Goju Sanchin Kata "Gone Wrong"

[Van Canna]

I'm not sure what mechanism you are implying here, Van. Do you have a source on this?

I believe that breathing can control neurohormonal status. But my understanding of it is quite complex. I DO however believe people used it long before they understood why it worked.

Because of my competitive sporting background ….I have heard different ways of explaining this:

One learning experience of mine here was when our crewing team was slowly ‘ramping’ to the starting line of a race and jostling to maintain an even ‘line up’ while awaiting the sound of the gun shot. The ‘ramping’ meaning … ‘emotional spiking’.

Our cockswain kept yelling at the top of his lungs to ‘exhale’ _ ‘exhale’ …. As cleansing breaths forcing the tension and nervousness out of our bodies… techniques learned during our extreme training….two hours in the morning before school and two hours in the evening…seven days a week.

Same for soccer and other sports…including getting ready to enter the ring in tournaments.

Another explanation was ….You are controlling the adrenaline built up in your body to be released with greater exertion while exhaling.

But the wisdom of this was validated by FMA Guru, Wes Tasker, when he graciously held a seminar at our dojo…who explained that …

In FMA, where speed and flow are of paramount importance, a regular, controlled exhalation keeps you relaxed and moving quickly as well.

And there is nobody I have ever seen in my life _ move and hit with the speed of footwork and power delivery than Wes.

[Van Canna]

Sometimes when I am moving or hitting or doing whatever strike/block I find that the exhalation of air starts to hurt my throat. In many cases I feel that I am doing something wrong.

Or is this just a symptom of the force of the exhalation.

Bill is correct...I see this problem often in people who don't understand the exhale....especially in students weaned on the tsst method...who have difficulty exhaling from the 'belly' [core]...

The exhale should feel like you are driving your lower abdomen down and out.

[Van Canna]

For CDoucet...here is another description

As in all Qigong, correct breathing is of vital importance. Breathing in while drawing and breathing out while shooting. Chen Jin (one of the most famous Chen style master whose writing was responsible for making Chen style known outside the Chen village) said when opening your are solid outside and soft inside and when closing you should be soft outside and solid inside.

For example, in the Chen style 36 Form, Form 34 Forward Cannon Punch, bringing both fists backward and downward to near the left hip (see picture one) is drawing the bow, then the punching with both fists (picture two) is shooting the arrow.

Breathe in while storing energy, your outside is solid and inside soft; then breathes out when punching out with the outside soft (and elastic) and inside solid (Qi sinks to the Dan Tian). When breathing in Qi moves upwards and when breathing out Qi sinks downward.

Dr Paul Lam MD

[Van Canna]

Exhaling on the stroke makes your impact more solid, creates a hard wall in your body in case you catch a counterblow, and it gets rid of carbon dioxide.

Focusing on the exhale is the best way to give commitment to your actions from a mental viewpoint.

By properly exhaling during a strike you’re are constricting your lungs, thereby causing more power with a wider range of movement capability.

You are controlling the adrenaline built up in your body to be released with greater exertion while exhaling, versus keeping it pent up inside during inhalation.

[Van Canna]

And here is something from a noted master ranked Uechi sensei

You know, in all my trips to Okinawa, how one breathes was NEVER an issue.

I think that it is everyone here that over thinks and needs explanations for everything they do. Because there are so many that I have trained with and beside in their classes in Okinawa I can not remember all the particulars of each teacher.

Breathing never came up as an issue, as to whether we were doing it wrong or correct. As long as you didn't pass out or turn blue it was acceptable.

I have watched carefully, as this is one of the things I take advantage of while on Okinawa, how the teachers perform and how their students perform and what the senseis expect of them and me. That is how I learn teaching techniques and subtleties of performance.

I have seen the "Uechi method" of breathing, I have seen the exhale on the strike in fact I have seen and heard Walters teacher Takara sensei exhale on the strike.

Nakahodo and Miyagi from the Shinjo lines use the 'old" breathing method that I, and I am sure you were introduced to 30 years ago.

Sanchin is an exercise, Uechi sanchin, is far different from Goju sanchin as far as breathing standards.

Sanchin breathing is far different from kata breathing demands, as is breathing when fighting different from kata breathing.

Here is something I will re type from Takimiyagis book where he talks about: I believe that this was also in the 'Blue Book" Master Uechis Kihon

Breathing methods. from Uechiryu and Shoheiryu for the 21st Century

An understanding of breathing methods must be present for effective kata performance. Technical groups of movements are separated not only by pauses but by breaths within these pauses, which both articulate the kata rhythm and prepare the performer physically for the next set of movements.

The basic breathing method is that learned in SANCHIN kata; an " interrupted" breath, short sharp and explosive This is not an un aspirated exhalation but a clearly defined aspired 'hiss' originating from the strained abdomen and expelling air through the mouth.

The focus of the breath must be on the exhalation:

replenishment of air must be allowed to take place naturally through the nose, immediately following the exhalation. This kind of breath is seen in all katas.

~~

Who is right, who is wrong? I have no idea.... Whatever works for you is the best way.

[Kuma-de]

Speaking of over zealous testing, has anybody ever had the experience of being tested in sanchin by Mr. Takamyagi? Something you don't easily forget.

No but, my friend Wade Chroninger studied with Meibukan's Ikemiyagi Sensei for some time on Okinawa. He is featured in this portion of this Discovery documentary:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHRQPgx4_bU

[Bill Glasheen]

my friend Wade Chroninger studied with Meibukan's Ikemiyagi Sensei for some time on Okinawa. He is featured in this portion of this Discovery documentary:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHRQPgx4_bU

"He may have cracked my rib on that one shot.." This is making the student stronger? This is conditioning a student to respond appropriately to violence? This is going to make the student want to stay in martial arts for the long run? What's the estimated half-life of the students' martial careers?

I see lots of Go; where is the Ju? How's all this going to work against a simple blade or firearm? With a many-on-one fighting scenario?

This gentleman would have been better-served working on diet and exercise. A little less human punching bag; a little more agility, efficiency of execution, and offensive mindset. But that's just my opinion.

Maybe my friend Van will come in and tell me I'm misguided...

- Bill

[gmattson]

I visited the Meibukan dojo many times during my original stay on Okinawa. Sensei Shinjo and I were tested for Renshi; by Meitoku Yagi Sensei at his dojo years later. I must say, Wade Chroninger's instruction is much different than any I have seen.

I won't say what I think of this new version of Meibukan Goju, but I do wonder what Yagi Sensei would have said, should he have witnessed it during his lifetime.

[IJ]

Bill, can you go into your vena cava milking in a bit more detail for me? I'm still lost on how matching the inhale exhale cycles guarantees a good result. First, some mechanics/anatomy--the two vena cavae carry the blood back from the body to the heart (there's one for the top and one for the bottom). The right heart pumps it to the lungs, and it returns to the heftier left heart to be returned to the body. All of this is pressure driven--blood moves from a high pressure area to a low pressure area. When we inhale, we lower the pressure in the chest, and more blood is sucked in (just as we ****** in air, but with the difference that there's an additional pump for the blood). The heart rate goes up to move the extra load along, which you can feel in your pulse if you monitor it with slow deep breathing cycles (it's call sinus arrhythmia, but it's normal, in fact, when it doesn't happen, something is wrong). FORCED exhalation has the opposite effect because the increased pressure keeps blood from returning to the chest. NATURAL RESTING exhalations use the elastic recoil of the lungs to expel air and do NOT reduce blood flow back, in contrast.

So for optimal venous return, your best bets are slow, deep inspirations and passive exhalations, I would say NOT forced exhalations.

There are other issues: the chest pressure affects blood outflow a little bit too. The left heart pumps across the aortic valve and when the chest pressure rises or falls it can't tell the difference because it changes the same amount across the valve; both are in the chest. But the blood in the aorta is flowing from the chest to outside of it, so if the chest pressure is high, this enchances flow. This effect depends on how hard someone is exhaling and would be balanced by how long and hard they were inhaling. The negative chest pressure from an inhale would reduce blood flow from the chest correspondingly.

I guess my feeling is that the decline in venous return with goju type breathing or any breathing that significantly increases chest pressure would decrease return and thus blood flow more than forceful inspirations are going to help, and more than the forced expiration will push blood out of the chest. I buy the "milking" conceptually, but I think of it like my driving a little. We've got some hills out here and I could turn my car off going down and work a little harder going up with the belief that I could minimize the mileage effect of the hills, perhaps even come out ahead. But clearly if I'm going up and down steep hills that's less efficient (loose analogy, but can we agree that extreme pressure breathing might be ineffective, even if in and out are opposite and matched? Nevermind whether it stresses the system).

Sanchin is energizing, too, but I'm not sure this is from the cardiac output effect, if shown--it's exciting and we get mentally focused doing it. I don't feel a rush of anything doing sanchin breathing without changing my mindset, and afterall my heart can increase my cardiac output much more than breathing could to match any exertion, and I trust it's judgment w.r.t. when and how much.

So, I'm sure you've studied this in more detail and actually have some numbers or data, always better than talk--what's up?

[Kuma-de]

Bill, can you go into your vena cava milking in a bit more detail for me? I'm still lost on how matching the inhale exhale cycles guarantees a good result. First, some mechanics/anatomy--the two vena cavae carry the blood back from the body to the heart (there's one for the top and one for the bottom). The right heart pumps it to the lungs, and it returns to the heftier left heart to be returned to the body. All of this is pressure driven--blood moves from a high pressure area to a low pressure area. When we inhale, we lower the pressure in the chest, and more blood is sucked in (just as we ****** in air, but with the difference that there's an additional pump for the blood). The heart rate goes up to move the extra load along, which you can feel in your pulse if you monitor it with slow deep breathing cycles (it's call sinus arrhythmia, but it's normal, in fact, when it doesn't happen, something is wrong). FORCED exhalation has the opposite effect because the increased pressure keeps blood from returning to the chest. NATURAL RESTING exhalations use the elastic recoil of the lungs to expel air and do NOT reduce blood flow back, in contrast.

So for optimal venous return, your best bets are slow, deep inspirations and passive exhalations, I would say NOT forced exhalations.

There are other issues: the chest pressure affects blood outflow a little bit too. The left heart pumps across the aortic valve and when the chest pressure rises or falls it can't tell the difference because it changes the same amount across the valve; both are in the chest. But the blood in the aorta is flowing from the chest to outside of it, so if the chest pressure is high, this enchances flow. This effect depends on how hard someone is exhaling and would be balanced by how long and hard they were inhaling. The negative chest pressure from an inhale would reduce blood flow from the chest correspondingly.

I guess my feeling is that the decline in venous return with goju type breathing or any breathing that significantly increases chest pressure would decrease return and thus blood flow more than forceful inspirations are going to help, and more than the forced expiration will push blood out of the chest. I buy the "milking" conceptually, but I think of it like my driving a little. We've got some hills out here and I could turn my car off going down and work a little harder going up with the belief that I could minimize the mileage effect of the hills, perhaps even come out ahead. But clearly if I'm going up and down steep hills that's less efficient (loose analogy, but can we agree that extreme pressure breathing might be ineffective, even if in and out are opposite and matched? Nevermind whether it stresses the system).

Sanchin is energizing, too, but I'm not sure this is from the cardiac output effect, if shown--it's exciting and we get mentally focused doing it. I don't feel a rush of anything doing sanchin breathing without changing my mindset, and afterall my heart can increase my cardiac output much more than breathing could to match any exertion, and I trust it's judgment w.r.t. when and how much.

So, I'm sure you've studied this in more detail and actually have some numbers or data, always better than talk--what's up?

Wow Ian, I've been doing Goju Ryu for 38 years and have never heard sanchin breathing explained in such a manner.

• 1. Sanchin breathing inhale is done via the diaphragm and less with the chest muscles.
  2. Initially, newbies to Sanchin will use dynamic tension to maintain muscular control but after a few years and if their body is in good shape, then the proper posture will give the practitioner the "Iron Shirt" qualities need for shime.
  3. Upon inhale, the tongue is placed along the the lower mouth with the tip behind the lower teeth.
  4. On exhale the tip of the tongue is placed along the roof of the mouth and at the last forceful exhale the tongue will cause a clicking sound.
  5. Both inhale and exhale should match the appropriate motion of kata movement. However, the breath timing may change due to the specific kata movement.
  6. There are 5 patterns of breathing in both Sanchin & Tensho kata

• a. Long inhale-Long Exhale
  b. Long inhale-Short exhale
  c. Short inhale- long exhale
  d. Short inhale- short exhale
  e. Irregular breath (This is done at the final yame to allow your breath to even out.)

Sanchin as seen here performed by Mike Mancuso from NYC:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewSqv2ZHkM4

You may see the 5 different types of breathing better by watching this version of Tensho:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCJttOw949o

Listen for the "click" of the tongue hitting the roof of the mouth upon completion of the exhale. You may be able to hear it better with an older practitioner who performs the kata even softer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qRy0e9cK34

[Bill Glasheen]

Bill, can you go into your vena cava milking in a bit more detail for me?

Dissertation stuff...

That which makes air rush into and out of the lungs can also make blood come into and out of the vena cava. Think negative intrapleural pressure on a sniff, and positive intrapleural pressure on a hiss. The louder and longer the sniff and hiss, the greater the amplitude of the waxing and waning of intrapleural pressure.

Meanwhile... You have a series of one-way valves in the system both proximal and distal to that stretch of very flexible pipe. Plus you have sensors in the right atrium, aortic arch, carotid sinuses, etc. which cause the heart to respond with greater force of contraction and higher HR each time a bolus comes through on a negative/positive intrapleural pressure cycle.

Make sense?

I'm still lost on how matching the inhale exhale cycles guarantees a good result.

If you do lots of restricted exhaling, you'll be squeezing (only) on the vena cava. That forces the blood into the heart. But you can only force so much before its volume is diminished, thereby getting a diminishing return with greater back-pressure on the exhale. If however you sniff on the inhale, the negative pressure in the chest will suk blood out of the periphery and into the depleted vena cava. The resulting greater vena cava volume after a long, hard sniff will give you more blood to push through on the restricted exhale. The sucking and squeezing cycle is what I call "milking."

My dissertation was Analysis of Cardiopulmonary Rhythms. I did Fourier Transforms of heart-rate, arterial pressure, venous pressure, peripheral blood flow, respiratory-rate, tidal volume, and minute ventilation signals on the dog (at exercise, rest, and with blood loss). I tried out a lot of my equipment on myself and a few karate students. I could get the magnitude of the respiratory peak in the heart-rate power spectrum to go up by doing this dragon breathing technique. This enhanced respiratory cycle would jack up the rhythms in all the cardiovascular signals. With a little practice and feedback from the power spectrum results, you could optimize your dragon breathing technique to get maximal improvement in cardiac output.

- Bill

[Van Canna]

Maybe my friend Van will come in and tell me I'm misguided...

Not at all...I agree in spades.

And as to all this technical/medical explanation/s of breathing whys and why nots...as interesting as it is...the fact is that high performance athletes use all kinds of breathing methods...as discussed and ...as required by their paricular goal of the moment...and they do very well in brutal competition.

I am a living example of it...with my background in soccer, rowing, track and field, and open tournaments.

[Bill Glasheen]

You athletes do your thing, Van. We geeks will try to figure out why it works.

- Bill

[IJ]

"Wow Ian, I've been doing Goju Ryu for 38 years and have never heard sanchin breathing explained in such a manner."

I'm actually just describing forceful inspiration / expiration as I've seen some goju people do it, but far from limited to goju. My description is of what I'd expect from any method that created a substantially negative then substantially positive chest pressure. Please don't overinterpret it as a goju commentary--I'm too ignorant of goju to have meaningful insights there.

As for the breathing--well, I'm getting more and more interested in Stuff That Works. If it looks nothing like fighting, then I don't anticipate using it in a fight, and I believe if I'm training for one I'm better off doing the stuff I will be doing. You may learn some english learning latin, but you'll learn more english learning english. On the other hand, I do my Uechi because I like to. It's not just about preparing for some battle (still yet to face one). Lots of other meaning.

Back to Bill's stuff:

Yeah, positive negative cycles thru the chest will produce blood flow. This is what CPR accomplishes, but it does it very poorly. We also know that when situations are exaggerated, things get worse. In this case, the relevant data is that when you overbreathe, the cardiac output goes down. The chest pressure reduces venous return, and far out of proportion to what benefit it has forcing blood from the chest to the rest of the body. Admittedly, this isn't a fair comparison because there's no vacuum phase of breathing, only pressurized breaths, followed by elastic chest recoil and positive exhalation that comes with compressions. The current thinking though, is "spare the air." (I do not see how positive chest pressure "forces blood into the heart." The intrathoracic vena cavae, the right atrium, and the right ventricle are all pressurized to the same degree so the gradient is not changed; equivalent changes occur on the left).

I agree that your sensors encourage increased contractility and rate when venous return is increased, but the opposite occurs in forced expiration, and output goes down in expiration. That's why I suggested your best bet for preloading your heart is long steady inspiration and passive recoil exhalations, although these are impractically long when you're really working, so your chest muscles get involved to squeeze some air out, too.

But the numbers probably don't lie, so... what was it you measured? I don't know what the respiratory peak in the heart rate power spectrum is. I've measured cardiac output in the ICU on living sick people using the thermodilution method (interested parties can check wiki), but you can't do this noninvasively. Did you compare dragon breathing to the patterns taken by Joes and Pros naturally to see if it augments our reflexive style?