Thread: Ukemi
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Old 03-16-2016, 07:32 PM   #18
MrIggy
Dojo: Aikido Klub Tisa - Novi Sad
Location: Novi Sad
Join Date: Apr 2015
Posts: 398
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Re: Ukemi

Quote:
Walter Martindale wrote: View Post
That was my experience - haven't spent a long time in Japan with aikido, but if you're going to stretch and do other things, you do that before the session starts, Once the session starts (I've attended sessions with Doshu and Masuda sensei back in 2003 and again in 2004), it's a few little warm up movements led by the instructor, partner up (same partner for the whole session), quick demo, practice, quick demo, practice, quick demo, practice.... By the end, the room is steaming and gi are sweaty. Glad I wasn't there in the summer. The "practice" intervals are between 5 and 10 minutes, the demo intervals are MAYBE a minute or so.
Very intense. I can only imagine what it's like in the summer. It's probably like a Finish sauna.

Quote:
That type of training includes a lot of ukemi, and a big contributor to the workout of a training session is in the ukemi - getting back up, ukemi, get back up... It might not seem like work, but you're raising your body mass from the floor to standing over and over and over. Do that with a weight lifting bar, and you call it a lot of work, do it in ukemi and you call it a practice, but it's all physical work.
Ukemi is one of the best and most demanding techniques/exercises i have ever done. Just keeping pace with Uke's techniques after 30 minutes of intense workout is a challenge. Many people don't think there's technique behind Ukemi, off course that's until they hit their head on the mat for the first time. Then they realize how physically demanding it is to keep your Ukemi technically correct while going through a 90 minute training session.

Last edited by MrIggy : 03-16-2016 at 07:37 PM.
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