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Old 11-13-2009, 08:38 AM   #4
Adam Huss
 
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Location: Ohio
Join Date: Jun 2005
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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.

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