Titan Judo

Club Grading

Congratulations to everyone that took part today.

It was great to see everyone showing how well they’ve done, and those new belts are well deserved!

Highland Open

Four of our more experienced players travelled north to Fort William to compete in this years Highland Open.

Stefan Creran and Ross Hepburn, who are now part of the West of Scotland Talent Development Squad fought in the morning, with Peter Doogan and Stuart Kennedy, two of our seniors competing in the afternoon.

Ross was first up for the team and started really well competing hard against what seemed to be much larger opponents. There was some excellent techniques shown with a fantastic tate shiho gatame hold for ippon against an east coast player which was rewarded with a bronze medal in the 60kg+ category.

Stefan was next up competing in the -60kg category which was undoubtedly the category for the craziest hairdo. Stefan started slow but really came on to a good performance by controlling his opponent with his gripping skills. There was no medal here but definately a good start to the competitive calenar.

The two senior players won their first fights of the day by the skin of their teeth. This was against the weigh in scales! Once on the mat Stuart was first up and started of with a throw for ippon. Stuart kept up the performances and won match after match by ippon all the way to the final. In the final Stuart fought well but was caught with a good throw for Ippon by, would you believe “Mr Mcguinness”, no it wasn’t me it was an english player who was part of a large team from Newcastle who had travelled north to compete.

Well done Stuart on an excellent silver in the -90kg category

Peter fought in the -81kg and his first fight was against a frenchman, there was some good exchanges in this match but Peter was caught on the ground and could not escape hi opponents grip.

Next up was a match against the eventual winner of the tournament. Peter attempted a nice seoi nage, but again was caught on the ground. Not the result Peter was looking for but gives us a starting point for the next competition.

Well done to all of the guys who fought.

Titan Scottish Silver

Competition season has started well with three of our players fighting in the Scottish Mini Mon championships.on the 8th of May.

Roland Smyth, Lewis Christie and Summer Cranney all took part in this years event which would have been their first judo tournament. All three did the club proud with some fantastic fighting and gritty performances. Roland started off the day with an excellent win by Ippon but unfortunately Lewis got caught cold early in the fight. Both of the boys fought well and came away with some valuable competitive experience and their heads held high. In the afternoon Summer started her first tournament well by winning her fights mostly by Ippon all the way to the final. Her performance in the final was fantastic and up against a more experienced player pushed her opponent to a golden score situation. Summer nearly had the gold as she had her opponent in a hold twice but she had managed to escape. It came to a referee decision and this time it went the other way. Summer came away with the silver, not bad for the first attempt.

On the 9th we held a club competiton which provided the crowds with some fantastic judo. Players from all of our classes from Tiny Titans up competed in some hard fought battles.

Well done to all who fought and keep up the hard work for the grading in June. Above is a picture of the medallists from the club competition.

Summer 2010 training camp

Summer 2009 proved a great time with the younger kids enjoying a totally free 4 week summer camp. Our coaches put on some great entertainment and judo practice for our members to enjoy during the summer break. This was possible due to generosity of to parties, Clydebank College for providing the venue and funding and also “Awards for All” for providing the club with a grant to purchase great quality GEEMAT from Fighting Films.

With this year in mind Paul had said “I’m trying to sort the kids programme but at this point due to the current financial climate we are unsure if the college would be able to support the summer camp, worse case is we can put on a watered down version for the kids”. Paul added ” Regarding the training camp, I’m trying to obtain the services of the countries top competitor at the moment to provide our big name for the summer, following last years big guns Graeme Randall, National Coach and Former World Champion and John Buchanan, National Talent Development Coach and World Bronze medallist”.

The club would again like to thank the afore mentioned parties in their valuable contribution to services we provide.

NEW TIMES FOR FEBRUARY

From February we are adding a new class to each of our days for the younger kids. Please have a look at the timetable page and see the times which suit you and your kids.

Turnovers

This is a pretty cool Youtube video, featuring 15 turnovers from some top players.

Happy new year!

Happy new year everyone!

First classes back are on the 6th.

See you on Wednesday!

An experiment with Twitter

Does anyone useTwitter?

In keeping with my habit of adopting these things about 12 months after everyone else, I’ve decided to go ahead and create a Titan Judo account on Twitter – here

Ok, I’ll freely admit to being not entirely sure what to do with it, but it might be fun. It’s free anyway.

So, if you are right up to date with your internet trends and already use Twitter, start following titanjudo and we’ll see what we can do with it.

Kosei Inoue’s Top Tips: #3

Use your strengths to your advantage

Inoue’s Uchimata and Ouchi gari are feared so much by his opponents that, even if not throwing with the particular technique concerned, he is still able to get them to work to his advantage. For example, when fighting those who are weary of his Uchimata, Inoue uses his Ouchi gari to sucker his opponents in for it.

Likewise when, fighting an opponent who tries to narrow the angle for Uchimata by standing in an extreme right stance, Inoue recognises that they are leaving themselves open for techniques like Osoto gari and Harai goshi and takes advantage of this. Even if not throwing with a favoured technique, Inoue’s judo shows that a player’s Tokui waza can still be used to their advantage, simply by exploiting an opponent’s fear of it.

Thanks to Fighting Films

Kosei Inoue’s Tip 2

Tip 2. Use your head

Your head is the pilot of your body. Inoue insists that whatever direction he is throwing in, his head must be looking and driving in that same direction. He also points out the importance of his head at each point of a throw. For example when turning in for Uchimata, his head flies downwards at first to help lift his opponent. It then rotates around at the last moment, in the direction that he wants his opponent to land.

Thanks to Fighting Films