This post is part of the First Year of Budo series

Another good class, after 3 hours though you start to forget some of the first corrections you are given in the first stage of jodo practice. Oh well, guess I’ll have to try to commit it more to memory at the time.

Jodo

We just did basic practice followed by a block/throw technique (the one after kuritsuke…) in paired form practice. I’m still not used to getting into the kuritsuke position to block the sword (getting the jo to land between opponents hands. My form feels terrible when trying to assume it in time. The person I was practicing with this time, cuts in a different fashion so that threw me out a bit too. No matter, practice practice practice.

We spent the rest of the session learning kata 8, which has some rather quick movements in it which once you get used to are quite fun. I couldn’t really commit enough to memory to go really out though so I couldn’t really get in the zone.

Iaido

After basic techniques we did paired form practice of kata 3 with bokkens. So the defender is kneeling, the attacker comes in from the side to cut vertically through their head. The defender sees the attacker in their peripheral vision and draw the sword up and out to parry the blow. In the same motion the sword swings up overhead, is grasped with the other hand and then the now off-balance attacker is slain from shoulder to hip. When practicing this in partner form we were trying to get the footwork correct (aligned at the end and not stepping out too far) as well as showing that the draw does not need to be rushed by the defender. They can do it at the last moment and it should be done while rising not after rising. Also as was pointed out later, don’t raise useful up fully, keep some bend in the knees.

After this we went onto free practice. I worked on kata 3 for awhile with an iaito and then I went on to kata 2. Kata 2 involves starting kneeling, then spinning 180 degrees while drawing and horizontally cut the opponent who was behind you. I was picked up quite severely on this one. On rising from your heels to kneeling the sword is only really having the saya pulled back, not much draw happens from the other hand yet. Then the sword is rotated 90 degrees (for horizontal cut) but still not drawing much more. The drawing happens once you are at the bare minimum past the 90 degrees of the 180 spin. To demonstrate, I had a senior student sit next to me so that I could not draw until I had moved the sword past their position (under threat of death if I did lol). It makes sense and is actually a lot more balanced as the right hand doesn’t come out in a direction that is not at the opponent. By waiting a bit more for the draw, the draw becomes more focused out towards the opponent like in kata 1.

At the end we did kata 1-12 as a group (1-6 for me). In this I saw the correct footwork for going into tatehiza position. After kneeling, the right foot comes forward before the left foot goes underneath. Going into tatehiza was really painful for me today, must be leaning on a piece of bone. I’ll have to experiment during the week.

After class sensei gave me the iaito catalog to have a look through over the week. I look forward to next week. Something like this is a really worthwhile thing to do. It brings a sense of discipline that you don’t get in a ‘normal’ life. And doing it together in a group just helps along the way.