Re: The tail of the dragon. Was: WOTT - Transfering skills from weapon to weapon

On Thu, 13 Apr 2006 13:49:47 -0600, Neil Gendzwill <ngendzwill@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Rabid Weasel wrote:

As far as obscuring maai, I've been instructed, from both Western and
Easter traditions, that an effective way of doing that is to level the
point of the weapon directly into the sight-path of the opponent so that
the tip of your weapon lines up with the shaft/body all the way down;
removes his ability to use depth perception to judge.

That technique is used not so much to obscure maai as it is to hide
movement, or rather to delay perception of the beginning of movement.
You often see advanced kendoka with this variation on chudan, rather
than having the kensen perfectly centred they will aim it at the
opponent's left eye so that he only sees the tip. The theory is that
it's harder to judge the start of the movement.

This doesn't work as well (if at all) with a two-handed grip. It does work
well with a one-handed grip, say, Bowie knife size and up to saber-length
blades.

I don't really buy that it works for several reasons. First, it's damn
hard to maintain that very precisely when both parties are moving, so
it's only really going to work in "old man" kendo when both are very
still.

True, it works better if the blade is still, but it only has to be still
for a second, just prior to the extension.

In addition the target may not be the eye(s) but the middle section of the
forehead.

Second, no guarantee which eye is going to be dominant so I
don't see how it's any improvement on aiming between both eyes, which is
standard.

Since most people are right-eye dominant, iirc, make your choice thusly.

And third, any decent kendoka isn't looking at your shinai,
he's either looking at your eyes or has his eyes aimed generally in that
direction without focussing on any one thing. He's going to observe
shinai movement more with peripheral vision, or a variant of that, than
being hyp-mo-tised by the kensen. So it's much more important that you
begin the movement straight in, so that there is not much
up/down/sideways to see - *that* makes the perception of the start
harder. It's one of the reasons we also practice smooth footwork, so
that you come in without any bobbing kind of telegraph that you are
coming in.

<nods>

As a side point, either you or Shuurai said you have to look at the
target, and I disagree there - usually if they look at a target they're
trying to sucker you, the target is something else.

At any rate, the slightly off-centre chudan has a more practical purpose
- it guards kote slightly and allows you to take centre. If you step in
while moving the kensen back to centre, you generate a little pressure
that moves the opponents kensen offline.

Neil

Thanks for the comments.

-B

.

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