As reported in my last post, the competition I was due to compete in on Sunday was cancelled and with DJC being closed for the school holidays I was left feeling slightly frustrated. However I received a text on Monday inviting me and a couple of other Dorking club members to Witley Judo Club for their Monday night Randori class, which kind of made up for it.
This was my second visit to Witley Judo club, having trained here once before almost a year ago to the day. Last year I trained here in preparation for the Redhill competition. This year I trained here as a substitute for the Redhill competition.
The instructor got us warmed up and then we progressed to some uchi-komi using Tai-otoshi, Ippon-seoi-nage, uchi-mata and harai-goshi, all with movements.
Following this we practised some turnovers from the turtle position for about 5 minutes before we started the Newaza randori which consisted of four rounds, each round lasting 3 minutes.
I tried to make a conscious effort to play a more aggressive top game but after struggling to get anything going against my first opponent, a blue belt, we ended up knee wrestling for most of the three minutes. Realising this was a waste of time I went to my back and attacked from there, quickly securing a san-gaku-jime and getting the tap. I pulled guard again and this time finished him quickly with a face down Juji-gatame.
I went on to roll with a couple of brown belts, and an Orange belt, and managed to secure another San-gaku-jime and Juji-gatame as well as an ude-garami, all the while managing to avoid being tapped or pinned in the process.
We had a quick water break before the standing randori started. We each took turns staying on the mat for two consecutive fights before standing out of one. I must have had about 10 rounds by the time the class ended and on the whole I was quite successful with my throws. Uchi-mata and Ko-uchi-gari were my favourite throws as usual and I also had some success with Sasae-tsuri-komi-ashi and Tani-otoshi. I desperately wanted to land a Harai or a Tai-otoshi but never quite managed it.
I really enjoyed the session as did the other DJC club members, so i'm sure I won't leave it so long next time before returning.
Thursday, 21 February 2013
Friday, 15 February 2013
Shiai
I started writing this post as I was supposed to be competing on Sunday. Unfortunately I received a phone call last night from one of the organisers who informed that due to low numbers the senior’s event would be cancelled. This is very frustrating as I am in good shape and injury free. I had also managed to keep below 90kg and was looking forward to competing for the first time in the -90kg division, especially as I am currently 89kg and therefore likely to be the biggest in my class. My gym work has gone up a notch for the last couple of months with me doing 4 sessions a week of weighted circuits. Add to that one boxing class and two judo sessions and the result is probably the fittest I have been in quite a while.
Of course there is a flip side to not competing on Sunday and that was the takeaway curry that I ordered almost immediately after my phone call with the tournament organisers and the half tub of Ben & Jerry’s Fish food that I forced down afterwards. Not surprisingly I weighed in at 90.5kg the following morning.
Anyway back to the original point of my post which was more to do with why one should compete. I read the below on the Judo forum recently and thought it was spot on, so I thought I’d share it.
“Shiai cannot be stressed enough as a key and vital element of judo. It can also not be stressed enough that shiai is not the whole subject of judo but one of its tiniest parts. Shiai is where we take our practice and put that theory to the test. Not only is ones technique tested in shiai it’s the place where the greatest character changing opportunities are offered by the practice of kodokan Judo. Ultimately in facing a partner in shiai we are facing up to our own fears, insecurities and self doubts. It’s a time to test our character and providing we enter shiai with the correct mindset shiai is the fire where we forge the character that makes a judoka what he can be.”
Of course there is a flip side to not competing on Sunday and that was the takeaway curry that I ordered almost immediately after my phone call with the tournament organisers and the half tub of Ben & Jerry’s Fish food that I forced down afterwards. Not surprisingly I weighed in at 90.5kg the following morning.
Anyway back to the original point of my post which was more to do with why one should compete. I read the below on the Judo forum recently and thought it was spot on, so I thought I’d share it.
“Shiai cannot be stressed enough as a key and vital element of judo. It can also not be stressed enough that shiai is not the whole subject of judo but one of its tiniest parts. Shiai is where we take our practice and put that theory to the test. Not only is ones technique tested in shiai it’s the place where the greatest character changing opportunities are offered by the practice of kodokan Judo. Ultimately in facing a partner in shiai we are facing up to our own fears, insecurities and self doubts. It’s a time to test our character and providing we enter shiai with the correct mindset shiai is the fire where we forge the character that makes a judoka what he can be.”
Daniel Larusso certainly faced up to his fears and insecurities and in the process earned the respect of John Lawrence of the Cobra Kai's. (yes I know it's Karate and not Judo btw)
The British public will never forget this touching moment when Gemma Gibbons guaranteed her place in the Olympic final
Tuesday, 12 February 2013
Breaking Grips - Yoshin Ryu
Still buzzing from Tuesday’s class at DJC I was able to visit Yoshin Ryu for their Thursday night randori session. Despite a smaller turnout than usual we still ended up with about seven dan grades and another seven kyu grades so 14 in total, which isn’t bad.
We probably spent around 15 minutes drilling these before we were told to get ready for Newaza.
Staying with the same partner I pulled guard to gauge his skill level. He immediately grabbed my legs and tried to pass to my right but I managed to get my knee in and returned to full guard. He then tried to cross collar choke me but at this point I had both my feet on his hips, so was never in danger. He was strong so I decided to stay in this position as I tried to conserve some energy whilst at the same time hoping that he would eventually burn himself out. After what must have been a minute or two I was able to secure a San-gaku-jime, pulling my right leg in really tight to ensure he tapped. We started again and he attacked straight away so I went to my back and looked for sweeps. I eventually swept him using the one I had been shown by Graeme on Tuesday and from there I got one hand in for a cross collar choke but matte was called before I could finish.
Przemek beckoned me over for my next roll which turned in to total annihilation. It didn’t matter what I did, every roll ended quickly with me being crushed underneath him. If I pulled guard he simply brushed my legs aside and pinned me. If decided to play top game he quickly swept me and pinned me. If he started in turtle he reversed me and pinned me. Of course sometimes he didn’t pin me, instead preferring to submit me with an armlock or choke. I think Przemek must have set some sort of record for the most subs in one roll. He commented afterwards that he had been practising his Newaza a lot with Sensei Tim and it really showed. The last time I rolled with Przemek he was good but last night he was on another level altogether.
After Przemek I was relived to get someone considerably smaller, a brown belt and proceeded to have an excellent tussle. None of us managed any subs or pins but there were plenty of sweeps, reversals armlock and choke attempts, with both of us at sometime having our back taken but managing to spin out of it.
My last roll was with Sean and we also had a good tussle, with both of us managing to submit the other. I was particularly pleased as I managed to submit him with Koshi-jime, a technique from the blue belt syllabus and one that I hadn’t been successful with in the past.
With Newaza finished we had a quick water break before a couple of rounds of randori. I lined up against a brown belt who got the better of me. But despite not being able to throw him, I was close on a number of occasions and never felt dominated by his grips.
My last opponent was Sensei Tim who, after throwing me a couple of times with ease stopped to discuss the grips he was using on me. I had a similar discussion with Peter regarding grips on Tuesday and what Tim said reinforced what I had been told as well as offering me some alternatives. Although I often use a high shoulder grip myself, due to my height advantage, I feel very vulnerable when someone uses the same grip against me especially if they pull me in close and start controlling my posture. It’s definitely something I need to work on but no more so than the rest of my Judo.
After we were warmed up I was paired with Jamie, a white belt who displayed skills higher than one would expect from a white belt. We first drilled Juji-gatame from the bottom and were then shown various different methods of breaking Uke’s grip should he try to clasp his hands together to resist the armlock. Some of these are shown on the following Kashiwazaki Video:
We probably spent around 15 minutes drilling these before we were told to get ready for Newaza.
Staying with the same partner I pulled guard to gauge his skill level. He immediately grabbed my legs and tried to pass to my right but I managed to get my knee in and returned to full guard. He then tried to cross collar choke me but at this point I had both my feet on his hips, so was never in danger. He was strong so I decided to stay in this position as I tried to conserve some energy whilst at the same time hoping that he would eventually burn himself out. After what must have been a minute or two I was able to secure a San-gaku-jime, pulling my right leg in really tight to ensure he tapped. We started again and he attacked straight away so I went to my back and looked for sweeps. I eventually swept him using the one I had been shown by Graeme on Tuesday and from there I got one hand in for a cross collar choke but matte was called before I could finish.
Przemek beckoned me over for my next roll which turned in to total annihilation. It didn’t matter what I did, every roll ended quickly with me being crushed underneath him. If I pulled guard he simply brushed my legs aside and pinned me. If decided to play top game he quickly swept me and pinned me. If he started in turtle he reversed me and pinned me. Of course sometimes he didn’t pin me, instead preferring to submit me with an armlock or choke. I think Przemek must have set some sort of record for the most subs in one roll. He commented afterwards that he had been practising his Newaza a lot with Sensei Tim and it really showed. The last time I rolled with Przemek he was good but last night he was on another level altogether.
After Przemek I was relived to get someone considerably smaller, a brown belt and proceeded to have an excellent tussle. None of us managed any subs or pins but there were plenty of sweeps, reversals armlock and choke attempts, with both of us at sometime having our back taken but managing to spin out of it.
My last roll was with Sean and we also had a good tussle, with both of us managing to submit the other. I was particularly pleased as I managed to submit him with Koshi-jime, a technique from the blue belt syllabus and one that I hadn’t been successful with in the past.
With Newaza finished we had a quick water break before a couple of rounds of randori. I lined up against a brown belt who got the better of me. But despite not being able to throw him, I was close on a number of occasions and never felt dominated by his grips.
My last opponent was Sensei Tim who, after throwing me a couple of times with ease stopped to discuss the grips he was using on me. I had a similar discussion with Peter regarding grips on Tuesday and what Tim said reinforced what I had been told as well as offering me some alternatives. Although I often use a high shoulder grip myself, due to my height advantage, I feel very vulnerable when someone uses the same grip against me especially if they pull me in close and start controlling my posture. It’s definitely something I need to work on but no more so than the rest of my Judo.
Thursday, 7 February 2013
Training Buzz
Graeme announced that we would concentrate mainly on Newaza tonight so after we were warmed up we got in to pairs for some Newaza randori with one of us starting on our backs and the other in our guard. First up was Ivan, who started on his back with me in his guard. I intended on trying the “stack pass” that Stewart had shown us before Christmas and although it wasn’t smooth going I did eventually manage to move in to side control where I pinned Ivan with Mune-gatame. After holding this position for five or so seconds I decided to move to tate-shiho-gatame and in the ensuing melee I managed to grab an arm and submit Ivan with Juji-gatame.
When it was my time to start on the bottom I got one butterfly hook in and turned Ivan over so I was in tate-shiho-gatame, I was then looking for Gyaku-juji-jime but couldn’t quite finish before Graeme called matte.
Next up was Oli and I started on the bottom first. Oli managed to escape to half guard and I was literally holding on, trying to work out a way to better my position when he allowed me the space to scoot out and flip him over so that I was in tate-shiho-gatame, which I held until Graeme called matte.
When we changed positions I found it very difficult to make any progress as Oli clamped his legs around my waist. He allowed me no room in which to get my arms in for the stack pass that I had used against Ivan earlier. I think this highlights the fact that I need to work on my guard passing.
Graeme went on to show us various sweeps from our back. The first was the one that I had used against Ivan earlier, i.e. pushing Uke’s leg back and getting a butterfly hook in on one side and then simply controlling the opposite side’s arm and flipping them over. We also did the one where you push both of Uke’s legs back, flattening them out and simply grabbing under their arm and turning them over.
We were then shown a nice choke from our backs which would be easier to explain if I could find a video of it but I’ll try anyway. With me on my back I take my left arm and encircle Uke’s right arm, grabbing their left collar with palm up by their neck. With my right arm I simply grab uke’s gi by their right shoulder and bingo, they tap. It’s one of those techniques that I have seen before but unless you drill them a lot you can never remember and pull off in Newaza randori. However I am going to try that every time I do Newaza now and see if I can add it to my list of techniques.
We were then stood up for some uchi-komi, I picked Tai-otoshi and we slowly progressed on to throw for throw randori, with no resisting the throws. This is a good way to get used to throwing on the move without the fear of being thrown yourself, which is especially good for the lower grades. Staying with the same partner we took turns attacking and defending, which made the throws slightly harder but again without the fear of being countered and thrown yourself. Finally we finished up with 3 rounds of randori. I managed to get an over the shoulder grip on Oli and executed a nice Tani-otoshi which I was particularly pleased with as I had been planning on using this throw before the class. I also had success with Tai-otoshi against Peter in my last randori session of the night.
I was really buzzing after the class, not because I performed excellent Judo, although it wasn’t bad, it was just one of those good training sessions with plenty of sparring that I like. The build up to randori, using uchi-komi, throw for throw and attack and defend made perfect sense and was well thought out. I’m looking forward to trying out some of the things have learnt tonight at Yoshin Ryu on Thursday.
When it was my time to start on the bottom I got one butterfly hook in and turned Ivan over so I was in tate-shiho-gatame, I was then looking for Gyaku-juji-jime but couldn’t quite finish before Graeme called matte.
Next up was Oli and I started on the bottom first. Oli managed to escape to half guard and I was literally holding on, trying to work out a way to better my position when he allowed me the space to scoot out and flip him over so that I was in tate-shiho-gatame, which I held until Graeme called matte.
When we changed positions I found it very difficult to make any progress as Oli clamped his legs around my waist. He allowed me no room in which to get my arms in for the stack pass that I had used against Ivan earlier. I think this highlights the fact that I need to work on my guard passing.
Graeme went on to show us various sweeps from our back. The first was the one that I had used against Ivan earlier, i.e. pushing Uke’s leg back and getting a butterfly hook in on one side and then simply controlling the opposite side’s arm and flipping them over. We also did the one where you push both of Uke’s legs back, flattening them out and simply grabbing under their arm and turning them over.
We were then shown a nice choke from our backs which would be easier to explain if I could find a video of it but I’ll try anyway. With me on my back I take my left arm and encircle Uke’s right arm, grabbing their left collar with palm up by their neck. With my right arm I simply grab uke’s gi by their right shoulder and bingo, they tap. It’s one of those techniques that I have seen before but unless you drill them a lot you can never remember and pull off in Newaza randori. However I am going to try that every time I do Newaza now and see if I can add it to my list of techniques.
We were then stood up for some uchi-komi, I picked Tai-otoshi and we slowly progressed on to throw for throw randori, with no resisting the throws. This is a good way to get used to throwing on the move without the fear of being thrown yourself, which is especially good for the lower grades. Staying with the same partner we took turns attacking and defending, which made the throws slightly harder but again without the fear of being countered and thrown yourself. Finally we finished up with 3 rounds of randori. I managed to get an over the shoulder grip on Oli and executed a nice Tani-otoshi which I was particularly pleased with as I had been planning on using this throw before the class. I also had success with Tai-otoshi against Peter in my last randori session of the night.
I was really buzzing after the class, not because I performed excellent Judo, although it wasn’t bad, it was just one of those good training sessions with plenty of sparring that I like. The build up to randori, using uchi-komi, throw for throw and attack and defend made perfect sense and was well thought out. I’m looking forward to trying out some of the things have learnt tonight at Yoshin Ryu on Thursday.
Tuesday, 22 January 2013
Shaking off the Tatami rust
If you’ve been following my blog you’ll realise that I haven’t been 100% for a while.
I had a neck injury which required some physio, then I had an Ear infection followed by manflu which basically laid me low for the whole of December and resulted in me losing nearly a stone in weight. So after two sessions back at Dorking I was eager to jump in to the Thursday night randori session at Yoshin Ryu. I was accompanied by Ivan and Meho.
On arrival I found out that both Steve and Sean are now 1st kyu’s and Przemek was now a 1st dan.
After a good warm up I was paired with Meho for some grip fighting and then went on to practice Ippon-seoi-nage uchi-komi, which is ironic when you consider the master class we had on this throw just two days earlier. Even more ironic was that both Meho and I had our form corrected by the sensei.
We were then shown a specific kuzushi drill whereby we took turns lifting both arms and elbows up and out, turning our head to look over our left shoulder. Whilst doing this our left foot steps behind our right foot and ends up slightly advanced of it. After practicing the kuzushi we were then told to pick our own throw. Meho chose Uchi-mata and I chose harai-goshi. On my first couple of attempts I didn’t get low enough against Meho, which considering he is roughly the same height as me shouldn’t have been a problem. Then suddenly it clicked, I remembered the little hip bump that Stewart was so good at and then Meho was airborne. Sensei Neil asked a few of us to demonstrate our throws to the rest of the class. Luckily for me I saved my best throw for this demonstration. Meho’s Uchi-mata was also his best.
Newaza next so I continued against Meho. I caught him with a San-gaku-jime but he wouldn’t let me have his right arm so I grabbed his left leg and turned him on his side so that I could squeeze really tightly. He tapped quickly thereafter.
Sensei Neil was next up for me and despite being pinned and squeezed and made to feel generally uncomfortable I did manage to catch him in a belly down Juji-gatame. He rolled on to his back and I followed, but then he turned parallel to me and eventually ended up pinning me again. Still I was encouraged even though I was tired.
Sensei Tim was next, the highlight for me was the almost successful escape from Kezure-kesa-gatame. I used the escape I showed in my last post, which almost worked save for the fact that he used his head, literally, to stop himself rolling over. The rest of the roll was again a blur or pins and submissions and at one point I was very close to throwing up. What I did notice was just how easy it was for him to sweep me when I was in top position. It wasn’t like he was using some complicated sweep it was just a basic, grab my gi pants and roll me over. It can be quite humbling to be handled in this way but that’s a good thing. It gives you something to aim for and reminds you how much there is still to learn.
I was totally knackered at this point but on the next change of partners I noticed Ivan was free so I crawled over towards him. Seeing that he was equally as tired as I was encouraged me a little. I decided to pull guard and just work on my sweeps, which I eventually got but I spent an awful long time trying to secure a collar choke from the mount position so I decided to go for a tate-shiho-gatame instead and make Ivan work to get out, saving my energy and expending some more of his. Thankfully matte was called shortly after so a quick water break beckoned.
At the water machine I joked with Steve about whether he was going to throw me with Tomae-nage we did randori and low and behold he did. His set up was more subtle than usual so I didn’t really see it coming. Before the end I did manage a Tani-otoshi counter.
Next up was Sean and for quite a lot of the time he wasn’t allowing me my second grip. I had the lapel grip with my right hand but couldn’t get anything with my left, although he couldn’t either. I was weary that he could be setting me up for a Seoi-nage so I decided to try a left handed Morote-seoi-nage on him, something that I’ve never tried in randori before. I wasn’t successful but I think it had the desired effect of giving him something to think about. I then decided to go for a double lapel grip (as shown to me by Brian Jacks) and was then successful with a couple of throws off of it. I had a really good tussle with Sean and I think our Judo was good. We didn’t spend overly long fighting for grips, we both attacked and we both scored with throws.
The last randori of the night for me was against another one of the higher dan grades. Like I’ve said in the past, against the instructors there is no point stiff arming and being defensive, they’ll still throw you anyway and you won’t learn anything. You may as well get thrown trying to attack, which is what I did and I was ritually dumped on my ass a number of times for my efforts. Still, I bounced back to my feet each time and tried again, which is all you can do sometimes.
When Sensei Neil finally called matte he had us all finish off with 20 press ups, star jumps, sit ups and squat thrusts, which finished me off.
It was really nice to be back here training hard and hopefully I can start coming regularly again.
I had a neck injury which required some physio, then I had an Ear infection followed by manflu which basically laid me low for the whole of December and resulted in me losing nearly a stone in weight. So after two sessions back at Dorking I was eager to jump in to the Thursday night randori session at Yoshin Ryu. I was accompanied by Ivan and Meho.
On arrival I found out that both Steve and Sean are now 1st kyu’s and Przemek was now a 1st dan.
After a good warm up I was paired with Meho for some grip fighting and then went on to practice Ippon-seoi-nage uchi-komi, which is ironic when you consider the master class we had on this throw just two days earlier. Even more ironic was that both Meho and I had our form corrected by the sensei.
We were then shown a specific kuzushi drill whereby we took turns lifting both arms and elbows up and out, turning our head to look over our left shoulder. Whilst doing this our left foot steps behind our right foot and ends up slightly advanced of it. After practicing the kuzushi we were then told to pick our own throw. Meho chose Uchi-mata and I chose harai-goshi. On my first couple of attempts I didn’t get low enough against Meho, which considering he is roughly the same height as me shouldn’t have been a problem. Then suddenly it clicked, I remembered the little hip bump that Stewart was so good at and then Meho was airborne. Sensei Neil asked a few of us to demonstrate our throws to the rest of the class. Luckily for me I saved my best throw for this demonstration. Meho’s Uchi-mata was also his best.
Newaza next so I continued against Meho. I caught him with a San-gaku-jime but he wouldn’t let me have his right arm so I grabbed his left leg and turned him on his side so that I could squeeze really tightly. He tapped quickly thereafter.
Sensei Neil was next up for me and despite being pinned and squeezed and made to feel generally uncomfortable I did manage to catch him in a belly down Juji-gatame. He rolled on to his back and I followed, but then he turned parallel to me and eventually ended up pinning me again. Still I was encouraged even though I was tired.
Sensei Tim was next, the highlight for me was the almost successful escape from Kezure-kesa-gatame. I used the escape I showed in my last post, which almost worked save for the fact that he used his head, literally, to stop himself rolling over. The rest of the roll was again a blur or pins and submissions and at one point I was very close to throwing up. What I did notice was just how easy it was for him to sweep me when I was in top position. It wasn’t like he was using some complicated sweep it was just a basic, grab my gi pants and roll me over. It can be quite humbling to be handled in this way but that’s a good thing. It gives you something to aim for and reminds you how much there is still to learn.
I was totally knackered at this point but on the next change of partners I noticed Ivan was free so I crawled over towards him. Seeing that he was equally as tired as I was encouraged me a little. I decided to pull guard and just work on my sweeps, which I eventually got but I spent an awful long time trying to secure a collar choke from the mount position so I decided to go for a tate-shiho-gatame instead and make Ivan work to get out, saving my energy and expending some more of his. Thankfully matte was called shortly after so a quick water break beckoned.
At the water machine I joked with Steve about whether he was going to throw me with Tomae-nage we did randori and low and behold he did. His set up was more subtle than usual so I didn’t really see it coming. Before the end I did manage a Tani-otoshi counter.
Next up was Sean and for quite a lot of the time he wasn’t allowing me my second grip. I had the lapel grip with my right hand but couldn’t get anything with my left, although he couldn’t either. I was weary that he could be setting me up for a Seoi-nage so I decided to try a left handed Morote-seoi-nage on him, something that I’ve never tried in randori before. I wasn’t successful but I think it had the desired effect of giving him something to think about. I then decided to go for a double lapel grip (as shown to me by Brian Jacks) and was then successful with a couple of throws off of it. I had a really good tussle with Sean and I think our Judo was good. We didn’t spend overly long fighting for grips, we both attacked and we both scored with throws.
The last randori of the night for me was against another one of the higher dan grades. Like I’ve said in the past, against the instructors there is no point stiff arming and being defensive, they’ll still throw you anyway and you won’t learn anything. You may as well get thrown trying to attack, which is what I did and I was ritually dumped on my ass a number of times for my efforts. Still, I bounced back to my feet each time and tried again, which is all you can do sometimes.
When Sensei Neil finally called matte he had us all finish off with 20 press ups, star jumps, sit ups and squat thrusts, which finished me off.
It was really nice to be back here training hard and hopefully I can start coming regularly again.
Wednesday, 16 January 2013
Ippon seoi nage
Joining Peter and Graeme on the mat tonight was another black belt, a 2nd dan called Duncan. I learned later that he has spent many years living in Japan and has even taught Judo over there so he is a welcome addition to the club.
Following our warm up I partnered up with Oli for some Ippon seoi nage uchi-komi. Graeme broke down this throw in to detail tonight and by the end of the class I was probably performing this throw better than I had ever done before. Now, this throw does favour the shorter person so it’s never going to be a favourite of mine but there are now a couple of taller guys in the club whom I could try this on next time we do randori.
Duncan was able to add some additional details of this throw which I found very useful. One was that you don’t want to be too close to Uke after you have turned in as when you pull uke on to your back, you want them to be off balance and this won’t happen if you are already touching them. I found this Koga video, which I think shows this perfectly. He does of course make this throw look ridiculously easy, even with one hand.
We got the crash mats out afterwards so that we could practise a fully committed version of the throw, one where you get really low under uke and then drive upward, doing a forward roll yourself in the process.
We finished up with about 5 rounds of light randori and to be honest I am still feeling a little rusty after the Christmas break. My attempts at Harai-goshi and O-guruma were woeful as I wasn’t breaking their balance or getting low enough. I therefore reverted to my trusty Uchi-mata and O-uchi-gari combination, which due to my long legs I always have success with. When paired against Oli he tried and almost succeeded in getting a flying San-gaku-jime on me. I sometimes forget just how good Oli is at Judo and how much knowledge he has. These occasional acts of brilliance remind me and I hope that he can remain injury free long enough this year to finally get his well deserved black belt.
Following our warm up I partnered up with Oli for some Ippon seoi nage uchi-komi. Graeme broke down this throw in to detail tonight and by the end of the class I was probably performing this throw better than I had ever done before. Now, this throw does favour the shorter person so it’s never going to be a favourite of mine but there are now a couple of taller guys in the club whom I could try this on next time we do randori.
Duncan was able to add some additional details of this throw which I found very useful. One was that you don’t want to be too close to Uke after you have turned in as when you pull uke on to your back, you want them to be off balance and this won’t happen if you are already touching them. I found this Koga video, which I think shows this perfectly. He does of course make this throw look ridiculously easy, even with one hand.
The full throw
We finished up with about 5 rounds of light randori and to be honest I am still feeling a little rusty after the Christmas break. My attempts at Harai-goshi and O-guruma were woeful as I wasn’t breaking their balance or getting low enough. I therefore reverted to my trusty Uchi-mata and O-uchi-gari combination, which due to my long legs I always have success with. When paired against Oli he tried and almost succeeded in getting a flying San-gaku-jime on me. I sometimes forget just how good Oli is at Judo and how much knowledge he has. These occasional acts of brilliance remind me and I hope that he can remain injury free long enough this year to finally get his well deserved black belt.
Wednesday, 9 January 2013
Back to basics.
Last night was the first Judo session of the new year and as eager as I was to get back on the tatami I knew that despite losing 4kg in weight, I wasn’t in the best shape. I did a fairly normal gym session at lunchtime and was really blowing out my arse afterwards so, with only a few hours rest, I figured I would struggle should we do any randori. Luckily Graeme took the class and went fairly easy on us all.
We started with a few circuits but nothing too intense. I was warm afterwards but certainly not tired, although I was aching from my Monday weights session and my Tuesday lunchtime circuit training.A quick couple of rounds of Newaza followed but we were told we couldn’t use armlocks or strangles and any pins should only be held for 10 seconds before transitioning to another pin. This is a good exercise in keeping control of your opponent and learning to transition from one position to another. I was quite impressed with Andrew as he seems to have a pretty good base despite his relative inexperience and I found it quite difficult to sweep him although I did get him in the end.
Graeme then said that this term we would be going over the basics, which is never a bad thing. Tonight, he said, we would work on the Kesa’s.
I paired up with Chris as we worked on Kesa-gatame and Kuzure-Kesa-gatame and then the escapes from both. I actually found this escape from Kuzure-kesa-gatame, whilst looking on Youtube, which I haven’t seen before.
After a change of partner (I was paired with Meho) we progressed on to:
Ushiro-kesa-gatame
And then
Makura-kesa-gatame
With it being the first lesson back after the Christmas break Graeme didn’t continue with any of my grading but we spoke after the lesson and he said we would continue it in the coming weeks.
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