Pressure-Point Fighting by Rick Clark

Author:Rick Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing

KUSANKU - KANKU - KUNG SAN GUN — SHUTO UKE 1

Kusanku is considered to be one of the primary kata in the martial arts community. Within this kata you will find movements found in the five Pinan (Heian/Pyung-Ahn) kata as well as in other kata. Some speculate that Anko Itosu used this kata to create the five Pinan kata taught in the school system of Okinawa. It seems that he may have decided to take a larger kata and break it into smaller, more manageable units for the students.

The opening movement of Kusanku offers several interesting bunkai for us to study. The hand motions start with your hands low and in front of your belt. If you extend your arms, and slightly bend them, your fingertips will come close together (Figure 1). The next movement is sometimes represented as “viewing the moon,” where your hands are raised to head level and your fingertips are almost touching (Figure 2). The next motion is “the double-knife hand block” or Shuto Uki (Figure 3). The first motion in the sequence can be used as a self-defense technique against a “full nelson.” If you have your thumbs pointed in a forward direction (Figure 4) your opponent will easily be able to apply this technique. A simple defense against a full nelson is to bend your arms slightly, rotate your thumbs back toward your body, and press down with your palms (Figure 5). When you perform this motion, your opponent will find it extremely difficult to raise your arms. He will find a great deal of difficulty in getting his arms past your shoulder area. This offers an opportunity to attack your opponent’s hand with a joint lock. The joint lock could be described as similar to an upside down Sankyo. The wrist is turned so that the little finger rotates in toward the body. With Sankyo, the elbow faces toward the ceiling and the fingers point toward the ground. In this variant, the fingers are pointing either to the left or right, and the elbow points in the opposite direction; the forearm is horizontal. This lock is applied by placing your thumb between your opponent’s thumb and forefinger. The tip of your thumb should rest on the knuckle of his forefinger, and the tip of your middle finger should be at the end of his little finger. Pressure is applied by pressing the little finger back and toward the thumb, and at the same time rotating the opponent’s hand toward his body. If you grab your opponent’s left hand with your right hand, you will twist the wrist in a counterclockwise motion. Your opponent’s wrist would have been turned in a clockwise motion if you had grabbed his right hand with your left hand. Another way in which to increase the level of pain is to keep the opponent’s wrist as straight as possible.

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