Tanren-ho (鍛錬法) — Conditioning Exercises

Tekubi Kansetsu Tanren-ho (手首関節鍛錬法) — Wrist Exercises

Key point: To train techniques safely, it is important to condition the wrists to be supple.

From Chapter 4 you will learn actual techniques. Aikido has many techniques that control the wrist joint, so conditioning your wrists to be supple is also important training. Ways to condition the wrist joints include kote-mawashi-ho (小手廻し法, the nikyo wrist exercise), kote-gaeshi-ho (小手返し法, the wrist turn-out exercise), and tekubi shindo (手首振動, shaking out the wrists). They stretch joints and tendons that you seldom use in daily life and widen their range of motion. Always do these exercises before training so that you can train safely without injury.

• Kote-mawashi-ho: With the left thumb, hold the base of the right thumb, and with the other four fingers hold the little-finger side of the right hand. Keep the armpit closed and bend the wrist. Holding the wrist, move it back and forth, and let the strength go out of your shoulders. This is the direction in which the wrist is bent in the nikyo technique.
• Kote-gaeshi-ho: Turn the wrist outward while pressing the little-finger side of the right hand with the left thumb. Put the palm of the turning hand against the back of the hand being turned, and twist the wrist inward as you lower it from the chest toward the belly. The thumb holds the base of the thumb.
• Tekubi shindo: Sit in seiza and raise both arms above your head. Relax the wrists and shake them as if shaking something off. Shake the hands with the feeling of shaking the whole body.

Ikkyo Undo (一教運動)

Key point: Learn the feeling of conveying the body’s power from the lower body to the upper body.

Ikkyo undo. Tori presses the partner’s elbow and cuts down in an arc from top to bottom → After cutting down, relax → Switching roles, raise the upper body and push the partner’s hand up from below → Cut the partner’s wrist and elbow down → Switch roles again and push up from below. The feet change hanmi with tenkai-ashi

Ikkyo undo is training in which two people work as a pair, alternately and continuously performing the movement of cutting down the wrist and elbow as in ikkyo (第一教), to develop the feeling of conveying the body’s power from the lower body to the upper body. One person, with both hands, cuts down the partner’s wrist and elbow in an arc from top to bottom. Then the other raises the upper body and in the same way cuts the partner’s wrist and elbow down from top to bottom. The two repeat this movement in turn.

Play

• Power from the lower body to the upper body: What matters in ikkyo undo is conveying the power of the lower body to the upper body. Do it in a stable posture, with your center firmly between both feet. Have the feeling of cutting down your partner’s wrist and elbow with the power of the whole body.
• Cut down the elbow and wrist: Cut your partner’s elbow and wrist down from top to bottom as if drawing an arc. Do not take hold of the wrist from the start; turn your partner’s elbow first, and then take the wrist. The key is to make use of the tegatana.
• Breathe together: When one person, as tori, has cut all the way down, they relax. Then uke and tori switch and continue. Develop the feeling of cutting down while matching each other’s breathing.