Judo Coaching: great coaches make great players

If you are a judo coach you have a very important role. If you are paid as a judo coach, then you have a very important job.

Why is it an important job?

You have a responsibility to your judoka, the athletes that trust you. The trust is often built on respect. Your judoka respect you, your behaviours and your opinions. They value your knowledge, they learn through the way that you communicate that knowledge.

When you share knowledge effectively, it can be utilised by the judoka to win a match. The judoka understands that the win is because of the knowledge that you shared with them. This reinforces their belief in you, and the knowledge that you have, and your ability to communicate it effectively.

Sometimes your knowledge is found wanting. You are not really sure how to deal with a certain opponent, or a certain kumi-kata situation. You are embarrassed at your limited knowledge in a certain area. You try to hide it. Maybe you convince yourself that you think you know the answer. Your judoka trusts you. They try their best, but they don’t succeed. Your limited knowledge let them down. There is a small chink in their respect for you. They are not sure to fully believe you the next time. Gradually the relationship breaks down. The trust and communication that you had together starts to fall apart. Each thinks the other is to blame.

How can we avoid this? Certainly you cannot hope to win all the matches, your relationship cannot be built on only winning.

If we think about a judo competition, in each round, half the players win their matches, and half the players lose their matches. That’s the sobering thing about judo. You either win or lose. If you keep a record of the matches of all your judoka, if the win record is better than 50% you are doing better than average.

If your judoka can see that you are constantly trying to improve your knowledge, they will see that you are investing your time to help them. They will see that you are studying for mutual welfare and benefit. They will have greater confidence that the suggestions that you make are based on reflection, on evidence, on research.

Research, evidence and reflection can help the judo coach to make better decisions, to offer better advice, to have access to a wider range of ideas. Study into communication methods and techniques can help the decisions, advice and ideas be understood and applied more effectively and more efficiently. Maximum efficiency with minimum effort.

Study hard, don’t expect it to be easy, and your players will benefit. They may even win more matches. The harder you work, the luckier they get.

Good luck to all your judoka.

 

Reflections and Resolutions

res·o·lu·tion (rz-lshn) (The Free Dictionary) noun.

1. The state or quality of being resolute; firm determination.

2. A resolving to do something.

3. A course of action determined or decided on.

At the Kodokan in Tokyo, and in many other dojos around the world, the New Year is marked by a Kagami Biraki ceremony. Literally this means cutting the kagami-mochi, the rice cakes traditionally eaten during the ceremony. The kagami is a mirror. You can see the eight sided mirror represented in the Kodokan badge.

This is the time of year that many judoka make resolutions to follow in the coming year. It could be that they are part of a process of goal setting, and review, which their coach has helped them develop.

But what about the coach?

Does the coach set themselves goals? Are you going to make any resolutions as a coach?

Probably best start by a little self-analysis. What are your strengths and weaknesses? Which areas could you seek to better yourself in the coming year?

Knowles, Borrie and Telfer recognise that “Recently, reflective practice has emerged as a key skill with which to enhance coach learning and increase the value of coaches' educational experiences.”

The symbol of the Kodokan reminds judoka to reflect on themselves, and at each new year to cut through the mirror and look at ourselves afresh.

The European Judo Union, through their Judo Knowledge Commission, also recognise the importance of reflective practice among coaches. The suite of coach awards at levels 3, 4, 5 & 6 all encourage reflective practice to help the coaches to develop.

Many of the coaches that have followed the EJU Coach Awards were rewarded in 2012 by seeing some of their athletes compete in the London Olympic and Paralympic Games. If you would like to improve your coaching to give your athletes the best chance, then be resolute.

To find out more about judo coach education opportunities visit www.judospace.com

Good luck and gambatte, to all judo coaches and their athletes in 2013.

Knowles, Z., Borrie, A., & Telfer, H. 2005. Towards the reflective sports coach: issues of context, education and application. Ergonomics, Volume 48, Issue 11-14, 2005. Special Issue: Sports, Leisure and Ergonomics (SLE) Conference, 19-21 November 2003. pages 1711-1720.

Be a lucky judo coach

"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." (Darrel Royal)

When your player goes off to the competition, often his friends or family will wish him "Good Luck!". As the coach you know that the luck is dependent on the preparation you have done as a team, both player and coach. The player puts in the effort to complete the sessions, the coach puts in the effort to ensure that the content and volume of those sessions is correct.

Great coaches study hard to ensure that the meal they are seving to the player is made up of the right ingredients. They want to know it's right, not just guess that it's right. They want to leave no stone unturned in their quest to provide their player with the best preparation.

The European Judo Union are helping coaches to do that, by providing a range of study opportunities for coaches, so that they can create their own luck.

Show me a champion judoka, and I'll show you a coach who studied hard to ensure the player had the best preparation.

Good Luck!

The EJU is working with the Judospace Educational Institute to offer the Level 3 Advanced Coach Award. Visit http://www.judospace.com/

Ippon!

Yoyogi Stadium, Row 10, Seat 14, 10 am on the 9th September... Hajime. The start of the World Judo Championships Tokyo 2010. The first time the World Championships had returned to its spiritual home for 58 years. So began a five day judofest, an extravaganza of waza, a whirling of judogi, a battering of tatami, and an explosion of ippon.

Ippon was the theme of the competition, from the calligraphy in the opening ceremony, to the spellbinding Oguruma by Junpei Morishita to win the 66kg.

http://www.judovision.org/?p=7542

Congratulations to coach Kenzo Nakamura for that result. Kenzo has been a guest lecturer on the European Judo Union Level 4 Performance Coach Award, where great coaches learn to make great players.

Can you imagine coaching your player in the final of the World Championship? An epic journey begins with the first step. Go to http://www.judospace.com/ and enrol on the EJU Level 3 Advanced Coach Award online. A small step to take to be the best coach you can be.

Breaking Balance

Kuzushi. Syd Hoare suggests it "is still the undiscovered secret of judo". I thought I'd try to discover a little more.

Over the years I've come to realise that people are so much easier to throw if their balance is broken. As I mature I find that I seek out any possible way to be more efficient with my efforts. It seems to me that practicing with partners
who are in a state of unbalance would be much more efficient. So how do I achieve that?

Murata Sensei, of the Kodokan, discussed with me the idea that kuzushi is an integral part of tsukuri.

Moshanov suggests that five of the most basic methods of kuzushi are to be found in the Itsutsu-no-kata, the Forms of Five. If kuzushi is so fundamental to the application of waza, then why is
itsutsu-no-kata so rarely taught? Perhaps if it was taught more then kuzushi wouldn't be such an undiscovered secret.

Leggett and Watanabe suggest that "the idea of judo is not to smash an opponents strongest point, but to get him off balance and keep him off balance...", applying less force to his weak point.

Kano states "Even if your opponent has two or three times your power, if you can execute your move at the precise moment he is off balance, you can easily throw him by something as simple as tripping him."

Sounds to me like the idea of maximum efficiency with minimum effort. Best use of energy. Seiryoku saizen katsuyo.

Hmmm... So it seems that the application of kuzushi is the manifestation of seiryoku Zenyo. There's a thought.

If you are interested in finding out more about the application of kuzushi, why not enrol on the Advanced Coach Award with the European Judo Union. Visit http://www.judospace.com/ to find out more.

Hoare. S., (2002) Judo Strategies. pp 48-49. Ippon Books.

Leggett. T. & Watanabe. K., (1964) Championship Judo. Foulsham.

Moshanov. A., (2004) Judo from a russian perspective. Ipa-Verlag.

Kano. J., (2005) Mind over muscle. Kodansha.

Judo Practice

When I am going to judo, I say I am going to practice. When I return, my wife asks me “how was the practice?” I started to reflect on what do we mean by practice.

Some say practice makes perfect, other say, no, practice just makes permanent.

So what does the thesaurus tell us about practice?; habit, process, exercise, application, discipline, preparation, rehearsal, repetition, study, training, work-out, drill, hone, polish, sharpen, pursue, apply, accomplish, create, develop, persevere, persist, form.

One definition of the verb to practice is: To do something repeatedly in order to acquire or polish a skill.

So the concept of repetition is important. I would suggest that guided practice is important. Imagine your player has a taiotoshi which is technically poor, biomechanically incorrect, then when they practice it, repeatedly polish it, they will get very good at doing taiotoshi badly. If they practice hard enough, they could indeed become expert at doing a bad taiotoshi.

So as a coach you need to be sure that your technical correction is accurate, then encourage repetition. Repetition in uchikomi, in nage komi, in tandoku renshu, in kakari geiko, in shiai. Give your players every opportunity to practice. Every opportunity to study and create their judo. Every opportunity to persevere, to develop and polish their judo.

Can you meet them before work, before school? Can you get in the dojo at 6 am? Can you remove excuses? Give them technically correct instruction, and help motivate them to practice. If they normally practice for an hour, for 60 minutes, could you extend it by 6 minutes? You would be increasing their opportunity to practice by 10%.

As a coach, can you improve yourself so you can give the players the very best guidance, the best instruction? Imagine the total possible knowledge in judo can be put in a cup, then ask how full is your cup? Now you can follow judo coach education online, at times that suit you, and interact with other coaches and coach educators. All accredited by the European Judo Union. Find out how at http://www.judospace.com/.

Enjoy your practice.

10,000 hours of judo

I have spent many years studying how you go about creating an environment which will allow a judo player to develop who is capable of medalling at Senior World Championships and Olympic Games.

One of the most compelling theories for me is the work by Ericsson et al (1993) which suggests the 10,000 hour rule. Ie, that it takes 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to become expert at something. This concept is popularised in Gladwell’s excellent book, Outliers (Gladwell, 2008).

So let’s think about training volumes achievable for a judo player. And let’s also think about ‘deliberate practice’. Training at club level in the UK, in a mixed ability group of average motivation, one might have a 90 minute session, of which 15 -30 minutes, is the time spent by the player intently focussed on technical improvement, or hard randori where they are technically challenged. The rest is warming up, resting, talking, acting as uke, helping lower grades or younger players, and playing games. Of course it is possible with the right attitude to get some benefits from these activities, but often I see that is not the case. Let’s be generous and say that there is 30 minutes of deliberate practice achieved. At a rate of 2 sessions per week, that gives you one of the required 10,000 hours.

Assume the player has good attendance and manages to attend the club for 50 weeks per year. Then they will achieve 50 hours towards their goal that year. It will only take them 200 years to become expert.

Most players are past their best by then!

So they clearly need to do more volume of deliberate practice. What if they could be in a well motivated training group, with a more experienced expert coach, who can keep them on task. And what if the sessions were lengthened to 150 minutes, of which, 2 hrs was deliberate practice. Could they do more than 2 sessions per week? How about 5 sessions per week? How about also doing a morning session with them? Could the coach keep them on task for 2hrs each weekday morning? They would probably have smaller numbers, so the coach would have to work harder to keep the sessions fresh.

But then they would have 4 hrs deliberate practice per day. Five days per week, That’s 20 hrs a week. In the earlier regime it would take our player 20 weeks, or 5 months to cover the same ground. Imagine our second player does this for 50 weeks per year. Then they can fit in 1000 hours per year. So they can feasibly become expert in 10 years.

So if we create a training environment where they can do 20 hrs per week deliberate practice, and we start when they are 16 years old, then by the time they are 26 perhaps they will be capable of winning at World level.

Could we start earlier? Gymnasts and swimmers start their deliberate practice much earlier. But in judo the best players are usually a bit older. Exceptionally they are 20 or 21 years old. Usually 23 – 28.

Do you have a talented payer you are working with as a coach? Are they doing deliberate practice? If so, work out for how many hours per week, and by what age they will have completed 10,000 hours.

For further reading on this topic try the references below.

To become that experienced, expert coach that can keep them on task, enrol on the Advanced Coach Award with the European Judo Union. Visit http://www.judospace.com/ to find out more.

Ericsson, K. A., (2000). Expert Performance and Deliberate Practice - An updated excerpt from Ericsson (2000). Accessed on 2nd May 2010 at: http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/ericsson/ericsson.exp.perf.html

Ericsson, K. A., Krampe, R., and Tesch-Romer, C., (1993). The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance. Psychological Review, Vol. 100. No. 3, 363-406. Accessed on 2nd May 2010 at: http://projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf

Gladwell, M., (2008). Outliers – The story of success. Allen Lane. London.