Bat-gi

[Kraen]

There is a black belt grading coming up and 6 people are going to be tested next weekend and I get to be the person being thrown (Bat-gi) for some of the people over the course of 2 days.

This is a big event because the club has only given out 21 black belts in 38 years.

I'm fairly decent at landing, but does anyone have any tips/any advice for making the falls a little softer? ;)

-Kraen

[Taffyleigh]

Wear padding!!!

[klaasb]

Just take the falls.

[Fish Of Doom]

you fooled me. i wanted pictures of a literal bat-gi

[koyo]

Hard to explain Kraen but..take the breakfall with your whole body. keep the ankles loose.take the shock of the technique into your hips rather than receive it into the limbs.

Turn over your own hip is an instruction I often give to avoid landing on shoulders etc.

regards koyo

I shall release his arms to allow him to slap the mat. However it is the turning of his hip that allows the breakfall.Difficult to explain yet I could teach you in a few minutes.

[Kurtka Jerker]

Slap aside, practise your breakfalls as quietly as possible. Sound means impact. I won't speak on the form of it all because different schools have different methods, but the point of a breakfall is to reduce shock, and lots of people seem to forget that there are people out there who can truly land without anything that could be reasonably called impact in casual conversation. Slap the mat if you want, but the real goal is to land like a feather. The methods I've found the most success with in motion is to touch down softly with one thing, and just flex to absorb the impact. Touching down with the arm and slowing yourself until you land, or touching down with the outside of a leg or shoulder and sort of rocking to slow your fall. If you use your arm, just practice so that you don't fold it under you as that will break your ribs, don't "recline" on your elbow as that will break your elbow or dislocate your shoulder, and don't straight-arm, as that will break your elbow or shoulder. All of those things result in a slamming landing anyway.

Although I'm sure this probably contradicts hapkido form. If your teacher does not want you straying from hapkido form, just ask him. It'll make him feel bigger.

[Coges]

Psych yourself up and get ready for the pain!!!

I have to admit I love being thrown and there's nothing better than being thrown by someone who knows what they're doing. If they do the technique properly and you fall correctly it shouldn't hurt at all.

One bit of advice on back breakfalls though is to use some of the energy after you land to roll backwards onto your feet again. The last thing you want to do is land with a thud.

Also, help them put on a good show. Some people may disagree with me but I feel a grading is just a demonstration of what people already know you can do. You don't want to flop for the techniques but don't be afraid of your breakfalls or you will be more likely to hurt yourself.

Case in point, when I graded for my black belt, one of my partners was grabbing and holding onto my dobok whenever I threw him. Now he still landed on the ground where he should have but in some instances it looked like I was cradling him to the floor like a baby as he fought not to have to breakfall.

Either way good luck. Get yourself really warmed up and get the adrenalin pumping.

[Yakka]

Don't tense-up, tuck yr chin in & most importantly always exhale on impact.

Good luck

Yakka

[dortiz]

Tell your teacher! If you are in a position to ask for this advice here you are not ready to take the falls for the test.
No disrespect, just watching out for you.

Dave O.

[Giovanni]

kraen, you have to make the falls your own, this is what works for me and it's really just repetition. what i like to do is practice falling down as much as possible on my own. front rolls, front fall downs, back falls, side falls, flip falls...with the idea of being as quiet as possible. then i like to have my buddy just toss me around about 100 time (lol) throughout the course of the week trying to keep the "quiet".

[Giovanni]

I have to admit I love being thrown and there's nothing better than being thrown by someone who knows what they're doing.

...

one of my partners was grabbing and holding onto my dobok whenever I threw him.

i agree romulus. i love being thrown. after awhile, the body knows instinctively what to do to make the landing as soft as possible.

holding on to the dobak? you should tell your friend to let go, it will be better for him/her because that the body can really get in the right position. grabbing on, to me, means tightness and the last thing you want when falling is to tighten up.

[Coges]

Yeah I think that you just get into the rhythm of it. Also, like I said earlier, if someone is doing the technique correctly it hurts nowhere near as much. Also, a way to condition yourself is to always breakfall for higher belt levels. Not only do you get valuable falling experience, you also get a first hand look at more advanced techniques.

It was really frustrating that he was holding my dobok. Unfortunately he was from another club and wasn't too familiar with some of our techniques. Oh well.

[piratebrido]

Get blind drunk. I have survived falls drunk that would have crippled or killed a sober me.

[Kraen]

Thanks everyone for your input. ;)

For the record I can be the dummy for the techniques I know up to so I know what's coming and don't end up with a broken arm.

I'm doing what I can to not get pumped full of adrenaline. The air was thick last night, full of people with high tension. It doesn't help that my cousin just had a kid earlier today though. =P

-Kraen

[Morra]

Hard to explain Kraen but..take the breakfall with your whole body. keep the ankles loose.take the shock of the technique into your hips rather than receive it into the limbs.

Turn over your own hip is an instruction I often give to avoid landing on shoulders etc.

regards koyo

I shall release his arms to allow him to slap the mat. However it is the turning of his hip that allows the breakfall.Difficult to explain yet I could teach you in a few minutes.

Koyo - I always wondered about this, and you seem the expert to ask:

One day, a couple years ago, I was doing some aikido breakfalls and rolls before BJJ class, just to warm up. My instructor had taken Aikido and Judo, and he scolded me, and told me to land on my feet, not on the side of my leg/ foot like they do in Aikido.

He said in aikido, you can choose where to fall, but in Judo, you can't and you have to land on your feet. He said if you did it the aikido way on the street, you could break your ankles.

Any truth to that? What are the major differences between breakfalls in Judo and Aikido?

Thanks in advance...

[koyo]

Hi Morra

Idealy we shall use the power and momentum of the throw to ukemi straight back up onto our feet since the opponent may choose to continue the attack while we are on the ground.

Many aikido techniques are executed to ALLOW this so the landing on the feet is correct. However there are techniques where a more judo type ukemi is needed.
(see photo I posted earlier)

The similarities with judo may be techniques which are ment to lock you and take you to the ground where you may be pinned and submitted.

Below I am throwing Derek with kaiten nage and the technique has allowed for a rolling ukemi that shall take him back up onto his feet.(photo 1)
There are others such as Chiba shihan bouncing me (photo 2) where you hit the mat/wall :)and hit it hard.


Which ukemi you use depends a lot on how the technique is executed.

regards koyo

To the OP..anyone worth a dan grade shall execute the technique without injury to uke (on the mat):evil:

[Kraen]

IF you break your "bat-gi" you automatically fail. Hurting, on the other hand is a different matter entirely. Being a wuss isn't an option either.

-Kraen

[Giovanni]

Koyo - I always wondered about this, and you seem the expert to ask:

One day, a couple years ago, I was doing some aikido breakfalls and rolls before BJJ class, just to warm up. My instructor had taken Aikido and Judo, and he scolded me, and told me to land on my feet, not on the side of my leg/ foot like they do in Aikido.

He said in aikido, you can choose where to fall, but in Judo, you can't and you have to land on your feet. He said if you did it the aikido way on the street, you could break your ankles.

Any truth to that? What are the major differences between breakfalls in Judo and Aikido?

Thanks in advance...

hey morra. at my hapkido dojang, we're also taught to land on our feet, specifically, on the balls of our feet with our outmost leg turned slightly outward. turning slightly outward and landing on the balls of the feet protects the ankles from breaking on the concrete. fwiw.

[Kraen]

It starts in 3 hours.

-Kraen

[koyo]

Best of luck buddy.Let us know how it goes.


koyo

[Kraen]

It went well. Very well. I'll write up a more in-detail summary once I'm less tired.

6 people were testing for black, this meant 54 levels had to be done. I got thrown for 8th kup once then 7th kup 3 times. After that they gave me a 'break' instead of throwing me for a few rounds of 6th.

A few minutes into my 'break' (I was just getting warmed up :evil:) they made me a camera jockey!!

I was so upset about that!

2 and a half hours of filming in a cramped corner!

Anyways..

My only injury was one of the final throws in which someone pulled me up for the landing.

I HATE it when people do that.

I know that's how it's taught, but whenever people do that to me on a throw/fly/whatever it is, I get hurt more often that not. The rest of the time it's a really soft landing. But if I get hurt, the soft landings don't become so soft. If people just let me land on my own, very rarely do I ever get hurt.

-Kraen

[klaasb]

So in the end you only got thrown four times?

[Kraen]

In the end I got thrown about 123 times (Did the math) out of about 3000 times in a very small window of time.

-Kraen

[klaasb]

I got thrown for 8th kup once then 7th kup 3 times.
1+3=4

[Kraen]

1+3=4

8th kup = 30 techniques

7th kup = 31 techniques

30 * 1 = 30
31 * 3 = 93

30 + 93 = 123

-Kraen

[locust]

Wow thats alot of throws/falls to break ,as you said in such a short time my congrats to you.

[koyo]

I would hope they thanked you for your efforts.

koyo

[Kraen]

I would hope they thanked you for your efforts.

koyo

They did. I was actually complimented on how well I could fly for my level. However, I was only thrown for about 0.04% of all the techniques done. In total all 6 of them did about 3000. I was hoping to get thrown for something closer to 0.09%. (7 out of 54 levels.) Would have made it that much easier for the high belts who had to get thrown for the higher levels too.

I would upload photo's but.. I don't know how to.:bang:

-Kraen

I just realized my math regarding % was wrong. Forgot to times by 100. So 0.04% is actually 4% and 0.09% is actually 9%

[nj_howard]

1+3=4

Brilliant.

Do you have nothing better to do with your time?

[klaasb]

I got thrown for 8th kup once then 7th kup 3 times.
When I read this, I could only think 'he got thrown four times'.

[Kraen]

When I read this, I could only think 'he got thrown four times'.

That would be "I got thrown once IN 8th kup and 3 times IN 7th kup." :hat:

-Kraen

[hkd_instructor]

Don't tense-up, tuck yr chin in & most importantly always exhale on impact.

Good luck

Yakka

Agree completely with this one! When my soke was in town for a recent seminar, he was throwing me most of the afternoon, and only once did I get up and think, "crap, I landed wrong on that one.." He was doing the obi nage, so you as the "uke" or batgi end up landing with both feet over. Just keep your ankles lose. I've seen folks more often injure themselves because they are landing on the outside of their foot / outside of their ankle. They have black and blue ankles for a few weeks, and limp while walking because of this.

Do you guys "pull" up just before impact to help soften the blow? I tell my students to do that so we can take more falls on less than ideal occassions (sometimes on dirt vs. the mats). this really helps reinforce keeping your head "tied" to your belly button....

Best of luck

[Kraen]

Sorry for the taking forever in getting around to writing up how it went. ^^;;

There are times where you're asked to pull up, but whenever people do that to me it's more like a 50/50 split chance of me getting hurt, just maintaining control of me during the throw is enough to almost enough to guarantee I land softly.

I'll be sure to get around to updating this thread... eventually.

-Kraen

[Kraen]

*Biggest slacker ever*

Okay, half a year later....

6 people tested, 4 from here (all just happened to start in the Junior system) and 2 from the Vancouver club.

Day 1

Lots of kicks, strikes, combo's, breakfalls and sparring. 1-v-1 and 2-v-1. The sparring was some of the most intense things I've ever seen, one even managed to land a scissor kick in the 2-on-1. I ran a camera. Dinner at Moxies soon followed.

Day 2

Because of the massive amount of techniques we had to cover in such a short time period, KJN came up with a system involving 4 examiners and it went like this:

-1, 2, 3 and 4 are the testing areas
-# is the 'somewhere you can stand and not have someone thrown at you' area while you wait to continue in the cycle for either being tossed about, or executing the techniques.
-! is the viewing gallery
- "_" represents the entrance and the area to the right is where we keep our bags/water
-... is filler to make the map work.


.........................----------
........................|.............|
...---------------|......#.....|
...|.........!..........|.............|
...|....................|.............|
.-----------------..............|
|.................|...................|
|........4........|........1.........|
|.................|...................|
|.................|...................|
|------------|--------------|
|.................|...................|
|.......3........|........2..........|
|.................|...................|
|.................|...................|
---------------_-----------
........................----|


He assigned 1 examiner per square and everyone rotated throughout until they we were done, giving you a rest of 2 for every 4 levels you did.

I was put into corner 3 and tossed for about 4 levels then they 'gave me a break' and put me on the camera in that corner for the rest of the grading.

Unfortunately due to extreme procrastination, a lot of the juicy details have faded, making this post a lot shorter than originally planned.

all 6 passed, making it rare for there to be more non-bbelts than bbelts for the next few months. A few of them are attending night classes at the College so we don't see them that often right now.

-Kraen

Edit: Layout didn't work. Suggestions on how to fix it?
Edit: Found a workable solution, but still open to more appealing alternatives.

[righty]

How many hours did it go for on each day?
That's a looooottt of techniques to get through.

[Kraen]

Lots. And lots.

I can't remember the exact numbers (my fault) but at Least 4 hours for the first day and..... 8? on the second day. For one person to do a test in one day, it takes 6 hours. I wouldn't be surprised if my numbers were coming up short.

-Kraen