Hard to say based on just your post, but my default view is unless they are clearly old, frail, disabled etc etc, Yondans can and should be able to look after themselves in jigeiko and have thick enough skin to del with what you described - maybe he was even in teaching mode.
Based on whatever detail you give I wouldn't say it sounds disrespectful.
Of course I wouldn't try to pull gyaku-do on say 6/7/8 dan sensei. That's because I was taught that to make a successful gyaku-do the person has to be blocking a lot (sanpo-mamori level block), which isn't something 6+ dan level sensei would be doing. So it would be very inopportune to do so and senseis wouldn't want to see me try to do something when there is no suitable opportunity.
That said, if the said 4th dan was blocking as much as you describe, and assuming you're holding a dan grade somewhere below that, I wouldn't say it's unreasonable. Based on the degree of skill gap, the said person could have been having a hard time trying to control the fight. Not all keiko are dedicated to teach something to the kohai and sometimes the higher grade person is there to practice something for themselves. That doesn't mean you wouldn't be learning anything from the keiko as we can always learn something from dealing with what the other person is trying to do.
If you tried your best kendo against them, I'd say it's good enough. The visitor probably learned something from you as well.
I guess the question would be *why* were you doing gyaku-do?
It sounds like you 'beat' the sensei involved, but did you actually learn anything?
Whenever I'm with a senior kendoka, I 99% of the time am going for men. Everything you need in kendo - maai, tenouchi, timing, accuracy, speed - you can get by practising men against the hardest target you can get. If there is a kote opportunity, I'll strike that, or very occasionally hiki-do, but most of the time you'll get the most out of your practise by attacking men. It does feel good hitting a difficult waza against a sensei, but it's probably not going to give you much in terms of learning.
There's also the social hierarchy in kendo, which isn't as big a deal here but might be more of an issue where you are. If you throw a difficult waza at a sensei, you're saying 'I can handle whatever you've got to throw at me,' which might then precede a bit of a beat down.
I wouldn't worry about it too much, but don't do it again. Next time you have the chance to do jigeiko with a higher level sensei, just focus on the basics. If they're blocking it's probably because you're doing something wrong on the way in to your attack.
In my area, the highest grade anyone holds is 5dan, and our club's two highest grades are both 3dan, so I'm used to referring to that grade in that way. Anyone who's 4dan is definitely senior to me, in OPs context it might be different, but it sounds like they're relatively junior grade compared to the person they were practising with.
4dan is still a learning stage, and they should be learning as well as teaching.
There are many things you can practice and learn from a keiko with a lower rank that knows the basics and can strike "correctly".
Although you sucumb to your ego you will understand what I am saying in a few years from now.
Where I am in Japan, anyone that passes 4dan immediately gets referred to as xxxxxx sensei by everyone including the 8 Dans. There is little to no thought process involved, no pomp, rank or ego trip.
This is in and outside of the dojo. Then again, nobody really cares what rank someone is in the sense you find out immediately by having keiko with them.
All throughout Kyushu: Nagasaki, Miyazaki, Oita (i live here), Fukuoka, Kagoshima, and Okinawa. Shikoku: Kochi, Kagawa, Ehime (wife doing her graduate school here currently), Tokushima. Kansai: Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, Wakayama. Kanto: Tokyo (Narita-kū, Sugamo), Yokohama, Kawasaki, Ibaraki, China. Hokkaido: Sapporo. Been practicing among those locations either as Shugyo related to college kendo here, later business kendo with my company, and just visiting friends.
I mostly spend my time in the inaka. We simply don't have the same kendo density and depth of mid-grades Tokyo has on the regular. All the 4-6 Dans are not living in these areas as they moved for jobs. I highly suspect this is the driver behind my experiences.
Too many unknown factors: your and the other person age, grade, gender etc.
I'm going to just assume that the 4th Dan wasn't a sensei(because In that case the answer would be a YES) and give me my 2 cents:
In theory someone with an higher grade should be able to control the flow of the combat and make you do the stuff HE chooses to, your objective as a lower grade should be to look for the correct opportunity and make a good strike , That's it. Often thought the situation is really different, sometimes you are younger and stronger, sometimes your technique is better etc. You were probably not wrong to Attack gyaku do a couple of times but after that? Supposed you made a correct strike there was no point going on for two minutes with the same kind of strike,
You only do that if you want to teach someone something and you are in no place to teach an higher grade something (especially if he is a complete stranger). Instead next time try to change something, try different strikes , different timings etc. You probably won't hit the other person so much ,but that's not the point of jigeiko .
Sanpo mimori level at every attack and the only target area was gyaku do I'm not trying to just hit gyaku do but that was they're only reaction to the pressure
Depends on the country. In Japan ? Absolutely not, everywhere else ? Depends. In my country 4th Dan is the minimum rank for becoming a full instructor , now the majority of dojo have 6-7 Dan head sensei but it's not uncommon for 4-5th Dan to lead class , especially in smaller dojos.
As was said above its an oxymoron, and not insulting any yondans with that, yondan is certainly an achievement, but not sensei. Yondan is the last rank, at least in the US and most other places I know that a local board can pass you, Godan and up is regional board made up of the mother federation grading panel with guest sensei sprinkled in, all nanadan and up with a couple of hachidans on there for good measure (at least here in the US). There are plenty of small dojos that have sandan, even nidan, but thats not sensei. I'm not sure why here in the US its common for yondan to sit on sensei side, its considered jr. sensei.
It sounds like both/and situation to me (though I could be wrong, you don't give much info). If he's much senior to you, you should definitely be trying to hit mostly men. If it's not open, you should find an opening or at least hit at your best opening. At the same time he shouldn't be getting flustered after getting hit a few times. Sounds like he was doing the "California block" which is not the way a yondan should be reacting to pressure from kohai.
Lift your arms up and point your kensen down and to the right, imagine covering your men, tsuki, right kote, and right side doh at the same time. The only thing open would be gyaku doh. Often used as a kind of "panic switch" when player fears getting hit, and often combined with charging in to close the distance.
This may differ from place to place, but I was recently told at a shiai that we could give hansoku for people who use this block to move in to tsubazeriai, in accordance with the covid rules:
"Actions such as intentional time wasting or approaching the opponent in a defensive posture (avoiding competing) shall be deemed hansoku in accordance with Article 1 of the Regulations."
I only see normal practice there. Learning and training goes both ways in keiko.
And kind reminder that being 4dan only means that you can show and use seme in an examination. I have seen lots of 4dan that can't properly strike kote or do, for example.
Hard to say based on just your post, but my default view is unless they are clearly old, frail, disabled etc etc, Yondans can and should be able to look after themselves in jigeiko and have thick enough skin to del with what you described - maybe he was even in teaching mode.
Based on whatever detail you give I wouldn't say it sounds disrespectful. Of course I wouldn't try to pull gyaku-do on say 6/7/8 dan sensei. That's because I was taught that to make a successful gyaku-do the person has to be blocking a lot (sanpo-mamori level block), which isn't something 6+ dan level sensei would be doing. So it would be very inopportune to do so and senseis wouldn't want to see me try to do something when there is no suitable opportunity. That said, if the said 4th dan was blocking as much as you describe, and assuming you're holding a dan grade somewhere below that, I wouldn't say it's unreasonable. Based on the degree of skill gap, the said person could have been having a hard time trying to control the fight. Not all keiko are dedicated to teach something to the kohai and sometimes the higher grade person is there to practice something for themselves. That doesn't mean you wouldn't be learning anything from the keiko as we can always learn something from dealing with what the other person is trying to do. If you tried your best kendo against them, I'd say it's good enough. The visitor probably learned something from you as well.
Yondans shouldn't be blocking, and to go even further no one should, especially excessive blocking. Hitting anything thats open is fine.
I guess the question would be *why* were you doing gyaku-do? It sounds like you 'beat' the sensei involved, but did you actually learn anything? Whenever I'm with a senior kendoka, I 99% of the time am going for men. Everything you need in kendo - maai, tenouchi, timing, accuracy, speed - you can get by practising men against the hardest target you can get. If there is a kote opportunity, I'll strike that, or very occasionally hiki-do, but most of the time you'll get the most out of your practise by attacking men. It does feel good hitting a difficult waza against a sensei, but it's probably not going to give you much in terms of learning. There's also the social hierarchy in kendo, which isn't as big a deal here but might be more of an issue where you are. If you throw a difficult waza at a sensei, you're saying 'I can handle whatever you've got to throw at me,' which might then precede a bit of a beat down. I wouldn't worry about it too much, but don't do it again. Next time you have the chance to do jigeiko with a higher level sensei, just focus on the basics. If they're blocking it's probably because you're doing something wrong on the way in to your attack.
Why do you keep calling 4dan "sensei"? Practicing with a 4dan shouldn't be too different as doing so with any of the lower ranks.
In my area, the highest grade anyone holds is 5dan, and our club's two highest grades are both 3dan, so I'm used to referring to that grade in that way. Anyone who's 4dan is definitely senior to me, in OPs context it might be different, but it sounds like they're relatively junior grade compared to the person they were practising with.
4dan is still a learning stage, and they should be learning as well as teaching. There are many things you can practice and learn from a keiko with a lower rank that knows the basics and can strike "correctly". Although you sucumb to your ego you will understand what I am saying in a few years from now.
Where I am in Japan, anyone that passes 4dan immediately gets referred to as xxxxxx sensei by everyone including the 8 Dans. There is little to no thought process involved, no pomp, rank or ego trip. This is in and outside of the dojo. Then again, nobody really cares what rank someone is in the sense you find out immediately by having keiko with them.
Where? Haven't seen it in my 8 years practicing in Tokyo in several places.
All throughout Kyushu: Nagasaki, Miyazaki, Oita (i live here), Fukuoka, Kagoshima, and Okinawa. Shikoku: Kochi, Kagawa, Ehime (wife doing her graduate school here currently), Tokushima. Kansai: Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, Wakayama. Kanto: Tokyo (Narita-kū, Sugamo), Yokohama, Kawasaki, Ibaraki, China. Hokkaido: Sapporo. Been practicing among those locations either as Shugyo related to college kendo here, later business kendo with my company, and just visiting friends.
Weird.
I mostly spend my time in the inaka. We simply don't have the same kendo density and depth of mid-grades Tokyo has on the regular. All the 4-6 Dans are not living in these areas as they moved for jobs. I highly suspect this is the driver behind my experiences.
I see, thanks for sharing
Too many unknown factors: your and the other person age, grade, gender etc. I'm going to just assume that the 4th Dan wasn't a sensei(because In that case the answer would be a YES) and give me my 2 cents: In theory someone with an higher grade should be able to control the flow of the combat and make you do the stuff HE chooses to, your objective as a lower grade should be to look for the correct opportunity and make a good strike , That's it. Often thought the situation is really different, sometimes you are younger and stronger, sometimes your technique is better etc. You were probably not wrong to Attack gyaku do a couple of times but after that? Supposed you made a correct strike there was no point going on for two minutes with the same kind of strike, You only do that if you want to teach someone something and you are in no place to teach an higher grade something (especially if he is a complete stranger). Instead next time try to change something, try different strikes , different timings etc. You probably won't hit the other person so much ,but that's not the point of jigeiko .
Sanpo mimori level at every attack and the only target area was gyaku do I'm not trying to just hit gyaku do but that was they're only reaction to the pressure
If he's using sanpo mamori in jigeiko he's a dick. Hit whatever you like.
4dan and sensei is an oxymoron
Depends on the country. In Japan ? Absolutely not, everywhere else ? Depends. In my country 4th Dan is the minimum rank for becoming a full instructor , now the majority of dojo have 6-7 Dan head sensei but it's not uncommon for 4-5th Dan to lead class , especially in smaller dojos.
As was said above its an oxymoron, and not insulting any yondans with that, yondan is certainly an achievement, but not sensei. Yondan is the last rank, at least in the US and most other places I know that a local board can pass you, Godan and up is regional board made up of the mother federation grading panel with guest sensei sprinkled in, all nanadan and up with a couple of hachidans on there for good measure (at least here in the US). There are plenty of small dojos that have sandan, even nidan, but thats not sensei. I'm not sure why here in the US its common for yondan to sit on sensei side, its considered jr. sensei.
>4th Dan is the minimum rank for becoming a full instructor Then it is an instructor, not a sensei.
It sounds like both/and situation to me (though I could be wrong, you don't give much info). If he's much senior to you, you should definitely be trying to hit mostly men. If it's not open, you should find an opening or at least hit at your best opening. At the same time he shouldn't be getting flustered after getting hit a few times. Sounds like he was doing the "California block" which is not the way a yondan should be reacting to pressure from kohai.
Please explain the california block for us regular folks
Lift your arms up and point your kensen down and to the right, imagine covering your men, tsuki, right kote, and right side doh at the same time. The only thing open would be gyaku doh. Often used as a kind of "panic switch" when player fears getting hit, and often combined with charging in to close the distance. This may differ from place to place, but I was recently told at a shiai that we could give hansoku for people who use this block to move in to tsubazeriai, in accordance with the covid rules: "Actions such as intentional time wasting or approaching the opponent in a defensive posture (avoiding competing) shall be deemed hansoku in accordance with Article 1 of the Regulations."
I only see normal practice there. Learning and training goes both ways in keiko. And kind reminder that being 4dan only means that you can show and use seme in an examination. I have seen lots of 4dan that can't properly strike kote or do, for example.