If you are thinking about getting into a martial art - and particularly judo - here's something to watch out for. There are these clubs that teach this pseudo-judo with the stated goal of getting new competitors ready to do tournaments ASAP. I call this type of activity pseudo-judo because competition-ASAP is not the original intended purpose of judo.
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See, from what I can tell, judo was envisioned by Kano as a disciplined, life-long practice of self-improvement that might incidently have some benefits in the realm of self-defense, and which might incidently be an outlet for occasional athletic competition. Competition-ASAP pseudo-judo is a short-term, destructive practice with fairly limited self-defense value and roughly the same self-improvement value as tee-ball. Don't get me wrong - tee-ball does benefit its players, and so can pseudo-judo, but neither is something that you can do as a discipline for years.
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If a coach tells you when you first sign up that he wants to teach you 1-2 throws and a little groundwork "real quick" so that you can be ready to compete in a tournament in 2 weeks... watch out. He is looking to add one more competitive judo monster to his stable - he's not looking to help you improve yourself.
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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com
