U.S. Tennis Association is the latest group to change the way things are done in its sport. Coming to the conclusion that American tennis is at its sorriest state ever- no American player is ranked in the top ten- it has launched a multi-million dollar development program called Ten and under Tennis.
My colleague Steve Scott, recently wrote in his newsletter, “As an interesting sidelight to how history repeats itself, a variety of these techniques are used in various forms of submission grappling and mixed martial arts, although they continue to be illegal in judo competition.” He was talking about various forms of shime waza or constricting techniques, not necessarily neck chokes. Not very long ago, one of my readers commented, “Please correct me if I’m wrong; wrestling, Brazilian jiujitsu, and competitive sambo will allow all Judo throws of the Kodokan in competition. With the IJF rules, Judo does not. This is a disgrace.” I couldn’t agree more.
Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful is the title of Yuriko Gamo Romer’s still-in-progress documentary film chronicling the life of Keiko Fukuda. Ms. Fukuda, the last surviving judoka to have studied directly under Jigoro Kano, was recently promoted to 10th Dan by USA Judo. She remains the highest ranking female judoka in the world, and becomes the first female 10th dan.
While growing up in Secaucus, New Jersey, I started collecting stamps as a project for a Boy Scouts badge when I was eight. My Czechoslovakian grandmother and French father were good sources for foreign stamps. Dad worked in the restaurant business in New York City and had access to lots of customers from all over the world. When I moved to France at age ten, my stamp collecting took off like a rocket.
This past Sunday, I ran another quarterly in-house developmental tournament using what I call Judo America rules- no penalties, no terminal ippon, and no banned techniques. As players started filtering into the dojo, one of my dads approached me with his young son. He told me his son had fallen off his bike the previous day and skinned his knee. He brought his son to the tournament hoping that his son could compete, but was worried that he might bleed all over. I took a look at the “wound” and told his son to get on the mat and be ready to compete. It was pretty superficial.