What Motodachi Should Do

Hello everyone, 

Thank you for reading the following blog post!
I'm Kota Suzuki from Japan. I've been practicing kendo since I was seven years old in Japan－I am currently 3rd Dan. Right now, I am studying abroad in the United States and regularly practice at the university kendo club here.

Today's topic: Motodachi. When you practice kendo, you always take a role as kakarite (attacker) and motodachi (receiver). As you know, motodachi receive hitting from attackers. However, what do you pay attention to when you do motodachi in usual practices? 

Motodachi is a very important role for a good practice. Many people always work hard when you practice as a kakarite because you can attack to your partner, but many of them don't focus on what to do as a motodachi. They might just receive attacks by the attacker and don't do anything else.

Today, I'm going to introduce three things you should do when you practice as a motodachi. If you are a great motodachi, your partner will have a good practice and improve a lot. In addition, you can also improve your kendo if you pay attention to three things that I'm going to show you today.

①Make correct maai

First, motodachi should make correct maai (correct distance) with your partner. As I mentioned in the last article, maai is one of the important components in kendo. You need to understand correct maai to get a point in kendo matches and usual practices. 

Motodachi have a chance to learn this maai many times. When you practice kihon-uchi (basic attacks such as men, kote, kote-men etc.), motodachi should make correct maai after your partner hit and go through. Some people just stand in the original position and wait until the partner comes again, but it doesn't work because you need to move for your partner.

Especially for kihon-uchi, you usually practice basic attacks around five times each. The best way to practice these techniques effectively is keeping concentration and avoid taking a break in each sets. Motodachi should follow your partner after he/she go through and make correct maai for keep it going. If motodachi don't do anything and just stand on the original position, your partner need to restart after hitting every time.

②Open hitting parts correctly

Motodachi should open hitting parts correctly. Kakarite (attackers) want to hit correctly for sure because they practice to get a perfect point. However, if you don't open hitting parts, it's very difficult for kakarite to hit the correct positions when they practice. 

Some parts are challenging to open correctly, so I sometimes have difficulty in hitting against these people. I recommend checking your receiving posture with mirror and think about your partner can hit each parts easily.

Once you open every points in every timing as a motodachi, your partner is able to hit with confidence and enough speed. If not, your partner need to pay attention to hitting correctly too much. They tend to swing slowly and lack moving speed if your receiving posture is not great. Work hard for kakarite hitting perfectly without ant frustration.

③Seme with your partner

The last thing I want to explain is about seme (the process before attacks). Basically, kakarite are doing seme because they are going to attack, but I also want motodachi to do seme with your partner. What I want to say here is that motodachi should be ready for hitting (They don't attack though) because kakarite can practice in the situation that is very similar to real matches. If motodachi stick completely, it doesn't work since we don't have such a situation in real kendo matches.

However, I don't mean you should move a lot meaninglessly. The important idea is having a great deal of pressure even in the basic practice. Both kakarite and motodachi have much better practice in this kind of practice. If you get used these similar situations to matches or dan-tests, you would perform better in the real matches as well as dan tests. 

Thanks for reading this article! Motodachi is as important as kakarite, so make sure you pay more attention as a motodachi from your next practice. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me. I'm always happy to answer them. If you have any requests of the blog posts, please give me a comment and I'd like to write about the topic! 

#kendo #剣道 #頑張れ剣道