Notes on bjj to judoka

**Shuma-Gorath** · Posted On: 9/02/2004 8:16pm

Mikus, one of my Judo coaches blew his right shoulder in competition and has basically given up on his right uchi-mata. Now he has to drill the **** out of his left uchi-mata to get back to where he was. Still, I hope your arms get back to where they were.

**mikus** · Posted On: 9/02/2004 10:59pm

Omar: The thing is that I've never met anyone who's problem with leg reaps was being on one leg for a split second. The only time people have what SEEMS to be a balance problem is when they are not driving forwards and they themselves get driven backwards. Still, that is not a balance problem in the way that standing on one leg would help. I'm not gonna say it's COMPLETELY worthless, but certainly it is not the best way to spend your time.

Thanks Shumagorath.

**Shuma-Gorath** · Posted On: 9/02/2004 11:22pm

This thread reminded me to read more of Best Judo, and in doing so I've already found two new guard passes to try out Tuesday at BJJ. Not only that, it looks like they won't get me triangled. Thank you.

**Omar** · Posted On: 9/03/2004 4:46pm

Mikus,

I think we may have slightly different ideas about what it means to have good 'balance'.

Balance as you independantly apply a technique is one thing but with any throw one major key is going to be ACTIVELY disrupting your opponents balance while preserving your own. That's probably the most useful thing that can be taken out of push hands for non Taiji people. You can sometimes just grab and yank for a throw but better still is to make contact and then **** with their balance. Little gentle pushes, chorizontal circles, switching it up between different directions and so on.

Think about it this way, if you were a statue made of cast iron in a "rock solid" stance, I could still knock you over with no more force than I have in my index finger. Why? Because your 'balance' is not dynamic. I just walk around to the weak side and give a gentle push. So when your fighting wiith your opponent to control each others balance it's really a matter of both of you simultaneously making zillions of little adjustments AND trying to feed confusing information to your partner to he can't compensate. I'm not talking about "losing your balance" in the middle of a throw, I'm talking about ...what do they call it in Judo? Kuzishi? or maybe that just refers to the plain vanilla version of balance that we all learned on the playground as kids.

The other thing I got from those silly exercises of mine was a way to make reaps more circular and less angular. It makes them harder to resist. Pull back at the bottom as you hit forward up top is kind if easy to fight if you see it coming. But make the bottom part of an osoto gari (to your opponents right side) go in a circle clockwise while your top part adds a bit of counter-clockwise motion . . . much harder to resist.

**Dochter** · Posted On: 9/03/2004 4:58pm

Originally posted by Omar
one of the MAJOR things I took from it was just how to have a good base on the ground.

...

Do the BJJ guys seem to not care to much about getting rolled over? It was always a big deal to me to ty and stay on top.

Having a good base is very important. It also is heavily stressed. Nobody wants to be mounted.