Tuesday, July 19, 2022

Tai Otoshi Inner Secrets 1 & 2

 

Tai Otoshi Inner Secrets 1 & 2

If you love tai, I'm hoping to add to the romance. If you don't feel you quite "get" tai, I'm betting you will feel much stronger about it after trying the first "Inner secret".


Sometimes, actually quite often, inner secrets are things we don’t even know that we know. During the last few years, I’d realized my old tai-otoshi was somehow gone. Something was missing. I could do a respectable tai-otoshi, and what I taught to my students worked well for them. There was no glaring problem, except that I knew something was missing. Then, I discovered an inner secret about my tai-otoshi after a sixty - plus year acquaintance with it.


After about three or so months into my beginning judo, I’d discovered my tokui waza. Or, as is truly the usual case, it discovered me. I nowadays communicate with three of my former Mankato State College Judo Club teammates and it has been remarked, from time to time, that they recall my tai-otoshi as a formidable throw. This, however, aroused my curiosity as to why it had worked so well. When a photo from long ago was recently sent to me, I was immediately awakened by something obvious.


This is the B&W photo of me at Mankato State Judo Club sometime around 1961 throwing my sensei, Paul Sheehan, with tai-otoshi. Below that is Kazuo Ito demonstrating his tai-otoshi. Ito became 9th dan and was the favorite student of legend Kyuzo Mifune. People used to say, when asked how Mifune did something, "Ask Ito. He will show you." If at this point you don't yet know who Mifune was, your most immediate next judo activity could be to check him out. It turns out that I was doing my tai just like Ito did it. (I love it when that happens.) Nice to know I'm in good company, tai-otoshi-wise.




            As you've possibly figured out, the lift of my collar hand is the secret. Not only is it in this position, it got there as the predominant "power" driving force throughout. It is the tsurite, the "lifting hand".


Quite often, the emphasis is put on the sleeve hand’s lift-and-pull. Perhaps that's because it is more noticeable when watching the throw. Additionally, the sleeve hand pulls in the direction of the kuzushi, so it is obviously very important. That is when the collar hand, the tsurite, gets overlooked, is given less emphasis, becomes a secondary consideration.


Thus, many new tai-otoshi learners allow the collar hand to lag behind, getting it behind their own shoulder. It’s a very common mistake. It can lead to shoulder damage, too. It also robs the throw of a huge amount of the correct use of force. Worse, a weak collar hand allows the force of the throw to come around and back into tori, moving it out of the zone of force that goes in the direction of the initial kuzushi. Go beyond the admonishment to not leave it behind; start with it.


In the pictures, it might also seem my left hand has lapsed downward, but it is actually completing a circle that was initially upward and outward toward uke's right front corner. Via the arrows, you can see that it and the right hand are making a large, congruous circle.


To help get the collar hand working right, It is a clever trick to think of the collar hand beginning the throw. Use it as an initiating action. Give it as much of a role in creating kuzushi as the sleeve hand gets. Do that, and it won't lag behind. Actually try it several times, until it feels like a powerful part of the throw.


I can even now recall what the correct use of the collar hand felt like when a sandan from Japan, Ken Ichiyama, threw me with his monster tai-otoshi. Back then, there were often Grand Champion divisions added to our local shiai, Ken would win the division above me and we’d be paired to compete. We bowed, took grips, and I think it took him about thirty seconds to nail me with a lightening tai otoshi.


After my loss to his devastating tai-otoshi, I went back to my dojo and tried to devise a way to combat this. My sensei suggested I could jump over Ken’s blocking leg. So, I practiced this many, many times. The next time we met. I was ready. This time I had the answer! Ichiyama came snapping in for his tai, I was ready. I jumped over his leg. He threw me faster and harder than the last time. As I was getting up, I heard him say, “Thanks for jumping.” I can viscerally recall the feeling of that collar hand owning me every millisecond of the way. I know it now, but didn’t sort it out back then. Ironically, I was using my hand the same way in my own tai-otoshi throws, as the picture shows. That experience also brought home to me why tai is considered a hand technique.


In order to accomplish this and be sure of its efficacy, the collar hand must be part of the very beginning of the throw. It isn't a high collar grip, just standard. Tori should feel as if it begins early, almost triggers the throw. It must get above tori, while tori simultaneously gets below it (otoshi). When you try starting by using the sleeve hand for your primary lift and pull, and it seems physically challenging, it is because the collar hand isn’t right there in the action at the start. 


If you go watch tai otoshi expert Neil Adams teach "Korean" style tai otoshi, you'll see what I'm talking about.


Here is something you might try in practice. Do the throw without the sleeve hand and make the collar hand do it all, being sure to keep uke's body from touching yours. This will give you a feel for how the collar hand works, and it will assure that you continue the throw in its intended front corner kuzushi direction. Of course, the sleeve hand can add to the rotation near the end, but you can start with it not holding on at all; or, if your partner is so inclined, uke can finish it with a front roll fall and no sleeve grip is necessary.


Another idea for you. Think of the hand moving the same way it would if you were going to do a front roll fall, the hand starting at your shoulder. In the picture, you can see that if I just let go of my right hand I could go into one. (The picture feet are, of course, reversed from the basic zempo kaiten ukemi)


Tai is a te-waza, a hand technique. It is said that Kano used to do it without the blocking leg. As is often the case, students look at the big picture and miss the underlying details. We see the leg blocking and creating the completion of the throw, and focus on that aspect. This distracts from looking more closely on the "te" part, studying it as the primary ingredient, then seeing the leg action as secondary. We tend to do this isolation of the obvious with almost all throws, and it is a natural thing to do. We see the "big" action, and the smaller yet critical action escapes us.


There is the second secret that this tai otoshi analysis offers, as it informs us regarding all wazas. Look for the fundamentals; see the devils in the details. For example, think of all the throws where the leg sweeps; o-soto, uchi mata, harai goshi, o-uchi gari, and so on. We are totally absorbed in the big sweeping leg action; however, there is detail action before those sweeps and reaps, and without it, they don't do anything.


For tai, focus on the te-waza part and get the kuzushi and the blend of that into movement which takes uke beyond the point of recovery. Then show up with the leg.


Among the many things that can be done to assure a good tai-otoshi, I’m hoping the added "inner secrets", this discovery of my own early days unconscious competence, and now conscious competence, will be of value to you.


Remember to always ask, "What is making the judo work here?"


 



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