Does the hakama help your training?
 

Hello all.

I was reading another thread when this came up...
Now, I have to agree with many people and admit, at times, those pants can be trouble to move in. However, I DO think they help my training.
Their extra weight reminds me to keep my weight 'underside' and my centre low and stable. I find that when I am not wearing the hakama I move quickly and freely as my legs are accustomed to moving me about with heavy material attached.

What do others think?:cool:

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Helps to take care of your footwork. Or step on it and leave your teeth in the tatami. Oh, and at the begining it helps to make you conscious of your center.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Extra padding for suwari waza.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Similar to some benefits of Iaido, it helps force a higher level of awareness. You must be conscious of what your feet/hakama fabric are doing so you don't get tangled up, particularly when transitioning between the ground and standing. Hiding footwork is another one I've heard. From a Yoshinkan background, when Shioda Sensei won the post-WW2 seminar and was granted training rights for the government...the Yoshinkan consisted of a small group of instructors teaching huge stadiums of military and police. The instructors wore Hakama so they were easily identifiable by the students. To this day, typically only the person teaching class, or a yondan and up, wear hakama (with exceptions, of course). So the practicality of its use in training as tool used to identify who was in charge.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I have only worn one in iaido as I am not allowed to in aikido. I find that it makes me more aware of my body and my surroundings. In a lot of the kata, I am doing them from seiza and sometimes go into standing after it started. You have to be aware of your feet and your hakama so you don't trip while getting up. I have to agree with Joep that hakamas also help with knee work. On shohatto for example, there is a point where we slide forward on our knee. I have found it much easier to do with a hakama on (esp. since the reinforced knee of my gi pants is more on my thigh now.....) but I also have to be aware of my hakama being pulled tight under my knee as I slide forward. Just a better sense of awareness.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I like the whoosh sound... and I like how it balances the martial aspect with its beauty.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Ditto.

There's also the aspect of preserving tradition. I certainly don't train in martial arts to help defend myself (although I would like to think that I may be able to if needed). I train to gain skill and knowledge, and thus help to preserve the best of what I can. That should include the clothing and the etiquette. If each generation chips away little things that are no longer relevant, then what they're training in soon begins to change.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

No help at all...it is pretty ubiquitous to me at this point. Although it does get in the way sometimes and it is a pain to wash and fold...so maybe it teaches something?

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I had to fold my sensei's indigo hakama before he left for a seminar.... and he NEVER folds it (he hangs it up after class). Needless to say, I had no lines to go off of. That definately brought out my CDO (CDO is like OCD, except in alphebetical order, like the way it should be) :D Anyway, with a bit of diligence and patience, I got it looking nice... more or less anyway. ;) So yeah, I agree with you Kevin about folding teaching you something.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Noobs think I'm "the deadly". Other than that.... nope, doesn't help me.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I'm going to help at a demonstration next week, and someone gave me his spare hakama for the occasion (I'm to give it back after the demonstration, of course). I tried it on at home. Yes.. looks cool as expected.. the +10 to vanity certainly applies.. but damn that thing is annoying to walk in (it's a little bit too long since the owner is a little taller than I am). Now I'm struggling to fold it again.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I don't know if it helps training or not. I rarely use mine since we do a lot of ground fighting and it would only be in the way.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I like the extra padding on the legs for ground work.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Extra padding? A layer of fabric? :confused:

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

The gi pants rub on the floor and the knee skin gets a good stretching.

The hakama rubs on the floor, the pants slide a bit on top of the inside of the hakama, and the skin doesn't get as much stretching.

That's my theory, and I'm sticking with it.

Walter

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

The hakama isn't merely an extra layer of fabric, but thanks to the pleats and incidental gathering of the fabric several layers are formed between the knee and the mat.

On the other hand, I do iai on a hard floor with no keiko-gi pants. In that case sometimes the pleats can dig into the shin rather uncomfortably.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Does that really help? I've got one pair of gi pants that's all bagged out at the knees from much use, so the right knee inevitably forms a wrinkle right...across...the kneecap. It's astonishingly painful for such a small thing.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

For me it's definitely a welcome layer of padding on the knees when I'm practising at home without kneepads (hard wooden floor).

Is the material of your gi heavy? I imagine that would create much more of a substantial 'fold' than the thinner hakama layers/pleats.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Um... hello... knee pads? Especially for Iaido!

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

It's one of those pants with the doubled knees -- there's an extra square of material at the knee. I dunno, maybe it's my kneecap that's defective, got a dent in it or something.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Mary, you might want to do the pants alteration that puts fusible fleece interfacing where you kneel - back in the days when I still did suwariwaza it was great, like pivoting on a potholder!

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

I did use knee pads when first starting out, but the school I train involves a lot of cutting down to one knee from a standing position. In this case, knee pads can actually be bad, because you don't learn the proper feeling for bringing the knee to the floor, and end up bringing it down much harder than necessary, putting more stress on it. Taking off the kneepads improved my iai tremendously, and greatly reduced post-keiko knee soreness.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Not so much. Kneepads cut at the back of the knee, which is not a good thing. In an extreme suwariwaza session, it's the lesser of two evils, so I'll wear them for that, but not as a regular thing. I like Janet's solution -- I'm definitely going to try that!

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

Ah... I wear these:

http://www.budo-aoi.com/iaito/wears/protector_003.asp

Just right amount of padding right where I need it.

Re: Does the hakama help your training?
 

No one wears knee pads in my dojo for iaido.