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I've been lucky enough to partner some of the very experienced guys in the dojo and some of the not so experienced. It helps me train each time as each person teaches me something different.
With the very experienced and senior guys, I learn subtleties I would often have not grasped without their help. Often my grip can be wrong without my realising it as the sensei pointed out about my executing a movement to grasp one end of the bokken without locking myself in in the next move.
Or I'm not moving out from the centre although I think I am. I learned the last session that I need for yokomen kotegaishi that I need to initiate the first movement exactly as I would do for the basic body movement.
Or that I'm using strength when I think I'm using technique. And how to change it so I rely more or technique.
What I appreciate most though is their sense of control. And I guess that is one of the distinguishing marks of the more experienced practitioners: the ability to control without or causing minimal damage and with minimal effort. It's never been an art about how hard or how fast but an exercise in self control and in controlling one's opponent.
02-03-2010 04:45 AM 