
Summer meeting 2023, reflections on kumite life development since 1983
I am one of the students from the advanced teams who are currently in the graduation process.
For the higher grades, starting from the 5th kyu Yakami Shinsei-ryu Taijutsu & Karate-do (YSK), the graduation consists of a number of stop tests. If you do not pass the first stop test, you will not progress to stop test no. 2, which applies all the way up. See overview 1 (below), for the applicable stop tests.
Through the first stop tests, you prove that you have:
- The physical and mental strength and stamina;
- The physical and mental endurance, stamina and resting strength;
- Understanding the theory at your level; and can respond to it in writing;
- The ability to explain the theory "here and now"
Then you are ready for the Shiai kumite test.
Green belt, 5.kyu YSK, doesn't sound like much to many people's ears and self-perception. But martial arts belt degrees are not standardized in the world. This means that 5.kyu YSK, in most single-track martial arts systems, is equivalent to 1.dan, black belt. I am coming back to that argument now with my international and national experiences and experiences through the last almost 40 years of martial arts training. Then you can judge for yourself afterwards 🙂
What is Shindenkan Shiai Kumite?
Shindenkan Shiai kumite is free fighting – i.e. nothing is pre-arranged, and Shiai unfolds dynamically and spontaneously with action and reaction. With us, Shiai is freestyle without division into weight, age or gender classes. Shiai is full contact, includes floor fighting and contains a minimum of rules. There are large weight differences, with both higher and lower weights. In Shindenkan this is called ShindenFight. The aim is not to win over others, but over yourself through getting to know yourself under maximum stress and pressure. It reflects and prepares for reality, if reality turns out to be unfortunate. Hitting and kicking with full contact is allowed, with 2 exceptions; no kicks to the knees and downwards, and no blows to the head. An experienced specialist is always present.
What do people think about Shindenkan Shiai?
"Many have wanted to introduce more 'real' kumite as part of the normal training, because it is the essence of karate."
"Many other clubs practice free kumite almost at every training lesson, so why do we hardly ever practice it?"
"Evil tongues say it's because we can't actually fight - we only train basic technique and agreed kumite combinations!"
"Kimu Sensei says it's because there is a real risk of injury with Shindenkan Shiai"
To that, most people had only one comment: "Boys, and just get on!" And they did.
A bit of background: Where did Shindenkan Shiai start and where is it now?
It requires a review of the facts and history so that we can learn from the past.
In 1996, I started in Shindenkan as a 3rd dan, karate-do, very experienced tournament fighter with 600+ national and international tournament matches and newly named double WC bronze winner in Japan, with a trial class where two different newly graduated 3rd kyu, YSK brown belts had dried floor with me in turn. I'm just saying – Welcome to Shindenkan!
I participated in the famous instructor's meeting in 2002, where in 25 full contact matches without equal time rounds, there were 50 technical knockouts, 6-7 full knockouts, a couple of broken toes, and a broken tibia. It was only for the experienced and higher graduates. No one complained, because those were the conditions when you are taken at your word and look directly into the world of reality, - and the point was (and is) to know and learn from your own reactions when you are under maximum physical and mental pressure.
The ShindenFight in connection with the graduation was held as part of the training meeting, where the idea is to make a party out of this, with spectators cheering on their instructors, training buddies and relatives.
It stopped abruptly in 2004, when a 95 kg full-grown 30-year-old man, 1st dan, black belt, after 1 minute and 42 seconds of ShindenFight was lying in convulsive cries in the fetal position, with his daughter as a shocked bystander calling out "father you must not die". It came after many stories about how cool the local hero was. No one could have imagined that. A short period later, the local school opted out of Shindenkan, and switched to a self-developed system. Then you can also clear out "unrealistic and unnecessary stop tests" yourself 🙂
After that, the Shindenkan Shiai stop test is closed, and only for the participants.
There are many examples of pages appearing of people that they had not shown before.
- A father, himself a black belt, who said of his son that he was not allowed to participate in Shiai because he was not allowed to die?
- Full-grown like young men calling for their mother.
- A former sports fighter who enters the field with a scornful look at his opponent, after which he receives a roundhouse kick to the head and goes to the floor.
- Another contestant gets a roundhouse kick to the head and goes to the floor. When he comes back up, the first thing he says is an appreciative, fat kick! And then passes out again.
- A contestant fighting on with a broken tibia and bruised ribs.
- Participants who go berserk and attack an opponent who has already fallen to the floor.
- Many participants turn their backs and either run or crawl out of the area.
But the combination of explosive membership growth in the Shindenkan and after 2004 when ShindenFight was only held in conjunction with brown and black belt graduations in a closed forum, made ShindenFight somewhat secretive and underground. Then came a growing roar from young people aged 16 to 50+ years of both sexes who wanted to prepare and test themselves through ShindenFight. At one point, the voices demanding more kumite became so loud that Kimu Sensei launched the ShindenFight concept in 2011, where the syllabus from the TaskFighting and Jujutsu courses is outlined and trained in depth over 6 training courses with both single and multi-match, i.e. fight against several opponents. The excitement would never end. All men, and many women, were looking forward to finally showing what they could do. But as Kimu Sensei had said: "There is a real risk of injury with Shindenkan Shiai", or in my words "Mad cats get their skin torn".
It was fast enough for most. Already after the first few course trainings, there were several who had bruises - sprained fingers and toes, pressed ribs, and scratches on the head that turned green, yellow and blue, so that a sharply increasing number of participants were "forced" due to injuries to finish the course as spectators. There were a lot of hurt egos 🙂
Since then, there has been much less demand for free kumite for the normal training lessons, and there has been no need to repeat the ShindenFight training series, as ShindenFight and Shindenkan Shiai have proven to be far too realistic.
So how does ShindenFight Shindenkan Shiai play out?
Shindenkan Shiai kumite has been held since 2011 at closed graduation training events, where only the participants have access. It takes place in a safe and secure setting, with protective equipment, such as gloves, mouth guard, forearm guard, shin and ankle guard, crotch guard, chest guard, and for JokoTeens and volunteers over 45+, with combat vest and combat helmet. Damage is minimized that way, as damage is not the purpose. Despite the protection, which takes the upper 10-20 % of impact, you can really feel your body the next day, and not least on the 2nd day. And despite all the protection, Shindenkan Shiai can still fulfill its purpose.
Recap of the ground rules; No weight, age, gender or ethnic classes. Hitting and kicking with full contact is allowed, with 2 exceptions; no kicks to the knees and downwards, and no blows to the head. Floor fighting is allowed and an experienced specialist is always present.
This graduation's ShindenFight/Shindenkan Shiai
This time the main fighters were two 17-18 year old graduates. They were optimally prepared, in great shape, and approached the task with humility and realism. But still, they were very excited, and maybe also a little nervous.
They gave their all in their matches, with everything they had in them. Therefore, they quickly got in touch with everything that ShindenFight has to teach you, and the fights did not last as long as they can do. They both had 2 long matches + 4 short matches. Both primary battles, where they fight continuously against fresh opponents all the time, and after 1-5 minutes of rest, secondary battles, where they enter as part of the fresh forces. Both wrestled a total of 7 minutes, and were in several takedowns and floor fights, something that really drains the energy. They were very visibly marked, and all strength and energy to look good was gone. Time felt endlessly long to them, they were pushed completely into survival and instinctive reactions, and they didn't know when it stopped. Afterwards come the reactions from such an overwhelming and uncontrollable experience, and the acceptance of oneself as one is, and the work on from there.
Two more mature participants participated in voluntary testing for 2 x 30 seconds, wearing a protective vest. It seemed to give them a good insight into what kumite was like, feeling the untamed ferocity and reactions. I was naturally also involved to the extent that Kimu Sensei judged that there was a need for additional pressure on the graduates, or on me 🙂
Why is Shindenkan Shiai necessary?
Facebook, Insta' and TikTok have made it normal to claim you can do it all in half the time, without anyone actually taking you at your word. There have always been many stories about what Shiai/freestyle is, and many have told how cool they are when they do it all in the best Bruce Lee style with their left hand while taking pictures for their Instagram profile with their right hand. Myths and claims abound, because no one challenges your bluff! But we do! Shindenkan does! Because it is imperative if we are to maintain our towering level of competence and develop as happy and whole people.
Marketing and self-promotion, is so popular, but it's only empty barrels that rumble. Everyone who goes in for their first Shiai is anxious about how they will do. After all, they have told everyone that they are fantastic karate masters. And then the match must show it! The match does not show whether you are approved or dumped. It just shows where you are in reality. Then you know the starting point and can decide what you want to do next.
Every journey starts with the first step, but it's YOU who decides if it's back to the local street love, where you can once again claim that you're the coolest, because no one would dream of taking you at your word - you hope ! Or the journey can go forward where you say you are OK! and good enough as you are, and from here you can only get better, and you continuously strive for that, step by step.
But isn't it cooler to live in the illusion?
What happens if you now think that it is not necessary - yes, I can tell a little personal story.
My personal story
And what is my background to make me write this? Is it pure bullsh*t, or is there real knowledge and experience behind it. You can judge for yourself 🙂
In his time, I entered Shindenkan as a 3rd dan, karate-do, after 14 years in a sister organization where I had trained sports karate, and was a very experienced tournament fighter with 600+ national and international tournament matches, in 10 countries in Europe, and newly named double WC bronze winner in Japan. I was used to a bit of everything, and in principle always participated in my own weight class, in the open weight class, in team kumite (if we could field a team). And since we trained traditional karate, I was also involved in Kata, Team Kata (if we could field a team). At certain events there was also Shobu Ippon (without gloves, and "to the death") where the match was only for 1 full point - where half a point was given for a technique that, if it had been fully executed, would have rendered the opponent incapacitated for a long time enough to put in a decisive technique, and a full point was a decisive technique.
In fact, I didn't have to sign up because my instructor and I had a tacit agreement that he would just sign me up for everything. Because it was real karate spirit - just get on!
At the time, Denmark was one of the top 5-10 nations in the world, with the national team very tightly managed by Bura Sensei from Shotokan, our arch enemy. There was no fraternization with the enemy! At rallies, you were in your own camp, and you didn't talk to the other participants. They were put on when kumite started, and that's how it was!
And it went hard for him. A spurt of blood was not uncommon, and everyone knew burning lips and gums after a well-placed punch or roundhouse had crushed them. Many showed respect, at the start of a match by giving the opponent a hard mark, received his penalty point and then the match started. I was never the one to do it, but it was widespread.
For my first event, I had a proper blood spurt, but I knew it could happen, so I stopped the bleeding and fought on - no one was going to stop me! Later I found out that the nose had been broken, but no one has yet died from that.
We were super cool sportsmen and women who gave and took, feeling very Japanese and invincible. But sportsmen have no chance against brawlers, as the tragic killing of boxer Rasheed Lawal – European boxing champion, stabbed to death in 1996 while he was working as a doorman at a discotheque, and numerous assaults on top martial artists show.
I had to admit that myself the painful way, when a birthday party for one of my then sports karate club members in Ishøj ended in a huge fight. There were no serious injuries, although many of us were past the emergency room. But that wasn't the painful thing. The painful thing was the humiliation, the loss of ego, the loss of control, the sense of horror of looking into the eyes of someone who just wanted to smash me and my friends. There was no funny band of brothers, karate people against the world, "us with blue eyes and smashed lips stand together". There was gang violence and not sports. I was one of those who had a sudden and unpleasant awakening, was in complete disbelief, and thought - this is just not happening! But it did, and my panic and my actions had nothing to do with my self-image as a gentle but if necessary hard-hitting karate master. I lost 100 % face and spent a very long time shaking it off. And I wasn't the only one. Although our instructor did damage control, where we trained in street fighting, with the dangerous techniques, the illusion was broken - and none of us felt invulnerable anymore.
Many students went in search of something that worked in reality and found other clubs and styles. A few members who had experience from combat "in practice" shook their heads at the rest of us, but the facts were that none of us had been mentally prepared for real combat - None of us had the attitude. I ended up switching to Shindenkan after trying various other places. And I did that because there, as a 3rd dan with the experience of my 600+ competition matches and all my training, I was pitted against 2 newly graduated 3rd kyu YSK brown belts. I was driven around the arena on my ass and elbows, and was chased around relentlessly and mercilessly. Then I knew that here I would not only learn a lot of fine techniques, but actually learn to defend myself. It's very simple: if you can defeat me, I believe I can learn something from you. Otherwise, I travel on until I find it.
This is the attitude I used to move on from MY unpleasant and totally transgressive experience. Taking up the challenge, because I must be able to do better! Get on the horse again, and soak up the knowledge for me, so that experience doesn't repeat itself. Maybe a little primitive, do your best and accept the consequences of your actions.
How is kumite with Kimu Sensei - Yamana-Itotani Sensei.
There has been great interest and many have asked what it is like to fight with Kimu Sensei. It has been said that we look very tense and alert, some say outright that we look scared or intimidated when we fight or demonstrate techniques with Kimu Sensei. I can answer yes to that, i.e. yes to the fact that it is incredibly uncomfortable and often very painful during and after the demonstrations, and often something we can feel for several days afterwards. So we are afraid of that 🙂
But we all 200 % have full confidence that Kimu Sensei has full control and control over all the often very painful techniques he performs, and that is precisely why we are maximally alert, ready and on! Because when the techniques are introduced, they are carried out so that they work optimally, and often you cannot understand that it can be done, do not understand it and then you are put under so much pressure that the body and the brain think that you are going to die, and then you simply experience real fear of death. We know it hasn't happened in 40+ years, but tell that to our brain, heart and body! When you can feel that the blood no longer flows to the brain, heart or other parts of the body due to a special pressure or energy technique, you really just hope for a neck strangulation, where you understand the technique and know that there is really a maximum of 0- 2 seconds until you are completely passed out, then there is no time to waste. Because Kimu Sensei always does the optimal technique on us, as part of his demo. Then everyone who sees the technique can learn from the best starting point, and the same applies to us who can feel the technique. Although sometimes we get tics and nightmares at night afterwards 🙂
Postscript: Serious or not?
Soke Sensei Tonegawa was once invited to a karate tournament, where he asked with a smile: "Why no dead people?", because karate is deadly, and if there are no dead people, they probably don't practice karate! In the right way!
So how do you train karate? – The Shindenkan Way of course 🙂
Overview 1
The preparation time for stop test 1 and 2 is from 4-6 months, as everyone is already in good shape through the Yakami Shinsei-ryu Taijutsu and Karate-do training.
- AYAME Stop test 1 – Physical dynamic fitness test – Fitness test high to very high for world elite + short physical dynamic strength test KataFIT 5S.
- AYAME Stop test 2 – Physical dynamic strength test – KataFIT 8S, 10S, 12S or 15S – fitness, whole-body strength, and self-discipline over 6-12 months.
- Stop test 3 – Ryugi test in writing – theoretical test 20 questions – the degree obliges to impart knowledge.
- Stop test 4 – Ryugi test oral preparedness – theoretical test – the degree obliges knowledge dissemination, also under stress.
- Stop test 5 – Ryuha test – Syllabus practical & technical from 10.kyu and up to the degree.
- Stop test 6 – OBC KM annual certification – multi-track of the single-track competencies for the degree – discrete.
- Stop test 7 – Shiai from 2.kyu onwards – free fight without weight, age and gender classes, full contact, floor fight and minimum rules. Reflects and prepares – if reality is unfortunate.
- Stop test 8 – Stamina & Fighting spirit test. Test of willpower, attitude and stamina after a 5-week graduation course.
- Stop test 9 – Role models worthy of the degree during at least the last three joint events. Humility to the task and holistic results orientation.
Additionally for multi-track Yakami Shinsei-ryu black belts (1st Dan – 3rd Dan – DENSHO) and higher;
- Stop test 10 – Bunbu Ichi – Thesis – Independent personal written process assignment, which is deeply confidential to the chagrin of many 🙂
- Stop test 11 – Summer meeting – basic teaching test completed satisfactorily. Role model & instructor when you are totally exhausted after 5 weeks of graduation. Besides own nose tip.
- Stop test 12 – RRCamp – training process – We meet you where you are and take you on a journey.
- Stop test 13 – The rising extraordinary to highly unusual as a role model; Katsu-Jin (50/55/60+ years), Kohaku-jin (Documented Physiological Minority Percentage of min. 8/12/15/18/30 %), AYAME GOLD and others.
- Stop test 14 – JODEN, JODEN HIDEN, OKUDEN, OKUDEN HIDEN, MENKYO – 4-6.dan YSK & 5-7.dan BKK GRK – the multi-tracked whole person – Unleash your full potential, step by step – Be yourself. Ryugi.
- Stop test 15 – JODEN, JODEN HIDEN, OKUDEN, OKUDEN HIDEN, MENKYO – 4-6.dan YSK & 5-7.dan BKK GRK – the multi-tracked whole person – Unleash your full potential, step by step – Be yourself. Ryuha.