Difference to other styles

Inspired by a reddit-post, where one person argued, that at the end all karate-styles have the same principle, and that wado-ryu can not be an exception.

My answer to you

You said, the core Karate principles are the same everywhere.

And i say: Wado Ryu adds some principles from koryu bujutsu (old martial arts, before 1868) and that makes a big difference.

It is not, that we have other combinations, like for example shotokan do Soto Uke / Gyakuzuki and we do Uchi Uke / Gyakuzuki.

It is not about this.

Examples from other areas

It is like say you can think, so you think the same way as every one else.

Then i say: "But i had a friend, Albert, and he thought different than you."

And you say "we all have different thougts, but we think all in the same way in our mind"

And then i say: "But my friend Albert made complicated thoughts, he made thought-experiments in his head"

And you say "at the end, every person can think complicated."

And i say "yeah, but my friend Albert Einstein formulated Special Relativity in his head and General Relativity and all other 100 billion people which lived in the world in the last 200'000 years did not, so he thinks somehow different."

and you say "but i can also think about relativity"

So in this example: Do we think all in the same way? Somehow yes. But some people are more intelligent than others. And some think total in different directions.

Other example:

Let us say, a friend of mine can run 100 meters in 9,7 seconds and is one of the fastest persons in the world. You would say "All people can run fast, when there are young and slim".

Yeah, you are right, but not all people in the world could do 100 meters in 9,7 seconds when they were young, so it is a difference in running technique but also in the quality of training and quality of result.

The same is with Wado.

Of course every young and healthy person can run fast and can think about different things from food to general relativity. But you can not say, every one is faster than the average person and every one could do what Einstein did.

So your claim "every karate style is the same at the core, has the same core principles and so only the curriculum is a little different" is in my opinion not true to wado ryu.

The real difference of Wado Ryu compared to other styles

Yeah, other styles also have evasive techniques. But still there is a big difference to Wado Ryu.

Difference 1:

Wado Ryu has formalised principles which are not ever talked about in any other style

I have never heard in any other style of Karate that they speak about Mudana Chikara, Mudana Dosa, Mudana Waza, Nagasu, Inasu, Noru, Ten I, Ten Gi, Ten Tai. Also not with different words. None of this you will ever hear in any other Karate-Style. How on Earth then you can say, it is the same principle in every style?

Difference 2:

Other styles use hard uke

Most styles use usually hard blocks to hurt the enemy. Like Uchi Uke and Soto Uke so hard, that it can be an attack to the attacking arm.

In Wado Ryu it would be wrong to block as hard as you can, to hurt the attacker.

This is the absolute opposite than other styles. You have to block so soft, that it does not hurt you or the attacker.

In this point Wado Ryu is just not compatible to other styles. You can not do it in both ways at the same time. And it would be a violation of Mudana Chikara, use of unnecessary muscle power.

Difference 3:

Other Styles make to big evasive movements

When i see evasive techniques in other styles, they go so for back and/or to the side, that they need to make again a step forward to counter attack.

In Wado Ryu this would only happen in some special cases (maybe evasive movement against mawashi geri, going one step back).

But usually in Wado Ryu when we use evasive actions, we never move so far away from the opponent, that we can not reach him with handy. (Exception is the first movements of kihon kumite, but this is about learning the basic principles of moving).

So when i see techniques of other styles on youtube, there is either only a hard block and a direkt hard counter attack. OR there is a step back or to the side, and then the counter attack is one second later, after a step towards the opponent.

In Wado Ryu you will almost never see that for a counter-attack in yakusoku kumite the defender have to make a step forward after the Uke Waza (Defending technique).

This is not only a difference on the outside, but it is a violation of Wado Ryu Principles like Mudana no Dosa (unnecessary movement).

Difference 4:

The Principles are there in almos any Yakusoku Kumite

When i say, that Wado Ryu have a lot of evasive movements and try to do counter attacks at the same time as the attack, then people from other styles claim, that this is the same at there style.

But when you see some partner drill, yakusoku Kumite of any style, you will see evasive actions only in 20% or so of the kumite-forms, the other times it is hard blocking, while in Wado Ryu you will see it in about 100% of all yakusoku kumite.

In other styles they can use counter attack at the same time of the attack, but i only see it in less than 5% (1 out of 20) of all yakusoku kumite (including ippon Kumite, kihon kumite, sanbon kumite, gohon kumite) that i can find on youtube (even from the greatest masters of theyr styles).

In Wado Ryu it is by around 80% (estimate from me). In the other 20% there is one evasive movement and then the counter-attack.

So even if you find some of the principles (like evasive movements, soft blocks and so on) in other styles, the quality and the quantity is not the same.

It is like saying "every person thinks in the same process, so we all think like albert einstein or stephen hawking", which is partly true, but not entirely.

Difference 5:

Wado Ryu is relaxed

Now all people will say, that they relax and only tense up during impact of the technique.

But is it true?

In Wado Ryu the relaxition is really different. In some karate styles you make oizuki by starting the arm movement only after the body is in the sable end position. In Wado Ryu we do Junzuki and the Tsuki ends in the same moment as the body movement. Maybe some styles do it like in Wado Ryu, but not all of them and these are 2 very different ways of doing the movement.

So the relaxation-principle is may there in all styles of karate, but not in the same way as in Wado Ryu.

Difference 6:

Wado Ryu is controlling the opponent

Maybe in all styles they would say, they control the opponent.

But there are some differences, i see:

In Wado Ryu after a throw, we usually don't let the hand or arm of opponent go. In the few cases we do, we did a some hurting techniques before the throw (kihon Kumite 10) and the opponent will land very hard.

But usually we hold controll of the arm of the opponent during and after the fall and make a finishing technique (kihon kumite 5).

Also a difference is, that in Wado Ryu when we move away from the attacker (on the ground or standing) we keep eye contact till both partners are again on there starting positions. In Other styles, when the attacker is on the floor, the defender often turns the back to him and walks away.

In Wado Ryu, we move away from the attacker in a way, that makes it impossible to attack us again without one or two steps. This is even the case, when the attacker is on the ground, even then control him and in the moment, we let his arm go, we make a step backwards, so he can not attack or grab us with his arm.

And there are also kuzushi techniques (controlling the balance of the attacker) on the advanded level. You can see it clear in all the Kumite Gata, but also in Kihon Kumite 4 and 8, in Kumite no Ura (6 partner drills on a DVD of Otsuka II.) and in Kyusho no e Kogeki (Partner drills in another DVD from Otsuka II.).

I have never seen any kuzushi-like movement in any other karate style (with exception of Motobu Choki, who influenced Otsuka Hironori a lot 100 Years ago). You can only see it in Motobu-Ryu and in old Ju Jutsu and Ken Jutsu.

So this principle is true Budo but not to be found in Okinawa Karate.

Conclusion

Many principles and techniques are more or less the same in all karate styles.

But in fact Wado Ryu has some principles that are not much trained in other styles (but they now it), principles that are unknown to other styles (like kuzushi) and principles that are contradicting the principles of other styles (like no hard blocks, Junzuki ends with reach of end position), where it is not possible to use the principle of typical karate and of wado ryu at the same time.

In the cases where the principles are there in other styles (like evasive movements, counter attack and block at the same time), there are in other styles only in about 10% of the yakusoku kumite (partner drills) where in Wado Ryu it is in about 90-100% of the kumite forms. So even if there are partly the same principles, it makes a big difference if you do them in 1 of 10 Kumite forms or in 10 of 10 Kumite forms.

Iwasaki Sensei once said in an Interview, that if Wado Ryu was a soup, the Karate part would be a pinch of salt (and the rest is Ju Jutsu and Ken Jutsu).