How to rapidly learn a martial art?

[brainfreez]

Hi there,

I'm starting a Judo class soon, they train 1 hour a week, and I want to progress fast. Would anybody advise on how to make the most of the short class time, and ways to train outside of class?

Thanks

 

[Martial D]

Maybe pay extra for private lessons?

Other than that practice what you learn for that one hour a week with a partner as often as possible.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I'm starting a Judo class soon,

Someone forces his son to use "hip throw" only for 2 years and nothing else. Later on his son won the 1st place in a Judo tournament in Taiwan. It's not how much that you know. It's how well that you can do in one technique.

Try to create yourself a sparring/wrestling club. You may only go to class once a week, it doesn't stop you from sparring/wrestling 15 rounds daily and 7 days a week.

If you want to learn how to fight, you will need to fight.

 

[TSDTexan]

Hi there,

I'm starting a Judo class soon, they train 1 hour a week, and I want to progress fast. Would anybody advise on how to make the most of the short class time, and ways to train outside of class?

Thanks

number 1!
Learn how to fall.... drill this hard and fast! make it the first thing you gain a handle on.
Avoid judo injuries, by preparing your body to safely fall without concious thought.

2.
Dedicate yourself to a minimum of 1 hour daily practice. Everything you can solo drill do it.

3.
Google judo solo drills. Do em until you hate em, and then do them some more.

4.
Stay hungry and motivated.
When you eventually plateau, double your solo training time for two weeks, then take 2 or 3 days of time not training. and resume training at 1 hour a day.

5.
Watch lots of judo throwing tutorials, YouTube has hundreds.

6.
ShinGiTai!
Develop your body. Develop your mind. And Develop your skill/technique.

7.
Purchase a judo throwing dummy.
Equip it with a DoGi.

 

[oftheherd1]

You have gotten good advice above from everybody. Especially from @TSDTexan. Especially break falls. That is more important than you may realize, and will pay dividends for the rest of your life, not only in MA, but it everyday life.

 

[now disabled]

Yes all good advice

I will triple reinforce the need to learn to break fall, No matter if it backwards forwards or flying it will stand you in good stead and if you can take good ukemi you will be in demand thereby you will get to practice with the better students and learn faster as you will see them perform the technique and if you can take ukemi for them they will help you

 

[Punchy]

Along with practicing technique and proper falling/ rolling, which are infinintly importtant, make sure you condition your body with proper strength training and flexibly training.

This will help offset potential injuries and overuse injuries.

 

[Danny T]

Embrace the suck, the struggle.
Work the single person drills/exercises your instructor gives you. But without a partner to do the actual controls, grip fighting, throws and ground positions it is going to be difficult.

 

[hoshin1600]

get a note book. after class immediately write down everything that was new to you, take lots of notes on specifics like foot or hand position and the names of throws. taking notes will help commit them to memory. dont trust your memory all by itself, it will forget a lot.

show up for class early and be the last one to leave. you could double your mat time. dont get sucked into socializing with everyone. the bulk of people will be standing around talking before, during and after class.. dont do it. if you want to get the most out of your time ,.,,your there to work..Get to it.

 

[Punchy]

Embrace the suck, the struggle.......

I'm sure it sounds more poetic in Chinese.

 

[TSDTexan]

Embrace the suck, the struggle.
Work the single person drills/exercises your instructor gives you. But without a partner to do the actual controls, grip fighting, throws and ground positions it is going to be difficult.

I wanted to tell him about grip fighting but that's beyond week 1. it's more towards intermediate.

 

[TSDTexan]

get a note book. after class immediately write down everything that was new to you, take lots of notes on specifics like foot or hand position and the names of throws. taking notes will help commit them to memory. dont trust your memory all by itself, it will forget a lot.

show up for class early and be the last one to leave. you could double your mat time. dont get sucked into socializing with everyone. the bulk of people will be standing around talking before, during and after class.. dont do it. if you want to get the most out of your time ,.,,your there to work..Get to it.

if I had a quarter for all the things I have learned and forgotten in class.....

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

But without a partner to do the actual controls, grip fighting, throws and ground positions it is going to be difficult.

You can train grip fight with your own arms.

- Let your right hand to grab on your left wrist with tiger mouth facing to your left hand.
- You rotate your left arm inward against your right thumb to break the grip (how to break a grip).
- Your right hand slide along your left forearm and reach on top of your left elbow joint (how to move from wrist gate to elbow gate).

 

[TSDTexan]

You can train grip fight with your own arms.

- Let your right hand to grab on your left wrist with tiger mouth facing to your left hand.
- You rotate your left arm inward against your right thumb to break the grip (how to break a grip).
- Your right hand slide along your left forearm and reach on top of your left elbow joint (how to move from wrist gate to elbow gate).

I find it's better to train grip fighting with another person.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I'm starting a Judo class soon,

Always remember that if your opponent can't grab you, he can throw you. Try to achieve the following:

- You have 1 grip on your opponent but your opponent has no grip on you.
- You have 2 grips on your opponent but your opponent only has 1 grip on you.
- If both of you have 2 grips on each other, break apart and start all over again.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I find it's better to train grip fighting with another person.

Assume you don't have training partner 24/7. Self training is better than nothing. You can do this when you watch TV, go to bath room, sit on bus, ...

 

[Danny T]

You can train grip fight with your own arms.

- Let your right hand to grab on your left wrist with tiger mouth facing to your left hand.
- You rotate your left arm inward against your right thumb to break the grip (how to break a grip).
- Your right hand slide along your left forearm and reach on top of your left elbow joint (how to move from wrist gate to elbow gate).

Yeah but no where near the same as with a partner.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

You can train grip fight with your own arms.

- Let your right hand to grab on your left wrist with tiger mouth facing to your left hand.
- You rotate your left arm inward against your right thumb to break the grip (how to break a grip).
- Your right hand slide along your left forearm and reach on top of your left elbow joint (how to move from wrist gate to elbow gate).

Judo grip fighting is primarily built around gripping the gi. That's a lot harder to drill solo.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

It's hard to learn any martial art quickly with only one hour of class per week. This applies even more so to an art like Judo which is primarily about manipulating another person's body.

Things you can do in your own time to speed things along:

Take notes after class and try to write down as many details as you can remember of everything your teacher showed.

Work on strength and conditioning (free weight or body weight exercises) so that you aren't getting tired in class and can focus on technique rather than being fatigued.

Breakfalls

Basic footwork drills

Basic groundwork movement drills (bridges, shrimps, reverse shrimps, etc) (assuming your Judo class covers groundwork - with only one hour per class you might not get to that soon)

Get yourself a bike inner tube and cut it so you have a long straight tube (or use one of those elastic bands used for some exercise classes). Find a spot where you can tie the middle of the tube to a fence or doorknob or anything else that won't move. Grasp the ends of the elastic as you face your target and practice stepping in for uchikomis (entries) while applying kuzushi by pulling against the resistance of the elastic.

Watch plenty of Judo instructional videos and competition. Don't worry about trying to learn the techniques - you should already be getting more from your teacher than you have time to practice with one class per week. Instead, try to absorb the feeling of the movement and the concepts being applied.

Have fun and report back to us once you've been attending class for a while.

 

[PiedmontChun]

I was in a similar situation - I did one 1.5 hour Judo class per week, for a about a bit under a year, until the club dissolved. It was the only scheduled class I could commit to at the time. I tested for yellow belt somewhere around in the middle, and was likely close to testing for orange belt near the end. I know belt rankings can vary from club to club, so I'm just throwing it out there as my own personal example.

Tony's advice above is excellent. Working on grappling specific conditioning like bridging and shrimping outside of class, so you can focus on the instruction at hand can help so much.

If there are Judo tournaments going on near you, even if you have no interest in competing, would be valuable to go and just watch the teen / adult matches. You will likely have several "light bulb coming on moments" watching some of the setups, counters, and grip strategy.

I bought the original Kodokan Judo: The Essential Guide to Judo by Its Founder Jigoro Kano to familiarize myself with the main techniques of Judo. Obviously that is pretty dated and we have YouTube now but it was nice to have it around as a coffee table book to browse when I had a little time to kill. It wasn't for the purpose of trying to learn those throws, but when we would learn a new throw in class, I had at least seen it before in some form, and it gave some helpful context. If you are visual, seeing the name of a throw helps you remember the names of techniques better.