DaveS

Does anyone know of a good account of Tomiki's development of the randori no kata (and his system of classification of techniques in general) and an explanation of why it is how it is? either on the interweb, in a book, or (if you've got time) via the oral tradition. I've picked up various bits of information from Scott Albright's book (Aikido and Randori), from stuff people have told me, and from Nariyama Shihan's account at his last london seminar (which probably had everything I want to know, but it being a seminar, I wasn't taking notes...)

In particular, did he produce a complete classification of which the randori no kata is the subset of techniques that are judged 'safe' for competitive training? And to what extent is the randori no kata (or the ur-kata of which it is a subset) an exhaustive list of ways of manipulating the body 'in an aikido way'? And in particular, why are there precisely those three uki waza? Are they the only posible ones?

Thanks! I actually got to go through (badly) the whole randori no kata in succession in training the other day, and actually starting to see how cool it is has made me curious...