The Tsurikomi Action

Tsurikomi-the simultaneous lifting/pulling action when throwing an opponent forward and over your body is probably one of the least often understood movements in judo. This photo shows Jim Bregman teaching the tsurikomi action at the Shingitai Training Camp in Perrysville, Ohio in May, 2011. Jim's uke is Joan Love.

WELCOME MAT ONLINE NEWSLETTER Nov. 9, 2010

THE WORLD OF BELTS

Years ago (I believe it was in 1977) my friend Bill Clark commented to me that judo (and martial arts in general) was wrapped up "in the world of belts." Bill, a tough old powerlifting, Olympic lifting and all-round weightlifting athlete, coach, administrator, official and innovator, is a man that I admire and respect. At the time, Bill was the Missouri Valley AAU arbitrator between the warring factions in the judo war between the USJA and the USJF. At that time, the AAU was the governing body of judo in the United States and the two judo organizations were heavily involved in a feud regarding belt ranks (among other things). As a bit of history, the Presidential Sports Act of 1978 broke up the AAU and each sport formed its own governing body which led to U.S. Judo, Inc. being formally organized in 1980 and functional in 1981 (USJI is now USA Judo). The problem was that the judoka in the United States were fighting over the legitimacy of belt rank and who should issue it. Basically, the USJF had an agreement with the AAU (before the 1978 Presidential Sports Act and when the AAU was still the governing body for all Olympic sports in the United States) as the sole group responsible for issuing belt ranks in the United States for judo. If you didn't have a belt issued by the USJF back then, you couldn't wear it in an AAU judo tournament. The USJA sued the AAU/USJF in 1978 and won. that meant that belt issued by the USJF were not the only belts an athlete could wear in an AAU judo tournament. (By the way, when we re-organized judo in the AAU in 1994, we purposely stayed away-and continue to stay away-from issuing any belt ranks. The AAU does not have a belt rank program other than one athlete wears a white belt and the other a red or blue belt for scoring purposes...the scoreboard is either white on one side and red (or blue) on the other.)

But my little history lesson digressed from the main point. Bill Clark's point was that we judo people (and martial arts people in general) spend way too much time worrying about our belt color. Bill told me that the only belt he had any use for was the one that held his pants up and the one he used in the gym...and he didn't much like using either one. Bill was right then, and still is. Don't get me wrong. I understand the history of how belt rank was developed in the early days of Kodokan Judo and how it has evolved (and devolved) through the years. Whether we like it or not, belt rank is very much part of judo, jujitsu, karate and all the martial arts. It's here to stay. The hierarchy within each martial arts organization, group or club often (in fact, almost always) is directly tied to belt rank. The person holding the highest belt rank is the group's leader in many cases. That's the way it is. We humans like to organize ourselves in a variety of ways and belt rank is one of them I suppose.

Getting back to what Bill said; it's true that we live in the "world of belts." Even if we don't particularly like it. In John Saylor's Shingitai Jujitsu Association, we don't have the red and white belt or the red belt for those promoted to higher rank. Once you've been promoted to Shodan, you are simply a black belt and stay a black belt no matter how far you climb in the rankings. (that tends to keep the "belt hounds" out of the organization.) In fact, I really buy into the notion that Prof. Kano devised that there are "graded" (yudansha-black belts) and "ungraded" (mudansha-non black belts) judoka. In essence, this is the original concept of belt rank. But we have taken it too far in the martial arts.

One time, about 1990 or so, I did a clinic for a martial arts club that had 17 different belt levels up to and including 1st Grade Black Belt. They had about every color of belt you can imagine, with different colored stripes running different ways on the belt. Each belt promotion cost the student (in 1990 dollars) $35.00. that was simply for the test. I was told that most people didn't make it on the first try and had to be re-tested (for an additional $35.00 fee of course). That didn't take into account the membership fee which was $50.00. And once the student passed the test, he or she had to buy the belt for $25.00. All that on top of the monthly training fee and the yearly membership fee for the club.

All this prompts me to say that the highest belt rank isn't a black belt, it's a money belt.

Some people, like Norm Miller for instance, handle the subject by not using belt ranks at all. Norm makes a good case for what he does. But most coaches are like me and view belt ranks for what they are. Belts are good motivational tools for students, especially kids; but they are good for adults as well. And, not everyone who participates in judo wants to compete and a hierarchy of belts give structure to a student's advancement and are very real signs of achievement. I use belt ranks for both judo and jujitsu here at Welcome Mat as an indication of the student's skill level and status in the group. When you look at it, ranks of some kind are used in most everything. For instance, a journeyman electrician if considered more skilled and experienced than one that isn't. He may, in fact, be a lousy electrician, but he has a journeyman's card and can get more money and better jobs than the guy who doesn't have that card. I had some awful professors in college but they had tenure and had job security. You get the point. So, the fact is that "rank" surrounds us. Like it or not, it's part of our human experience.

One time (about 1996 or so), a fellow visited Welcome Mat and proudly wore his red and white belt firmly tied around his large stomach and snow-white judogi. He introduced himself to me as "His Name-Rokudan." He said "rokudan" so fast that it actually sounded like part of his name. He looked down at my black belt and asked 'What rank are you?" I answered that I was the head coach and owned the mat we were standing on. He said; "No, really...what rank are you?" I asked him why he was so interested in my rank and he replied that if I wasn't the same rank as him he could run the practices for me while he was visiting Kansas City. I quickly, and with absolutely no smile on my face or friendliness in my tone of voice told him that I didn't care what his rank was, I was the head coach..."but since you have to know, I'm the same rank as you." Reminds me of what Fritz Goss once said; "I don't trust chubby guys wearing red and white belts."

Some quick thoughts. One time, a martial arts instructor told me that people have a "right" to a black belt. No kidding. He was serious. Another time, when I was about 22 and a young black belt, I visited a karate club that advertised that they did judo as well. When I arrived and met the head instructor, it was a young man about the same age as me. He claimed to be a "master" and a 10th degree. He wore an impressive belt too. It was a red belt with a gold tassel sewn on each end of the belt. I am not kidding. The tassels were the kind you would see in an old lady's living room looped around her drapes. By the way, he told me they didn't really do judo there; it was just to get people to come in the door. Another time, a fellow called me on the telephone and wanted a belt rank promotion. The only trouble was...he claimed that he did "no gi jujitsu." I asked him why he needed a belt promotion if he didn't wear a gi. As expected, no rank was issued to him.

How we look at "the world of belts" in judo and jujitsu dictates how we approach our study and practice of these combat activities. There are those who would sell a body part for a belt rank promotion, especially to a red and white belt or red belt. Then, there are those of us who simply view our black belts as a symbol of accomplishment, knowledge and dedication. It's not the belt that matters, but what it took to earn that belt.

Belt rank is part of the martial arts. Whether we like it or not, we do indeed "live in the world of belts." Belts can be used a a motivational tool as well as a method of hierarchy in a club or organization. Both are legitimate uses; and in fact, most people use them in this way. But the fact remains that we Americans are over-ranked. I'm not bashing America...don't get me wrong. I am commenting (bashing) on our proclivity to promote ourselves to high dan grades, and that's a problem. We're more concerned with the color of our belts, and have been for many decades, than we are with our success of our athletes in international judo competition. We're also more concerned with promoting students to high rank than we are with teaching them solid, serious, effective and functional judo. It's my opinion that we advance out students too fast in belt rank and somehow expect to be promoted to a lofty belt rank as we get older. It's time to slow down, be honest with ourselves and approach belt rank with a lot more humility than we have in the past.

The belt isn't the problem. It's how we view the belt. It's the respect (in some cases a begrudging respect, but respect none-the-less) that is more important that is earned from the judo, jujitsu or martial arts community that is important. It doesn't matter what rank Bob Corwin is. What matters is that he has coached hundreds of champions for many years and his athletes are technically very skilled, always show up in shape and are outstanding in every other way. Obviously, Bob must know something about judo or he wouldn't have the kind of success he has had for many years. I don't know what rank AnnMaria Demars is, but I know she was a World Judo Champion and a great one at that. These people are respected for what they have accomplished, what they know, and what they contribute. Maybe this sounds corny, but it's not the color of the belt but it's the fire in the belly that what really counts.

One more thing to mention, and not related to this subject. If you want to read a good blog, go to AnnMaria Demars' blog at http://drannmaria.blogspot.com/ and have a look. I also recommend Geral Lafon's blog but don't have his address in front of me. You can Google it. Both are definitely worth your time. By the way, we will miss Alisher Mantobetov, who recently returned to his home country of Kyrgyzstan. Alisher was in Kansas City for 2 years and was a great addition to our club. He will be missed, but he has an excellent chance of making Kyrgyzstan's 2012 Olympic Team for judo. It was also good to have Jarrod Fobes in town for a few days and do a couple of clinics for his old team-mates at Welcome Mat. Jarrod lives in Denver. Okay, so much for this issue.

WELCOME MAT ONLINE NEWSLETTER Oct. 31, 2010

This issue's quote; "Small things make big things happen." John Wooden

IT'S IMPORTANT TO "SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF SO YOU WON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT THE BIG STUFF." ANOTHER WAY OF PUTTING IT IS TO WORK ON THE MORTAR THAT HOLDS THE BRICKS TOGETHER.

If you're serious about winning at any form of sport combat (and real combat as well), you better take the time and effort to work on the small things...the details...that make the big things happen. Any of you who have trained with me, or have read what I've written in the past, know that I firmly believe it's vital to "sweat the small stuff" and often refer to John Wooden's quote that "Small things make big things happen."

When I was coming up as an athlete in my early career as a kid and young teen-ager, almost all of my instructors told us to work on our "major techniques." Little, if any, time or effort was given to working on made those "major techniques" work. When I was 16, I started training with Ken Regennitter, and he pounded it in my thick head that I had better start paying attention to working on how to control my opponent's movement (Ken didn't use the word "position" but that's what he meant). Ken also convinced me of the importance of effective, hardcore, rough and tumble and "blue collar" groundfighting.I had about 4 years of good, classical Kodokan Judo training and my throwing skills were pretty good, but my newaza stunk, to be quite honest. Although my preference was for groundfighting, I had only a basic idea of how to do it effectively. Ken spent a lot of time on the mat coaching me and handing my butt to me to insure that I knew what he meant. Often, we spent a lot of time working on details...things that weren't apparent or obvious, but necessary for success. Later, I was able to train briefly with Maurice Allan, the World Sambo Champion, and it was Maurice who told me to "Make your judo work for you." In that, Maurice specifically meant to work on the details and mold the technique to fit my body and my needs.

This meant that it was (and continues to be) necessary to spend a lot of time working on things like position, gip fighting, defense, rides, escapes, hip shifts, sit-outs, transitions from throws (or takedowns) to groundfighting, transitions from one groundfighting move to another (pin to pin or pin-switching), pin to armlock, pin to strangle, pin to leglock, armlock to armlock, armlock to strangle...you get the idea. The 'small" stuff that really isn't so "small."

One major thing, in fact the most important thing, that makes all this happen is showing up in shape. Your fitness level must be, as John Saylor puts it "in over abundance" and you must be in superb physical shape to make it all happen the way you want it to and to happen when you want it to (sorry for ending the sentence in a preposition). In other words, you have more strength, more cardio vascular capacity and more fire in the bell than is really needed, but having it makes it so that you can perform it as needed and make up for any technical flaws that you might have. So, the fuel that makes it possible for the small things making big things happen is being in shape, and being in shape so that your skills can be performed under the stress of a real situation, whether it's in a combat sport or in real combat.

Here's an example of what I mean by the "small" stuff or the "mortar that holds the bricks together." Every practice, and I mean every practice, make it a point to grip fight or grip randori with several partners. We often go several 1-minute rounds doing grip randori at every workout I run. We do it for a reason. It's a good warm-up, as we do it early in the workout, but it puts every athlete in a position so that he or she has to fight to gain a better position or advantage over his training partners. This isn't randori, as we try to out-grip each other, and it's very much "grip randori" where each athlete wants to dominate the grip and control his opponent. Each athlete works on his grip so that he can use it to actually attack with in a real match. Often, the grip fighting (grip randori) gets aggressive and this is good. This is working on the "small" stuff (but then gripping really isn't a "small" thing), meaning that it's the grip that sets up the actual throwing attack. If we simply jumped into working on throwing and letting each other do some throws without working on how to actually get the opponent into position to make them work, then we would only work on the "big" stuff and not the important (and necessary) detail of using the grip to set him up to throw him...or break his grip and counter with our own grip...or shut him down so he can't get his grip and we impose our own grip...you get the idea.

Another obvious thing that is the "mortar holding the bricks together" is to always when working in groundfighting, work on breakdowns from a variety of positions, controlling the position with an effective ride, then working for the breakdown, and work for the scoring move (pin or submission). There isn't an opponent on earth who will let you pin him or get him in a submission technique, so you had better work on the details so that you can effectively set him up so that it happens on a consistent basis. These are the "small" things as well. I'm amazed at how many people don't ever train on how to break an opponent down on a regular basis, and hope to merely fall into the move or rely on luck. If you want to armlock someone who is skilled, fit and resisting, then you better work on how to make it happen. No one will ever lay down for you and let you stretch his arm. You have to make it happen, and the only way to make it happen is to work on it on a consistent basis with drills.

Sure, working on lots of uchikomi helps your technique...but it only goes so far. You have to analyze why and how the technique works best and the only way to do it is to "sweat the small stuff." Simply banging out hundreds of uchikomi or butsukari won't get the job done. Work on the grip, movement, tempo, location on the mat, distance between you and your opponent...all that stuff. Do you work regularly on defense? Do you work on how to react if your opponent offers a good defense to your throwing attack? Do you work on countering your opponent's posting a leg or arm when trying to break him down or turn him over onto his back?

Showing up and doing only randori or rolling every workout won't enable (or force) you to work on the things necessary to make you improve. You can show up and beat the hell out of training partners and feel pretty good about yourself...but only for so long. Eventually, you'll run into someone who's better. Not only that, but you'll soon run out of training partners or people who are willing to have the hell beat out of them. As AnnMaria Demars said; "There are no winners in randori." I know this if off the main subject, but really it isn't. Only doing randori does not allow you to work on the "small" stuff. You simply reinforce what you are already doing well if you're mindset is to fight at practice all the time. You'll never improve because you'll only concentrate on beating your randori partner and not being placed in situations that are necessary for you to learn. I'll discuss effective randori training at a later time.

Some of your best workout can be getting together with some training partners and working on moves. Work on things that actually come up in a match or real fight. Place yourself in a bad position and figure out ways to get out of trouble and then reverse the situation. I had many hours on the mat with my buddies as a young man simply working on moves and how to get out of them...working on position and rides. "Brainstorming" workouts where we worked on things that were not common to us, but may be common to someone else. In other words, we worked on the "small things that make big things happen" and the "mortar that hold the bricks together" and often found that these workouts were some of our best.

Train hard, but train smart as well. Working on the "small things" will certainly make you train both hard and train smart.

WELCOME MAT ONLINE NEWSLETTER Oct. 11, 2010

This issue's quote; "Train hard. Fight easier. No fight is easy." Clint Smith

ARE YOU DOING ENOUGH KATA IN YOUR TRAINING?

By Steve Scott

A number of years ago, someone asked me how often we did kata in my club. I told him "every time we work out" and I meant it. You and I both know that he meant one of the standardized kata of Kodokan Judo...Nage no Kata, Ju no Kata and so on. But I was entirely serious when I told him that we did, indeed, do kata every workout (and still do). The person who asked the question views kata in the light tht it's a series of movements that resemble more of a performance that a training exercise. Obviously, we were talking about two different approaches to the purpose of kata. I suppose it all depends on how one looks at "kata" and how it's used in training. I tend to view kata as a method of training effeciently.

Kata is structured training. The word means" form" or "shape" and the context for which it is used definitely implies that "structure" is the core of its meaning; and the use of it when discussing the teaching or practice of judo (or anything else for that matter) directly indicates that there has to be structure to any training program, workout, practice or class.

Kata, for about 50 years, has been thought of (and practiced) as a pre-arranged performance in judo and not the vital training methodoligy that it was inteded to be. It's a fari question to ask me; "So you're tuned in to what Jigoro Kano was thinking? Who are you to say this?" Actually, when doing more research for my upcoming book on judo, I found a lot of information that leads me to believe that Prof. Kano (among other early leaders of the judo movement) used kata to infuse structure into their dailing training programs. Kata was used by Kano to make sure that his early students at the Kodokan learned the skills of judo and didn't simply randori all the time. Kano developed the two kata known as the "Randori no Kata;" Nage no Kata (form of throwing) and Katame no Kata (form of grappling) to specifically provide structured training for his students at the Kodokan in its early days. Initially, the training at the early Kodokan consisted of a lot of randori. Prof. Kano was an adherent of the Kito-ry school of jujutsu and they used "ran o toru" (a phrase meaning "freedom of action") which Kano modified and became "randori." Randori mad eup the bulk of the training at the early Kodokan and Jigoro kano was concerned that his students were not sufficiently skilled in the technical aspects of jujutsu (soon to be called Kodokan Judo by most people). Practices at the Kodokan were rough and tumble; people were getting seriously hurt, but most importantly, Kano didn't want his Kodokan Judo te be just another form of rough-house jujutsu. He wanted his pupils to be skilled. Drawing on his formal training as an educator, Kano took the old concept of "kata" and added a new aspect to it. No long was kata only to be used as the primary way of tranmitting techniuqes from one generation to the next (as used in the old jujutsu schools of Japan), kata was to be used to give a structured, disciplined opportunity for training to augment the randori he was using.

In essence, Jigoro Kano developed the concepts of using a three-pronged approach to the overall development of his students; kata (structured training), randori (free practice) and shiai (testing of one's skills). This concept of kata, randori and shiai was innovative at the time, and continues to be used to this day. This is why I can honestly say that we practice kata every time we work out. If you look at it, kata, randori and shiai are used in every form of physical education and sport. In my upcoming book (as well as in COACHING ON THE MAT), I use the example of a football team using kata, randoir and shiai. The coach runs his players through their drills (skill drills where they learn their plays, as well as fitness drills and drills to increas the team's tactical application of the game-the situratinoal drills) during the week (this is the kata). As the team makes progress, the coach has them scrimmage to allow the football players a chance to execute their skills in a more realistic, game-like situations (this is the randori). On game day, the team plays another team in a real game, and this is their shiai. So, the concept of kata, randori and shiai are all part of a total appraoch to development.

By relegating kata to the stiff, regimented performance that it has become is to do it a dis-service. Kata is the structure that allows us to retain the skills of the past, practice safely and in an orderly, structured way and provides a framework that enables every judoka an atmosphere to learn.

Here's a photo showing kata during a workout at John Saylor's training camp. It may not look like the "kata" people are comfortable with, but it's a kata in every sense of the word nonetheless.

WELCOME MAT ONLINE NEWSLETTER Oct. 1, 2010

This issue's quote; "Discipline yourself so others won't have to." John Wooden

TRAINING AT THE BARN OF TRUTH

It took us 17 hours to get to Perrysville, Ohio from Kansas City, Missouri; 4 hours more than normal and making it the longest road trip in a long time. For some reason, the traffic around Dayton, Ohio (no matter what time of the day or night) is terrible. We ran into 3 traffic jams and at one point Eric Millsap was driving no more than 7 miles per hour for about a 20-minute stretch of time on I-70. We had guys in 2 cars and Eric and I played catch-up to Nick Rothwell, Jeff Owens and Derrick Darling most of the way. At least, the traffic jams provided for more chances for all of us to solve the world's problems and tell dirty jokes. Okay, enough griping about the road conditions...the workout at John Saylor's barn was great.

John had a good crew of guys at the Barn of Truth on the last weekend of September. Mike, Scott and Miguel drove in from Maryland and the rest of the bunch were Ohio guys who wanted to get a good workout with the Welcome Mat bunch. Sean Daugherty and Mike Hallman ran several of the workouts and had some great drills that we certainly will work on at Welcome Mat. Mike's fast-paced and mobile style of groundfighting is not only effective, but a lot of fun to do and I'm glad he lent his coaching skills to the group assembled. Sean's a stud on leglocks, and I'm looking forward to having him get together next May with Jarrod Fobes at Saylor's Spring Camp (May 14 and 15, 2011). That will be a leglock clinic that will need to be filmed.

We started things off right with a good 90 minutes or so in the Barn's weight room before getting on the mat and John introduced the guys to some of his training methods. John has a hard core gym, and is my kind of place. The kind of place where spandex isn't appreciated, but sweating is. This photo shows Jeff Owens benching with John Saylor spotting him. We all gave Jeff a lot of credit for not running away after looking up and seeing that scary view of Saylor from the bench. Seriously, look at the thick PVC pipe Jeff is pressing and what it's holding on each end. Not your typical bench press routine, but one that works the ever-living crap out of your upper body providing serious, functional strength.

We trained on the mat about 8 hours per day for 2 days, getting in as much mat-time as possible while we were at the Barn. And while the workouts were great, the comraderie of being there was even better. I guess there's nothing like shared abuse to make for a cohesive group of people. Melissa Stage, John's office manager, worked her rear end off to make everyone feel comfortable and welcome and she has our sincere thanks. Unfortunately, John didn't have any of his famous potions available for us to drink (see last issue) but that didn't dampen the atmosphere. By the way, Jeff Owens was promoted to Shodan in Shingitai Jujitsu (Saylor was impressed with Jeff's progress since he saw him last year and wanted to make the promotion at the Barn) and Mike Hallman was promoted to Yondan (in an overdue promotion...Mike is really-make that really- skilled). Belt rank isn't the main thing in our world of jujitsu and judo, but these two guys deserved their advancement in rank.

My main goal was to have our Welcome Mat athletes work mostly with John, Mike and Sean and I made it a point to only chime in when asked. We picked up a lot of good ideas on position drills and leglocks from Sean Daugherty and some really effective guard passing drills from Mike Hallman. Fritz Goss and John Powell also stopped by, offering a few words to the group. I know Fritz has done some motivational speaking recently and I would love to see him talk to a bunch of salesmen or something. He would have those people so worked up, they would sell stink to a skunk. John Powell related some of his experiences in Vietnam and it kept everything in perspective when anyone might think he's a "tough guy" after hearing some of the stuff John went through. It's one thing to roll around on a mat, but it's a totally different thing in combat.

One of the highlights of my trips to Perrsyville is spending some time with John's parents. While everyone stayed at the Barn and listended to Melissa's band "Hagatha's Bluff" practice on Saturday night, I went over to Rev. and Mrs. Saylor's house across the road and had a nice, quite visit with them. Melissa's band is great...really...they are professional musicians and play good rock and roll, but it was a good time to get away and have a chat with the Saylors. I might add that John (like me) is an animal lover and I always like visiting his cats and dog. His cat, Dippy, has more personality than a good many people.

All in all, it was worth the long trip. It always is. We had some concentrated, serious workouts with serious people. No one, not one single athlete at the camp, was a specialist in kuchi waza. Everyone drilled, rolled and worked hard...and we enjoyed the comraderie that only shared abuse can engender in a group of athletes, even if it was for only a couple of days.

As October goes on, I'll pound out some more thoughts. The weather's beautiful in Kansas City and tomorrow is Saturday. That may call for walking around the block a few times with some dumb-bells after some time in the weight room. Nothing like trying to irritate father time on a pretty Fall afternoon. More later; until then stay healthy.

WELCOME MAT ONLINE NEWSLETTER Sept. 21, 2010

This issue's quote; "Blessed is he who teaches, for he learns twice." St. Augustine

TRIP TO THE BARN

As reported in my last installment, we'll leave from Kansas City on Thursday to travel to Perrysville, Ohio for several days of training and hanging out with John Saylor and his crew. Six of us are making the 13-hour drive each way. A long drive but certainly worth it. I remember years ago when I would make the trek to Colorado Springs, Colorado on a fairly regular basis to work out at the Olympic Training Center and stay at John's house. That was when John was forming his Shingitai Jujitsu Association in the early to mid-1980s and we spent a fair amount of time working out at his jujitsu dojo in the evenings as well as the daytime workouts at the OTC. Those early workouts were a lot of fun and we had some rough-house workouts in those days. One of the times Becky went with me, we stayed at the Saylor mansion and spent the evening watching Charles Bronson movies (one of my favorite actors, and a legitimate stud). Somehow, watching Charles Bronson motivated John to want to try some groundfighting moves on his living room floor, so we cleared the furniture and proceeded to work on juji gatame drills, and then roll around a little bit to see if they actually worked. Now, here are two grown men, both rather large in stature, wrestling around on a living room floor like two kids. Becky stood by, offering cogent advice to me (since Saylor was kicking my butt in our impromptu match) and John's first wife Kathy had left the room; knowing that it was useless to continue to tell us to stop. Now, years later, John lives in a barn (in Ohio, his home state and not Colorado) that he completely re-designed as a dojo and weight room, along with a large living quarters, office and kitchen and we can still roll around on the floor (now covered in tatami mats) and act like kids. The more things change, the more they stay the same. (An additional note to this...As I remember, Bob Corwin was once at John's house with us when John and I had an impromptu grappling match on his living room floor. Bob found it quite amusing. I seriously wonder how many other poor souls were lured into taking a beating after an evening of watching Charlie Bronson movies at Saylor's house in those days...)

TOM CRONE'S JUDO DVD

My friend Tom Crone in Minneapolis just released a new DVD on judo. Tom calls it JUDO BASICS. It's close to an hour in length and a good addition to anyone's library. I recommend it. Tom worked with me on the National Coaching Staff for juniors (under 21) in the 1980s and early 1990s and is a good coach who knows his stuff. The DVD is $19.95. To order a copy, e-mail Tom Crone at tomailto:tom@tomcrone.com and his web site is http://www.judominnesota.com/ or http://www.northstarjudo.com/om/.

THE SHOULDER SIT
A position in groundfighting that is pretty much taken for granted and not actually taught very much is what I call the "Shoulder Sit." This is the time when the attacker may have just thrown his opponent or may have broken him down and squats on his head and shoulder as Bill West is doing to Josh Henges in this photo. Good judo and jujitsu athletes do it, as well as good submission grapplers. Basically, the top athlete parks his opponent there temporarily and works to secure another move. We drill on it a lot at Welcome Mat by doing the "spin and stretch" drill where the attacker spins his partner over and squats on him as shonw here, and then rolls back to a juji gatame. This is a strong "transition" position and one that I recommend everyone drill on in practice. I'm including this move in the upcoming book on judo that Turtle Press will publish later this year. This is one of those moves that a lot of people simply take for granted, or even don't even think about but should be worked on as much as possible.

CONDITIONING FOR COMBAT SPORTS

John Saylor and I worked hard on this book and it's been getting some great comments from people who have purchased it. The book is 320 pages with over 1,000 photos and full of serious, hard-core training information. Order your copy from http://www.turtlepress.com/ or http://www.amazon.com/ .

THE LEG PRESS

Here's another position in groundfighting that is overlooked, and for the most part, not worked on during practices. It's the "Leg press" position. This photo shows Warren Frank doing the leg press in the sambo national on some poor guy who is about to get his arm stretched. Basically, you roll your opponent onto his back as shown here and control his body with your legs as you sit beside him. Not only can you get a juji gatame from this position, you can control him for a long while in the leg press and switch to a pin or a strangle if the juji gatame doesn't work out. Like the shoulder sit, drill on this position often (we do at Welcome Mat) and you will see the many good things that open up to you and the many bad things that can (and will) happen to the bottom guy.

AAU FREESTYLE JUDO NATIONALS

Ken Brink plans on hosting the 2011 AAU Freestyle Judo Nationals in March in Kearney, Missouri. He's still working on getting a definite date for both the Freestyle Nationals and the AAU Grand Nationals in July. Norm Miller plans on hosting the AAU Nationals in Milwaukee, Wisconsin Aug. 15.

ONE GOOD THING...BLOGS HAVE PHOTOS

I liked doing the old online newsletter in the e-mail format, but this blog stuff isn't so bad after all. The part I like most is that photos can be placed on this blog. As time goes on, more technical stuff will be presented on this blog. However, I still have trouble with the word "blog." It's me...I know, but it's a weird word.

AAU INFORMATION

It's time to renew your AAU membership. The AAU membership runs from Sept. 1 to Aug.31 of the next year. Go to www.aausports.org and follow the links for membership.

TIMING YOUR UCHIKOMI

Here's an idea that will help in your foot speed for throwing, as well as overall speed and ballistic effect. Time how fast you do uchikomis. First, however, it's important to have good form in doing uchikomi drills before trying to time them. The goal is to perform one uchikomi per second. A good idea is to perform 10 static (not moving) uchikomi on your training partner and have another training partner it. If you average 1 per second, then you hit your goal. I realize some people don't like uchikomi, and that's okay with me, but I really believe this drill is a good one to teach precise and skilled movement. Doing both static (non-moving) and moving uchikomi help develop good throwing skills. One more point...there's a difference between uchikomi and butsukari. The butsukari is more suited for development of foot speed. Many people don't differentiate between the two drills, but there is a definite difference. An uchikomi is doing the full movement of the throw up to the actual throw and butsukari is the "chest touching" drill that emphasizes foot speed and pulling action with the hands.

WRAPPING IT UP

The original idea was to get out a newsletter after returning from Ohio, but the urge hit me so here it is. There's still time to get downstairs and get a workout in in the weight room. Until the next issue, train hard and train smart.

WELCOME MAT ONLLINE NEWSLETTER Sept. 12, 2010

This issue's quote; "No fight is easy. Train hard. Fight easier." Clint Smith

FOLLOW UP ON THE FIRST ISSUE NOW THAT I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING (KIND OF...)
Here are a few items that may be of interest. This first item is a "tease" for the new book on judo. A portion of it will be about the freestyle judo rules (but not all of it). I'm putting this in this blog because, since yesterday's blog came out, I have literally received dozens of questions about freestyle judo. I believe Kenney Brink is planning on holding the AAU Freestyle Judo Nationals in March, 2011 in Kearney, Missouri (near Kansas City). The date is still not certain, but that's what he's shooting for.

AN EXPLANATION OF FREESTYLE JUDO: “THE WAY JUDO OUGHT TO BE!”

When it gets down to it, good judo is good judo and what I (and others) call freestyle judo is simply allowing for the full range of judo skills and tactics to be used in a contest. Although many adaptations of judo have emerged since its inception in 1882, there is only one judo and that is the Kodokan Judo of Jigoro Kano. Kodokan Judo is more than simply a sporting event, but, without any doubt, the sport aspect of judo is what has made it an activity that is popular in every corner of the world. Freestyle judo is an outgrowth or continuation of judo as a sporting activity with adaptations in how a judo match is scored making it an uncompromising approach to judo competition. It’s most definitely not my intention to invent a new “style” of judo or in any way replace the Kodokan Judo of Jigoro Kano. Judo, as a combat sport, has stood the test of time and whether people realize it or not, has been the technical and theoretical basis for many other combat sports as well. Because so many types of submission grappling are an outgrowth of judo, or at least parallel with judo, anyone who wants to win in any form of grappling or combat sport that includes grappling will find value in this book.
When judo was accepted as a demonstration sport for male athletes at the 1964 Olympic Games, and then later accepted as a full Olympic sport in 1972, the dye was cast and judo became an international sport. As time passed, women’s judo was added as a demonstration sport in the 1988 Olympics and accepted as a full sport on the Olympic calendar in 1992. I’m not the first person to recognize that judo’s enduring strength has been its ability to absorb and incorporate anything that it has encountered in its long history. Sambo from the former Soviet Union is a good example of what I mean.
In 1962, the Soviets entered the European Judo Championships with a team of sambo wrestlers in judo uniforms and were decidedly successful. Two years later, at judo’s inaugural appearance in the Olympic Games in Tokyo, the sambo men again displayed their unorthodox throwing and grappling techniques and won four bronze medals in the process. Initially, the judo world responded with “that’s not judo” but when it was obvious these Soviet athletes with their weird gripping, unusual throws and aggressive groundfighting weren’t going away, anyone with common sense and a desire to win adapted. As a result, more and more “unusual” (but certainly innovative and effective) techniques were seen in international judo tournaments, and the activity of judo absorbed these new techniques and made them distinctly part of the sport of judo.
These innovations made judo, from a technical point of view, more varied and vibrant. From a sporting point of view, the inclusion of these new techniques made judo more exciting and competitive.
Either by design or good fortune, the contest rules of judo used from the early 1970s through the mid-1990s allowed for an open-ended, competitive and technically sound style of judo to be contested. If you were a specialist in standing or a specialist in groundfighting, it didn’t matter. The rules allowed for a wide range of techniques and this period of time was, in my view, the “golden age” of competitive judo when exciting, new and highly effective techniques were introduced to the world of judo. It was a tremendous period of technical development. However, as the 21st Century appeared, the international contest rules began to favor the standing aspect of the sport. We were told that this made for better television viewing. Maybe it did, but it didn’t do anything good for the technical development of judo and it’s my belief that judo lost a good deal of its combat realism that made it so effective. Athletes began to crouch over in an effort to avoid getting thrown, and while there were specific rules that prohibited such passive and defensive judo, the officials didn’t seem to enforce them. Judo athletes resorted to “negative” or “safe” attacks with an emphasis on leg grabs and dropping low to avoid being countered. In 2009, the contest rules of judo were re-written and limited specific attacks to the legs and lower body. By now, judo had lost its original combat flavor and was so refined it became a type of standing wrestling in jackets. A number of people observed that it resembled Greco-Roman wrestling in a judogi.
In 1998, I hosted the National Shingitai Jujitsu Championships in Kansas City, Missouri. The rules of that tournament were based on both judo and sambo and it proved to be an exciting, competitive event that placed emphasis on fighting heart, effective skill and a high degree of physical fitness. Everyone who attended the tournament agreed that the rules we used provided for one of the best grappling events they ever attended. That was the initial development of what eventually become the rules of freestyle judo. In 2008, I began experimenting with our AAU judo tournaments and, as an additional event at that year’s Missouri State AAU Judo Championships hosted by Mike Thomas in Lee’s Summit, we included a freestyle judo category for the first time. The freestyle rules proved to be more popular than the established judo rules and we knew that we were onto something that would be beneficial for the sport of judo. All through 2008 and 2009, we held local and regional freestyle judo tournaments, making adaptations to the rules as needed. In November, 2009, Ken Brink hosted the first AAU Freestyle Judo Nationals in Kearney, Missouri (near Kansas City). That initial tournament was a real success. Freestyle judo proved to be an excellent addition to the judo community, as well as a viable alternative to those who believed the prevailing contest judo rules were too restrictive.
As mentioned before, it would be presumptuous for me, or anyone, to imply that freestyle judo is a “new” style of judo or an improvement on what judo is. What has been done is to format the rules of judo so that as many aspects of the sport can be used by as many different athletes as possible. The Ippon has been retained but other changes were made in how the match is scored so that it’s as complete a stage as possible for athletes to compete in from a sporting context. The goal was to bring back the original “combat sport” element of judo, allowing for the athletes to use as many of the skills and techniques (both standing and in groundfighting) of judo possible. My good friend John Saylor was the first to comment that freestyle judo is “the way judo ought to be!”
How we view a sporting event is directly affected by the rules of the game. Judo is no different. The rules of the sport of judo have changed through the years, and as is the case with any physical activity, these changes in the contest rules affect how people teach, learn and train in judo. The early rules of judo made for a rough and tumble form of fighting and for the safety of the combatants, the rules of judo underwent numerous changes over the years.

DO TOUGH GUYS HAVE CAULIFLOWER EARS?

Josh Henges told the recently that he had a conversation with someone who questioned if Josh was "tough" because he doesn't have cauliflower ears. Josh assured him that "tough" is a very relative term, but having a cauliflower ear really isn't the hallmark of being a tough guy. I think Josh mentioned to this person that he would rather be the guy giving a cauliflower ear to somebody else. But this brings up a good point. Really, I've seen a lot of seriously "tough" guys with cauliflower ears. but then, I've seen about an equal number who don't have cauliflower ears. Maybe it's not worth mentioning, but since I am, it's worth thinking about. (This photo shows two "tough" guys. One has a cauliflower ear...Shawn Watson. The other doesn't...Josh Henges.) I remember, as a 19-year old, getting a cauliflower ear. I didn't want a cauliflower ear, and for that matter, I didn't want a flat nose. Even back in those days, doctors could drain a cauliflower ear, and that's what I had done. Maybe it would have made me look tough, but that really never crossed my mind. However, I remember a guy who was tough, and good at judo too. He was a training partner of mine back in the 1970s and had won the collegiate nationals and was a serious judo man. But, he didn't have a cauliflower ear and he wanted one. So, he worked hard by banging anything hard he could find against his ear and eventually had a really tough looking cauliflower ear. He was proud of that ear, as it really did look like a hunk of cauliflower on the side of his head. A genuine tough guy with a cauliflower ear. Now that fits the stereotype.

But the bottom line is that if you get a cauliflower ear and don't have it drained...that's up to you. But there are a lot of people who watch way too much pro wrestling or MMA on television who think that a cauliflower ear makes a "tough guy."

TRAINING AT THE BARN OF TRUTH

Several of us will be making the 13-hour drive to Perrysville, Ohio to get some time on the mat with John Saylor and his bunch. John's inviting anyone who would like to attend. The workouts will be at John's barn Thursday, Sept. 23, Friday, Sept. 24 and Saturday, Sept. 25. Call John to sign up or get more information. We'll be doing both "gi" and "no gi" training and spend most of our waking hours rolling around on the mat.

This photo shows John's special tonic that he drank for a while. He told me that it was "nature's viagra" and regulr use will certainly do a man good. Several of our Welcome Mat guys sampled it (I learned a long time ago, after drinking some kind of green sludge, to politely avoid drinking any of John's potions) and reported that it did, indeed, taste as bad as it looks. The tonic wasn't around during my last trip to Perrsyville in May, but when John reads this, he may make up another batch. Seriously, training at Saylor's is a realy treat, that is if you consider training hard, having someone try to choke you senseless and sweat your butt off a treat (but I do). Being aroudn John is the real treat and the friendship and great atmoshphere at the Barn of Truth is worth sitting in a car 13 hours each way. It's not too late to join us, so call John at (419) 938-6089 if you want information on the workout.

THE NEXT POST SHOULD BE IN ABOUT A MONTH

Okay, it seems that this blog thing isn't so bad after all. However, it's time to get off this thing, go teach a CPR class and then go down to my basement and get a good lifting workout in. Don't forget to look into getting our new book CONDITIONING FOR COMBAT SPORTS at either www.TurtlePress.com or www.Amazon.com and please write a good review. No kidding, it really does help and there are cretins out there who post negative reviews simply to kill sales of competitor's books. Talk to you in about a month.