Teenagers' Judo Class


Some of our teenage members attend the children's class, some attend the adults' class. The teenager class gives them an additional opportunity to train with people their own age.

Judo consists of throwing techniques and ground fighting techniques. Our club puts equal emphasis on both aspects. This means that we spend more time on ground fighting than some judo clubs.

Our teenagers learn the adult curriculum. This includes much more in-depth ground fighting than in our children's class. They will learn all the submission holds (chokes and arm locks) that the adults do. We also place more emphasis on self-defence applications in the teenager class than we do in either the children's or the adults' classes.

A typical class starts with a warm-up game followed by stretching. The beginning of class also includes sport-specific movements such as break-falls, shrimping and bridging, etc.

The stand-up half of class includes time for technical instruction, free drilling with a partner, and sparring. Focus is sometimes spent on developing a single technique, or a combination of two or three throws. Throws can be practiced to completion on our tatami mats, or hard throws can be practiced on our crash mat for safety. Isolation sparring is used to practice a specific aspect of judo (such as foot sweeps, turn-around throws, or grip fighting). New students can try out their throws in sparring as soon as they demonstrate that they can take falls safely. Every class includes free sparring, as this is the fastest way to learn functional technique.

The ground fighting half of class includes time for technical instruction, drilling with a partner, and sparring. New students are first taught the dominant positions of ground fighting (hold-downs) and are invited to spar right away to try out these positions. They are then taught the defensive positions of judo (guard and turtle) and spar again. They are taught escapes from hold-downs into defensive positions, reversals from defensive positions into dominant positions, and finally submission holds (chokes and arm locks). Experienced students continue exploring all the aspects of ground fighting in drilling, free sparring, and situational sparring.

Our members are encouraged to go to competions to challenge themselves, to test their judo and to have fun. There is usually opportunity for car pooling and shared hotel rooms. We attend several judo competitions every year. Some of our members also like to compete in brazilian jiu-jitsu and no-gi submission grappling tournaments for additional experience.