When the founder of aikido passed away in 1969, sword training at the Honbu dojo in Japan ceased to exist as a part of the regular curriculum. The importance and history of sword training in the study of aikido is discussed in this article by BiIl Gleason Sensei, chief instructor at Shobu Aikido of Boston. (~1300 words) At that time sword training… Read more →
I had a catastrophic car accident in 2014 and after 18 months of rehab in the gym I was no longer seeing any progress. Looking for other options, I contacted an aikido school and a sabre school (I’d trained both previously) and asked how they felt about taking on someone recovering from serious injury, who did not have full control… Read more →
O-sensei spoke of the six pillars of aikido: osae waza, shihonage, iriminage, kokyunage, kaitennage and ushiro. But on what do these pillars rest? As we work to define Great Ocean Aikido, I’d like to propose three “grounds” — aiki body, aiki physics and atemi jutsu — as a way of describing our approach to aikido. Aiki body refers to building the engine that… Read more →
Engaging your core muscles is essential for aikido and aiki body training. Below is a description that I found really helpful. Core muscles work optimally when engaged no more than 25–30%. This is really important. If you do more than this you recruit additional muscles and will no longer be doing this exercise. It should feel like no more than a gentle squeeze. The following… Read more →