Find a membership that fits you and become part of the Aikido Club!

Watt is Aikido? 

Aikido is a defensive martial art. The style of Aikido practised at this club is Shodokan Aikido. Shodokan Aikido combines traditional Aikido techniques with the principles of competitive sport and live resistance sparring, making it somewhat unique among Aikido styles. 

Here are some key features and aspects of Shodokan Aikido: 

Sportive Element: Our style incorporates a form of sparring called “randori” (Japanese: 乱取) where participants engage in controlled, live training scenarios. Randori allows students to apply Aikido techniques against a fully resisting opponent, promoting practical application and testing of their skills. 

Kata: Shodokan Aikido includes a set of standardized forms known as “kata” (Japanese: 形). These are choreographed sequences of movements that represent various Aikido techniques. Kata serves as a foundation for training and allows practitioners to practice techniques in a controlled, predefined manner before applying them in randori. 

Safety and Ukemi: Health and Safety are always the number one priority. Because of this, one of the first and most important skills we teach is “ukemi” (Japanese: 受身) which is the skill of landing safely after falling or being thrown. This is a crucial skill, not only for practicing Aikido, but also to keep yourself safe from potentially serious injury from falling over or tripping in your day-to-day life. 

Open-Handed Techniques: Shodokan Aikido primarily focuses on open-handed techniques, which involve joint locks, throws, and immobilizations. While weapon training, such as sword (bokken) and staff (jo), is also incorporated, Shodokan Aikido mainly concentrates on unarmed combat. 

Principles: Some of the key principles of Shodokan Aikido are:  

• Changing the angle of an attack instead of contesting it directly.  

• Interrupting an attack at the point when the aggressor is unbalanced. 

• Using the structure of the entire body rather than pure strength.  

These principles aim to enable a smaller or weaker person to defend themselves effectively against a larger and stronger opponent. The goal of aikido is not to harm the opponent but to neutralize their aggression while protecting both parties from injury. 

Grading system: We use a belt grading system where the colour of your belt will change as you learn new techniques and develop your skills. Beginners start with a white belt and work their way up through the belts in the following order: white, red, yellow, orange, green, blue, brown then black. To progress through the belts, you must learn a set of techniques and then demonstrate them in front of the club coach. 

Competitions 

Student Nationals 

All student members have the opportunity to compete in the British Student Nationals which are hosted by one of the university clubs every year. In this competition there are the following events: Individual and team men’s randori, individual and team women’s randori, and multiple Kata events which are mixed. While all are encouraged to compete, it is in no way a requirement.  

Our club are the current British Student National champions and have won the British Student Nationals every year since 2018.  

Open competitions and Squad training 

Members that want to push themselves and improve their abilities even further also have the opportunity to compete in higher level national competitions hosted by other Aikido clubs across Britain and at even higher-level competitions such as the Shodokan Aikido European Nationals.  

Once members have progressed to green belt and with the recommendation of the club coach they can also train with the British National Aikido squad with the intention of working towards competing in the squad at the Aikido World Championships. 

Training 

Summer holidays 

We are one of the few clubs that train throughout the holidays. As a general rule, if Oriam is open, the Aikido club will be training. Depending on who is around during the holidays, we can usually increase the intensity of classes and provide another opportunity to grade for a new belt. Every two years we go to the world championships sometime between August and September. 

Club Committee 

As with all Heriot-Watt Sports Union clubs, we elect a committee from the club’s student membership every year. The 2026-2027 committee is 

Captain – Jadon Rongong 
Secretary – Calum Stewart 
Treasurer – Liam Barnes 
Social Secretary – Willow MacClancy 

Coach

Martin Livingston

Martin is a senior Aikido coach in the UK and set up our club in 1999 when he was a student at Heriot-Watt. Since then, he has earned his 5th Dan black belt and is 3 times world champion in Aikido Kata. 
 
Martin was awarded an Honorary Blue in 2022 and also shortlisted for Scottish Student Sport’s Coach of the Year. 

Social Media

Facebook: Shodokan Edinburgh

Instagram: @hwaikido

Shodokan Aikido Federation (SAF)

We are affiliated with the Shodokan Aikido Federation (SAF). If you would like to know more about Shodokan Aikido, find out more through the SAF website below: