Quote:
Peter Rehse wrote:
Jo I seriously doubt your 74 year old sensei could survive Shiai, most Aikidoka are overwhelmed the first time and that's why we work up to it slowly. As has been mentioned any number of times it is a training method taken to its logical conclusion. Aikido itself encompasses far more than the skill set randori teaches. Randori is a very physical/aerobic endeavor and is heavily weighted to the young and fit. Of course there are a number of 60+ Shodokan members that continue to train in the randori method.
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During the run up to the Osaka tournament a few years ago, some sports science students who took the British Shodokan squad on as a project put a heart monitor/data logger on one of our young bucks as he got into some shiai. They wanted to get some objective measure on how strenuous it was. He was (still is) an extremely fit young man, even so they were surprised to find his heart rate peaking up into the 200's.
There are a lot of people who'd be ill advised to push their heart rate right up as far it'll go, especially for really quite a marginal benefit. (Shiai is a valuable learning experience, but its hardly central to the curriculum after all.) I don't think anyone would really want to send a 74 year old into a sport lab to take a VO2 max test, what would be the point? Same applies.
As Peter says, randori is weighted to the young and fit. The 'competition' thing is most attractive, and most useful, for young bucks (of both sexes). In terms of their aikido, I get the distinct impression that they're expected to enjoy it, learn from it, but ultimately grow out of it and move on.
For older folks, the benefit may not be worth the increased risk of injury even if they are extremely fit for their age. Of course the individual may feel differently, skipping the randori is only an option after all, its not compulsory. Some people may need to persuade the grading panel they're up to the randori section - but then the whole point of a grading is to persuade people that your aikido is up to a certain standard anyway.
Theres plenty of opportunity for a vigorous oldie to demonstrate that they're up to it in the run up to the grading anyway, all they have to do is practice with a few young bucks and leave them sweaty and out of breath.
For pregnant women, if that increased risk of injury carries with it a risk of miscarriage, it just isn't worth it. We're talking about the grading syllabus here anyway, the time in grade requirements are several years at this level, gradings are frequent, so a pregnant woman who really wants the randori always has the option to wait a while and do it when she's not pregnant any more.
For what its worth, I'd really like to see that "women and older people" phrased differently. I think it gives the wrong impression, especially the "women" part, it implies that young women are less able than young men.
I know there was a time when women were dissuaded from getting into judo shiai, and female greco-roman wrestlers only got to join the men at the Olympics for the first time this year. I think the word "women" in that bit of our grading syllabus is an artifact from a few decades ago, of an attitude that has largely gone the way of the dinosaur. (An attitude for which, hopefully, total extinction beckons.)
Sean
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