Slap in the face

Freeze-frame: mid-slap

Who would have thought that a slap to the face could rearrange it, albeit temporarily?

Here's the video proof, in super slo mo.

Of course, copping a water balloon in the face would be even more distracting!

The secret of a great turn-out?

An anonymous poster asked "What's the secret of a great turn-out?" in response to a picture of a packed mat.

I'd say that there are several elements, primarily:

1. A great class
2. A core group of regulars
3. A good time slot
4. A convenient location
5. Patience

At least these are the factors that have conspired for my class.  It's always been a good class -- hands-on instruction in an excellent martial art -- but it's got better as I've developed as an instructor and a core group of regulars has coalesced.  This year I have been greatly aided by having Anthony assist with the large classes as well as all the colored belts.  Since Jiu-jitsu is predominantly a paired activity I can't teach a hall full of beginners single-handedly: students teach each other and I demonstrate and guide.  Learning this martial art teaches you how to teach one-on-one ... from day one.

The core group of regulars also means that a newcomer observing the class for the first time sees a group practicing with real skill, learning and having fun.  That's appealing.

One of the factors that seems to have contributed to the growth of the class was a switch from Monday to Wednesday nights: mid-week nights seem to draw a bigger group than Friday or Monday evenings in my experience.

We're situated across the road from a major railway station, making the class easy to get to and increasing the catchment area.

Also, it's taken quite a few years for the club to achieve "critical mass".  In the early days sometimes I'd get just one student (or even none), but I was encouraged to persist by my own instructors through leaner times.

* * *

The big classes are great because there's a buzz and energy that you get from a packed mat.

At the same time it's been nice to have some smaller classes from time-to-time, where we have room to do stand-up randori, practice sutemis, and in which I get to spend more one-on-one time with everyone.

Finally, I don't measure success purely in quantity, but in the quality of experience and the learning that takes place.  There's such a thing as too big as well as too small a class.

Results!

Congratulations to everyone who trained hard in the latter half of the year. Presentation day was on Sunday 19 December, and everyone who graded was successful.

Well done:

• Lejoe: Orange belt (1 bar) in both jiu-jitsu and judo
• Damian: Orange belt (1 bar) jiu-jitsu and yellow (2 bars) judo
• Ashley: Yellow belt (2 bars) judo
• Tegan: Purple belt (1 bar) jiu-jitsu
• Ed:  Purple belt (1 bar) jiu-jitsu

Congratulations also to everyone else who successfully graded from the Honbu, Monash Clayton, and Cockatoo.

Full mat!

The mat's looking pretty full nowadays. With a large class it's starting to get cramped during warm-ups:

Warming up with some breakfalls

And it's really full when everyone stretches out:

The class at rest

Throw or takedown?

John Coles is investigating the difference between throws and takedowns in the martial arts for his forthcoming book, and has written a couple of blog posts on the subject.  John points to some discussion of the various takes on the difference this thread from the Martial Arts Planet forum.

An empirical exploration that anyone (with a bit of experience) can do is go through their style's syllabus and pull out the techniques explicitly labelled as throws and those labelled as takedowns and look for any differences of principle.

That's what I intend to do!