“Keeping Distance Apart”:

an exploration of the principles of Aikido Kyogi (Sport Aikido) 

by Paul Wildish 6th Dan BAA-JAA © 2000

Randori Shiai (free-style contest) was created as a competitive format for applying ‘aiki’ techniques by Kenji Tomiki around 1960, and since that date has been the subject of continuous development and evolution. This has enabled it to justly claim a place alongside judo and kendo as an exemplification of budo in its modern sporting form. Indeed the starting point for Aikido Kyogi development lay in the profound influence of Jigoro Kano on the young Kenji Tomiki’s maturing ideas on the nature of budo in the modern world.

In a series of speeches made between 1926 and 1927, Kano addressed the issue of incorporating atemi techniques in judo randori (free) practice. Then as now, any form of atemi (striking vital points) technique was proscribed from judo randori and shiai for reasons of safety, limiting contest to grappling techniques starting from an initial seizure of the sleeve and collar of the keikogi. Atemi waza and certain of the most severe wrist and joint locks from the canon of jujitsu on which judo was based, were strictly limited to kata practice only. Despite these self imposed limitations Kano believed that: “Randori or bouts including Ate Waza may be developed through some devices and further research, but it may not be easy.” This demonstrates that after some fifty years of judo development, Kano was still thinking of ways to broaden the scope of randori to encompass all the elements of jujitsu technique.

It was this challenge that Tomiki Sensei, took with him to the Daido Academy in Japanese-occupied Manchuria around 1936 when he accepted an appointment as a professor of physical education. At the Daido Academy, the Kenkoku University and latterly, after a period of internment by the Russians at the end of WWII, at Waseda University, he developed an entirely new form of randori practice, employing not only atemi waza but a range of wrist and elbow kansetsu waza based on his considerable knowledge of aikido. As a student of both judo and aikido, and holding at that time an 8th Dan in both arts he was uniquely placed to attempt this synthesis of aiki techniques and judo-style randori.

Tomiki's Aikido Randori Kyogi is characterised by grabbing the forearm of an opponent and the use of atemi and kansetsu (joint-locking) waza techniques but excluding leg techniques or any grabbing of the keikogi (uniform). Eventually the randori application of these techniques took on two distinct forms as a contest between two unarmed players, or Toshu Randori, and Tanto Randori where an unarmed player uses aiki technique against the other who is ‘armed’ with knife (tanto) made of rubber-sponge. The armed player named for his weapon ‘Tanto’, attempts to hit vital parts of his opponent’s body with the knife, whilst the unarmed player ‘Toshu’’ counters with aiki techniques. After much experimentation it is Tanto Randori that has met the test of official competition; Toshu (empty hand) Randori is a less popular form for competition as it requires a very high threshold of skill to perform without falling into the trap of close grappling. However, as a training practice, it remains a solid proving ground for the development of the principles of kuzushi (balance breaking) and renraku (combination attack) techniques.

The central problem that Tomiki Sensei addressed in the development of Randori Kyogi was the question of maai (combative distance) and how players should, despite the conditions of contest, demonstrate effective aiki techniques and not fall into a form of judo style grappling. He characterised this maai as “taking distance apart”, hanarete, whereby the aikidoka defends against striking, stabbing and kicking techniques by blocking with tegatana or hand-blade. This “distance apart” (approximately 1.5m) is also the starting point for attack or counter attack. However as may be judged from kata practice, the application of kansetsu waza without prior use of atemi against an uncooperative opponent in a contest situation remained problematic. Early experiments utilising protective body gear proved impracticable given the nature of aikido waza, until it was determined to redefine the use of atemi in contest situations. Instead of using atemi to attack anatomical weaknesses, it was found more effective to attack the mechanical weaknesses of an opponent. Kogure Sensei, who was a young student of Tomiki Sensei at that time, describes the principle this way; “...if I take two steps forward while my opponent takes only one step back, he will naturally fall backward. In other words, power is not necessary since he is in a position to fall if I move my hips straight towards him. Then he will naturally try to use his hands to prevent himself from being pushed backwards and this will result in him making physical contact with me. We thought we could execute various techniques at this precise point of contact.”

This can be illustrated by the exercise of sei chu sen no bogyo, where uke feints an attack either with a fist or kick, tori drops his body weight and moves in swiftly to uke’s centre, placing his tegatana against uke’s chest to propel him backwards. Tori must maintain good central posture maintaining the “...kuzushi so that tsukuri, structuring, and kake, technique, can be applied.”5

This inevitably forced a change in the employment of aikido waza from the usual circular patterns of movement to a more linear application within matches. Tomiki then set about devising a number of abbreviated aikido techniques that could be applied under these conditions, eventually settling upon a kihon (basic) kata of 17 randori techniques, together with 10 ura (counter) waza. These are organized into 5 atemi waza, 4 wrist kansetsu (joint-locking) waza, 5 elbow kansetsu waza and 3 uki (floating) waza. It is important to remember however, that the curriculum of Tomiki Aikido does not end with these 27 techniques. Tomiki players practise defence against other budo forms and more complex or dangerous aikido waza as kata, in just the same way as any other school of aikido.

Despite the employment of techniques specifically designed for contest situations, it is rare to see a decisive technique during shiai where the players are evenly matched in ability and fitness. This was the subject of some criticism and still is, but Tomiki was unconcerned, commenting that, “We rarely see decisive techniques in judo competition, either. There are only about seven effective techniques in judo matches. In karate, there are only a few variations such as punching and kicking techniques. In kendo, there are only four scoring techniques, men, kote, tsuki, and do. Although in aikido it is said that there are around 3,000 techniques, there is nothing strange about the fact that there is only a limited number of techniques, which can be used, in a practical situation. So, naturally it is more difficult to execute decisive techniques in matches”. 

While the principles of “keeping distance apart” and the use of atemi to attack the mechanical weaknesses of an opponent remain the theoretical base for Randori Kyogi, open play cannot be guaranteed without a framework of rules. The passion of competition often leads to a situation where players can fall into grappling with an opponent if their initial response falters, or is countered by the Tanto player’s resistance. Having managed to seize tanto’s forearm while failing to maintain kuzushi, the immature player is often reluctant to surrender what is perceived as an advantage, futilely attempting to force or ‘wind-on’ a kansetsu technique by strength alone. The outcome is a scenario where the grappling takes on the appearance of a particularly untidy judo bout, without any of the advantages of being able to seize a collar or sleeve to execute techniques.

In the past the rules relied heavily on the role of Tanto to keep play open. Tanto is encouraged to maintain the attack on Toshu (enabling Toshu to execute aiki waza) by rewarding successful tanto strikes on the target area (on the torso above the belt and below the collar bone) with tsukiari, equivalent to yuko or one point. The rationale of this score is that it must be sufficient value to provide the incentive to attack but not so high that it should outweigh the successful application of aikido waza, which must remain paramount. This balance has been a difficult one to get right, too high a weighting has led to an unacceptably high number of bouts being decided on tanto scores rather than decisive aikido waza, particularly when skill is finely matched. Too low a score and there is little incentive to press home tanto attacks and risk seizure and counter attack by toshu, despite the warnings and exhortations of the referees. Without the vigorous and serious attacks of tanto, there is little opportunity for the skilful application of aikido waza and the contest may often slip into a desultory standoff that singularly fails to provide an opportunity to demonstrate effective aikido.

It must be remembered that Tomiki Sensei’s primary intention was not to devise a game where players might win or lose by any means, but to provide a format where the aikidoka has the opportunity to “objectify his power”; to test the effectiveness of his aikido against an uncooperative adversary. The degeneration of a bout into a situation where tanto fails to make serious attacks, or when seized by toshu he is hung on to, merely to be wrestled and tugged around the mat can never be considered Randori Kyogi.

Although it is primarily the immaturity of players, together with a lack of understanding of the meaning and intention of Randori Kyogi that produces unsightly struggles of the kind described above, it must be said that it is also a failure of the rules. Any game, to be successful and enjoyable to both watch and play, must aim to be as simple as possible, particularly if that ‘game’ is based on a form of combat. Nevertheless it cannot be entirely left to the tacit agreement of the ‘players’ to provide an opportunity for open play. This open play cannot even be ensured in the practice forms of kakarigeiko and hikitategeiko without the vigilance of the instructor. The game itself must be structured to guarantee, unless the rules are deliberately broken, that it cannot be played any other way.

Any sport undergoes a long evolution before its basic structure is settled upon and even then it has its own dynamic that requires a periodic review of practice, this is true of sports with long histories such as soccer and cricket as much as it is true for a young sport such as Aikido Randori Kyogi. Recently the impact of international level competition has produced much thought on how the rules might be structured to provide guarantees that play should be open and “keep distance apart.” This has produced two innovations, one addressed to the role of Toshu and one most dramatically to the role of Tanto.

As mentioned above, Toshu may be tempted to ‘hang-on’ to the seized forearm of his opponent even after he has failed to break Tanto’s balance by maintaining initial impetus or applying a swift combination of multi-directional attacks. If Tanto is in a solid defensive posture, Toshu is left hanging onto the forearm with only the option to tug and push to effect a disturbance of balance. To prevent this situation going on beyond any reasonable opportunity for Toshu to establish kuzushi skilfully, the 5 and 3 second rules were brought in for the 1989 First International Sports-Aikido Tournament, held in Tenri, Japan. These rules allow Toshu to maintain a grip on Tanto’s knife-bearing hand and forearm for 5 seconds and his other arm for 3 seconds. If Toshu fails to structure (tsukuri) his counter adequately and Tanto’s balance is not disturbed then he must let go after 5 or 3 seconds respectively or risk penalty from the referee. With vigilant refereeing the worst abuses of grappling can be avoided requiring Toshu to improve his timing and tsukuri. Further penalties awarded for failure to employ correct taisabaki (avoidance) against Tanto’s thrusts assist this open play process, preventing Toshu rushing down Tanto and crowding his attacks.

The most dramatic innovation in the nature of Tanto Randori Kyogi was announced at the 1991 BAA Silver Jubilee Open Championships in Cardiff, and demonstrated by Morikawa and Fukushima Senseis at the subsequent International Seminars. From the 2nd International Sports-Aikido Tournament, held in Chiba from the 16th to the 18th October 1992, Tanto was allowed to use a limited number of aikido waza as counters to Toshu’s seizure of the forearm; specifically the five prescribed randori atemi waza and their variations. Hitherto, Tanto has been strictly restricted to resisting seizure by body movement and the use of tegatana by the free hand alone. Under no circumstances had Tanto been allowed to grip Toshu or his own hand to reinforce resistance to his opponent’s attempts to break his posture. Now, however, Tanto is able to neutralise seizure and the application of kansetsu waza by utilising the atemi waza techniques of shomenate, aigamaeate, gyakugamaeate, gedanate and ushiroate as counter technique of his or her own.

The outcome of this rule change, tested in subsequent international and national competitions, has been to increase the opportunity to employ decisive aikido waza by both players and to seriously inhibit any attempt at grappling on the part of Toshu. Under this rule Toshu can only risk seizure of the forearm if he or she has properly structured the attempt and his or her timing is perfect. Further opportunities also exist for Toshu to counter Tanto’s counter which of necessity makes play more open and fluid than the dogged defensiveness that the earlier rules failed to eradicate. The whole concept of this change is to turn the circle back towards a contest format more closely resembling Toshu Randori Kyogi, the basis of Kenji Tomiki’s original experiments with competitive aikido.

Sports Aikido competitions are not confined to randori alone, just as with kendo and karate, Tomiki saw the necessity of giving kata equal status as ‘sport’ to match its important status as a training method. For this method of competition, Embu Kyogi, the skills of kata (yakusoku renshu - agreed practise) are competed and points awarded by judges according to the quality of performance. There are kitei, or prescribed, embu and jiyu, or free-style, embu. In the prescribed embu contests, tori and uke perform one of the standard kata sequences developed by Tomiki, while in free-style events competitors develop their own sequences, giving the players an opportunity to demonstrate a degree of creativity and self-expression. A useful analogy would be with ice-skating competitions where both prescribed ‘figures’ and ‘free-style’ events are competed.

Kenji Tomiki, first presented his creation of aiki randori techniques to an audience of his peers at the Japan Physical Education Conference (Nihon Taiiku Taikai) in 1960, locating his research within the theoretical framework of the process of jujitsu development to competitive sports. Tomiki described ancient jujitsu as comprising four components, nage waza, katame waza, atemi waza and kansetsu waza. From this basis Kano had identified three major principles for his judo; the principle of kuzushi (breaking or unbalancing posture), the principle of yawara (flexibility) and the principle of shizentai (natural posture). These principles were the foundation of judo waza, and for Tomiki they were also the principles underlying his conception of aikido, seeing, as he did, judo and aikido as a unity stemming from the same source. The division point for Tomiki was the distance, or maai, from which each was applied, with aikido identified as its distant form and judo as the close grappled form. 

Kano had created his competitive judo, as we have seen, from the grappled forms of jujitsu, using katame and nage waza at the point where an opponent’s collar and/or jacket is seized in both standing and ground work positions. Tomiki, with Kano’s encouragement, had built on his research developing a competitive aikido from the ‘other half’ of ancient jujitsu waza. The techniques characterised by this ‘half’ being kansetsu waza and atemi waza, which he mentions in his “New Aikido Text”, as making the best use of the budo axiom “from the unarmed to the armed”. All the principles of kendo, with respect to maai, metsuke (eye contact) and blade techniques have equal and similar application to aikido. For Tomiki, it was these technical characteristics and adherence to the best axioms of Japanese budo, that is, the use of waza to make an armed opponent fall or to hold him down without causing injury, that gave aikido its originality. He rejected the view that it could be described by its practice methods as in, “aikido has no competition”, or it is about “respiration power”, circular movement or by any of its metaphysical concepts. As a philosopher and historian of physical education and budo, the only categorisation with any validity was the recognition of atemi and kansetsu waza, including those forms for the unarmed against the armed that distinguished aikido from other budo.

Within the Tomiki school kata and randori are equally represented in daily practise, with randori seen as complementing the ‘weak’ points of kata practise, that is, the function of techniques. The student is brought to an understanding of their application and function in an environment where attack and defence are freely delivered. The permutations that would be required by kata practise to simulate this experience would be almost endless and take much longer to acquire. Randori techniques offer the opportunity to develop timing, to learn how to seize the opportunity to deliver decisive techniques during the attack and defence and finally how to make combinations of waza in response to an opponent’s movements in a much more dynamic way than kata allows. It is a training method that recommends itself as physical education, sport and as an environment for learning some practical aspects of self-defence. Competition, adds to this in providing “a scenario of serious struggle, where one’s past efforts in learning waza are revealed in the existence of an opponent”.7

In conclusion, Tomiki Aikido must be seen as a ‘modern’ budo, standing alongside and in the same tradition as judo and kendo, offering a unique ‘sporting way’ to the understanding and enjoyment of aikido.

How the game is won

As with any combat sport, the player scoring the highest number of points during the match is declared the winner. The points scored during a match are of three types:

toshu points scored by applying a successful aikido technique without a tanto, tanto points scored with a tanto, and foul points awarded by the judges against the player for infringements of the rules.

For toshu, three categories of technique are effective for scoring purposes. Firstly, ippon atemi-waza, when the player throws his/her opponent cleanly to the mat on his/her back or side, using an atemi technique. Secondly kansetsu-waza, when the player breaks his/her opponent's balance and successfully maintains a controlling hold. Finally uki-waza, when the player throws his/her opponent cleanly using one of the 'floating' projections, such as sumi-otoshi or hiki-otoshi.

For tanto, the player must strike the opponent cleanly with the tanto within the target area, defined as the torso above the waist or belt level and below the armpit line. "When tanto strikes, he must be in good posture with his back straight and with his hips stable, and the tanto must be approximately at 90 degrees to the target area at the moment of impact. He does not always have to strike from the optimal distance at the edge of his opponent's defence zone (i.e. one step/thrust from toshu); tanto attacks from nearer or farther away are permitted." Additionally, tanto may employ any of the five atemi techniques, included in the basic seventeen waza, the junanahon (see 'Techniques') in counter application when seized by toshu on either of the forearms.

The highest level of points (4) is awarded for toshu ippon, for a clear atemi throw or a clearly defined kansetsu-waza or uki-waza.

Toshu waza-ari scores 2 points, for a technique judged by the match officials as almost an ippon. To score waza-ari it is not strictly necessary to throw the opponent, but a clear breaking of an opponent's posture must occur.

Yuko, the final scoring category for toshu, scores 1 point for a technique that is almost a waza-ari. Tanto tsukiari, a clean strike with the tanto, scores 1 point.

Minus points are awarded against competitors who break the rules and are scored for the opponents; chui, 1 point and shido, 0 points. However two shido (registered warnings by the referee) will score 1 point for the opposing player.

As with any contest activity, the players can be so evenly matched, particularly, at high level international competition, that the score for play is drawn. In this case, the player with the highest number of toshu points (awarded for aikido technique), wins. If the score is still drawn, then a judgement of kinsa, or superiority, is made, on the following basis. Firstly the highest number of near yuko techniques, secondly the number of shido, then a judgement of the skill of technique, the players attitude and spirit. This assessment is made by the referee and the judges after consultation.

When injury forces a player to retire from the contest a draw by injury, or itami wake, or is given, but the injured player is given the right to continue to another round.

Techniques

The range of aikido techniques legitimately employed in tanto randori competition has been limited to a basic seventeen waza, known as the junanahon and systemised within the Randori no Kata. These techniques were developed by Kenji Tomiki over many years of experimentation, where he sought to find techniques that both demonstrated the principles of aikido, that is irimi and tenkan, yet safe enough not to cause major injury when competed. This was particularly the case with respect to the atemi, or striking techniques. Early experiments used kendo headgear to allow blows to be delivered. This hampered the employment of locks and throws and the headgear itself was dangerous for the player when knocked to the ground. Finally, four techniques were settled upon where the blow is translated as a push, delivered with open-palm hand, or tegatana, and forearm against the chin, torso or legs. These are shomen ate (forward head strike), agama ate, gyakugamae ate, and gedan ate. The final atemi technique, ushiro ate, is a pull-down from the rear.

Atemi techniques, allowing swift responsive action, are undoubtedly the 'big' techniques that provide the dramatic throws and win matches. This tends to give contest aikido a more linear look than a freestyle session in the dojo. However, all the aspects of avoidance, the good judgement of ma-ai, combative distance, and the crucial aspect of timing still apply to gain success. Next in the hierarchy of contest effectiveness are three of the hiji waza or elbow techniques, hiki-taoshi, ude-gaeshi and waki-gatame, with variations of waki-gatame most frequently attempted. The more complicated tekubi (wrist) and uki (floating) techniques are more easily countered however, kote-gaeshi, sumi-otoshi and tenkai kote-gaeshi (shihonage) offer effective waza-ari scores.

The clear star of the tanto randori contest is the atemi technique of shomen-ate, and is often seen as a variation where the chest is struck instead of the chin, the impact and the follow through on toshu's part often lifting tanto horizontally off his feet.

Paul Wildish