Gyaku Do from Tsubazeriai

[hugo]

Does anyone happen to know if there is any explicit rule stating that a person cannot strike gyaku do from tsubazeriai? It's basically hiki-do the other side of the opponent.

Although I'm sure that some people would think that striking gyaku do from there is a bit rude.

[Paburo]

i think its a valid point if there is correct maai, posture, hasuji, kiai, kikentai and zanshin... i've seen it being scored a few times. especially against nito/jodan...

[JSchmidt]

There's no rules forbidding you to strike anything. There's a set of rules defining what is a valid point and if you fulfill those, you'll (most likely) score a point.

[skilled]

There are some judges that won't award gyaku do

But for me Gyaku Do is the most "real" cut .

I dont know , I think that a Gyaku do is a big and realistic cut , than for example a small men , wtf ? you can't do that with a katana right? =)

So I don't know why some Judges dont award Gyaku do w/e forward or backward (hiki).

[Massimo]

In my opion it's more effective if done in the moment your opponent try to cover his men rising his shinai and left hand up.
It's like to say: "ok, he scored do because he saw an opening" and not "oh, he's trying to cut his opponent for real with a bamboo stick"

[hugo]

Thank you to everyone who responded. Our dojo is preparing for a tournament and, for one of our members, this will be his first. He's hit gyaku-do from there successfully a few times during shiai practice, but none of us were entirely sure whether it was valid.

Also, I'm not a huge fan of mudansha resorting to gyaku-do.
But if he can score with it, I won't stand in his way with a tournament coming.

[Halcyon]

So I don't know why some Judges dont award Gyaku do w/e forward or backward (hiki).
One theory is that with gyaku-dou, you are essentially cutting through the saya, so some judges believe that the gyaku-dou must be truly exceptional (clean and strong) to be considered a yukodatotsu.

[nebosuke]

Thank you to everyone who responded. Our dojo is preparing for a tournament and, for one of our members, this will be his first. He's hit gyaku-do from there successfully a few times during shiai practice, but none of us were entirely sure whether it was valid.

Also, I'm not a huge fan of mudansha resorting to gyaku-do.
But if he can score with it, I won't stand in his way with a tournament coming.

If it's his first he's likely kyu, if anything. Just make sure gyakudo is allowed in your federation for his age/rank. Some restrict it's use.

[hugo]

From what I can tell of our federation's regulations, there's no actual rule that a mudansha can't use gyaku-do, but I know that several sensei in our area tend to frown upon it being used too often.
I tend to tell any person at their first tournament to only try "do" once per match. Most likely their "do" isn't that developed yet and will leave their men vulnerable if they try more than once.

[Masahiro]

He's hit gyaku-do from there successfully a few times ....


Define: Successful

if you've got someone who's higher than 5th dan saying these are indeed valid, successful strikes. .. ..then i'd say GO FOR IT!!! You can't beat talent of that kind, other wise, hmm do it at your own risk.

[skilled]

In my opion it's more effective if done in the moment your opponent try to cover his men rising his shinai and left hand up.
It's like to say: "ok, he scored do because he saw an opening" and not "oh, he's trying to cut his opponent for real with a bamboo stick"


In that case the argument about gyakudo being invalid because of the saya

would be the same .

[xvikingx]

One theory is that with gyaku-dou, you are essentially cutting through the saya
I've read this more than a couple of times here and I can't figure out for the life of me where this stuff comes from. Why choose to be semi-realistic about this certain point pertaining to kendo and cutting?
Also I don't know about you but my saya is never up around the area where I receive/hit gyaku-do.

[Fudo-Shin]

If your guy is still in his kyu's, I would doubt he has the experience to successfully nail gyaku dou in shiai. I would have him concentrate on men and kote only...just my opinion though.

[Bokushingu]

From what I can tell of our federation's regulations, there's no actual rule that a mudansha can't use gyaku-do, but I know that several sensei in our area tend to frown upon it being used too often.
I tend to tell any person at their first tournament to only try "do" once per match. Most likely their "do" isn't that developed yet and will leave their men vulnerable if they try more than once.

he may be able to hit gyaku do safely in class under controlled conditions, but things will be very different when he's playing in a taikai. you should prepare him for the fact that he may not be able to score and he may get scored upon quite easily. And he shouldn't be disappointed if he loose quickly.

also you should spend alot of time making sure his gear is ready:Kote Himo not hanging, etc... Also make sure he know the ettiquette: not stepping over shinais & how to enter & exit the court. make sure he understands the shinpam's commands. I think it will be more important to prepare him that way.

usually at the begining of the taikai they recite the rules.

as for rules to how many times you hit do during a taikai..well I think shinpam are way to busy watching for yuko datotsu than trying to count how many do's a person throws.

Good luck to him

[Halcyon]

I've read this more than a couple of times here and I can't figure out for the life of me where this stuff comes from. Why choose to be semi-realistic about this certain point pertaining to kendo and cutting?
Also I don't know about you but my saya is never up around the area where I receive/hit gyaku-do.
Yeah, I hear ya. Just relaying what certain sensei have told me. In my own humble opinion, the increase in the use of gyaku-dou -- and the willingness to award ippon for it -- corresponds to the popularity of the diagonal blocking move (shinai pointing down and to the right), which exposes your left dou as a target. If you're gonna block that way, hidari-dou is fair game in my book.

[emitbrownne]

....
example a small men , wtf ? you can't do that with a katana right? =)
....

Yup..you can.

Stood still. maybe not, unless you applied a fair bit of pulling force.

Moving forward you provide the neccessary sawing/slicing movement by driving through. Which is why you are taught not to bounce a cut off the target, and have good Kime.

just my opinion

Paulo

[skilled]

If that was true , tameshigiri wouldn't be as it is

=)

[D'Artagnan]

If that was true , tameshigiri wouldn't be as it is

=)

Tameshigiri is nothing to do with cutting men-uchi.

If you can't strike small men,or any other waza, with enough force to cut effectively, then it cannot be considered Ippon.

Either way, 'you couldn't do that with a real sword' is not really the train of thought you want to be travelling on when practicing Kendo - The purpose of Kendo is not to become an effecitve sword fighter...

[xvikingx]

Yeah, I hear ya. Just relaying what certain sensei have told me. In my own humble opinion, the increase in the use of gyaku-dou -- and the willingness to award ippon for it -- corresponds to the popularity of the diagonal blocking move (shinai pointing down and to the right), which exposes your left dou as a target. If you're gonna block that way, hidari-dou is fair game in my book.
Absolutely. Teramoto (and Sato both) used gyaku-do often in the 55th(?) AJKC, and although no flags went up it was key in upsetting Takanabe for the win.
All is fair in love and war right? If it's a valid target and it's open, hit it.

[xvikingx]

The purpose of Kendo is not to become an effecitve sword fighter...
My dreams dashed to pieces with a single sentence. Oh my, all those wasted years....

[D'Artagnan]

If it's a valid target and it's open, hit it.

I like to apply this rule of thumb to many aspects of life...

[lax]

We recently had two Sensei from Brazil here and they told us this:
- NO gyaku-do from tsubazeriai. you could get hasoku because it is inherently dangerous to your opponent.
- gyaku-do can never be one movement. you have to create the opening first.
- kaeshi gyaku-do is also acceptable. In this the movement is backwards after the cut.

[emitbrownne]

...The purpose of Kendo is not to become an effecitve sword fighter...

Boo! Boo that man!

Coming here destroying my dreams

:-)

[xvikingx]

- NO gyaku-do from tsubazeriai. you could get hasoku because it is inherently dangerous to your opponent.
How so????

[Toecutter]

We recently had two Sensei from Brazil here and they told us this:
- NO gyaku-do from tsubazeriai. you could get hasoku because it is inherently dangerous to your opponent.
- gyaku-do can never be one movement. you have to create the opening first.
- kaeshi gyaku-do is also acceptable. In this the movement is backwards after the cut.
I've never heard that but in a conversation with a sensei someone asked why don't we hit do on the right in the first place, his response was it was too violent which I thought was interesting. I know of one person in particular that use that move often and I've seen him score it from tsubazeriai and going forward in matches, but it's always very clean.

[Mr Softee]

And then the whole arguement begins about a waza being dangerous unless you can do it properly but how can you do it properly unless you practice it and use it.

[skilled]

what the heck?

How can gyaku do be dangerous :S

In that case even a men uchi could be dangerous! or a kote!

wtf XD

u__u

[jjcruiser]

How so????

I second this question. I just had my first exposure to gyaku do last night, as a matter of fact, as an exit from taiatari. It doesn't look any more "dangerous" to me, (in my ignorance), than anything else. Worst that happens if someone misses doh is they tag your chest/side, and give you a nice little bruise, right?

[hugo]

How so????

Admittingly, I began this thread to find out if any rule exists prohibiting gyaku do from tsubazeriai. It seems that the answer is "Yes, if the Shimpan-Cho at the tournament mentions it at the beginning of the tournament." In other words, it's much like the "mudansha can't use tsuki" rule. It's not written anywhere, but they tend to bring it up at tournaments. (And probably should be, given the likelihood of injury.)

On the subject of gyaku do being violent, I am going to guess that older sensei of certain rank(s) are truly practicing gentlemen's Kendo. That is to say that they older, refined kenshi tend not to use a lot of excessive shoving, they don't take a lot of dirty or missed shots, and other things that initially seem purely cosmetic in nature.
Since gyaku do is a more powerful strike (the downward motion and the energy needed to make the right "crack" on the do) it is possible that they just consider it aesthetically unpleasing.
I've heard a few sensei state that, to them, striking gyaku do can be considered rude because it's wide open so much of the time. I suppose it could be a situation where they would prefer to see you pressure the opponent and make them open themselves up, rather than just hitting what is staring right at you.
As someone stated earlier, they are more likely to award gyaku do if you pressured the opponent into raising his arms or doing that diagonal blocking.

[xvikingx]

I suppose it could be a situation where they would prefer to see you pressure the opponent and make them open themselves up, rather than just hitting what is staring right at you.
As someone stated earlier, they are more likely to award gyaku do if you pressured the opponent into raising his arms or doing that diagonal blocking.
I have to disagree with this point. At least in my experience is rarely open, and I've only just recently been able to pressure people into opening up for me. By the logic above regular old do would also fall under that category considering it doesn't take much movement on your opponents part for it to open.
*Other than odd JHS or HS kids I rarely encounter people who triangle block

[Sandra S]

One theory is that with gyaku-dou, you are essentially cutting through the saya, so some judges believe that the gyaku-dou must be truly exceptional (clean and strong) to be considered a yukodatotsu.

This is a same explanation a Japanese Hachidan once gave at a French seminar. It is the one I agree with. Just because you don't use a saya when doing Kendo it doesn't mean that you should forget that originally, a saya used to be there. And not just the saya, the wakizashi as well, unless your opponent is doing nito.

I also remember in a Iaido Koryu seminar, while teaching Ryuto, a MSR kata where the target resembles gyaku-dou, the Hachidan Iaido Sensei, who was also a Kendo Nanadan, explained that in the case of this kata, you can indeed cut this way, because the attacker has finished a cut downwards and is leaning forwards off-balanced, much like Uchidachi in Kendo-no-kata #1.

Because he is leaning forwards, his saya instead of diagonal would become parallel to the floor, and even his wakizashi, if it was there, would offer no great obstacle, and one could cut properly just bellow the ribs, because now there is a clear opening. Otherwise, if it was standing straight, it would be much more difficult.

At the end of a Kendo takai where I used gyaku-dou, the Nanadan Shushin of the match came to tell me that I could indeed use gyaku-dou, but if I wanted to score I needed more impact, more presence, a really clean cut, a really strong kiai and, as an hiki-waza, really clear away from my opponents' distance after doing it. Because it takes that much to cut through a saya.

I've never been at a taikai where the shinpanin would say gyaku-dou cannot be used. Nobody has ever mentioned to me that it can dangerous. Dangerous in what? I find Tsuki dangerous, especially if done against lower-grades who do not know how to receive one. I've heard of taikais where Tsuki could not be used, but Gyaku-dou?

Yes you can use it, there is no written rule against it. Just be aware that some shinpanin do not agree with it's use and don't expect to score with it, unless it is a very very exceptional one.

Sandra

[Raffa]

Whwn you realize that your opponent is not used to be striked gyaku do, sometimes is quite simple to deliver a very impressive one.
Obviously is a strategy that you can use only once in a keiko....

[streetcleaner]

score 2 gyaku do's from tsubazerai yestarday at local chemp (the only's "gyaku do's from tsubazerai" at chemp ;) - judjes score only _very_ strong and clean hits. normal hiki do are much lighter

[ben]

There is a common assumption that kyu grades won't be able to perform certain waza until they have practiced them sufficiently, hence their chances of landing, say, a gyaku do worthy of yuko datotsu should be considered pretty slim.

In my recent experience I have found this to be not entirely true. The high school students that I teach (12 and 13 y.o.) wear full bogu after only 6 weeks and take part in shiai (amongst themselves only) after less than 10 weeks. In spite of this extreme fast-tracking I already see in many of them the beginning of various tokui waza. For one it might be that he can perform men-suriage-men very naturally, another might repeatedly succeed with degote. In this setting it is not uncommon to see gyaku-do performed at a level I would have to say is worthy of yuko datotsu, even though this goes against all my kendo instincts.

Gyaku do is a very natural movement for non-kendo people, it is perhaps the one cut that really succeeds because of over-use of the right hand. If a kyu grade succeeds early and often with gyaku do however, what will that do to their later kendo development? This is the kind of thing shinpan are weighing up when they judge.

For this reason I also use the "saya and/or wakizashi would be in the way" explanation as to why we discriminate against gyaku do.

b

[Koki]

If you do it correctly, you score... that s all...

But then there is also the element of people not knowing how to judge it...

[Neil Gendzwill]

The main problem with gyaku-doh and the reason that many people don't like it is that in order for it to be open, the aite must raise their hands quite high. This is because naturally in chudan, the left hand is lower and therefore the elbow covers the doh on that side. To open up doh normally, all you need is to get the aite's hands coming forward but for gyaku-doh they have to come up. Therefore if you just swing for it without being able to get an opening, you run a higher risk of injuring your opponent. Even if he opens up, because your hands don't cross over, people tend to hit right-handed and are more likely to miss or to get hasuji wrong. So therefore riai (reason to hit) becomes a part of that judgement maybe more than the other points. If your opponent takes jodan or fights nito, then gyaku-doh becomes a more logical target and the judges are more likely to take it.

Another problem with gyaku-doh is that the movement after the hit is more difficult and most people have trouble moving away smoothly. So showing good zanshin becomes more difficult.

Finally because there is some bias against the technique, you do need to hit clean and strong. If you do the older style with no movement, ie just set your feet and cut, then even more so, you have to demonstrate the aite is good and dead and cannot counter.

[Thunder]

Our sensei always tells us that Do, no matter if its Gyaku Do or Normal, needs to be clean, quick and powerful
Everyone around should recognize the hit without question...all flags should be raised without delay due to the hit and zanshin.

I remember at the nationals there was a very LONG delay when in the Junior division an opponent struck and scored a Hiki-Gyaku Do.
The opposite team coach raised a protest-- saying that Gyaku Do was not valid due to the fact that they were juniors and its not being taught
at his dojo for that rank. (At least thats what I heard through the grapevine in the stands). Anyway after about 15 minutes, the judges awarded the point. I felt sorry for these kids; they had to sit in seiza for 10 minutes before the judges allowed them to stand and relax while they continued to discuss the issue.

Im not sure why the protest was raised --They made it very clear at the beginning of the tournament and the "swearing in" that the only strike prohibited was Tsuki for the Junior division.