Quote Originally Posted by JohnnyV View Post
We don't "grab" the rod with the free hand. The grip is open, very light pressure of the fingers is used to control the direction of the tip of the rod. It may be hard to tell in the video, but the fingers are used by just lightly touching the rod with the fingers left open/loose (not clenched down on the rod). I learned this technique directly from Dr. Ishigaki as the proper method to control hard fighting fish. He cautioned me that this is a very advanced tenkara technique. After spending a week fishing with Eiji Yamakawa, Kyoshi Ishimura, Masami Tanaka, Dr. Hisao Ishigaki, Daniel Galhardo, and Masaki Nakano, I witnessed all of these tenkara anglers use this technique. Must be something to it or they wouldn't do it. That group of tenkara masters and anglers have pretty close to 130 years of combined tenkara experience.
I did see that it was just the fingers. Even this can be enough to change the fulcrum point and break the rod. I have built a couple rods and have done quite a bit of reading of building and this is one thing all builders warn people of. Just because the so called masters do this does not mean you will not break a rod. I am not saying you will break a rod if you do this but you do increase the chance of a break.