The Way of Least Resistance

Here's a technique I somehow hadn't considered for the cage (although on reflection it is one of the civilian defence methods that is reasonably suited to that enviroment): the "double punch" from naihanchi/naifunchin/tekki . It was in December 1986 and my brother and I were visiting our sensei in Durban, South Africa. One hot and sweaty morning, during one of the many intensive private trainings at his dojo, sensei asked my brother and me to consider the application of the naihanchi/naifunchin/tekki double punch technique - and report back to him in an hour or so. It was a kind of test. Now the "double punch" is exactly that: a full sideways facing punch with one hand, the other a shorter "hook" punch (also executed sideways). Try as we might, we couldn't think of a rational reason for having 2 punches to the opponent - at such vastly different reaches. We thought it might be in case you missed with the first one or the second one... ...

Introduction The preceding discussion about the uraken or backfist has made me think about the related issue of where backfists occur in karate kata and what techniques are often substituted. In fact only one technique is regularly interchanged with the uraken - the age ura zuki or rising inverted punch. How this technique functions and where it is "exchanged" for the uraken in kata, are very interesting questions. What is an age ura zuki? In Japanese an inverted punch is called "ura zuki". This is commonly performed as a low, short-range, horizontal punch, which stops just after your elbow clears your ribcage. As I discuss in my article " Why corkscrew your punch ", the ura zuki is contained in every standard karate punch. In fact the karate punch goes through 3 distinct stages: 1. First, the chambered punch clears the ribs (ura zuki). 2. Second, the punch extends into a mid-range vertical fist punch (tate ken zuki). 3. Third, the punch corkscrews ...

Hot on the heels of my blog article "The naming of sanchin" , here are my thoughts on the naming of the kata most widely known as naihanchi, but otherwise known as tekki (in shotokan), naifuanchi, naifanchi and naifunchin. For the purposes of this blog I shall refer to the kata as “naifunchin” (our preferred name). This is because this is how my instructors were taught to refer to it when they were in Japan and Okinawa in the 60s. The name is not often used now and the more common "naihanchi" predominates. It is said that naifunchin is to the shorin styles (shuri and tomari te) what sanchin is to naha te: the fundamental conditioning (heishugata) form. There is some evidence to suggest that Chojun Miyagi practised the form even though it was not included in his syllabus. There are various legends associated with the origins of naifunchin, however no written records of this kata survive. All that is known with any certainty is that it was passed down from the source...

We have always taught the kata we call naifunchin (naihanchi shodan) along with the goju kata (we teach naifunchin just after saifa). Even so it is not an especially popular kata because it is so different. It really has nothing in common with the other kata (no goju kata uses kiba dachi - a horse stance where both feet point forward - but instead the kata use shiko dachi where the feet point outwards at 45 degrees). Some “shorin” schools practice naifunchin with shiko dachi and not kiba dachi - eg. Tomari te, however this might be due to the influence of Naha‑te, rather than reflecting its original form. Despite its somewhat "strange" feeling and uniqueness, we find that it is a very useful "conditioning" kata (heishugata) and would not consider dropping it from the syllabus. But I’ve often wondered why we, as a goju-based school, should have adopted this kata. The simple answer has always been that our instructors originally studied Kyokushinkai, then Shotokan in...