Kosen Judo (training report)

[sha]

The name "kosen judo" always pops up in jujitsu vs judo discussions, as in "the omoplata wasn't invented by brazilians, kosen judo guys were already doing it in 1890".

This style of judo puts the emphasis on groundwork, and has no time limit for newaza in competition. Reminds you of something ? Actually it is very similar to BJJ (or maybe I should say BJJ is similar to Kosen Judo) since they share the same roots.

I had the occasion to try it for myself in Kyoto University, where the style was born and evolved, and I wasn't disapointed.

The people there were much better on the ground than the average judoka, and played very active open guard games. They also had all of judo's strong points: agressive armbar atempts from all positions, good pressure and great pins, and good stand up/ground transitions (one guy was flying armbarring everybody !).
Another thing that was different from traditional judo class is the large amount of sparring. After maybe 20 minutes of warm up and uchikomi, we spent about 1h30 doing randori.

Overall it felt like doing BJJ with guys that are good on their feet, too (although this didn't keep them from pulling guard on me a few times...) !
I found this great because usually if you train standing up with BJJ guys they'll pull guard to drag you into their game, and if you train groundwork with judo guys they'll turtle up to stall.
It's not often that you find people who blend both games seamlessly, although I think the trend in both sports is evolving in this way.

So a big thank you to the Kyodai judo club for welcoming me for one class !

[ozyabbas]

It sounds like you had a really cool experience. Just a few questions

1) What were the instructors like.
2) From what positions did they spar from, was it strict newaza and randori. Could you do standing passes.
3) Were there any illegal techniques or holds.

Cheers

[blanko]

interesting, because when doughbelly was in japan years ago, the so called "kosen" and kodokan judo guys didn't do too much newaza. But then again that was years ago.

[sha]

Strangely enough the "sensei" (older stern looking guy who I assumed was in charge) didn't lead the class or do anything besides watching. The class was led by one of the black belts, who showed a few pins and escapes from pins, but then other guys chimed in and added details or other escapes, so it was not really like a traditional class.

They sparred from standing up, but about half of the time they would pull guard or go for a flying armbar instead of doing more "normal" judo.
They did standing passes too, in fact I was a little bit confused by the rules at first. But basically it was BJJ minus leglocks.

I don't know if I dropped in on a special newaza class or if they always train like this. I assume they have nage waza (throwing) oriented classes too because they were good standing up too.

[georgejjr]

Reportedly if you go to the Kodokan there's very little instruction, almost all of the time is spent in randori (or so I was told by our national team coach, Nick Gill, who'd been there more than once). Perhaps some of the heavy emphasis on randori in the Kosen club is just the Japanese tradition.

Mind you, the Kodokan might run different kinds of practices ... Gill was a two time olympic medalist, so they might not have seen much point in putting him in a class full of instruction.

Kosen certainly sounds interesting. Another interesting flavor of judo is Kawashi (he was sent by Kano to introduce judo to Europe a long time ago), if you can find it - they still do leg locks. I had an old instructor who came from that style, though I suspect there's only a handful of clubs left.

[sha]

There might be a few Kawashi instructors here in France, I know I've heard about him before.
But I'm not sure how alive the style is. It's probably integrated into standard judo, I doubt they still do leglocks.

[sha]

There might be a few Kawashi instructors here in France, I know I've heard about him before.
But I'm not sure how alive the style is. It's probably integrated into standard judo, I doubt they still do leglocks.

[furdog]

Modern "Kosen" Judo is for style elitists who don't want to admit they're doing BJJ. They usually cross train or have instructors who cross trained in different arts and then incorporate it into their Judo. It's most likely that those guys at Kyoto University cross trained or had instructors who cross trained in catch or BJJ.

[Mohawk79]

Originally Posted by furdog

Modern "Kosen" Judo is for style elitists who don't want to admit they're doing BJJ. They usually cross train or have instructors who cross trained in different arts and then incorporate it into their Judo. It's most likely that those guys at Kyoto University cross trained or had instructors who cross trained in catch or BJJ.

How do you know that? BJJ is not nearly as popular in Japan as it is here in the states. I think most of you keep forgetting that BJJ came from Judo, and there are lots of Judoka's in Japan that spent a lot of time developing ground fighting techniques and focusing on groundwork before the Gracies came to the states and marketed their own form of Judo. Everyone here in the states gets so defensive whenever they hear of Judoka's that can kick ass on the ground, and accusing them of training in another art to learn techniques and call it their own is bullshit. Why would they need to do that when they have already been doing it in Japan long before it became popular here? The Japanese are the ones who invented all the techniques you see in BJJ, whether most people want to acknowledge it or not.

[sha]

Although it wouldn't surprise me if they have been exposed to BJJ before, I can assure you their style is different from BJJ and evolved on its own.

you can learn more about Kosen judo here:

History

In Taisho 3 (1914) the Judo Competition of Higher schools and Colleges (Kosen Taikai) was commenced in Kyoto [...] In the Kosen competition, we did not have any restriction on practicing "Newaza" (ground work), so that we could fight under the rule of admitting "Hikikomi".