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Old 05-25-2012, 05:24 PM   #10
JW
 
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Location: San Diego CA USA
Join Date: Aug 2000
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Re: Outer Seams and Ikkyo Curve (OK) but Inner Seams???

Hi Chris P, I appreciate your video as a first step and I hope you take Chris H's advice, partially just because I would love to see it! But mostly because I think he is right-on in terms of how to progress. There is a big difference between someone who doesn't know what is coming but is open to it, versus someone who doesn't want to go to the floor.

At any rate, I think what you are playing with is also represented in several videos, such as Ikeda sensei's videos. The compilation from the 2007 summer camp for instance shows a lot of it. I think each person who shows things like this might explain it differently or parse it differently in their mind-- you calling it an “inner seam” in reference to Ledyard sensei's ikkyo seam I think is one good way to phrase it.

Personally, I think of things in terms of yin/yang, and in terms of connection. In other words, there are 2 opposite directions of connection, one towards the attacker (compressive direction) and one from the attacker (tensile direction). If you increase pressure so that he has to step/stumble backward, you are loading the compressive direction. If you create vacuum so that he comes toward you, you are loading the tensile direction.
So, an ikkyo that sucks uke in makes heavier use of the tensile connection, and an ikkyo that projects uke out makes heavier use of the compressive connection. Any functional ikkyo will use both, and I think the positional and directional extremes of those 2 connections represent what you call inner and outer seams.
My point is-- I think any good ikkyo is using what you call the inner seam, but is using it together with the “outer seam.” Here, you are showing it in relative isolation. So from that point of view you are using only 1 of 2 essential tools when you highlight it like that-- good for demo, bad for application. But that's important, because I wouldn't hope to be good at using any tool in combination with others unless I worked with it on its own, to get a feel for it.
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