybe put one together if time allows.