Speed in Iaido and even Kendo Kata?

[LNGUYEN]

I see Iaido practice with the speed relatively slow and even Kendo kata too. The katas are real techniques which were used in old times and I am sure they didn't fight that slow in the ancient time. As for beginner, we practice them slow to get everything correct, however, should they be performed faster? Kendo is like experience of real fight before and in kendo, speed is important too. Is that the same for Iaido and Kendo kata eventhough Iaido don't practice against each other. Some one please enlight me.

Thanks.

[itachi]

well if you want it to be effective.

[Hyaku]

Anybody can do things fast and make a mess of it. Doing it both fast and correctly takes time and work.

In Iai we do have a techniques called Hayanuki. A sort of Iai Kakarigeiko.
However its impolite to do this and Kaishaku for demonstrations.

Batto Jutsu has a slighly different concept. Practice slowly in the dojo but for public demonstrations its pull all the stops out. Fast but more messy if you cant inject some good kihon through daily practice.

Another thing about speed is as we learn the concept of timing we have all the time in the world to respond to a technique.

Also the objectives set out for the arts change with ones age bracket. An older person is looking for one very nice technique done with timing rather than blasting away with young strength and stamina. After all its the first technique thats counts. After that its just fencing!

[Neil Gendzwill]

I'll just add to Colin's comments that for kendo kata, there are variations in the speed that actions are performed - it isn't all at one pace, whether that's fast or slow or inbetween. The goal in kata (for me at least) is not so much to make it faster and harder as to make it live and breathe. If should feel like there's a real fight happening. Eventually that means that some of the cuts get stronger and quicker.

[DCPan]

See the response by Scott Irey in the link below:

http://www.e-budo.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=16827&perpage=15&highlight=jo%20ha%20kyu&pagenumber=3

[gsx1100s]

tried the link but it didnt seem to work??

I understand that breathing has a great deal to do with the Kata in Iaido anyway ,and thus I suppose the speed of it all is linked to this.thats my two bits:)


cheers michael