Blocks & Defense

Reading the names

Kyokushin teaches blocking as a graded list rather than a category of its own: each kyu adds two or three uke to the ones before it. The names read as a formula — the level (jodan, chudan, gedan), the surface doing the work (shuto, shotei, koken, hiji), and the shape of the movement (uke, barai, juji, morote). Learn the parts and an unfamiliar name mostly explains itself.