Robert - Just for the record, since you are responding to something written to me. I don't know what you train, but as far as I'm concerned, what Mike has shown me is absolutely congruent with the two Japanese arts I train. AND - Araki-ryu and Toda-ha Buko-ryu use remarkably different drivers of movement (THBR is rotation around an axle from crown to perinium, whereas Araki-ryu is like a bowling ball carrying the limbs and upper body in its wake. One would never mistake one art for the other). I'm not defending Mike - just reacting to any blanket statement about "Japanese budo."

What I'm focusing on is the fact that, as I put it elsewhere, there's ice cream and there's salted caramel and there's passion fruit/guava. Interestingly, what Akuzawa Minoru showed me is less congruent with those same two arts.

Best
Ellis