Traditional Aikido Lineage
Iwama Style Aikido
Traditional Aikido Lineage
Lineage distills the essence of a martial arts tradition.
How Lineage Produces Benefits
Lineage is a time-tested method to insure quality control in instruction. You start with one of the great martial artists of all time. That highly realized practitioner certifies his students to go out and teach. The knowledge is passed from one generation to another with teachers standing behind the instruction given by their students. If a student has a serious problem and is considered unqualified to teach, their teacher withdraws support. As Bruce Lee once said, martial arts are not about fighting. It is a way of life. To insure all of the benefits can be transmitted, the instructor needs to be evaluated not only in terms of physical technique, but in terms of character as well.
Iwama Aikido
Known to represent the exact empty handed training method by the founder and only complete source of his weapons system.
Our dojo is directly connected to the exact training used by the founder in the last 23 years of his life.
Dojo lineage from Aikido Founder
Morehei Ueshiba
Founder of Aikido
Morihiro Saito
Top student of founder/took over Iwama Dojo
Mark Larson Sensei
Top student of Saito Sensei in last 10 years
Aikido Founder
The founder of Aikido prayed every morning at the Aiki Shrine before he went about his daily activities.
It was in Iwama where he famously trained Morihiro Saito, invented the Aiki weapons systems and pursued farming.
Part of Aiki Shrine (above) in our Dojo
On the Kamiza of our dojo sits a small part of the trim from the Aiki Shrine. Our dojo may be the only place in NY that has an actual relic from the life of the founder.
Morihiro Saito Sensei
Saito Sensei was one of the two most advanced students of the founder. Both he and Koichi Tohei were asked by the founder to take over his two dojos upon his death. Saito Sensei taught in Iwama from 1969 until his death in 2002.
Mark Larson Sensei
Mark Larson Sensei spent 10 years training closely with Saito Sensei in Iwama. He was given the name Takuto (leader of the tradition). Saito Sensei also named his dojo Minnesota Aiki Shuren Dojo. The founder gave the name Aiki Shuren (Aiki intensive training) to Saito Sensei.
Larson Sensei gave our dojo the name New York "Still Mind" Aiki Shuren Dojo.
In the 2019 annual All Japan Aikido Demonstration, Larson Sensei’s group was honored to represent Aikido for the United States.
