Also "te kagami" and "ude osae dori", Dennis Palumbo, Secrets Of Hakkoryu Jujutsu: Shodan Tactics, Paladin Press, 1987. Pages 80-85; 95-97.
Steps 4-6 of H. Shodan find us pulling back from a down-block posture, swinging the right arm in a large circle, and dropping down into front stance with a tettsui hammerfist strike. After the strike we step forward and execute a left oi-zuki.
In Traditional Shotokan they tell us this is a wrist release followed by a strike to the collarbone, or arm, or head. You jerk your hand back toward your left hip, rotating your wrist anti-clockwise to lever against the enemy's thumb. This frees your hand, but it is a tactical blunder. It returns you to a no-advantage status where you must launch a following attack on an alert, upright enemy. We pretend that the hammerfist attack would be effective, but any one of us would simply block it or preempt it. There has to be more to this story.
Well, it is a wrist release and counter attack, but it is much more devastating than just getting your hand free and then swinging your fist. Here are some interpretations that we can teach to beginners.
- You did a right downblock, and your opponent caught your right wrist with his left hand. Twist your wrist the wrong way (clockwise) to tighten his grip as you use basic principles to yank your arm back toward your left hip. If he is holding on tightly and is taken by surprise, this move breaks his posture and makes him bend forward at the waist. Your wrist comes free anyway as you start to raise it on the backside of the circle... so you complete the circular motion and drop a powerful hammerfist blow on the fatally exposed back of the neck. Snap. Killing blow.
- From the same starting position, pull your arm gracefully (no jerking) back toward your left hip and swing up until you can look into the palm of your open right hand. This is the setup for the "Te Kagami" (hand mirror) throw as practiced in aikijutsu, aikido, and hakkoryu jujutsu (references above). (Te Kagami is a variant on the Te Nage hand throw.)
This move inverts his left hand so that you can reach under it with your left hand and secure the jujutsu "pistol grip" on the back of his hand. Your middle, ring and little fingers clamp around the base of his thumb so you can apply a very painful wrist lock. Once you have the grip, it is trivial to pull your right wrist free of his hand.
Do not throw your opponent over! Simply apply pressure with the wristlock to break his posture. You can "dial in" increments of pain to twist him into more and more awkward postures as he struggles not to fall over on his left side. Here's the payoff. In one of those incrementally-awkward postures, he exposes the right side of his neck to your downward tettsui strike. It's a kill strike. The tettsui will break his neck.
Twist his wrist to make him helpless and vulnerable; then unload the full power of your Shotokan training against a lethal point. He can't dodge, block, or counter. This isn't just an "effective" self-defense technique: it would be murder to do this in real life. This is what I mean by "twist and shout" applications. - Here's another interpretation of the same part of H. Shodan. It, too, is a wrist-release and counter.
The opponent has your right wrist grasped in his left hand, as before. Bring the fingers of your right hand up to the outside of his wrist so you can grasp his left forearm just above the wrist. Now make the sweeping pull back to your left hip, as prescribed by the kata. Use your left hand to join your right in capturing his left arm in the classic "ikkyo" straight-arm bar and wristlock. This is the first thing you learn in most aikido, hakkoryu or aikijutsu classes.
Once you have his hand/arm in ikkyo, secured with your left hand, it is trivial to pull your right arm free of what remains of his grip. Your right fist arcs upward and starts down... aimed at what? You have him in a rigid arm lock, with his elbow exposed and vulnerable. The tettsui comes down on the elbow joint, dislocating it and probably breaking the proximal end of the ulna (the olecranon process).
Again, twist, then shout. - This time, have your opponent grasp your right wrist using his right hand instead of his left.
Swing your arm back toward your left hip (as required by the kata), then up, over and down as if reaching toward his face. As the hand is on the upward curve of the circle, reach in with your left hand and press his fingers tightly against your right wrist so he can't let go. This is called the "nikkyo" lock in aikijutsu and aikido, and is known as "Matsuba Dori" (pine-needle lock) in hakkoryu jujutsu. Done slowly, it forces the opponent down to his knees, turning his body slightly toward your right. (Done quickly, it forces him to his knees while dislocating his wrist.) This puts the right side of his head squarely in the maximum-impact zone for your upcoming oi-zuki. The punch will do vicious damage to his right temple because he as no way to dodge or block. He's going to get hit in the temple with all the power you care to use. This is another "twist and shout" type of application. - In step 6 of this kata we turn 90 degrees to the left with a sweeping downblock, gedan barai. Consider that the opponent is on his knees right in front of you, and has just been punched in the side of the head. This may or may not have the desired effect:
- If you manage to hit him squarely in the temple, he'll fall unconscious on his left side, sprawled away from you.
- If the hit isn't solid, your fist will glance off his head and pass by, either grazing his face or passing behind the back of his head.
- If you manage to hit him squarely in the temple, he'll fall unconscious on his left side, sprawled away from you.
Note that the applications up to this point of the kata have demonstrated wristlock techniques that are highly appropriate to beginners. These are the beginner wristlocks that everyone learns in the first few days of a jujutsu class.
