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Suburi, sword strike exercises, with shinken (a sharp steel blade). The Japanese sword arts have influenced the aikido techniques and principles greatly. Therefore, aikiken – sword practice in aikido – is an important part of the curriculum. Katana, the Japanese sword with the two-handed grip, takes a lot of practice to handle with some skill. Already the grip is quite difficult to get right. Most important is to be able to cut straight, exactly in the direction of the edge. Otherwise, its legendary sharpness doesn’t do much good. Well, there is so much to be said about how to handle the Japanese sword, there is not enough room here. I hope the essentials are visible on the video. If not, you find more information on my website about aikibatto: I use a shinken, a sharp steel blade, on the video. That’s for clarity. Practicing suburi with the katana instead of bokken (a wooden sword) is very good to understand how the sword works. That can be don
