Building Tame when your aite take the initiative by seme

[Raffa]

A few days ago i failed my sandan shinsa at Sportilia. All the people that have given me some advices after the examination said that, while i was showing a good seme-tame when i was starting the action, when my aite start first i didn't built tame, going in almost instantaneusly. They said it seemed like i was reacting instinctively, not building the action. Two days ago, a very nice nanadan, tell me that to build tame on your aite initiative, you must overwhelm his seme with yours, or, in other words, you must go on it.
Obviously the first thing i think was "oji waza"! But with what mental disposition?
(well, regarding the exam after the 10th successful seme-men maybe i could have think to do something different like that, but, really at the moment i didn't feel any opposition, so i just continue to seme in - both my opponents where in the 40% that passed).

Any opinion/advice on the subject?

[rfoxmich]

Please post a video of your test. Otherwise it's tough to comment.

[Raffa]

Sorry rfoxmich, maybe i express myself in a wrong way.
The question is not on my exam (in that case i agree that without a video is almost impossible to comment), but on the way of developing/exerting tame when the aite gained the initiative making seme. In that case what you (try to) do? What you think?

[Neil Gendzwill]

If your reaction when he steps in is always to attack, then your opponent is driving the action not you. If you truly were applying seme to him, then he would not be so inclined to step in all the time or you would be able to smother or counter his attack when he foolishly did.

[Bokushingu]

To me, Tame is like being ready or focused to instantly respond in the correct moment with the correct response. my old boxing trainer use to tell me, after you bob or feint be ready to counter.

you may have been anxious during the test which makes it even harder to maintain a calm & controlling moment and not just react or attack once your opponents use seme. If you go into a situation feeling there may be only 1 slight oppertunity for ippon & it could come at anytime, you will build focus & Tame.

when both you and your aite use seme & build tame, Kendo gets really exciting and fun! you both are applying seme & attempting to take center while feeling for that correct moment to go; & when it it's the moment, you go without any hesitation or overuse of power--it's very smooth, appropiate & beautiful. You will feel a sense of satisfaction when you went at the right moment.

When you practice daily, you should for a brief second reflect on your last strike & question yourself: was that the right moment? did it feel right? did i just go? did i out-seme him and get him to react, allowing me to go? I'm told if you don't practice it constantly, you won't be able to use it during a high stress moment & the judges are so skilled and experienced they can see if you understand it or not.

I'm also told you can not build tame without correct Posture, weight distribution, footwork & how to use Seme-ashi correctly.

Pretty much all the Sensei that i asked or watched me jigeiko have told me what Neil Sensei posted and what I wrote. also as we move higher up & test for higher ranks, we have to understand that we won't pass the first time due to there are things they will be looking for that we don't quit understand--we will just have to practice until we do get it...then we can pass

[cesarekim]

Hey Raffa,
I don't remember if I said this to you or to another person at the exam but I was always told that pressure and counterpressure can be built by using your right foot. If you press forward with the foot and your aite flinches, you're set to go and have won the first fight. If your aite moves forward with his right foot first, IMMEDIATELY press forward with your foot as well. The stage is then set for a great game of chicken. The first one who flinches and moves forward or backward will lose as they have lost sen. OTOH, if your aite steps back in good order, try pressing him again. If you can get him to step back once more, you've won sen...

Seme tame and what have you are great concepts to get your mind around but I think you need to work on the conceptual stuff after you have grounded it in your body through practice. The right foot exercise is good because it gives you something physical to work on. The great sensei may be able to do this without budging but mere mortals such as you and I still need to do something to project the pressure.

YMMV...

[JSchmidt]

Failing someone for lack of tame in a 3rd exam sounds a bit harsh, especially if you scored multiple ippons.
If you react the moment the opponent move in *and* hit him, then his 'control' isn't worth much.
Then again, I'm not a big fan of 'building tame for tame's sake', which often seems advertised here as a key for passing a grading. If the opportunity is there (the opponent is about to move, a potential opportunity) and you hit him, then, at least in my opinion, you have done the right thing...especially for 3rd dan.

[D'Artagnan]

Yeah I am with Jakob, I am surprised you are expected to have ever even heard of 'tame' for 3dan. I you can demonstrate a decent understanding of basic Kendo, with the beginnings of an understanding of what is an opportunity, then you should get 3-4dan without a problem...

[G-CHAN]

A few days ago i failed my sandan shinsa at Sportilia. All the people that have given me some advices after the examination said that, while i was showing a good seme-tame when i was starting the action, when my aite start first i didn't built tame, going in almost instantaneusly. They said it seemed like i was reacting instinctively, not building the action. Two days ago, a very nice nanadan, tell me that to build tame on your aite initiative, you must overwhelm his seme with yours, or, in other words, you must go on it.
Obviously the first thing i think was "oji waza"! But with what mental disposition?
(well, regarding the exam after the 10th successful seme-men maybe i could have think to do something different like that, but, really at the moment i didn't feel any opposition, so i just continue to seme in - both my opponents where in the 40% that passed).

Any opinion/advice on the subject?

Hi raffa,

It's seems to me you were reacting to the aite randomly. There is a difference between randomly striking and striking with a purpose. When kenshis randomly strike, they don't seme at all, they seem to attack as soon as they enter issoku maai. If their opponent lacks a good understanding of seme and waza, they just seem to randomly react, usually with ai men.

I was taught for you to strike with a purpose (creating opportunities), you must strike with good timing. In order for you to strike with good timing, you must have a good understanding of seme, maai and tame.

1) Seme. Seme is not just about adding pressure to the aite. There is a direct correlation with your knowledge of executing various waza and seme. The more waza you know how to execute, the stronger your seme will become. For instance, if you can counter a men 5 different ways, it becomes very difficult for the aite to strike your men.

2) Maai. In order for you to execute various waza, you must understand how to execute it from various distances, toma, issoku and chikama. I don't mean you have to strike a men or kote from toma or chikama. For instance, you might face a aite who's taller or an aite with a longer reach, which means the aites issoku maai is in your toma. The aite attempts to strike your men, you counter with suriage men or dekote.

3) Tame... tame to me is about not waiting. To be "on guard". When I seme and press forward, I look for signs or reactions from the aite. I look in the eyes of the aite or their body language. Their body language tells me what there thinking. I can get a good indication when their about to strike just by looking through there eyes. Of course, this is hard to do against experience kenshis, but the fact remains I know 2 things are going to happen, if the aite attacks you know he's most likely coming for your men or kote ( I have to be ready to counter) or he hesitates or pauses (shikake waza) or I just take the initiative (harai or osae).

4) The bottom line is... the more waza you know, the more opportunities you can create and take control of the aite. Opportunities that you create for less than a second.

A lot to think about. Hope this helps.

[The great I AM]

if you can counter a men 5 different ways, it becomes very difficult for the aite to strike your men.

You'll have to forgive me here.....but how does that work?

[b8amack]

Bummer Raffa. Especially watching people pass who you felt like you were owning, in there.

[Neil Gendzwill]

Yeah I am with Jakob, I am surprised you are expected to have ever even heard of 'tame' for 3dan. I you can demonstrate a decent understanding of basic Kendo, with the beginnings of an understanding of what is an opportunity, then you should get 3-4dan without a problem...

The criteria I have been told is good technical kendo + understanding of distance and opportunity == 3 dan. 4 dan requires creating the chance by managing your opponent. But I have stopped being surprised by differences from region to region or even from year to year.

[Raffa]

Thank you all for the very interesting points.

Regarding my shinsa, I do my best but simply it wasn't eenough. Did I exert seme? Yes, when i take the iniative (let's say 2/3 of the time), i think not when my aite takes it. In the first case i seme ashi in, see my opponent reaction, and attack consequently. Most of the time, as I take the centre, they left their men open, an so I go for it, usually successfully. I think I overdone it, I hit the same way too much times. But they did't give me other targets.

Hey Raffa,
I don't remember if I said this to you or to another person at the exam but I was always told that pressure and counterpressure can be built by using your right foot. If you press forward with the foot and your aite flinches, you're set to go and have won the first fight. If your aite moves forward with his right foot first, IMMEDIATELY press forward with your foot as well. The stage is then set for a great game of chicken. The first one who flinches and moves forward or backward will lose as they have lost sen. OTOH, if your aite steps back in good order, try pressing him again. If you can get him to step back once more, you've won sen...

Hi Cesare! You had given me some very good advices (you said more or less the same things of Zago sensei, which in turn was more or less what Neil said) but not exactly these. However they are a good answer to what i was asking. Curiously, during yesterday training, I work a little on the argument, and I realized something similar. See below...

If your reaction when he steps in is always to attack, then your opponent is driving the action not you. If you truly were applying seme to him, then he would not be so inclined to step in all the time or you would be able to smother or counter his attack when he foolishly did.

Neil, i think you have point out the problem. When my aite stepped in if i was seeing men i gone for it realizing ai men. Even if it was ippon i wasn't creating/driving the action, i was only reacting (Cesare tells me something similar after the shinsa).

Hi raffa,
It's seems to me you were reacting to the aite randomly. There is a difference between randomly striking and striking with a purpose. When kenshis randomly strike, they don't seme at all, they seem to attack as soon as they enter issoku maai. If their opponent lacks a good understanding of seme and waza, they just seem to randomly react, usually with ai men.

I think this has been my case. When my aite have done seme ashi in, if I was seeing his men open i would go for it. Even if I hit , in effect I was not applying a seme in response of his seme. As far as i have understand, tame is the result of two seme "colliding". In that case mine was absent.

3) Tame... tame to me is about not waiting. To be "on guard". When I seme and press forward, I look for signs or reactions from the aite. I look in the eyes of the aite or their body language. Their body language tells me what there thinking. I can get a good indication when their about to strike just by looking through there eyes. Of course, this is hard to do against experience kenshis, but the fact remains I know 2 things are going to happen, if the aite attacks you know he's most likely coming for your men or kote ( I have to be ready to counter) or he hesitates or pauses (shikake waza) or I just take the initiative (harai or osae).

4) The bottom line is... the more waza you know, the more opportunities you can create and take control of the aite. Opportunities that you create for less than a second.

A lot to think about. Hope this helps.

G-Chan, it seems to me that what you are saying match well with what Cesare said. So, if tame is reacting with your seme to the seme of the aite the next question is: how?
Cesare said doing seme-ashi. I think about how higher grades manage it, and my answer is that they somehow channel your seme with theirs, reducing your options and forcing you to do an attack they choose (with some oji waza awaiting for you). Then during the last training, I tryed do do something similar with people of my level.
The results are that, if they take initiative and make seme ashi in, taking centre, i can immediatly respond with a little seme ashi too, or, if distance is too reduced, I can make seme by pushing with the hips and flexing a bit the knees. Then i have basically two choice, the first one is retaking centre, a decise action of this type will induce a kote attack, and i can counter it with nuki or suriage. The second choice is to made seme at his left eye, this reaction will stimulate a men attack, which I can counter with suriage or kaeshi. If they don't attack than I have regained initiative, and the game start again.
I am sure I oversimplify it, and that with experience many other options are possible, these two are what come into my mind at the moment. They worked quite well yesterday.
The strange thing is that I already know most of these concepts, if taken alone, but together they are making a new puzzle....

[tango]

Raffa --
There's a lot of good things mentioned in this thread...

My two cents.... I tend to agree with several of the last few responses here. When people start really talking about tame, I tend to think they are talking about 4.dan+ level kendo.

As Andy said, "I'm surprised you're expected to have heard of tame for 3.dan." In my experience, I never had even heard the term until after I failed my first attempt at 4.dan...
As Neil said, "The criteria I have been told is good technical kendo + understanding of distance and opportunity == 3 dan." This has been my understanding of things as well. In more general terms, my understanding has been along the lines of "the 3.dan guy's kendo should indicate that he's beginning to understand the principles of 'opportunity.' I think it then goes without saying that in order to be working on 'opportunity' you'd necessarily have to have a better-than-2.dan understanding of seme, and an ability to put a 3.dan-level of seme into practice. Personally, I wouldn't expect to see a 3.dan candidate be able to absolutely overwhelm and control aite at every exchange. I would expect to see him demonstrate that he's working on developing that ability. In other words, if it looks like he's starting to grasp the concepts that are putting him in the direction of 4.dan, then he should be able to do those things necessary to pass 3.dan.... That's just my perspective of things at this point in my kendo career ---- but understand that I'm not a 6.dan+ who sits on grading panels for 3.dan candidates!

That said, on your specific question of seme and tame, the big wigs here have weighed in with some good info. My personal take, based on what you are saying, is that you are a bit impatient. If you are trying to allow tame to build, then...uhh.. you have to allow tame to build. By that, I mean, it seems that if you are pressuring aite and he starts to move, you are automatically assuming that he's reacting in such a way as to make himself open (or is in the process of opening) so that you can attack. If you are always attacking as soon as he starts to move, YOU don't have any real concept whether he is reacting to your seme or if you are being controlled by his seme. If you have an underdeveloped sense of how to read the opponent, then you become very, very susceptible to being controlled by him.

You need to be able to read the opponent to determine when he has been affected by your seme in such a way so that he is committed to attacking.. and then you need to develop the ability to recognize when he is actually attacking. Personally, I think that level of understanding is where you need to be for 4.dan and not 3.dan .... but as Neil rightfully pointed out, it seems the expectations can vary from country to country...

[Neil Gendzwill]

Rogers also bear in mind that whenever Raffa talks about seme, he is talking about a physical action. So maybe we are talking about a 3 dan level after all - hard to say from just words.