Naihanchi - Recap of a month of posts

Whew!  This past month has been a whirlwind tour through the most versatile and excellent of all karate kata - naihanchi.  Check the following for a review.

• A month of naihanchi
• Zempo naihanchi
• Interesting naihanchi story
• Three ways to start
• The backhand
• which direction does it start?
• What naihanchi is not
• The returning wave kick
• This is a frustrating blog topic
• The ideal of naihanchi
• The pulling elbow
• The teacup
• The down block
• Naihanchi A.K.A. Tekki
• The hook punch
• The backfist
• The hi-lo push-pull
• The hammer
• The double side punch
• Why is naihanchi a grappling kata?
• Footwork in naihanchi

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - footwork

A reader commented on one of my posts and mentioned that he wished that I'd post on the footwork in the kata.  So here you have it ;-)

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There are three pretty distinctive types of footwork illustrated in this kata

• the cross-step - essentially a normal walking step (ayumiashi) stepping forward across your other foot.  Useful for changing your angle wrt the opponent.  I have posted on this idea before and called it "walking over the hill"
• the returning wave step - a sliding side-step (tsugiashi) - one foot picks up off the ground and sets back down without ever shifting your center of mass over the standing leg, so you begin to fall/slide to the side of the foot that you picked up.  In this kata, this motion is typically used to illustrate how to drop your weight into a strike, but it also suggests the proper mechanism for a sliding evasion step sideways.
• backward turning step - if you pick up your right leg and pivot clockwise on your left leg, placing your right foot back on the ground behind you and perhaps a little to the left of where you started, then you are in the same position as if you'd cross-stepped forward with your left foot.  This very useful turning motion (tenkan) is not explicitly seen in the kata, but is suggested by the cross-step.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - why a grappling kata?

Some of my commentators have mentioned that they think I'm nuts regarding my grappling naihanchi ideas, and some others have said it is (at least) an interesting idea - worth exploring.  What is it that makes me think that naihanchi is mostly about grappling as opposed to kick-punch or some other theme?

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First, grappling does not necessarily mean wallowing around on the ground.  It means grabbing and holding and pushing and pulling and generally striving in prolonged contact with the opponent.  This description pretty much fits naihanchi to a tee.

• Nearly all of the obvious strikes in the kata are performed with the striking limb bent approximately 90 degrees, shortening the range.
• The kicks are all short, fast actions that are most easily interpreted as striking with your knee, stepping on feet, or kicking your opponent's knees.  These actions pretty much only ever happen at extreme close range.
• The kata features nearly all closed-handed techniques, which can be treated as punches, but which most authors suggest indicate closing the hand on something - i.e. grabbing.
• ...and, corrolary to the previous point, if you are in range to grab them then they are in range to grab you.
• Most all of the Okinawan kata have at least some common grappling applications (pulling as you hit, maybe a leg throw, etc...) but naihanchi is absolutely rife with grappling interpretations of every single movement in the kata.  And this observation holds across pretty much all schools.

It seems pretty obvious to me from the selection of techniques in the kata, that it was designed with close-quarters combat, and with grappling in mind.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The double side punch

And now we come to the last movement in the naihanchi kata - the double side punch.  Yes, I know it's not really two punches to the side.  Well, I guess it could be, but that would be a kind of obscure application.  A more common explanation would be holding something (like an arm) against your belly with the bent arm as you smack it with the straight arm.

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My favorite explanation for this movement is simply a continuation of the hammerfist idea.  Earlier in this series we saw that you could do effective hammers straight forward, or to the corners, either with or without dramatic weight-dropping shifts. Here we see one more angle for an effective hammer - horizontally to the side.

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Additionally, to my way of thinking, the position of this technique within the kata (at the end of the line) suggests its importance and its use.  I've said earlier that I view all of the techniques in naihanchi as very general-purpose motions useful in a close-quarters fight.  These techniques can be applied in the kata ordering but they can also be effecively combined out of order counteless ways.  When you get into this type of situation you could almost start blindly flailing your arms in naihanchi patterns, and end up improving your situation.   Well, when you're in the middle of your naihanchi flailing, if you get confused or lose your place... go back to the end of the naihanchi line and start over with either the backhand or the double side punch.  This gives you a pair of effective backups for when the rest of your ideas from this kata start going south.

[photo courtesy of tommarker]

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The hammer

After the hi-lo push-pull in naihanchi comes another distinctive feature of this kata - the hammerfist.  There are three repetitions of it - one facing forward with weight stable on both feet, and two facing the corners and dropping weight onto alternate legs.

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The hammer is absolutely my favorite closed-handed technique.  I can hit far, far harder with a hammer than with any other fist-technique.  When we used to do board-breaking techniques in karate, our instructors made the beginner breakers always start with a hammer because it's a safer way to build confidence.  I don't know of many techniques that I'd brag this way about, but if I get scared and pull out the hammer, you're not gonna enjoy being the anvil.

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In naihanchi, the targets are typically neck and jawline and temporal zones, but this thing can also be extrapolated to elbows and kidneys and collarbones without much stretching of the mind.  perhaps my favorite application of the forward hammer is against a chest grab/push - lay your free arm across his arms to hold his hand(s) to you, twist to jerk him off-balance to a corner, then drop a hammer into the angle of his jawbone with the impact happening slightly toward yourself.  Likely consequences are severe.

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Then again, with a hammer you can hit so infernally hard without hurting yourself, that even without precise targeting, you can get great results, as Bud Spencer demonstrates several times in this following clip...

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - the lo-hi push-pull

This is one of the most distinctive movements in naihanchi, and is probably the most versatile motion in the entire exercise.  It can be interpreted quite simply as...

• grabbing something low and holding or lifting it into a strike or grab coming from the high section
• grabbing something high and holding or pushing it down into a strike or grab coming from the low section

Basically this is a Point of Origin concept - wherever your hands happen to be... whichever one is available, use it to grab something on the opponent (high or low) and push/pull it offbalance and into a strike from the other hand.  Again, the strike can be uppercut, hammer, forearm smash... whatever works in the moment.

Often this is more concretely interpreted by beginners as grabbing sleeve or hair and jerking downward into an oncoming uppercut.  That is a great example of this lo-hi push-pull.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - the backfist

This is another of the less versatile techniques in the exercise  I mostly think of this as a strike - but still, it can be interpreted as several different kinds of striking ideas:

• a simple backfist strike
• an uppercut
• a hammer fist
• I've even seen folks call it a rising block-backfist-uppercut combo.
• a forearm smash...

Additionally, whichever strike you think this is, it can approach the opponent from several different directions - downward or upward into an eye socket...downward as a forearm or hammer onto a collarbone... upward into the chin... sideward into a temple or xygomatic arch...

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - the hook punch

Though this  technique is commonly called a hook punch, and though it can be used that way, It just never feels right that way.  I usually interpret this as one of a couple of grappling movements...

• a simple grapple - uke pushes or grasps your chest with either or both hands and you cover his hands with your forearm, holding him to you as you shift, dragging him off balance in preparation for the next strike or throw.
• iriminage - similar to Steven Seagal's clothesline, stepping across and placing your foot behind him in his weak line and either pushing his face with your palm or hooking his head with your elbow to drive him backward over your leg.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - also known as Tekki

While I'm doing a series on naihanchi, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out this source for a handful of interesting articles about the kata.  Check out Colin Wee's posts on Tekki.

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The down block

So, you've grabbed the opponent by the sleeve, snatched him off balance as you pulled yourself to a safer location outside his arms, and trapped his arm against your hip.  Now comes probably the most versatile motion in the whole kata - The down block.

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Screeeeeech! Wait, what?  The down block that you learn on day#1 of practice is the most versatile thing in naihanchi!?!?

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Yep - This isn't your grand-dad's down block.  It's good for a lot more than knocking a front kick aside.  The motion that we call downblock is really a general-purpose smashing, brushing, defending-while-attacking, grabbing-and-pulling, offbalance and pinning thing.

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It is so versatile that Rick Clark has written a book called 75 Down Blocks!  Looks interesting, though I haven't gotten a chance to read it.

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Coming after the teacup in naihanchi, the downblock is typically assumed to be an elbow smash to the trapped arm or else a crushing blow to the neck of the off-balanced opponent.  But there is really no end to the application for it.  When combined with some of the naihanchi footwork, the downblock even becomes a kosotogari (one of the first sweeps we teach in judo).

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Hint: We just call it "down block" to have a simple name to call it.  You could call it "Fred's multipurpose arm motion #1" if you wanted to, but "down block" seems more... I don't know... evocative?

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The teacup

After the pulling elbow, both hands come to the hip in a classic "teacup" chamber position.  It's called a teacup because the near hand is horizontal (like a saucer) and the far hand - the one that is reacing across the body is vertical, like a cup on top of a saucer.

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"This is a chamber - pulling back to get ready to do the next movement strongly."  Nope.  The moves that we call "chambers" (I dont know where that term came from) aren't wasted getting-ready moves.  All movements in the kata have to be potentially useful for improving your condition and/or injuring the opponent.  So what is teh teacup useful for?

• Your opponent grabs either of your wrists with either of his hands, you countergrab with your free hand and release your held hand as you snatch both hands to your hip, pulling opponent offbalance.
• Alternately, you could directly grab one of his sleeves with both of your hands in the same place and snatch him offbalance with both hands.
• Additionally, if you combine this teacup pull with the type of footwork seen in naihanchi - a cross-step or a sideward slide into a horse-riding stance, then you have just executed a classic Japanese pass - moving from a position between opponent's arms to a position behind and outside - in the opponent's dead angle (shikaku)

This third application illustrates an idea that I consider to be fundamental to understanding naihanchi - the moves don't have to happen in the order they are done in the kata (they can be but they dont have to be).  They can be combined in nearly any order in limitless combinations, and usually result in useful offensive motions.  In the third example above, the teacup is combined with the cross-step, but in the basic, mnemonic form of the kata, the teacup is done in a stationary horse-riding stance.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The pulling elbow

After the backhand in naihanchi kata, the next movement is the pulling elbow.  This technique seems pretty straightforward - you're grabbing someone by the head and pulling them into an oncoming elbow strike, right?

• What if you're not grabbing them - what if they are grabbing your wrist?
• What if you're not striking with the outside, sharp/hard surface of the elbow - what if you are striking with the inside crook of your elbow?
• What if you're not pulling with the pulling hand - what if you are using an open hand to point to your own elbow as a reminder to yourself to attack or focus on the opponent's elbow?

These are actually a couple of my favorite alternate applications besides the blatantly obvious (but very effective) grab-and-smash.

• Opponent grabs your left wrist with their right hand - you countergrab with your right hand on their wrist and smash your elbow into theirs, releasing their grip and pulling them off balance (in preparation for the next move of the kata)
• Opponent grabs with his right arm around your left side/back as if for a hipthrow or bodyslam - you strike across in front of your body, trapping his elbow/forearm against your side and hitting his reaching elbow with the inside crook of your elbow.

In kata in general, and naihanchi in particular, nothing is just the one obvious thing that it appears to be.  That is part of the genius of well-constructed kata like naihanchi - the kata never teaches you just one thing at a time.  Not only are there no wasted motions, but all the motions are very multi-purpose.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

The ideal of naihanchi

RE: Openhand's blog post - one of the things he talks about is teaching beginners the basic form  - the one that remains unchanged - unpolluted by personal preference - and allowing them to get good at that basic form before getting much into personal application and etc...

While I'm sure that Openhand could probably naihanchi me to death, I disagree about how to best teach it.  Instead of teaching a standardized, basic form first then applying it to the individual,  I think it is probably best taught as an application-first sort of practice with a live partner, with great amounts of repetition, similar to what you'd expect to see in a jujitsu-type class.  Then, once the student has gotten a decent grasp of how to apply these ideas to a live person, you can teach the kata as sort of an encoded shorthand mnemonic device that the student can take home and use in his spare time as a visualization aid.

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Application before kata instead of kata before application

Of course, when practicing application, the student is often forced to make little individualized tweaks to the movement in order to get it to work for them.  So then, after practicing individualized application, it makes little sense to teach them a standardized, basic form of the kata as a mnemonic.  You want the mnemonic to reasonably well mimic the idea that it is supposed to help you remember.  So then, we're back to the idea of eveyone having their own personal version of naihanchi full of their own little tweaks.  Most of these naihanchis will be similar and easily recognizable as naihanchi) but still not something that you would teach to new students as a standardized ideal.  

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I favor letting each student develop their own ideal naihanchi through live partner practice instead of teaching them your ideal naihanchi and hoping they can extrapolate from your ideal to theirs.

[photo courtesy of Mike Oliveri]

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi is a frustrating blog topic

So, I've been trying to focus on the karate kata, Naihanchi this month.  It's not like I think I'm some sort of expert or anything, but Naihanchi is so amazingly complex and rich in content that I figured I could skim a topic per day to talk about.  But that has turned out to be problematic.  Like drinking from a fire hydrant, Naihanchi has so much awesomeness that I'm having a hard time pulling out discreet nuggets to talk about.  Maybe I should have done a month of posts on 2-3 techniques from naihanchi... (and of course I'm only  talking about naihanchi #1 - I could probably write a year's worth of posts on naihanchi #1, 2, and 3)

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I'd thought to do some video clips using my android (my digital videorecorder is defunct - my kids are masters of destroying or losing the associated wires and cords). But havent gotten around to that.  I think some video would help me to convey the ideas though, so I'll keep trying to find the time and the partners I need to put some of my very limited knowledge on video clips.

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While we're on the topic of naihanchi, check out this blog article by Man of the West...

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Ok, now I'm done with my whining rant.  Back to actual naihanchi content!

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The returning wave kick

In keeping with the theme of naihanchi being an ultra-versatile kata composed of general-purpose movements, the one kick in the exercise is actually interpretable as several different types of kick or footwork:

• avoidance of a low strike/sweep
• a low, stamping kick to either knee
• a low, angled side kick to the inside of a knee
• a stomp/step onto a foot

I typically don't try to demonstrate applications of these kicks when practicing naihanchi, although I will occasionally do a crossover stomp with the oblique hammers into the jawline.  I'm gonna have to practice this along the lines of some of my commentators that suggested that by changing your angulation you could do that same crossover stomp from your right leg to their left leg (I usually think about a crossover stomp going from my right to his left).

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

What Naihanchi is not

It probably does not need to be said... I'm sure that most of my readers are pretty with-it.  But just in case there is someone out there that has listened to the myths about this kata...

• Naihanchi is not about fighting three opponents - one in front and one to either side
• Naihanchi is not about fighting while pressed back against a cliff or a wall or in a hallway or on a bridge
• Naihanchi is not just a trivial hip-motion and weight-transfer kata

Come-on.  That's just crazy talk.  Despite some of the nutty narration (from an otherwise awesome guy), here is a pretty good basic rendition of this exercise.




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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - Which direction does it start?

Another interesting variation between styles is in which direction naihanchi starts.  Some teachers teach this kata stepping left first and some stepping right first.  Each style seems to have a preference, but even within a given style, occasionally you will see a teacher that teaches this thing backwards with respect to the other teachers in the same style. 

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It doesn't really matter (much) because this kata is perfectly symmetric - all the movements that are done on one side are repeated on the other.  But it is an interesting phenomenon.

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My isshinryu instructor once told me a tale that might be apocryphal but it gives what is at least a plausible explanation.  According to this story, back in the olden days the teacher would teach naihanchi to one student at a time, standing directly in front of each other and close together, so that the instructor acted as a mirror to the student.  Thus, every generation of karateka ended up learning this thing on the opposite side from their instructor. And whether or not that is true, it's not a bad way to teach the thing.

[photo courtesy of Mike Oliveri]

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - The backhand

One of the distinctive features of naihanchi is an open-handed sweeping motion to the side.  In different styles you will see this done differently, sometimes as a palm-upward ridgehand, but more commonly as a thumb-upward backhand.  Like all of the movements in Naihanchi, this movement is extremely general-purpose, and can be used in a lot of different situations, including...

• a flicking eye-rake or an open-handed back-knuckle strike into nerve centers
• swimming through the opponent's arms into his center
• a scooping throw, similar to aikido's gedanate

[photo courtesy of Mike Oliveri]

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi - 3 ways to start

If you watch practitioners from different lineages doing this kata, there is a good bit of superficial variation.  A good basic indicator of which lineage you are watching is the opening motion.  Commonly thought of as a salute or simply an opening flourish, these movements have actual combative application.  There are three common openings for naihanchi, which I have nicknamed...

• "Modesty" - The practitioner holds two spearhand-shaped palms pointed downward and crossed with straight arms, as if covering his groin in modesty.
• "Hidden Fist" - The right fist is covered by the left spearhand.  This usually starts high, near the face, and sweeps down the body until the covered fist is held low, near the groin.
• "Viewing The Sky" - This one follows a path opposite to that in Hidden Fist.  The open palms start low and arc up the centerline to just above head level, then separate and follow separate arcs downward to either side, ending at the starting point.

I typically interpret Modesty as a frontal bearhug separation, Hidden Fist as a shearing wrist destruction against a frontal chest grab or push, and Viewing The Sky as a generic opening response to any punch.

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Patrick Parker

www.mokurendojo.com

Naihanchi opening - interesting story

So I promised a video and a cool, funny story about the beginning of naihanchi.  Class was cancelled last night because of floods and lightning and etc... so no buddies to do the video with, but here's the funny story.

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The first movement of naihanchi, the opening, is commonly interpreted as a wrist-shearing joint destruction somewhat similar to nikyo or kotemawashi in aikido.  It comes off of a chest-push or chest-grab attack.

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Well, a few years ago we'd played this technique a good bit and we were all confident in our ability to pull it off.  One of my students and her boyfriend were out at a jukejoint-type place and while he was away somewhere, a drunk, young-adult, Hispanic fellow came up and asked her to dance (among other things).  She declined in non-ambiguous terms, to which he responded by grasping her breast and reiterating something suave, like "Come on, baby."

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She says she stood fibrillating mentally for a moment or two because this guy had the audacity to actually grab her boob, but then the first thing that popped into her mind was, "I know how to break this guy's hand!"  Her hands reached upward toward the man's hand just like in naihanchi... she was running through the move in her mind... everything was in slow motion... And then he was gone.  Disappeared.  he had literally vanished from in front of her while she was looking at him!  She looked left and right and behind her.  Then she looked down and found him lying in a mangled, crumpled heap.  She thought, "Did I do that?!"

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Turns out her boyfriend had seen this encounter and, striding up behind the fellow, had hammered him with a fist on top of the trapesius HARD and had knocked him straight into the earth, semi-conscious - another technique that can be extrapolated from the beginning of naihanchi.

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They beat a hasty retreat from the juke joint, but they had an interesting story to tell about how they'd done a synchronized team naihanchi to this poor assailant.

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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com