Good Question !

The question was posed last night before class, "Did the Samurai have and type of stretching or workout regimen ?" It was an unusual but very interesting question. I had no answer, but fortunately I have a fantastic resource, Sensei Mike Belzer a martial artist of excellent skill and reputation who was the student of Don Draeger (look him up) Draeger Sensei made a life long study of fighting systems, weapons and warriors both ancient and modern. So when I presented my question Professor Draeger had already answered it. Ancient warriors and Kroyu (Old School arts) do not have formalized warm ups. If warm ups and stretching were required they would be ineffective for combat or self defense. It was that simple, the training was the the training. You want to master the sword go out and swing a sword around. Today you can lift weights to improve your physical strength, or have a session of mat pilates to loosen your body, and that would be ok. We are not training to hold the line at Thermopylae we are training to lean the Danzan Ryu system of Jujitsu can one use this art for self defense without a warm up ? From personal experience I know the answer to be yes. That said if I am planning an evening of nage and grappling with my 20-something students you bet I am going to have a through warm up !

Further Study

http://www.danzan.com/HTML/PEOPLE/mbelzer.html

http://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?PHPSESSID=18a585506d19ef3f79fb045c5bfb5c0f&topic=1084.0


Good Question !

~Sensei~