# Anyone heard of Gensei-Ryu?



## Pyros (Jan 4, 2003)

Any experiences about it? I know of history, but anyone have any real-life experience? What's it like? Effective or not?


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## RyuShiKan (Jan 5, 2003)

I met several of their 5th~6th dan members at the annual Budo Seminar in Chiba, Japan. While they seemed like nice guys I wasnt not that impressed with their Karate.it seemed like what you could find in any JKA/JKF dojo in Japan.


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## Pyros (Jan 5, 2003)

> _Originally posted by RyuShiKan _
> *I met several of their 5th~6th dan members at the annual Budo Seminar in Chiba, Japan. While they seemed like nice guys I wasnt not that impressed with their Karate.it seemed like what you could find in any JKA/JKF dojo in Japan. *



Oh. I've read that their karate is full of acrobatics, didn't see anything like that? Gensei-ryu is supposedly a transition from old karate towards the founder's next art Taido, which is totally full of acrobatics. I have heard Gensei-ryu would be like karate with half the acrobatics found in Taido.

Also I've heard that they use hard contact with lot's of low kicking with the shin. I've been told that if it weren't for the acrobatics, people would usually mistake it for Kyokushinkai Karate as far as the low kicks with shin and overall hard contact was concerned.

I have no first hand experience and usually people haven't heard of the style when I ask about it.


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## RyuShiKan (Jan 5, 2003)

> _Originally posted by Pyros _
> *Oh. I've read that their karate is full of acrobatics, didn't see anything like that? Gensei-ryu is supposedly a transition from old karate towards the founder's next art Taido, which is totally full of acrobatics. I have heard Gensei-ryu would be like karate with half the acrobatics found in Taido. *



Yes I was told that too by a friend that does Taido.



> _Originally posted by Pyros _
> *Also I've heard that they use hard contact with lot's of low kicking with the shin. I've been told that if it weren't for the acrobatics, people would usually mistake it for Kyokushinkai Karate as far as the low kicks with shin and overall hard contact was concerned.
> 
> I have no first hand experience and usually people haven't heard of the style when I ask about it. *



I didn't see or hear about any of that.
Mostly what I saw was kata done in the JKA/JKF style with "tippy-tap" sparring.


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## arnisador (Jan 5, 2003)

What's this?


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## Pyros (Jan 5, 2003)

A good site on taido: http://www.wolf.ox.ac.uk/clubs/taido/

There are a couple of things for the newcomer to understand about taido:

First and foremost, often it is said Shukumine applied his scientific knowledge to karate and it became Taido. But He already begun this with Gensei-Ryu Karate, so why change the art? This is political, he was a high official in JKA and tried to modify the rules of karate tournaments so they would more favor technical skill over competitors' size and physical attributes. The whole idea behind Gensei-Ryu is to find out how a smaller man can use technical skill to overcome a larger opponent. When he was unable to affect the rules so technical skill would have more effect on the outcome of the tournaments, he jumped ship and formed his own organization so he was able to write his own rules which favored technical skill over physical attributes. So, Taido is just a new name to Gensei at the time. But it has evolved a lot and they look quite different nowadays, as Genseiryu has stuck to it's karate ways.

Secondly, in karate sparring you are free to use the standard footwork similar to TKD, (kick)boxing and all other combat sports. In taido, there is a completely new movement system composed of eight different methods of moving (stepping) towards, away from or around your opponent and in Taido these are the only allowed ways to move. You will never see a Taidoka move like a boxer in the ring. Taido stresses the technical issues so much you have to use it's movement patterns or you're disqualified. This is because many people who already are familiar with other arts, usually try to hold on to their own ways of moving and then they lose the whole advantages and ideas that make up Taido altogether.

So these two things are what separates Taido training from Karate training like nothing else does.


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## arnisador (Jan 5, 2003)

Thanks, the site explains it well.

Who heads Gensei-ryu then?


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## Pyros (Jan 5, 2003)

Currently the head is Shukumine's number one student from the karate era, Kunihiko Tosa. Here's the english main page of the organization: 
http://www.karatedo.co.jp/genseiryu-butokukai/eng/index.html

P.S. Shukumine is also sometimes written as Iwamine.


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## Bob Hubbard (Jan 6, 2003)

Mod Note: Thread split.

Please goto http://www.martialtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=5432 for the language discussion, or look in the Japanese General Forum.

:asian:


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## Pyros (Jan 7, 2003)

Well I found an article that describes Genseiryu training. Go to http://www.genseiryu.dk/ and choose english language, go to articles and read the article "Gensei-Ryu: Karate Training 'The Hard Way'".


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## RyuShiKan (Jan 7, 2003)

Go to the English section/Photos/Training section (starts on photo 34)
That kind of "self-defense/fighting" might work in their world but I doubt it would stand a chance in the real world.


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## Pyros (Feb 5, 2003)

Just returned to this old post to tell, that I found out that the "Scandinavian Genseiryu Karate-do Federation" that supposedly teaches this style in Sweden and Finland is in no way recognized by the Honbu in Japan and they are technically very different. The founder of SGKF got 1st dan from Tosa, then founded SGKF awarding himself 5th dan in Genseiryu Karate-do. You can probably guess the Honbu's reaction to this...

This is just to explain why:

- the honbu website does not list any dojos or instructors in Sweden or Finland

- the SGKF people attend open tournaments, but not any Gensei tournaments

- the SGKF people have a totally different curriculum and look different from, say tha Danish Gensei-ryu people

- the SGKF people all get their ranks from some guy in Holland, never from Japan


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## RyuShiKan (Feb 5, 2003)

That's not surprising. From what I hear through my Taido friends about genseiryu there is a lot of bickering and politics in genseiryu. 

(both Taido and Genseiryu were started by a man named Shukmine, and he most likely started Taido because of the politics in genseiryu)


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## Pyros (Feb 5, 2003)

Yes, I've heard such stories too. BTW: the stuff I told about this, that's the official Gensei-ryu's side of the story. I asked about these issues, in a very polite and non-threatening manner (I tried to imitate a newbie student who was just interested in some basic things like the teacher's lineage, etc.) via e-mail from the founder of SGKF and got no reply. This was some time last year, so I don't think they are just "slow" answering their e-mail.

What is saddening about this, is that the people studying under SGKF are not told about any of this. They get a Japanese master visit them from Holland now and then, but they're not told the guy hasn't really got that much to do with Genseiryu at all. But people just like the fact that some old Asian guy come test them and they think that is cool enough.


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