Conditioning

[newtothe dark]

Does traditional Nijutsu have conditioning execises like Iron palm and such in the Chinese arts? Just thought they would compliment each other. I am just curious and thought that is would make for some nice discussion.

 

[Masshiro]

with ninjitsu the focus is on speed and pricision so any other strengthining would help. remember a ninja would want to kill as fast as posible and get away. so iron palm would be Beneficial with the practice of dim mak.

 

[Bruno@MT]

Is there any particular reason that you are resurrecting threads that are several years old?

with ninjitsu the focus is on speed and pricision so any other strengthining would help. remember a ninja would want to kill as fast as posible and get away. so iron palm would be Beneficial with the practice of dim mak.

Big fan of Vandamme, are you?

 

[EWBell]

with ninjitsu the focus is on speed and pricision so any other strengthining would help. remember a ninja would want to kill as fast as posible and get away. so iron palm would be Beneficial with the practice of dim mak.

Only if Ashida Kim is the one teaching it. :ninja:

 

[Chris Parker]

But to get serious for a second, the Koto Ryu tradition of Ninjutsu includes a teaching for conditioning the striking surfaces (various fists, kicks, even the head), called Atemi no Tanren. There are various combinations and methods of training this, and Takamatsu Sensei, when he was young, was said to have prefered his training in Koto Ryu over his training in Togakure Ryu, due in no small part to it's emphasis on conditioning.

As I'm sure many here have seen, he worked his fingers and toes so hard by striking a numer of different surfaces with them that the nails grew incredibly thick and strong (about 5mm for the fingernails, a bit thicker for the toes), and he could reputedly only cut them with strong pliers.

He did say later in life that such harsh training was not necessary today, with stronger footwear etc., and that such conditioning led to opponents being aware of your skills, as well as arthritis in old age (not many of hte ancient warriors neede to worry about old age much...).

Within our schools, we do include hand-conditioning, utilising a variation of Koto Ryu's methods and Traditional Chinese Iron Palm techniques. My personal instructor was a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and helped provide the ointment for our students.

By the way, isn't this an old thread? Hope Newtothedark is still interested...

 

[Bruno@MT]

Koga ryu wada-ha (the last known koga line) also emphasized conditioning.

Some of the actual conditioning is documented in the book 'Fujita Seiko: The last koga ninja'.
Very interesting and extremely impressive. But in today's society, not that useful anymore. Or rather: not as big an advantage as it used to be.

 

[EWBell]

I don't necessarily think it is necessary to go to the extreme Takamatsu Sensei did, or even that of Okinawan fighting arts. However, I do agree that some conditioning has to be done. For instance in our warm ups we do pushups using fudo-ken, shuto, etc., which is a form of conditioning. I think striking objects is another that has to be done, because we all know punching air isn't the same as actually hitting someone. At the same time, I don't want to go to the extreme of having my hands all jacked up either because I do enjoy playing my guitars from time to time.

 

[clfsean]

I don't necessarily think it is necessary to go to the extreme Takamatsu Sensei did, or even that of Okinawan fighting arts. However, I do agree that some conditioning has to be done. For instance in our warm ups we do pushups using fudo-ken, shuto, etc., which is a form of conditioning. I think striking objects is another that has to be done, because we all know punching air isn't the same as actually hitting someone. At the same time, I don't want to go to the extreme of having my hands all jacked up either because I do enjoy playing my guitars from time to time.

As with everything if you do it properly & use the proper medicinals, you're good to go. I do some pretty serious conditioning of my hands & arms with no problems picking on a guitar. I've got tendonitis, but that's unrelated to the conditioning (actually from playing neo-classical stuff) I do now & have for the past 10 years or so.

 

[EWBell]

As with everything if you do it properly & use the proper medicinals, you're good to go. I do some pretty serious conditioning of my hands & arms with no problems picking on a guitar. I've got tendonitis, but that's unrelated to the conditioning (actually from playing neo-classical stuff) I do now & have for the past 10 years or so.

I understand about the tendonitis for sure. I actually have more problems with my right wrist than my left hand. Must be my picking technique.

I've always been a bit wary of some of the conditioning I've seen though. Guys with fingers going every which way, and super enlarged knuckles...just not my cup of tea.

 

[newtothe dark]

But to get serious for a second, the Koto Ryu tradition of Ninjutsu includes a teaching for conditioning the striking surfaces (various fists, kicks, even the head), called Atemi no Tanren. There are various combinations and methods of training this, and Takamatsu Sensei, when he was young, was said to have prefered his training in Koto Ryu over his training in Togakure Ryu, due in no small part to it's emphasis on conditioning.

As I'm sure many here have seen, he worked his fingers and toes so hard by striking a numer of different surfaces with them that the nails grew incredibly thick and strong (about 5mm for the fingernails, a bit thicker for the toes), and he could reputedly only cut them with strong pliers.

He did say later in life that such harsh training was not necessary today, with stronger footwear etc., and that such conditioning led to opponents being aware of your skills, as well as arthritis in old age (not many of hte ancient warriors neede to worry about old age much...).

Within our schools, we do include hand-conditioning, utilising a variation of Koto Ryu's methods and Traditional Chinese Iron Palm techniques. My personal instructor was a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and helped provide the ointment for our students.

By the way, isn't this an old thread? Hope Newtothedark is still interested...

Yes still very interested and I too have done Irom palm training and have lots of Dit Da Jow haha. That was the reason for my interest.