Quote:
Basia Halliop wrote:
Doesn't really sound much like how I was taught iriminage either. (The most important steps seem to be missing -- getting behind and unbalancing. Why would you try to put your arm on his neck if he's upright? That doesn't work even in the dojo.)
Not that iriminage would be something that I can easily imagine coming to my mind if someone actually attacked me 'for real'. I can well imagine I would find it hard to get into a position to set things up where it was possible to even try to do it. Not sure if that's more me (it's not my best technique) or if most people find it a difficult technique to set up.
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You are
right.
I know this may sound puzzling, saying that you're right just after I have explained why iriminage does not work.
The fact is, the way iriminage is taught is precisely the type of iriminage that will
never work.
Unbalancing a big guy throwing punches at your face as he stands with a very good grounding on his feet, who comes forward not like a fury but with steady paces, who uses
both arms, and who is vigorous and
highly mobile on his feet and hips
both (well, like all human beings are) is something that will be fundamentally impossibile.
Unfortunately the highly fictional settings of most dojos where our ukes diligently follow us as we iriminage them, do not reproduce in the least the following things:
1) the stubborn refusal of a real opponent to bend or follow our movements and agendas
2) the truly considerable resistance to any force you may apply and the
immediate countereactions.
3) the near-zero availability not to turn on his feet and hips
immediately in order to face you again: he will
jump,
turn,
skip, dodge, exert
brutal force,
dart , escape, slip, bounce back - he will do, in short (and with remarkable
speed), a lot of things in a dojo they don't do.
It is not that iriminage would never work: it is that the type of situation where you may place one in a
real situation is a
rare one.
Given the way most persons are used to iriminage in a dojo, I would recommend never to attempt it in a real situation. Discovering right then that it did not work would be a tough lesson.
In a real situation, if you have done iriminage only against ukes, be
very very wary of iriminage.
The ideal situation is that of a guy rushing headlong against you.
If you can iriminage like Seagal does in a few of his videos, then it's safe. But then, Seagal never put his hand on a guys neck in order to accompany him: he knows very well that won't do.
In many dojos I have seen they say to you to grab the neck and gently turning it and placing it on your shoulder "as if it were a baby" - if that is sort of what they taught to you, beware of that "baby"...! It will bite hard in a real fight.