The Finer Details.....

[John W]

Hello fellow kendoka!!

Q: You are backing away from tsuba zarei (excuse any spelling mistakes) and your opponents shinai is touching your do, then all of a sudden you pull out of the bag a lightning hiki men cut with bucket loads of kiai and zanshin and to your dismay the shimpan with the exception of one do not put their flags up...

Should this be a valid point or not? Lets just say that the all the elements for a valid cut are their.

[SOLDIER]

i have seen alot of seemingly good points made going backwards..but i think the judges want to see you going forward.. but i have seen what happened to you before....dont dwell on it..just keep at it..

[Shazzanzzz]

hiki wazas.... Every tournament, I only get about 1/5 of them called as points. The judges would only call the hikis if they are perfect, good ki ken tai ichi, good distance, power, zanshin...

Also, you can't score if opponent's shinai is touching your body i dont' think. Also, if your opponent follows you up after your hiki strike, you most likely won't get a point either.

[hamish]

At the point of striking, was the shinai still touching you? Was your opponent just touching the shinai to your do to avoid getting a point scored on them? Did they move forward holding the shinai against your do as you went backwards?

I would be inclined to give that point purely from an opportunity and timing point of view, given that your opponent was wide open with the shinai down low, even if they were touching your do. As long as you struck using the monouchi, if that was the reason given for not scoring it, that's being a bit too tight!

Hamish

[D'Artagnan]

Sometimes we hit points that we think should score, but they don't. Although we think they were good enough, the shinpan don't.

Q. Who knows best??
A. Not you

when this happens ignore it, and make an even better point next time.

Sometimes really great points you make don't get scored, but on the other hand sometimes really great points that are made on you don't get scored either. It works both ways.

[Dave Fowler]

I was told this little numbers game to give you an idea.


If for every 99 times out of 100 you score a point going forward.

Expect that 1 of every 100 time you try backwards you'll get a point.

In other words when your doing it backing up it had better be 'perfect' and your opponent was not expecting it at all.

Classic example: Entire dojo is lined up to fight someone who is heading off to nationals. No one has been able to score a point. I head in look at the person's style and go..oh ok Hiki Men...they didn't see it coming as everyone was only attacking forward.. I got the point and was the only one to do so
:-)