During my nosing about online I've come across this person posting offensive comments on martial arts videos of someone I know, so had a look at his page and found videos of him in action. I can't embed as on Facebook, but the page is https://m.facebook.com/max.rozenberg.18?ref=bookmark&__user=100004029891291 Please could the Aikido community on here advise whether this is a good example of Aikido and the practitioner (the big bald man) fit to pass comment on others. Also, as a side point, is this the sort of behaviour that would be expected of an Aikido Sensei? Thanks KB
I thought the video was quite poor. His student seemed to get tired very quickly and once he was on the floor he had nothing. As for his behaviour. It's not what is expected. But it's also far too common. Aikidoka are people and not particularly special in anyway. Some are nice, others aren't. In my experience there are two types of teacher who will bad mouth other clubs or teachers. The mediocre/embarrassingly poor and the empire builders. If the teacher is fat then they're either not doing a whole lot of training themselves or they're eating too many pies and downing too many pints.
The bald guy didn't quite seem to be standing up straight. His back, to me, seemed a little bent. He seemed to be leading with his arms/shoulders instead of hitting with complete body unity. Maybe it's just the camera, but, if not, that's bad. This type of "randori" in a video always leaves me puzzled. I don't like them. As isolated moves, the two throws in the video can be legitimate. It's a deceptive balance thing that has to be felt to be believed. However, I can't and don't believe that these are going to work over and over and over and over again like in this video UNLESS that is what the people wanted to practice. It's one thing to practice a given move over and over again. I get it. That's good. We all do it. It's totally a different thing to limit your attacks and defenses in a randori drill while calling it "self defense" or "realistic" or "a true demonstration of aikido" or something similar. That's phony. What are they doing there? I really don't know. I don't know.
Frankly the posture of the students just kneeling on the mat before they began was terrible and that really tells you all you need to know about the standard of teaching.
May be we are judging too fast just by watching the clip? Once awhile we do perform similar drill to show others how to take advantage of space and how to get out of line of attack (taisaki). Say 2 guys attacking the same time, you will focus on the weaker one and use him as shield instead being attacked by 2 persons the same time. With this drill, you can deal with one person and using him to get into the way of the second person. Never present yourself in the middle of 2 persons.
How do you know which of your attackers is weaker? I mean weaker? What does that mean? Are we talking strength? The ferocity of the attack? The ease with which they are intimidated? Their lack of tactical awareness? Your line of attack also suggests that you assume you'll have some sort of warning. That's often not the case in real life. Now if an attacker approaches you from the front while his mate tries to back stab you. How do you avoid being in the middle of two people? You're only option is to make a move. The whole reason such drills exist is because it's a likely scenario you will find yourself "caught" in. Not one you deliberately choose to be in. Now if you think you're about to be attacked. Why would you be standing around presenting anything? The criticisms on this thread of the video are primarily about the quality of what has been presented. Frankly I'm being kind by saying it's poor.
Ok, it's been a little while since I practised Aikido. But honestly? I felt the BB was trying to muscle the throws in rather than allowing the flow of movement to dictate how it happened. The posture of the students as they charged in didn't feel right either. I'm also surprised how little he could do when taken to the floor. Sure, many aikidoka don't train to be "grappled and escape" like a BJJ practitioner might, so you expect weaknesses. But my 64 year old Aikido instructor could get me off his chest when I was 18 stone and double his size, so I fail to see why there seemed to be a complete lack of technique. Loved that guy. As for the attitude...he's human. Humans are muppets. Doesn't mean I'm OK with it though.
If a person spar a lot, s/he knows if the opponents have been trained or untrained. Untrained folks simply have no idea how to take advantage of spacing/distance, legs/arms do not coordinate well and unable to control their adrenaline. All the want is to charge at you. You can tell right away if someone have not been trained how to punch or kick. You can also guess a little if attackers are defensive or offensive type. Posture would be different. Aikido posture and stance would be entirely different than Karate and TKD. Karate and TKD would be different too. You can also tell if the attacker is a kicker.
