good god i didn't know that my fingers could ever get this sore. On the plus side, i managed to execute okuri eri jime successfully. unfortunately it was the only successful technique of the evening. Some of the cob webs are working themselves out. I still felt rusty last night, but better than last week. A big help was that we spent a good deal of time practicing combinations.

Class was great. I, however, was extremely rusty.

It's good to be back into the swing of things.

I found a series of books not too long ago published by the United States Judo Association. They are the USJA Coach Education Program (Levels 1, 2, and 3)

I finally ordered them a few weeks ago and just received them yesterday. I took a quick look through them last night and was quite impressed: how to structure a practice, different drills/games for warmups, etc. It seems like this is quite similar to the NCCP Levels 1, 2, and 3, but with an emphasis on martial arts. They author even states in the introduction that even though the book is published by the USJA, it is not only for judo; jiu jitsu, aikido, karate - all martial arts styles can benefit from these manuals. Even though I am not teaching anymore, I am looking forward to reading these books to improve my own game and to get the most out of my training sessions.

Around June 5 my sciatica flared up and got progressively worse. My last day of training was June 10 and that was painful. I've been seeing a fellow club member who is a chiropractor and physiotherapist at the Talisman Center who has helped quite a bit. On the 18th I had a very bad flare up which made it too painful to even stand up. I am fortunate that i can get pain relief by sitting or lying down. The Graston technique that Chris (the PT) has been doing has been working albeit slowly. I don't think that I'll be able to train for the rest of this month, and then the dojo will be closed for the summer, but all Ishi Yama members are welcome to train at Hiro's any time. First step: heal. Seconds step: train.

Class was good last night. It would have been much better had my back been cooperating, but i did what i could and didn't push myself. We did a lot of uchikomi and i had a chance to practice a lot of combinations with one of the brown belts. I'm getting more comfortable with the foot sweeps and am starting to get the ko ouchi - ouchi - osoto gari combination a bit smoother.

I finally treated myself to a Mizuno Eurocomp gi. I can't wait to get it. I wore my Fushida Tournament gi (size 5) last night and it is definately too small for me. it seems to shrink a little bit more every time i wash it (and it's not because i'm getting bigger... i've LOST quite a bit in the mid section over the last few months.) My Toraki BJJ (size A4) is getting to be too big for me, now. Such is the cost of losing weight, i guess. I'll probably have to retire the Fushida and Toraki gis before the end of the year and get a Toraki Personal Gold or another Mizuno Eurocomp.

Class was great tonight. we had a father and son instructor duo come from saskachewan to teach class. I believe that the son had just won his division in the Nationals.

We focused on a lot of ne waza techniques with uke in your guard and how to sweep uke so you end up in the mount. There were several techniques, but the common point to all of them is to never stay flat on your back. always have your shoulders up.

1. sweep from guard into arm bar. Tori has both legs up in a failed triangle position. Tori grabs uke's foot on his left side and brings his right leg onto the right side of uke's head. Instead of using your legs to push uke over into a "traditional" position, keep using uke's foot to pull you almost under his calf so you force uke into a front roll and then apply the arm bar.

2. grab lapel. left arm over uke's left shoulder and grab the belt whle you get up on your right side. scissor sweep to the right.

3. uke has your lapel. your left hand secures uke's left hand on your lapel. your right hand pushes uke's elbow into a belt arm bar almost and pushes his arm across your body so it is across uke's face and your head is over uke's left shoulder (almost in the same position as kata gatame). your left arm reach up and much as possible and then the elbow bends and you wrap your arm behind uke's head and grab your gi on your right arm. from here, bridge and sweep to the right. as you sweep, the choke gets tighter. you end up in the mount with a choke.

4. you try to do 2 or 3, but uke counters and starts pushing his shoulder into you to flatten you on your back. get an underhook with your left arm under uke's right arm and grab your right hand behind uke's head. try to straighten uke's arm so his bicep touches his ear. sweep and roll uke. hook both of you legs until his and straightn his body out while compressing.

5. you try 2 or 3 but again uke counters by pushing his shoulder into you. put uke's head into your left armpit and hook your arm under uke's left armpit. bridge and roll right. you can apply a hold down or crank it further for a spine lock/neck crank.

In tachi waza, i took sensei's advice from last week: keep a shorter stance to help increase the speed of your attacks. it worked. i was able to hold my own (relatively) with a brown belt and i managed to execute a full power with full resistance de ash barai foot sweep on an orange belt tonight. woohoo!

I took class easy tonight. I had to tape up my feet because of the blisters.

I had a chance to to tachi waza with the instructor and he gave me some valuable advice: keep a shorter/narrower stance. This allows you to enter into attacks with greater speed so that your opponent doesn't have time to counter. Too bad he told me this at the end of class. I'll have to try it next week and see how it works for me.