I accidently discovered a light touch KO

Around 1984 through the karate magazines I began to hear about the technique of Seiyu Oyata and his light touch knockouts. I remember an article about him doing so to George Dillman.

Oyata KO's George Dillman 1983
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3f2lW4dr5U

George studied with Oyata for a while then began teaching his own Tuite. Which among other things was known for their light pressure strike ko's.

Shortly there after all the karate magazines found more and more individuals teaching many versions of this technique.

I was with Tristan Sutrisno at a Dillman tournament in 1984 where he attempted to get Tristan to addend a clinic he was hosting with Oyata.  Tristan was not interested, in fact he had begun to teach me Indonesian techniques that were similar earlier that week.

I never studied with any of them, however I was curious and began obtaining their books on  Tuite and Dim Mak.

Many of those books were by George Dillman, actually written by Chris Thomas. But after doing an analysis of what was being presented realized no matter where they struck they always had a kyusho answer why they worked. Personally I found the theories behind their answers less than satisfying,

I looked so many places. One of them was Erle Montague's Encyclopedia of Dim Mak. It was the early two volume edition and contained a great deal of information. But as I was never going to purposely KO my students with such strikes. Even such information added no real information to allow me to verify such arts.

I filed the light touch KO to remain a mystery for me. Of course I had many, many ways my instructors and friends gave me reliable methods to down an attacker.

Then one day in my adult class a different way to use techniques from Wansu kata came to me. This was back around 1989 when I was beginning my own research into use of karate techniques. Everyone was working on their own kata, as I began thinking of a different way to use a technique from Wansu kata.

I believed I had something and wanted to try it out. I grabbed a teenage brown belt, Chirene Abi-Aad and asked her to attack me, with our standard beginning attack (RFF Right Straight Right Punch). I told her I wanted to try to work this out with a slow response against that attack.

So she stepped in and I responded moving to the exterior line of defense to such an attack.  My right foot stepped forward to the exterior of her lead foot.  As I did so I turned clockwise towards her attack, Simultaneously I sliced my right nukite to the left lightly across the outside of her neck while my left nukite sliced to the right, lightly sliced across the right side of her ribs. Both strikes were being done softly as I was feeling my way to attempt to fit this response toward the space that attack presented.

But very suddenly Chirene's knees gave out and she began collapsing to the floor.  I immediately reacted and grabbed her before she fell. I seized her stopping her fall and kept her on  her feet.

I never expected such a light response would have such a result.

That got me thinking again. I then grabbed Dennis Driscoll and tried the same defense of that Wansu kata technique.   This time my light technique did not cause him to drop. Of course I realized a more vigorous technique would have a response.

So two different people responded to my light defense, differently.

 

At that I stopped further tests and began a very long reflection on what I had done.

 

I really had no explanation. My assumption was that each responded differently due to their own natures.

I tried reviewing the literature I had on Dim Mak from several sources, but nothing I found gave me an answer.

 

Suddenly I had an idea. That was to contact Erle Montague about what I discovered. I wrote to him, describing even checking his Encyclopedia of Dim Mak, I could not find a satisfactory answer.  Then I asked him is perhaps he could clarify what ocurred.

 

Eventually I received a response from Erle,  but his response did not clarify what I discovered. It was in the form of a letter, now somewhere in my hard files.

 

Now this was about 5 years prior to me meeting Sherman Harrill and about 15 years prior to meeting Sherman's student John Kerker. And even with our time together, I never had the chance to discuss this with them.



https://isshin-concentration.blogspot.com/2021/07/thoughts-on-striking-into-neck-ii.html


I once wrote this up as follows:

It is a slightly different application.

Wansu Step back, grab and strike

 

 
As for that section of Wansu kata, I haven’t given that section much thought. There is more than enough Wansu applications to think about that I have not been worried about it.

For one thing it is a transition movement.

If I was going to thing about potential applications I would likely want to think outside the box a bit.

Consider this, against someone stepping in with a right punch

1. You step outside the attack (an exterior line of defense) with the right foot and deflect the attack away from your centerline with a clockwise circular parry with your right hand.
2. Then after that  your right open hand moves counterclockwise to make a sweeping strike into their head.
3. And as you are outside their initial attack, your left hand grabs a. the back of their neck, b. their collar from the rear, c. their belt from behind, d. their garment from behind – be it shirt, or jacket, e. their groin from behind then pull back and down
4. And as they are falling backward you strike into their a. rear of their head, b. or their falling shoulder, c. or their back with a focused right reverse punch.

Of course that is how I might address this movement at this instant.

Another time, another answer I suppose. I do not see movement as just one potential answer for application. The possible potentials a process to experience.