Why does the right hand move towards the left hand?

by Olga
(Ukraine)

Sometimes during suburi at a fast pace or during kirikaeshi (sayu-men) the right hand moves back from tsuba so that there is a space between tsuba and hand.  The right hand moves closer to the left hand. What are the possible reasons of that and how to fix that?

Answer: One of the possible reasons that the right hand moves down to the left hand is to try to reach out a shinai.  Also generally speaking, tsuka is too long.

The length of tsuka is different between shinai and katana.  We don’t slide the right hand to the left hand when using a katana because

1. the tsuka is too short for that, and


2. you will lose the control of the katana easily.

The tsuka of shinai became longer because the shinai itself got longer. The length of katana is way shorter than the 39 shinai, right? So the tsuka had to be longer. Also we have kote (gloves) on in kendō so the tsuka should be longer than that of a katana.

My suggestion is to shorten the tsuka.  I usually make a tsuka of my shinai shorter.

Also you have to be aware of what you are doing. If you want to fix something, you should keep telling yourself, “I’m gonna fix this” and also have a good image of yourself doing the target behaviour.

Hope this helps!