Judo women have a lock on their art

[Bill Glasheen]

This article about the Rousey women made me smile.



Keeping judo in the family

- Bill

[JDeLuca]

Not a sport for the weak of heart.

"If they don't like it they should take up ping pong"

After I missed a month of practice because of a knee injury this same coach looked at me when I walked on the mat and told me the "dance studio' was down the hall.

BTW he was there when I injured my knee. Class never stopped.

[f.Channell]

Jim,
Wonder who your coach was, is he going to Athens?

You should have been there when I split my head open last May.
Wrapped my head up in an old Judo gi, and wrapped an obi around it.
Judo gi's make great bandages.

Fred

[Bill Glasheen]

It is an instructor's dream to come across such wonderful raw material to work with. Much of this competitiveness and toughness is bred, and not made.

Anyone know where these women are, and if we can steal them?

- Bill

[f.Channell]

Bill,
Thought you'd like to know.
Rousey made the Olympic team for Athens.
They had the trials this past weekend.
Fred

[Dana Sheets]

Fred,

Sent you a PM

Dana

[HALFORD E. JONES]

Reminds me of the Aikido masters who do the same thing: break arms,wrists,etc. when you fail to yell or say,'MAITE'(spelling) even though you might tap for all your life is worth. It's a matter of principle in this art of aikido apparently. Strangely enough,this sort of thing takes place on the mats where it is not usually 'randori' but pre-arranged motions for many! Well, women's judo, if I recall correctly, allows only the arm bar and maybe this is true for all judo matches. Seems, if I am not again mistaken, that women's matches were not involved in grappling but in throwing originally as grappling was considered or unladylike? Well, judo does toughen one where other martial arts don't but you have to do judo to understand what this really means.

[HALFORD E. JONES]

Many,if not all,judo competitors have one favorite technique that allows them to win no matter what you do to avoid it even when you know what it is! Surpisingly, very few judo players can do all the holds, throws,etc. according to the canon of judo! This is true of champion competitors because they don't need to know anything other than what they do best!

[Bill Glasheen]

This is true of champion competitors because they don't need to know anything other than what they do best!

Yes and no... Your comments bring up some very interesting and important issues.

You only need to "master" a few techniques. But you need to "know" the full repertoire. As they say, "Know your enemy."

The UFC was an eye-opener to the average martial artist who believed in the infallibility of his martial art. The Gracies and other grapplers did so well in the beginning not because BJJ and other arts are superior, but because they trained with and against their competition. The arrogance of the striking martial artists was their downfall.

Now everyone who steps into these rings is a "mixed martial artist," even if they only have a few techniques "mastered." Strikers are once again doing well, but only because people like Joey are ready, willing, and able to take it to the mat if that's the way the match goes.

- Bill

[HALFORD E. JONES]

I should have clarified things a bit. Judo and Aikido and karate and boxing bouts, tournaments, whatever, usually do not follow the 'anything goes' rule but in such 'sporting' contests,whatever, they have certain things going for them as you know. If you look at boxing and see just what punches and combinations win then you will see what I mean. Of course, certain strategies help in setting up the opponent for the specific technique you want to employ.If you look at the techniques that judo champions use, actually use,in contests then you will see they do not exhaust by any means all the possible techniques,etc. The same is true in karate: remember 'superfoot',etc. Sometimes even in jiu-jitsu or self-defense or street fighting(old style) one or two or three methods prevailed! How many times has a choke/stranglehold been effective in such fracas? Will they work forever, all the time, probably not but the percentage of times they will is still high, don't you think as opposed to not doing anything?

[f.Channell]

Halford,
One other thing which I find interesting is that quite often in Judo your favorite technique is not your most effective.
Possibly this is because your opponent knows this is your best technique or perhaps not.
There are something like 99 throws in judo, plus their endless angles of attack and setups.
However if you look at the studies conducted there are less than ten which win 90% of the time if I recall correctly.
So why learn 99 if all you need is 1-3 good ones?
This is where the art comes in I suppose.
F.

[Bill Glasheen]

So why learn 99 if all you need is 1-3 good ones?

That's easy.

1) Everyone is different (unique). You never know which ones YOU will be good at until you give the whole menu a try.

2) It's important as an instructor to know it all because you never know which techniques each of your students will be good at. It's a HUGE mistake making students clones of yourself. Sadly though this is what most instructors do.

3) Now and then you come up with that freak situation where a certain technique you thought you'd never need or use suddenly becomes the most obvious solution.

4) It's good for the brain and the body to broaden your horizons.

5) Even though people rattle on and on about Hick's law and needing just a few solutions to a problem to respond quickly, I personally think folks really don't understand how that law actually works in practice. IF an individual makes all the repertoire follow just a handful of simple principles, then the few principles - and not the individual techniques - will be what matters in the end. That means one maximizes one's ability to respond to myriad situations with just a small set of principles that can be spun in an infinite number of permutations.

- Bill

[HALFORD E. JONES]

I have discussed this same topic, sort of,in other forums and perhaps in this one. It is simply this: can principles exist without techniques to demonstrate them or can techniques exist without principles to explain them? This discussion of two aspects usually has to be resolved by each person to their own satisfaction probably. Arguments for both contentions are strong,of course, but I think that techniques came first and in 'peacetime' or leisure moments, warriors, soldiers, etc. analyzed if they were so inclined what seemed to work on the battlefield, in the street, or the dojo,etc.,etc. and more literary/scholarly types began writing these things down,etc.,etc. Taking this to its perhaps logical conclusion one could expect that at least one, probably three, techniques could show the basic and even advanced principles involved. I think some confusion enters when people do not define what a technique is and what a principle is and they tend to mix them up a bit,especially on the popular level. I'd be interested in your comments on this.Thanks.

[f.Channell]

Halford,
From my readings I know that Kano stated that he learned many techniques but never the principles which made them work or not work.
He was of course one of the foremost educators of his time.
It was the training of these principles which he felt were most important.
I could elaborate more but I would need to take out his essays and read them over again.
I am fortunate to have his rare book.
http://www.bestjudo.com/brjudo.shtml
A hard one to find.
F.

[HALFORD E. JONES]

Is the book you have in Japanese or an English translation? Anyway, the fact that the old jiu-jitsu schools focused on techniques or practice and practicality rather than theory should not detract from this discussion. It is quite a 'standard practice' to withhold the so-called 'secrets' of the arts from even the most dedicated students and disciples, and in some cases given only to family members,etc. Well, I am sure those of you acquainted with the history of martial arts in general know this already. Kano did come up with many principles but you have to admit that some of them are most difficult to implement. If you look at the kata of judo,the one that attempts to demonstrate the judo principles, you will see what I mean,but only a few persons really get into the "traditional judo kata of Kano Jiudo" and they much prefer randori as a rule or waza.