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Wastelander
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Motobu-Inspired Hand Trapping

Hello, everyone,

This week's Waza Wednesday takes a look at some methods for dealing with punches that retract, as opposed to wild punches that swing through their target, or static punches that freeze in place at the end. These take inspiration both from some methods that my Sensei was fond of using in sparring, as well as methods found in Motobu Choki's book, Okinawa Kenpo Karate-Jutsu: Kumite Hen

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

I like it! Motobu’s drills do have some great concepts within them. The also had a huge influence on the two-person drills of Wado-Ryu … and people who know those drills will also see the crossover with what Noah shows here (i.e. the method shown at 2:00 is very similar to Kihon-Gumite No. 10).

Part of the problem with the Motobu Drills and Wado’s Kihon-Gumite is that they are most often practised in a very formal “3K way”, and hence the usable concepts they contain are rendered useless and are totally obscured by the false formality. However, when you ensure more realistic actions, closer distances, and remove false "timing" (as Noah has here) we can see the value of those methods.

All the best,

Iain

PS App users can see my take on all 12 of the Motobu drills in the “Misc Technique and Drills” section.

Wastelander
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Iain Abernethy wrote:
I like it! Motobu’s drills do have some great concepts within them.

Thank you! I find a lot of great concepts in his drills, as well, but I think they have been overly "cleaned up" over time, and lost their realism a bit. They are great drills to explore and play with, in my opinion.

Iain Abernethy
Iain Abernethy's picture

Wastelander wrote:
Thank you! I find a lot of great concepts in his drills, as well, but I think they have been overly "cleaned up" over time, and lost their realism a bit.

I completely agree! When “roughed back up” I think they have some interesting things to say about limb-control, predictable responses, tactical positioning, etc. However, when “3K’d” all of that gets obscured as the realistic actions, distance and timing are all lost.

All the best,

Iain