Thread: Powerful
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Old 02-28-2006, 05:33 AM   #38
DaveS
Join Date: Nov 2005
Posts: 91
United Kingdom
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Re: Powerful

Quote:
Ian Dodkins wrote:
Nothing wrong with strength and power. Aikido is about efficiency - using power without resistance. Thus you need to gently unbalance someone with perfect timing, then, when they can't resist, grind them into the mat.
Also speed is an important part. Using power against someone who pushes back in the opposite direction is Bad Aikido and probably not the most effective option even if you do have the strength to make it work. On the other hand (in my rather limited experience) muscle power can be useful in working with someone who resists by being very relaxed. Using shomen ate in a hikitate geiko setting, for instance, the most likely result is that uke will just step back and to the side and stay standing up. To get the technique to work, I need to (get it more accurate and) faster so that uke is moving too fast to keep his footing. GCSE physics tells me that acceleration = force / mass, so strength is definitely going to work in my favour here.

In other words, pushing against a line of very little resistance is the right thing to do, but if you've got strength on your side, you're going to move along that line a lot faster.
Quote:
Many people may be intimidated by your size..
But being nage to a large uke is fantastic - you're pretty sure that you're not accidentally going to pull their arm out of its socket, and if you do the technique wrong you can tell that it hasn't worked. More than makes up for being chucked around a bit when it's your turn.
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