Quote:
Chris Evans wrote:
Which Aikido school in or near Berkeley offers the most vigorous (and the least arrogant and delusional ) physical path to mental and spiritual training, please...
...A nagging doubt for me is that two jiujitsu players have given up on their years of Aikido as not being useful under pressure.
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If these are your criteria then your most viable option is Bay Area Shodokan whose website you highlighted in your original post.
The training method there will involve regular pressure testing of your Aikido skills (and your own mettle) through resistance-based randori, which is one of the hallmarks of our approach. My personal experience in training ex-karate folks is that they pick up the syllabus quite quickly as long as they relax a bit.
Our Aikido is also pretty close in design to Daito Ryu Aiki Jujutsu as studied by Kenji Tomiki under Ueshiba M. during the 1920's and 30's so the martial aspect is supposed to be maintained in all aspects of freeplay and kata training.
As for the instructors, I have trained alongside both Sensei of the dojo at the recent U.S. National tournament. They have exceptional technical form, sound principles and are very good at randori. They also study the traditional martial roots of our training quite deeply so their understanding of Budo is also quite developed.
I suggest you speak to the Sensei of the class about your training needs and try out a session with them to decide further.
If you need more details on how we train please contact them or drop me a PM.
Best
LC