worst technique

I frequently hear about tokui waza, or one’s best / special technique to be used when fighting or sparring. I have a couple of those.

I think there should also be a word for the opposite – a technique that you practice but have a very hard time with, just can’t get it right. I have a couple of those as well, more than a couple.

One that stands out recently comes from the sai kata / form. The motion is 左上段返し打ち, or hidari joudan kaeshi-uchi, a strike to the opponent’s head which circles once outside the left arm before striking downward.

In practicing the first sai kata, chikin shita haku no sai (or tsuken shita haku no sai, if not in Okinawan dialect), I have gotten pretty comfortable with this motion on the right side, as it appears in the form several times. It is a great motion, really: after blocking the opponent’s strike (they are using a bo staff), you roll the sai outside the arm – keeping the opponent’s bo away from you – while moving in closer and striking their head with the sai.

It appears only once in the form on the left side, however, and I am right-handed. I try to keep well-balanced in my training with left- and right-side repetitions. I have even been using my chopsticks in my left hand to improve dexterity. But I just can’t seem to nail this motion.

Last week, it re-appeared in another incarnation. I am not officially learning the next sai form yet (chatan yara no sai), but I have had a glimpse of things to come. It is a wonderful kata full of great motions – and another one of these left-handed circling attacks.

So, there is one more item on the homework list – doing more things left-handed. Chopsticks of course. Brushing teeth. Operating iPods and other small gadgets. And, of course, the technique described above.