This is one of the best instructional books out there, especially for
the money. The added bonus is that it is written by one of the truly great
American martial arts pioneers. Wally Jay’s system of small circle jujitsu
is a truly wonderful piece of work; it has demystified and simplified
the nuances of the art of joint locking. A practitioner of any martial
art with joint locking in its repertoire can benefit from this book. As
a system of jujitsu, there are several similarities between the small
circle techniques and the techniques of any related art: judo, Brazilian
jujitsu, hapkido, aikido, etc. This gives the reader ample reference points
within his/her own system from which to work, letting them focus on refining
the technique as opposed to struggling with unfamiliar motions. But even
practitioners of unrelated arts may be able to incorporate small circle
jujitsu principles into their practice. For example, it has applications
in Tai Chi Ch’uan push hands. There is a lot of wisdom and many years
of experience expressed in the book’s ten principles of small circle jujitsu,
and as Wally Jay wrote in my copy, "Pain makes believers".
The book starts by covering falling, warm-up and introductory exercises,
footwork, basic resuscitation, and vital areas to target. The bulk of
the book is application: a host of arm bars, wrist-locks, finger locks
(particularly good, and in my opinion something of a specialty of small
circle jujitsu), leg and ankle locks, chokes, and throwing. Self defense
scenarios and responses further demonstrate the principles in action and
show additional techniques. The techniques fit extremely well into the
GMA Hapkido curriculum. USHF practitioners will find many of the self-defense
techniques applicable to situational self-defense. Most of the locks are
similar to the existing USHF student repertoire, and the ones that aren’t
represent a valuable source of variations not normally emphasized due
to time and curriculum constraints -especially those locks that are not
as easily reached via jobgi. Additional techniques that fall under the
come-along or passive restraint requirements (USHF intermediate and advanced
ranks) are also present.
The fact that it is nearly impossible to show every second of motion
in book format makes writing instructional books rather problematic; most
simply show the beginning and end points with marginal description of
the in-between movement. This book is less vague than most, with a decent
number of simple but quality photos as each technique necessitates. (Perhaps
the techniques were chosen because they were easier to extrapolate what
was going on.) It is hard to place an instructional book on the recommended
list, simply because it is rather difficult to learn from a book, and
if the reader doesn’t understand the technique there isn’t anything else
that could be of value to the reader. This book has only a short biography
and history, not enough to make it a recommended reference. One should
view this book as a valuable supplement and reference to his/her current
study, not as a replacement or substitute for actual instruction. But
if you are serious about joint locking, then you need to be at least familiar
with what Wally Jay’s small circle jujitsu is about. And for the more
recreational martial artist who simply wants to explore joint locking
techniques, as far as instructional books go, you can’t go wrong with
this book.
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