Kenichi Sawai
澤井健一
Japanese colonel and judoka who studied yiquan under Wang Xiangzhai in Beijing and in 1947 founded taikiken (Taiki Seiseikenpo) in Japan.
Quick Facts
JapanBiography
Kenichi Sawai was a Japanese martial arts master, known as the founder of the style Taiki Seiseikenpo, or taikiken. He was born in 1903 in Fukuoka Prefecture and died in 1988. He served as a colonel in the Japanese army.
He reached 5th dan in judo, which according to English-language sources he received from Sanpo Toku, 4th dan in kendo and 4th dan in iaido. In 1931 he moved to Manchuria. In Beijing he met Wang Xiangzhai, the founder of yiquan, and according to the sources he first tried several times to defeat him; in one of the clashes he fought with a shinai while Wang had only a staff, and he lost. Then he became his student. Most of his training within Wang's school he completed under Wang's student Yao Zongxun.
After the Second World War, Wang Xiangzhai encouraged him to spread yiquan in Japan. After returning home, Sawai in 1947 renamed yiquan Taiki Seiseikenpo so that the name would suit the Japanese public, and thus founded taikiken. He practised it without a permanent training base in the area of the Meiji Shrine in Tokyo. In 1976 he published the book Taiki-Ken: The Essence of Kung-Fu.
He kept a close working relationship with the founder of Kyokushinkai, Mas Oyama. His students and associates included Hatsuo Royama, Jan Kallenbach, Anton Geesink and Hajime Kazumi.
Teachers, students and family
Associated Martial Arts
Ranks and titles
- 5th danJudo
- 4th danKendo
- 4th danIaido