Yotam posted some photos from the Kodokan's Spring Red and White Tournament. The "highlight" pictures are in the "Japan 2008" set, starting here and ending with this shot of Yotam and Thomi Lee (click the photo to see it on Flickr):
The whole "2008 Spring Kohaku-jiai (Red & White Tournament)" set is here. I almost feel like I was there.
Paul and Stephanie after Paul's performance at the Hudson Promotionals.
Oishi Judo had a good turnout at yesterday's Hudson promotionals. Alex, Bob, Karim, Mars, Michael, Paul, Ron, Tom, and Yotam all competed.
Congratulations to Yotam Gingold, who advances to nikyu, and Paul Virtue, who is now a kata test away from shodan. Paul won six times in a row in the masters division, including five consecutive ippons.
Here are highlights, including ippons by Ron and Bob.
Update: Here are the matches that Yotam won, in their entirety:
[I was sending Jeff a recap of Wednesday's class and thought what the heck, I'll put it on the blog, with minor edits.]
Numerous crowd-pleasing throws for ippon.
G's tai-otoshi has gotten noticeably better. The extended leg is springier, not so much straight out like a stick. He was throwing R around pretty often, and R is no pushover. I mentioned the improvement to G and he said he got it from I, in particular the ouchi-gari as a setup. It doesn't have to be a serious ouchi-gari; a threat will do. He said the best thing to improve one's tai-otoshi would be to watch tapes of I and MC.
Y caught O with, I believe, a kouchi-gari and landed him flat on his back. He also got EK with a perfect seoi-nage — I think it was morote — complete with that moment of flailing by uke trying not to go over. Y got applause for one of those throws; I forget which.
M got D with a hard harai-goshi. D got him back with something shortly thereafter. I feared one of those two delicate persons might have been harmed in the exchange. Miraculously, they were okay.
Of course I was too polite to mention this at the dojo, but I find it very inconsiderate that people are improving in my absence. Don't they realize how hard this makes it for me to throw them? It's bad enough that they improve when I'm there.
The dojo will be closed all day Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day. The schedule will otherwise be as usual.
Everyone played nicely at the dojo tournament on Saturday. Hisato got the most wins, and John Faulkner got an award for Throw of the Day. Below is a highlights video, which you can also view with a direct YouTube link. I'll post a couple of individual matches later. Also photos when I have a chance to go through them.
Sensei will be having an informal dojo tournament during the regular adults' class time (1:00) on Saturday, December 15.
Besides being generally fun, dojo tournaments are a good gentle introduction for people who have never been to a tournament.
Hope to see you all there.
Congratulations to Oishi Judo's newest black belts.
Here are Nina and Tom's successful kata tests.
Oishi Judo will be closed on Thursday, November 15, 2007.
Paul Virtue and Milton Chacon were in the same division at the Tech Judo tournament today. Milton took first and Paul took third.
John Faulkner, a white belt from the day class, was there as well. I believe he had two matches and won both.
Here are the matches I got on video.
Paul and Milton:
Paul's second match — note the quick grab-and-go osotogari:
Paul's third match:
Unfortunately I didn't get either of John's matches. And I accidentally recorded over Milton's second match, which he won very quickly with a drop seoinage for ippon. Sorry, Milton! Trust me, it was a nice throw.