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 Adi Jones in Japan The Long Hot Summer Just Passed Me By Part 3 in an ongoing series |
| It's slowly coming to an
end, and as all students know, long hot summers are the best. However, the Judo club at the
university carried on training with just one week off, so there was no rest for judoka. Most
of the others on my course (guys from Mexico, Peru, Chile, Romania, Mongolia, China and Korea,
plus kendo players from Australia, Canada, Norway and one more Brit), all took breaks from
training and like myself, weren't in the dojo much. The "holiday" started off well
with a different summer training programme. No running in the morning, but two and a half
hours randori, and then in the afternoon one hour of Ne waza and your own personal training.
My weight has been an issue here (lost 4 kgs!) so I decided to just do the morning randori
session every day, and to build up again.
The dojo was like an oven through the summer. The sun burst into the dojo from about 7.00 every morning, and by 9.00 it was roasting. A sweat was well and truly on half way through the typically light warm up (which is really just a couple of minutes of light stretching). Through the summer there were many visiting teams at the dojo, which made it interesting and the atmosphere changed and became a bit more intense. The Sapporo police were here, a couple of company teams and 2 very strong university teams, as well as the odd high school team. Also from overseas came an American team and the Austrian national youth squad, and before the summer there were also teams from China and Finland. ("Come on BJA, send our team over!"). Most of the visiting teams stay at the dorms with us, but some stay at a guesthouse in town called Kanda. It must be famous in the Judo world as there are pictures and signatures of famous, and not so famous, players from all around the world. Even the great Koga has stayed there! Just before the holidays really began it was the All Japan (Individuals) University Championships held at the Nippon Budokan. Budai had 12 players who had qualified from our area and we ended up after two long days of fighting with 2 Silvers, and a few others in the top 8. Not bad. It's fatal to say it or even think it, but I'd been quite lucky with injuries while here. Two other guys came and in their 1st/2nd session had very serious injuries (a broken arm and a dislocated collar bone). However, half way through the summer I had a muscle spasm in my back during Uchi komi (so much for those light warm-ups) and have been pretty much off the mat ever since. The last 6 weeks or so have been very frustrating with loads of rehab, and virtually no judo. And all this after such a silly little injury. Oh well nothing for it, classes don't start until next week, so I guess I'll have to hit the beach! Adi Jones adijones@hotmail.com « back |
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