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The following is a conversation with Neil Adams, a legend in the sport of judo.
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He is a world champion, two-time Olympic silver medalist, five-time European champion, and often referred to as the voice of judo.
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Commentating all the major events, World Championships and Olympic Games.
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Highlighting the drama, the triumph, the artistry of the sport of Judo.
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Making fans like me feel the biggest wins, the biggest losses, the surprise turns of fortune, the dominance of champions coming to an end, and new champions made.
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Always speaking from the heart.
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And now, a quick few second mention of each sponsor.
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Check them out in the description.
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It s the best way to support this podcast.
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We got ZipRecruiter for hiring, ASLE for napping, Masterclass for learning, Element for hydration, and NetSuite for business management software.
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Choose wisely, my friends.
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Also, if you want to work with our amazing team or just want to get in touch with me, go to lectremen.com slash contact.
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And now, onto the full ad reads.
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As always, no ads in the middle.
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I try to make these interesting, but if you skip them, please still check out the sponsors.
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I enjoy their stuff, maybe you will too.
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This episode is brought to you by Zip Recruiter, a site that connects employers and job seekers.
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This episode is brought to you by the bringer of naps, called Eight Sleep, and it s part three cover.
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I ve talked to a lot of Olympic athletes, CEOs.
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I think it s kind of fascinating to discuss with them because they ve already accomplished, in many cases, they ve already accomplished the really grand, big things, the Olympic gold medals, or running, starting, scaling, running, and winning at the game of business.
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And then when they look back, the big lesson in terms of health they often go to is the value of sleep.
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Now, it s hard to know whether that lesson is supposed to be learned.
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You re supposed to fail and then you learn it.
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Meaning you spend your 20s or your 30s or some stretch of time sacrificing sleep.
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And it s not actually a sacrifice.
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It s a gift to the gods of excellence.
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So it s not like, it s not supposed to be that way.
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It s not a mistake, it s not a failure.
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But when they do look back, in a kind of offhand way, they ll say, I learned the value of sleep, that I m just a better thinker, better performer, more efficient, wiser, all those kinds of things when I get a full night s sleep.
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But anyway, the moments you get with your bed, use them wisely.
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This episode is also brought to you by Masterclass, where you can watch over 180 classes from the best people in the world in their respective disciplines.
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I watched many of them, loved many of them.
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Let me bring up Martin Scorsese.
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He has a masterclass on filmmaking.
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He made a lot of incredible, incredible films.
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Goodfellas.
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I know you re not supposed to give an Oscar for that kind of thing, but why not?
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Give the man an Oscar.
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Raging Bull, Casino, Taxi Driver, Genius, and then Shutter Island,
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The Irishman, the new one with the Killers of the Flower Moon.
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I mean, just genius, genius.
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By the way, I got a chance to recently meet and shake hands with Leo DiCaprio.
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And I went out to nature with him.
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It s just the depth of curiosity he has about the world, about ideas, about the natural world, about the visual world, that beginner s mind.
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forever still there, burning bright.
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It s good to see.
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Anyway, Martin Scorsese really breaks down simply the way he thinks about filmmaking.
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And that really is the only way to learn about geniuses like him, is to hear from them.
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to see the genius in the words and the spaces between the words.
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Get unlimited access to every Masterclass and get an additional 15% off an annual membership at masterclass.com slash lexpod.
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That s masterclass.com slash lexpod.
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This episode is also brought to you by Element.
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It s an electrolyte drink that has sodium, potassium, magnesium that I think is foundational
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And what is it about fasting that brings clarity to the mind?
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I mean, some of it is physiological, I m sure, but some of it is just that
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feeling of longing this physical longing for satiation just feeling a little bit incomplete and sitting in that feeling but it s not the completeness that s needed for a good life
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for a clarity of thinking.
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It s the longing for completeness.
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It s like the machine within the machine that finds the common language for the different parts of a business to communicate.
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I m still slightly haunted by a thing I read a long time ago that Jeff Bezos said that every business eventually dies and that you want to prolong the life of a business as long as possible.
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But I don t know why that broke my heart so much.
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Like it always does, the finiteness of good things.
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I would like to believe that businesses, groups of people, people themselves, when they re good, they last forever.
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When they do good by the world.
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But that s not how it works, does it?
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Anyway, I think about the finiteness of great businesses.
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And I guess, as Jeff Bezos said, by the way, amazing human being, but as Jeff said, the whole
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job of a leader, of a manager, of a business is to keep that first day thinking, keep innovating, reinvigorating, being ready to pivot, to make hard decisions, all of that, every single day.
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It never ends.
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This is the Lex Friedman Podcast.
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To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.
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And now, dear friends, here s Neil Adams.
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You are a five-time European champion, world champion, two-time Olympic silver medalist.
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Let s first go to the 1980 Olympics.
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Where was your mind?
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What was your preparation like?
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What was your strategy leading into that Olympics?
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That was my first Olympic Games, so my preparation was a little bit different to how it was the 84 and the 88 Olympic Games.
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And I d kind of done part of the preparation as well for 76 Olympic Games.
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I wasn t quite old enough for those, but I was first reserve.
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So in 1980, I d had four years build up.
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And I was hungry and I was one of these young athletes and I see them so often now that was developing and, you know, full of, I won t say I was full of myself, but I was certainly confident of my ability and I wanted to conquer the world.
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And I d had a couple of really tight matches with the current Olympic world champion.
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So I knew that there was possibility that I could get there for the 80 Olympics.
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So building up to the 80 Olympics was quite interesting because I was kind of coming through the weights and I was halfway in between the 71 kilos weight category and the higher weight category of 78 kilograms.
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And, um, I got third place at the 79 world championships, the weight below for the whole year at the higher weight category, didn t want to lose a contest.
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So I d beaten everybody in the world.
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And, uh, and then I had to make a decision as to whether to drop.
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to the weight below because I was seeded in the weight below.
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It was a different seeding then.
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So I decided to drop into the weight below because I was seeded in the top four.
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As it happens, I think it was probably the worst decision I made.
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Well, simply because it was the only contest that I lost was the final of the Olympic Games in that year.
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So you re a young kid, what, like 1920 at that time, full of confidence, vigor, so the decision to cut weight, how hard was it for you to cut weight to the 71 kg division?
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I ve gotta say that it was the hardest because as I was going up, I was, you know, it was 73, then it was 74 kilos, 75, so I was moving through the weight category.
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It wasn t like I was stuck in the middle and then I dropped the odd time to compete.
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It was literally going up in weight by a kilo every month.
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And then by the time I came to a month or two before the Olympics, it was really hard.
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Fought the European Championships at the higher weight category and won that.
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And so everybody that was on the Olympic rostrum at the Olympic Games was on my rostrum at the European Championships.
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Was it a mistake?
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Yeah, because I didn t have my diet sorted out.
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My nutrition was appalling.
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It wasn t as readily available as it is now for the nutrition.
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I would say that if anything lost me that final, other than the fact that I was fighting somebody who was terrific, he was an excellent, brilliant athlete, but it definitely didn t help that my nutrition was not very good.
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Okay, so you lost to Etsuyo Gama.
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There s probably a lot that we could say about that particular match.
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Maybe let s zoom in.
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What were your strengths and weaknesses judo-wise in that Olympics?
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You said you haven t really lost a match.
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You won the European Championship leading into it.
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But if you had weak spots, okay, you already said diet, but specifically on the mat in terms of judo.
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I think that none of the fights lasted time going into the final, you know.
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So I won fairly quickly and every match by Ippon, you know, way before time.
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Do you remember how you won the matches?
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I won them by throw, a couple of throws for Ippon and then an arm lock for Ippon.
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Semi-final was an arm lock against the East German, Kruger.
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And yeah, I just, I was flying through, you know.
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What were the throws?
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Do you remember?
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Taya Toshi, Uchimata, my favorite kind of toku was, my favorite throws.
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And then Juji Katami as well, which was a Juji Katami roll against an East German who I d beaten before, but always had a really tough match, but managed to beat him well.
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So you had a beautiful exhibition of Japanese-type judo in the first two matches.
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You threw people, and then you also did the nawazi.
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You armbarred a person.
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Great.
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So you re going into the final.
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What are the weaknesses going into the final against the Italian?
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Like I say, taking nothing away from him as a great athlete and a brilliant judo man.
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And left, which wasn t good for me.
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That was definite no, because I hated fighting lefties.
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Still do.
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But I ll tell you why in a minute.
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It s one of those.
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But I think
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As I went through the contest, we had an eight-hour break from the semifinal to the final.
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They took us back to the Olympic Village, then we had to come back in, and then we had to start a warm-up again, you know, so I kind of lost my momentum.
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I had to start again, and I never... I didn t.
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I just didn t.
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I had a job to get going.
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I got halfway through, started to rescue a dying match, and, you know, I was kind of one step, half a step behind all the way through, so never really got into it.
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So why do you hate fighting lefties?
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And lefties are, we should say, overrepresented in terms of the high ranks of judo.
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I don t know why that is.
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Well, you know, the thing is about a lefty is a lefty will have more opportunity to fight righties, you know, right handers.
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Because I mean, 70% of the population are right handers, 30% left.
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So they get to fight more right handers.
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And it s just a fact, you know, that happens.
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So the thing that they hate is fighting left against left.
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They don t like it left against left.
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Whereas a right-hander will go right against right.
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But the opposite is awkward for me because just simply I like to go onto the sleeve and then I like to dominate the grips.
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But the actual angle of the opponent wasn t what I wanted.
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So I had to work hard, really hard against it.
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What happened in that match?
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It was a split decision in the end.
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And so to lose an Olympic final on a split decision is pretty, you know, it s something that s still on my mind.
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And, you know, I think that it s a strange one because I can still wake up
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that one and four years later at the Olympics, because I was silver medalist at the Olympics four years later as well.
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And yeah, it still haunts me.
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Do you sometimes wake up and think like, man, I should have eaten better?
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Or maybe like a specific grip that you re like, I shouldn t have taken that grip.
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I do.
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I mean, the diet side of it, it s difficult to really admit that, isn t it?
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That you went to an Olympic games
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And the one thing that you really sucked at, right, was one of the most important things now at world level sport, you know, where you ve got the nutrition, you know, we ve got it.
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You would think that most people have got it sorted, but there s still people making mistakes.
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There s still people that haven t got it totally sorted.
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And then there s people like Travis Stevens, who I think doesn t care.
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He ll just have atrocious nutrition.
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and he just makes it work.
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I think the way he spoke about it is you can t always control nutrition, so it s best to get good at having crappy nutrition.
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It s a good way of looking at it.
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I never, yeah.
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Maybe that s what I did.
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Yeah, exactly.
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Exactly.
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Do you remember what you were eating?
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Are we talking about like candy or?
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Yeah, well, I got a sweet tooth, but it wasn t really, I mean, I didn t have a lot of money at that
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time either, you know, so the diet wasn t steak and, you know, good nutritional salads and things like that, you know, I did what I thought was best without, you know, proper advice.
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And the crazy thing is, is that I had such good advice as well, you know, when it came to kind of fitness training and things like that, we re quite ahead of our time and, you know, we really had it nailed as far as the conditioning was concerned.
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The judo training as well was a way in advance, because I was a good trainer, and I trained more than most.
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I can honestly say that.
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It probably got me away with a lot.
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Where was your mind, so mental preparation, going into that Olympics?
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You said you were confident, but is there some preparation aspect behind that confidence?
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I think in the early days, I didn t think I was going to lose.
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I never thought it was possible to lose.
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And I think that I went into every contest expecting to win.
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So when it didn t quite go my way, I didn t lose that many contests.
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So the only ones I lost were in the final of the World Championships or in the final of the Olympic Games.
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So I didn t lose that many.
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I never lost a European title.
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I had seven golds at European championships, five seniors, two juniors, and 20s.
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And I never lost the final.
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And then I only lost two on a split decision.
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So I didn t lose that many.
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And my attitude was that I wasn t going to lose and I couldn t lose.
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So I was always surprised when something happened.
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In Neil Adams  A Life in Judo, written in 1986, you wrote, ever since I can remember, I have wanted to win.
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It wasn t the ordinary feeling that children have when they take part in their first primary school sack race on a grass track, or even the keen determination of a young swimmer prepared to train early in the cold winter mornings in order to make it into the countyside.
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With me, the desire to win was and still is as much a part of me as my arms and legs.
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In other words, it wasn t something I learned as I grew older, but rather it was deeply rooted in me.
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Perhaps this competitive instinct is the greatest difference between my public image and the view from the inside.
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So people see the kindness, the warmth you have, the charisma, the excitement, but there s this
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big drive to win inside you.
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So what s behind that?
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Can you just speak to that drive to win and how that contributed to your career?
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You know, when I look back now... That s a lot of years ago, we should say.
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It is a lot of years ago.
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Is that true or are we just being poetic?
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It s not far off.
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No, it s not.
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When I think about it now, because I d like to think that I m a different person now.
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And, you know, since I ve kind of calmed down, I see athletes now and I see them, you know, and their kind of arrogance, their walk and it s a strut, you know, and it s a kind of a confidence, isn t it?
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You know, and as we re older and as I ve become older, I ve calmed down.
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And but, you know, it doesn t matter what I m doing.
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It s still that will to to win, you know, and and I m much better at masking it now if I don t.
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But it still bothers me as much.
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You talk about like, I don t know, even just like stupid, silly things like like, I don t know, a game of pool or something like this or just anything.
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Yeah, I m still trying to win, you know, like, so my son loves to, he loves to play me at bowls, because I m useless, you know, and I just can t throw a straight ball.
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So he loves playing me at that, you know, but it bugs me that I m not better, you know.
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There are certain things that I do, it really bugs me when I m not good at it.
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I guess it s one of the reasons that long after I d finished competition judo, people still want to train with you.
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Even at an older age, even now, if I do in a seminar, do you still do?
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Do you want to still go?
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Can I feel it?
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And, you know, one of the things that s in me is that I just, all the way up to 40 years of age, so from 30 when I finished competition, up to 40, I could still train with the best.
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and I could still go with anybody.
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Then when 40 hit, things started to fall off a little bit.
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I used to get either my hips or my legs and my knees.
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I realized that I had to pick my practices and that rankled as well.
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I had to then just calm it down a little bit.
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Otherwise, I was going to be injured.
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It s not a good thing when you get an older and you ve still got the same competitive mind.
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But things change.
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So it s still there.
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You get on the mat probably even now, right?
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You get on the mat with a world champion, you know, you still the current world champion.
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There s still a little part of you.
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Oh, yeah, yeah.
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Could I still toss this guy?
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You know, kids these days are soft.
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Well, you know what?
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Some of these athletes, I mean, like I give you a prime example, right, is Ilyas Ilyas.
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Yeah.
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I mean, he is a monster.
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Of course, you couldn t because at 60 something, you couldn t.
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But you like to think that you could.
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You could, you never know.
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You got to find out.
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You know what you would do?
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What you can do is you can cause them problems and they feel it immediately, but you d last a minute.
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So you ve trained with Ilias Eliadis.
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I got a chance to train with him as well.
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He s a really nice guy, really great guy.
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He trained with me.
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We were training together.
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Every hotel that we used to go into, we d end up in the gym together and we d train.
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And this one time he was in there and he just wanted somebody to grab and grip hold of.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so we ended up doing this kind of grappling in the middle of the people doing weight training and, you know, the different things, watching these two madmen doing.
1
SPEAKER_00
I m glad we weren t on a mat at that particular time.
1
SPEAKER_00
But good fun.
1
SPEAKER_01
What do you think about that guy?
1
SPEAKER_01
He, like you, achieved a lot of success when he was young.
1
SPEAKER_00
17, you imagine that, 17, 18 years of age, and he s able to compete with the men.
1
SPEAKER_00
There s not many men can do that, and it doesn t happen very often.
1
SPEAKER_00
It happens later with the men.
1
SPEAKER_00
Often, they re not physically as developed as they.
1
SPEAKER_00
So for me, for example, I fought Nev Zorov, who was World and Olympic champion.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was the current World and Olympic champion.
1
SPEAKER_00
They sent me to the European Championship senior at 17.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that doesn t happen very often.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I pulled Nevzorov.
1
SPEAKER_00
So I fought Nevzorov, and I had him really worried, because he expected, without a doubt, to come out, throw this kid and junior,
1
SPEAKER_01
And he was like thick and shredded.
1
SPEAKER_01
He s a man.
1
SPEAKER_00
He was shredded.
1
SPEAKER_00
There s a picture of him in his judogi and his judogi is just cut.
1
SPEAKER_00
And he looks the business.
1
SPEAKER_00
And there s me in this baggy, skinny kid inside this baggy thing.
1
SPEAKER_00
And the thing was is that the more he tried and the harder he tried and the more he panicked.
1
SPEAKER_00
the further it went away from him.
1
SPEAKER_00
Of course, he got the decision at the end and deservedly, but I worried him.
1
SPEAKER_00
For me, that was a massive step forward because a year later, I was starting to fill out and two years later, I was competing for the Olympic title.
1
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if I remember, but at least Iliadus is interesting because even at 17, I feel like he was doing big throws, like literally lifting them with his hands.
1
SPEAKER_00
Just rips them out of the ground, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
And I was saying to Nikki, my wife, and she said, what would you do now
1
SPEAKER_00
that was different than the way you did then.
1
SPEAKER_00
I never had any pickups.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s not what we did.
1
SPEAKER_00
But you have a look at the young Ukraines or the young Russians or the young Eastern Bloc Mongolians and they re ripping people out the ground.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s just different style of judo and it just looks different.
1
SPEAKER_00
But now they re starting to do traditional style judo as well.
1
SPEAKER_01
So, can you speak to that, what are the different styles of Judo?
1
SPEAKER_01
So, for you, you mentioned Uchimaru, Taira Toshi, these, how would you describe them?
1
SPEAKER_01
They re like these effortless, less lifting off the ground, and power, and strength, and more timing, and position, movement, momentum, all this kind of stuff.
1
SPEAKER_01
That s more traditionally associated with Japanese Judo.
1
SPEAKER_01
Because for Japanese Judo, the traditional Judo, you re supposed to throw people in a big way without much effort.
1
SPEAKER_00
And of course,
1
SPEAKER_00
In 1990, we saw the introduction of all these Eastern Bloc countries.
1
SPEAKER_00
There were so many more.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it was Soviet Union when I was competing.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then, of course, in 1990, everything changed.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then there were so many more of them out there, different countries, that their wrestling styles were introduced into judo.
1
SPEAKER_00
Put a jacket on them and let s get into judo.
1
SPEAKER_00
So judo kind of changed shape.
1
SPEAKER_00
it changed shape from this upright standing, you know, and having to know the technicalities of how to get a body that s weighing 40, you know, 14 stone or, you know, whatever it is up into the air, and using the momentum and the balance and the direction and the skill to do that, and knowing how to do it, you know, and how to use movement.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then you get the wrestlers and the leg picks and the double legs, single legs, double legs.
1
SPEAKER_00
And by 1995, judo was bent over.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so it was the IOC that went to IJF, International Judo Federation,
1
SPEAKER_00
And they said, you gotta change this or we re just gonna have one wrestling style.
1
SPEAKER_00
It looks like wrestling with judo, with judo jackets on.
1
SPEAKER_00
So you either change it or we re gonna take one of you out.
1
SPEAKER_01
By the way, we should sort of clarify, when we say people are bent over, that s usually how you see freestyle wrestling.
1
SPEAKER_01
Wrestlers are more bent over to defend the legs and so on.
1
SPEAKER_01
And traditional judo, people are more standing up because that s the position from which you can do the big throws and all that kind of stuff.
1
SPEAKER_01
But I think the other case to make,
1
SPEAKER_01
for banning leg grabs is, you know, a lot of people are using it for stalling and not for beautiful big throws and all that kind of stuff.
1
SPEAKER_01
So it s not just not to make it different from wrestling.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s also like you want to maximize the amount of epic throws and dynamic judo and
1
SPEAKER_01
exciting stuff to watch, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, win by judo, not by wrestling.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I think that, you know, the ones that were shouting about it were the wrestlers, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Because they like to compete with both.
1
SPEAKER_00
They want to do both.
1
SPEAKER_00
They want to do, you know, their wrestling matches and then come into judo.
1
SPEAKER_00
So basically, I mean, what we ve said is then learn to do judo and there s nothing stopping you then from doing both, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
But not from the other way around.
1
SPEAKER_00
All right.
1
SPEAKER_00
So
1
SPEAKER_00
Rules always dictate development.
1
SPEAKER_00
They ll always dictate which direction it goes.
1
SPEAKER_00
So if you introduce a rule that states that you cannot dive at the legs and just pick up, then you ll have to do it standing up.
1
SPEAKER_00
And also, it increases the possibility of defense.
1
SPEAKER_00
with the hips because actually good defense judo wise standing up is with the hips as opposed to sticking your arms out and then sticking your backsides out there just to defend all right so if you attack me and i i move my body in the wrong place so i m in the right wrong place at the right time so you don t hit the right target and then also i use my hips
1
SPEAKER_00
So again, it s a form of judo that was being lost.
1
SPEAKER_00
So now we got it back.
1
SPEAKER_01
So let s go there.
1
SPEAKER_01
Let s speak about judo as if we re talking to a group of five year olds.
1
SPEAKER_01
So what is judo?
1
SPEAKER_01
What are some defining characteristics of judo as a sport, as a way, as a martial art, as a way of life, all that kind of stuff?
1
SPEAKER_00
I think when you say it is a way of life, I think the great advantage that we have in judo, my young grandson, so I got two little boys.
1
SPEAKER_00
that are three and a half years of age love going to our dojo.
1
SPEAKER_00
They love it.
1
SPEAKER_00
So dojo was the first word that they used.
1
SPEAKER_00
It was one of the first.
1
SPEAKER_00
So when they come to see us, they see my wife and I, it s like dojo.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s not grandma, granddad, it s a dojo.
1
SPEAKER_00
So dojo, they take their shoes off going into the dojo, you know, so they have respect for where they re at, you know, and I think it has that kind of feeling that, like I tried to build my dojo with a feeling of reverence.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s kind of almost peaceful, you know, so if I m not religious, I m not a religious person, but I like going to old churches because when I go into an old church, it doesn t matter, you know, what the religion within the church, but there s a reverence in there.
1
SPEAKER_01
Reverence is a good word.
1
SPEAKER_01
It feels like a really special place, no matter which dojo you go to.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s just, you bow and there s a calmness before the storm of battle or whatever it is.
1
SPEAKER_00
And respect, you know?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, respect.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, look at the respect.
1
SPEAKER_00
We were just talking about it just before we came on air.
1
SPEAKER_00
We were just saying that we very, very seldom do we have a situation where there is animosity
1
SPEAKER_00
other than them fighting.
1
SPEAKER_00
I m not saying that they don t fight each other because sometimes it does turn into a brawl.
1
SPEAKER_00
At the end, two people bow off and show their respect.
1
SPEAKER_00
A champion, I see people winning events and they re good judoka, they re excellent, they win world championships, might even win the Olympic Games.
1
SPEAKER_00
But a great champion for me is
1
SPEAKER_00
is somebody who treats, who does the right thing when they lose, you know.
1
SPEAKER_00
So when you see them lose, that s when you see the true them, you know.
1
SPEAKER_00
And actually that was one of the biggest things that I had to really cope with, you know.
1
SPEAKER_00
So when I lost the Olympic Games in Moscow and also the one in Los Angeles, the hardest thing is when the microphone s in there and you ve got to,
1
SPEAKER_00
be respectful and nice, and the hardest thing is to smile.
1
SPEAKER_00
But actually,
1
SPEAKER_00
Some of the great champions, they ll go, that s just one match.
1
SPEAKER_00
I remember we ve got one great champion, Agbeg Nenu.
1
SPEAKER_00
She s a five-time world champion, Olympic champion.
1
SPEAKER_00
She s favorite as well to get this Olympic gold medal, French.
1
SPEAKER_00
What a great champion she is because she lost one of the matches.
1
SPEAKER_00
She d come back and she d given birth, come back after giving birth.
1
SPEAKER_00
And everybody was going, well, was she?
1
SPEAKER_00
And then she lost one of the matches on the way through.
1
SPEAKER_00
And she said, don t be upset.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s just one match.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s just one contest.
1
SPEAKER_00
Next time I m going to put it right.
1
SPEAKER_00
And she did put it right.
1
SPEAKER_00
And now she s back up there and she won the world title back.
1
SPEAKER_00
So these are great champions for me.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I mean, that s the right way to see it.
1
SPEAKER_01
But it s also tragic to lose the Olympic Games, you know, twice.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yes, it is tragic.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I do have sleepless nights.
1
SPEAKER_01
I mean, that s the magic of the Olympic Games.
1
SPEAKER_01
Anything can happen.
1
SPEAKER_01
And your 1980 Olympics were very different from the 1984.
1
SPEAKER_01
But if we just linger on the 80 and just your what we re talking about,
1
SPEAKER_01
how much you wanted to win.
1
SPEAKER_01
Do you love winning or hate losing more?
2
SPEAKER_01
I hate losing more, but I love winning.
2
SPEAKER_01
When I won the world title a year later, and I had no doubt when I went in that day that I was going to be world champion.
2
SPEAKER_01
No doubt.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you won the 81 World Championship.
2
SPEAKER_00
At the higher weight.
2
SPEAKER_00
At the higher, the 78.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_00
KG.
2
SPEAKER_00
Actually, can we go there?
2
SPEAKER_00
What was going through your mind?
2
SPEAKER_00
You ended up armbarring a Japanese fighter, a Dr. Jimmy Pedro, a friend of yours, somebody who said you were a mentor to him for many years, and he told me a bunch of different questions to ask you.
2
SPEAKER_00
But you said that was a really special time.
2
SPEAKER_00
That was a really special, like, dominant run you had.
2
SPEAKER_00
And especially finishing with an armbar against a Japanese player.
2
SPEAKER_00
So take me through that.
2
SPEAKER_00
What do you remember from that?
2
SPEAKER_01
I think that it was so my weight was better.
2
SPEAKER_01
I didn t have to lose weight.
2
SPEAKER_01
That was one thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
So the nutritional side wasn t as important, but probably it still wasn t as good as it could be, my nutrition.
2
SPEAKER_01
Although it was getting better and I was trying to eat the right things at the right time.
2
SPEAKER_01
But
2
SPEAKER_01
I still trained really well, and I was so confident there going into that World Championships that I could win it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to win.
2
SPEAKER_01
But, you know, obviously, corner of your mind, you re thinking, just don t make mistakes.
2
SPEAKER_01
But, you know, this is the incredible thing is that
2
SPEAKER_01
Once you start to ask you, once I see contests change direction when I m commentating, so I can see somebody who s in there just going forward, just trying to win.
2
SPEAKER_01
And that s a difference to somebody who s trying not to lose.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s two different ways.
2
SPEAKER_01
So sometimes when you, so when I was world champion, then I had a period of time where every time I stepped out there, I was really afraid of losing.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I think that that s what happens later on in your competitive career.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, the great champions manage to come through that.
2
SPEAKER_01
Teddy Rene is one of those, you know, he just, he puts it out there and he keeps beating them, you know, so they can t take it away from him.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, it s fantastic.
2
SPEAKER_00
So stepping on the mat, every single encounter, you re trying to win.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re looking for the grips and the, with the intention to throw, throw big, even when you re ahead on points, all that kind of stuff.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s a really good point is that if you go ahead in a match and you look at the clock, it depends when you go ahead.
2
SPEAKER_01
So sometimes you can go ahead in the first minute and you ve still got three minutes to go.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I see the ones then that go into, I don t want to lose because they go into defensive mode and then sometimes they can lose it on penalties or something can go wrong and the other one comes on strong and then they can sneak the contest.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so it s really difficult, but when I was coaching, I was trying to always encourage that positive attitude for the full four minutes, five minutes then.
2
SPEAKER_00
I ve competed a lot in judo and jiu-jitsu.
2
SPEAKER_00
I ve always hated that part of myself.
2
SPEAKER_00
When I m up on points by a lot, you look at the clock and it s what you do when you look at the clock.
2
SPEAKER_00
Minute and a half, you re really tired.
2
SPEAKER_00
and you kind of quit, you just defend.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I hated that part about myself.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re saying don t do it.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, well, as opposed to just go out in judo, that s for a big throw, just keep going for the throw.
2
SPEAKER_00
In jiu-jitsu, it s go for the submission, like throw caution, like win in the real way versus on points.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I hated that part of myself.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, mostly underneath that is cowardice induced by exhaustion.
2
SPEAKER_01
Exhaustion is the one, isn t it?
2
SPEAKER_01
But it is, isn t it?
2
SPEAKER_01
It s a mindset as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
Actually, trying to get your mind positive all the way through.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, if you listen, when I commentated now is I say I hope that they don t change the mindset and that they keep on and they are going forward all the time.
2
SPEAKER_01
Actually, they re then more difficult to catch.
2
SPEAKER_01
We had one just a couple of weeks ago, and he lost in the final second of the contest.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was the only one to score.
2
SPEAKER_01
He got penalized all the way up.
2
SPEAKER_01
two seconds to go and stepped out of the area and, you know, but he went like that thinking the bell was just going and the bell went one second after he actually stepped out.
2
SPEAKER_01
So he got penalized, lost the match and lost all of the points for qualification.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it was, you know, that s paying high price.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s paying high price.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, there s a thin line between triumph and tragedy in those competitions, but especially at the Olympic Games.
2
SPEAKER_00
So let s just stick on 81 World Championship.
2
SPEAKER_00
What did it feel like to win that World Championship?
2
SPEAKER_00
And also getting an armbar as a Japanese player.
2
SPEAKER_00
Jimmy told me your arms were exhausted.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
The thing is sometimes when it s competitive as well, ours is a different intensity where you can take time a little bit.
2
SPEAKER_01
Ours is bang.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s transitioning from standing down.
2
SPEAKER_01
You ve got 10, 15 seconds to go in there.
2
SPEAKER_01
You go in a 100 percent.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s a bit like running full out for 10 seconds.
2
SPEAKER_01
Then you ve got to decide then,
2
SPEAKER_01
especially if they re defending it, whether you let it go, because when you get up, your forearms are blown, and you ve got lactic acid in there, and you ve still got to grip up, because remember, ours is about gripping as well on the jacket.
2
SPEAKER_01
So if you can t grip up, then you can t gain the advantage, then
2
SPEAKER_01
they can throw you, so you have to decide.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had a massive attack on him and we changed directions four or five times and then I wasn t going to let him go.
2
SPEAKER_01
But still, when I was turning him there, I had to decide, am I going to go all out for this?
2
SPEAKER_01
There has been occasions when I ve released it to just, if I ve got a minute to go and just lock out.
2
SPEAKER_00
So what you re saying on the feet, there was a change of direction, all different kinds of attempts, and then you went to the ground.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
So what was that?
2
SPEAKER_00
Do you remember that decision of like, okay, am I going to finish this?
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I knew it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I just, as soon as I climbed his back and then I thought he s not going, he s not going, I m not going to let him up.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I was just changing.
2
SPEAKER_01
Something in my head was going, don t just stick on him.
2
SPEAKER_01
Then it s always about pressure on the arm.
2
SPEAKER_01
Of course, he was like that, defending.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was almost total bridge trying to get out of it.
2
SPEAKER_00
Did it start in turtle and then did you flip on it?
2
SPEAKER_01
Started in turtle because I did an attack, came back out of the attack and then he went on to his front.
2
SPEAKER_01
Then I was on his back and then I started the whole thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
Saw an opening and you just went for it?
2
SPEAKER_01
It was an automatic transition.
2
SPEAKER_01
The transitions are what we teach because the ones that are quicker down with the transitions are the ones that catch it.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s our nawaza.
2
SPEAKER_01
Our groundwork is the transition from standing down to ground.
2
SPEAKER_01
We don t have a situation where you can work your way in.
2
SPEAKER_01
You are in or you re not in, you re standing.
2
SPEAKER_01
You got to make sure that you re in.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was just on his back like a leech and I never let him go.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you see, I mean, yeah, so that s where the armbars, that s where the attacks on the ground, which is called Niwaza, happens in the transition.
2
SPEAKER_00
At that level, at that high world-class level.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I mean, he was no muggy, though.
2
SPEAKER_01
I think he d just got third place in the All Japan Championships, which is all weight categories.
2
SPEAKER_01
So he wasn t a muggy, you know, he was strong.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I d fought him once before, and I knew he was a lefty as well, which was really awkward for me.
2
SPEAKER_00
Did it feel good?
2
SPEAKER_01
Better for me than him.
2
SPEAKER_01
It did.
2
SPEAKER_01
It felt amazing, you know, because it was almost like all these things, disappointments and everything had kind of come to this one point where I was at last kind of champion of the world.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s everything I said as a kid.
2
SPEAKER_01
that I had no idea how difficult it was going to be.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know, so as a kid, as a 14 year old kid, I remember saying, I m going to be world champion.
2
SPEAKER_01
I m going to be the best in the world.
2
SPEAKER_01
I had no idea how difficult that was going to be.
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, there s wisdom to that, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
Like there s power and stupidity of youth.
2
SPEAKER_01
I like that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
Just like I m going to be a world champion.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m going to win this without knowing how hard it is.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then once you go after it, it s you re trapped.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re going to have to do the work.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, I mean, you see it a lot with parents as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
Parents, our little Johnny is amazing and he s this, that, and the other.
2
SPEAKER_01
They have no idea what s out there.
2
SPEAKER_01
I remember the very first time I stepped out in 1974 into the European cadets.
2
SPEAKER_01
I remember that we were fighting.
2
SPEAKER_01
I d only ever fought in Great Britain.
2
SPEAKER_01
I was unbeaten in the juniors, kids.
2
SPEAKER_01
and went out there and there were these different fighters out there that were treating me with total disdain.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I remember thinking,
2
SPEAKER_01
How dare they, you know?
2
SPEAKER_01
And I realized when I came back from that event, there s other people out there.
2
SPEAKER_01
There s just a whole, you know, and there are different levels of, you know, the majority of people are just not informed as to what s out there and the different levels that there are out there.
2
SPEAKER_00
Do you remember like a certain opponent that for the first time you felt like, holy shit,
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, there s pop like somebody just gripped you up and you re like, this is there s another level to this game.
2
SPEAKER_01
Ezio was Ezio was one of them.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I fought him, you know, and I beat him in the European Championships.
2
SPEAKER_01
I beat him in, you know, two times and then lost him in the Olympic Games two months after I d beaten him in the European Championship.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it wasn t that that made it even more difficult.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
Nemesis there.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
So that made it more difficult.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so he, Ezio was one, and getting hold of, I remember, getting hold of Nishida of Japan.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he had me going up and down.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I just, I thought, wow, this guy is amazing, you know, and I d never fought, first time I ever fought Japanese.
2
SPEAKER_01
in a major tournament, you know, and I felt the danger.
2
SPEAKER_01
I always talk about the danger when we go out to Japan to train.
2
SPEAKER_01
I could go probably months without getting thrown in training here in Europe and go to Japan and, you know, everybody s throwing you, you know, and that s difficult to accept.
2
SPEAKER_01
And the reason that kind of danger and that kind of
2
SPEAKER_01
a feeling of danger is something that puts a real edge on, you know, and so that was first time when I got a hold of Nishida, I thought, oh my God, you know, this guy, you know, didn t matter which way he was turning like that, he stretched out and I thought this, I want to do this, you know, and then I ended up fighting him again in Japan.
2
SPEAKER_00
So that feeling of danger is really interesting.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like I ve, you know, did Randoi with a lot of world-class people from different parts of the world, including Ilios Iliadis.
2
SPEAKER_00
And like there s a certain part, like Eastern European Judo, you feel like you re screwed the whole way through.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like the gripping, you really feel it in the gripping.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s the gripping that does it.
2
SPEAKER_00
But with really good Japanese-style Jidoka, you don t, it s a terrifying calmness.
2
SPEAKER_00
At least the experiences I ve had, you don t really feel it in the gripping.
2
SPEAKER_00
You just feel like anywhere you step, you re getting thrown.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a different thing, isn t it?
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a different thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I mean, mine was kind of a mixture.
2
SPEAKER_01
I liked it to be a mixture because the gripping is definitely the key point.
2
SPEAKER_01
So if you get high level guys that are gripping up, and I always used to put this to the referees when we were doing referee seminars when we first started them.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I d say, how many?
2
SPEAKER_01
Because they would referee to their understanding of the match.
2
SPEAKER_01
So they were penalizing for certain grits that were, you know, and actually so.
2
SPEAKER_01
As an ex-athlete, high level, I would say, have you ever gripped up with high level?
2
SPEAKER_01
Because if you haven t, you need to do it.
2
SPEAKER_01
Because then you will understand why they do certain things with the grips.
2
SPEAKER_01
Because these guys are like, when somebody grips you and you think, you know you re going to go.
2
SPEAKER_01
When Iliadis puts his arm over your back, you know you re going to go up and over.
2
SPEAKER_01
You know you re going to go over.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s it.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a cool feeling.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like whenever- Not for me.
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, I understand.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it s like, I mean, because it s not, it feels way more powerful than it should.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s weird.
2
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
2
SPEAKER_00
You want to attribute it to strength and all that kind of stuff.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, people say you have like immense upper body strength, but it s probably something else.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like technique, it s some kind of weird- It s a mix of everything.
2
SPEAKER_00
Just like something hardened through lots of battles around Dorian and that kind of stuff.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it s cool that humans are able to generate that kind of power.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s cool.
2
SPEAKER_01
When I was 84 Olympics, but I m just going to go there now just quickly.
2
SPEAKER_01
But there was, we had a freestyle wrestler.
2
SPEAKER_01
He s American actually, but he had the English nationality.
2
SPEAKER_01
So he competed for Noel Loban, his name is.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he competed for Great Britain.
2
SPEAKER_01
He got third place at the Olympics in 84.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was training.
2
SPEAKER_01
We were training at Budokai and he was training.
2
SPEAKER_01
He came to do some judo and put jacket on.
2
SPEAKER_01
And of course, he was training with some of the lower levels and he was really handling himself well.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then he said, I need to feel, you know, when we did randori, you know, so he did some randori with me.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I immediately thought, I got to catch it.
2
SPEAKER_01
I got to stop, single leg and double leg, because he was really quick, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So strong as well, 90-something kilos.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was like, you know, he s a big guy.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I caught his sleeve, immediately caught and controlled him.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then he couldn t start, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So he said I needed to feel the difference.
2
SPEAKER_01
So then I thought,
2
SPEAKER_01
I better reciprocate this.
2
SPEAKER_01
I said, well, we did the randori and I threw him a couple of times.
2
SPEAKER_01
He said, I m really glad we did that.
2
SPEAKER_01
I said, I need to feel the difference as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
We take the jackets off.
2
SPEAKER_01
We took the jackets off and he was a nightmare.
2
SPEAKER_01
This guy was a nightmare and like a monster.
2
SPEAKER_01
He was single-legging me and it was just totally different.
2
SPEAKER_01
It was like the jacket makes a massive difference, huge difference.
2
SPEAKER_01
to something and people think it s just a jacket that we re wearing, but it isn t.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s our only tool, actually.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and it s a way of establishing control over another body, and it s a whole art form and a science, and I don t even know if you understand it, really.
2
SPEAKER_00
You understand it sort of subconsciously through time, because there s so much involved, because pulling on one part of the jacket pulls other parts of the jacket, and the physics of that is probably insane to understand.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s absolutely insane.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then, you know, they changed the rules for a little while and they changed the rules so that you couldn t hold, you know, that certain grips were not allowed.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re only allowed a certain amount of time and there were a lot of penalties from it, you know.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then, you know, they had some of the ex-fighters into the referee commission.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so we were pushing for
2
SPEAKER_01
just let them grip, because that s our game.
2
SPEAKER_01
That s what makes us different.
2
SPEAKER_01
Again, if grip up with somebody like, so they were on about Teddy Rene.
2
SPEAKER_01
Teddy Rene comes out, takes the sleeve, big arm over the top, and then he throws people.
2
SPEAKER_01
They were saying, yeah, but you can t stop him doing it.
2
SPEAKER_01
This guy is six foot nine.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he is built like Garth.
2
SPEAKER_01
And not only that, he s skillful as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he s got that mentality of a winner.
2
SPEAKER_01
He has got that mentality of a winner there.
3
SPEAKER_02
wins important matches.
3
SPEAKER_00
And he goes over the top of the grip.
3
SPEAKER_00
Do they, where s that land now in terms of rules over the top?
3
SPEAKER_00
Because those are some of the most epic, awesome types of grips.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
Just like over the top, just big grab.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
Well, as long as they throw from it, so they can take any grip,
3
SPEAKER_02
As long as you move them and then catch them, kind of action reaction, really, you know, as long as you catch them on the move, then you can do it.
3
SPEAKER_00
So as long as you re not using it to stall or that kind of stuff.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, you can t block out.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I mean, if I, so like, for example, if I ve got dominant grip on you and I just block out and I just stop you attacking me, so then what?
3
SPEAKER_02
I get you three penalties, get you off.
3
SPEAKER_02
and you haven t done an attack, so you ve gotta stop that, you can t have that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, definitely.
3
SPEAKER_00
You were the favorite to win the 1984 Olympics, but you got silver.
3
SPEAKER_00
I watched that match several times.
3
SPEAKER_00
You probably have it playing in your head.
3
SPEAKER_00
So there is a nice change of direction by your opponent, German Frank Wanneke.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
It was a fake right Uchimada, and then to a left drops Sayonara.
3
SPEAKER_00
How did that loss feel?
3
SPEAKER_02
Devastating is not, you know, is not enough really.
3
SPEAKER_02
Because, you know, the strange thing was, is coming into that Olympics, I was tired, really tired.
3
SPEAKER_02
So my mental state wasn t the best, wasn t certainly the same as it was coming into the previous.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I,
3
SPEAKER_02
I remember thinking I just need to get this over with and then I m going to have a break and just have a rest.
3
SPEAKER_02
That s totally the wrong attitude.
3
SPEAKER_02
It s just not good for going into an Olympic Games.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was coming in there with a different mindset and I remember,
3
SPEAKER_02
Every match that I had, I was winning well, but I was winning with a struggle.
3
SPEAKER_02
I d fought Novak, and I was pretty of France, who was one of the strongest physically.
3
SPEAKER_02
That was in the quarterfinals.
3
SPEAKER_02
I beat Brett Barron by an Ippon.
3
SPEAKER_02
I armlocked him.
3
SPEAKER_02
won my first match by Epon as well.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then Michel Novak, I was fighting a France and I was lucky to win it.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was up, I would scored on him, but I was like starting to defend and just everything that I talked to you about, you know, and then just about held on and then I won.
3
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, so him and I were talking afterwards, like some years afterwards, and he said, I was close, wasn t I?
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but not close enough.
3
SPEAKER_01
I didn t mean it.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I had to say it.
3
SPEAKER_01
Of course.
3
SPEAKER_02
Of course.
3
SPEAKER_02
And no, he was right.
3
SPEAKER_02
You know, and it was one of those.
3
SPEAKER_02
So it s through to the semifinal.
3
SPEAKER_02
I fought Lesac in the semifinal of and I d fought him in the semifinal of the world s as well.
3
SPEAKER_02
I d never gone time with him.
3
SPEAKER_02
I d always beaten him fairly easily and with by upon and that went time.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was just glad to get it done.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was in the final then against Frank Winnicker of Germany and I d beaten Winnicker before, but he was just a young German coming through.
3
SPEAKER_02
When I started the final, I was, I thought, right, I ve just, and I started all my techniques just that little bit off.
3
SPEAKER_02
Nothing was coordinated.
3
SPEAKER_02
just, it was just, I can t really explain why it was just a little bit off.
3
SPEAKER_02
I see it so often now with a lot of the guys that are going for second, third Olympic Games and I see their technique just not quite there and they re struggling and I know when they re, you know, I know what they re going through and I kind of empathize with them.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, it felt like you were dominating that final.
3
SPEAKER_02
I dominated it.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I was winning.
3
SPEAKER_02
Actually, if it had gone another minute and a half, it would have been all over and I would have been Olympic champion and it would have been done.
3
SPEAKER_02
He wouldn t have batted an eyelid, because he would have fought me really, really well.
3
SPEAKER_02
We talked about it afterwards and he said it was just my good day for me.
3
SPEAKER_02
He knows, he was very respectful.
3
SPEAKER_02
This guy is very respectful.
3
SPEAKER_00
He was surprised almost.
3
SPEAKER_00
I mean, not almost.
3
SPEAKER_00
He was very surprised and celebrating like a surprise.
3
SPEAKER_02
Jumping up and down.
3
SPEAKER_02
And you look at that, can t you go, well, it was a nip on, but would I have got it back?
3
SPEAKER_02
I don t know.
3
SPEAKER_02
But I think that actually taking the pressure off, because that was another thing as well, pressure of being favorite.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I see that with a lot of them.
3
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, the great champions, the ones that keep coming through, Capellic.
3
SPEAKER_02
There s a guy, you know, he can look very ordinary and then comes the big tournament and he ll win it.
3
SPEAKER_00
The tragedy of the Olympic Games.
3
SPEAKER_00
I mean, you were the favorite and just like that, like split moment, you lost it.
3
SPEAKER_02
split moment, devastated, and lived it probably not every day.
3
SPEAKER_02
But, you know, Nikki, my wife will tell you that, woken up in sweats and, you know, and I think they contributed as well, because I had a period of my life after where I was drinking too much.
3
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, and I think kind of when I look back, kind of led into
3
SPEAKER_02
though that kind of dark period in my life, you know, and I never, ever, ever, you know, did it go through my mind, anything else, but it definitely affected me.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I was on a downward kind of spiral in a lot of different ways.
3
SPEAKER_02
We have an amazing marriage and we have an amazing family and everything s great, but I still wake up sometimes and I ll say, I ve just dreamt.
3
SPEAKER_02
It s the same reoccurring dream where I m trying to get somewhere and I m trying to put it right.
3
SPEAKER_02
this chance of putting this Olympic final right.
3
SPEAKER_02
In this dream, I ve got a chance of doing it, but I can t get there, and the traffic s stopping me, or something stops me, and then I wake up and I m sweating.
3
SPEAKER_02
And you think, well, after all this time, that s not possible, but it is, and it happens.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, in the match itself, there s that feeling.
3
SPEAKER_00
For me, just watching it, like you re going for throws, you re almost getting there with the throws, and it s almost like he s going for a kind of crappy uchimata, and then you re just like, you re stopping, you re blocking it, and all of a sudden, I mean, that s the beauty of the Olympics.
3
SPEAKER_00
He finds it in himself to switch.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And that, like, against a favorite, against sort of,
3
SPEAKER_00
the great British Judoka just finds the perfect drop Sanagi.
3
SPEAKER_02
Well, you know, his team doctor and coach, he came up to me afterwards and said, I m just really sorry.
3
SPEAKER_02
And that s all they said is, I m just really sorry.
3
SPEAKER_02
They were sorry because, you know, obviously the obvious sadness about that, you know, and of course, everybody takes their, you know, I went actually
3
SPEAKER_02
Tuna was it three weeks later the german open so he had to compete in the german open.
3
SPEAKER_02
Three weeks later so i went over to fight him and.
3
SPEAKER_02
and beat him in the final of the German Open.
3
SPEAKER_02
And it didn t do anything for me, because it was a much tighter match.
3
SPEAKER_02
He was a lot closer.
3
SPEAKER_02
He had a lot more confidence coming in.
3
SPEAKER_02
So he fought me a lot differently.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then it was me pulling it back and just managing to win in the final.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I thought, well, that might appease, it appeased nothing, didn t do anything.
3
SPEAKER_00
When you give your whole life to judo, just, and your love of winning, that s crazy how much the Olympic games mean.
3
SPEAKER_02
It means so much.
3
SPEAKER_02
I ve got to say this, and this is honestly, if it meant that if I d have won that Olympic Games and it had to change my life into a different direction, which I probably would have not competed in the 88 Olympic Games then.
3
SPEAKER_02
If it had changed my life and then I didn t meet my wife and I didn t have my family that I ve got now,
3
SPEAKER_02
I wouldn t swap that, what I ve got now, for anything.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, part of the demons that you ve gotten to know because of those losses is part of probably the central reason that made you the man you are, a legend of the sport.
3
SPEAKER_00
You could have been not that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because an Olympic gold is just an Olympic gold.
3
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_02
And it is, isn t it?
3
SPEAKER_02
And I think that there s a lot of Olympic champions and world champions that win and then are forgotten.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I said to Nikki, I said, my wife, I said, I don t want to be forgotten and I want to be remembered.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I m going to do anything, anything I do, if I m going to do commentary or whatever it is, or coaching, I want to do coaching to a high level.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I want to
3
SPEAKER_02
commentate at a high level.
3
SPEAKER_02
I remember the first commentary I ever did, it was terrible.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I just thought, I ve got to do better than this.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I thought, I just, I need to do it well.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I ve got to do it professionally.
3
SPEAKER_00
So in the book, A Game of Throws, you have a chapter titled Lessons in Losing.
3
SPEAKER_00
So what are some of the lessons here?
3
SPEAKER_00
What are some of the deeper lessons you ve pulled out of losing?
3
SPEAKER_02
I think great champions are made up of the people that handle it in the right way.
3
SPEAKER_02
and you could say, well, I don t like losing, and you could throw your dummy out the pram, and you can be a bad loser in front of everybody.
3
SPEAKER_02
Actually, people pick up on that very, very quickly.
3
SPEAKER_02
You know what it s like in broadcasting, right?
3
SPEAKER_02
Somebody has a bad word to say about somebody, but actually, the ones that endear themselves to you are the ones that handle it in the right way, the correct way.
3
SPEAKER_02
It doesn t mean that you ve got to like it.
3
SPEAKER_02
I didn t like it.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I thought that I handled it certainly in later years in the right way.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I like to see athletes do it in the right way, you know, and I think that it s a make or break situation.
3
SPEAKER_02
It s not all the contests they win, it s the one that they lose and then how they pick themselves up and handle themselves after.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I think that that is a big one for me.
3
SPEAKER_02
And also,
3
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I went through, you know, obviously a later divorce and that was difficult on my son, really difficult on Ashley.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then I was, and I think that some of that was the fact that I was, you know, kind of, I wasn t drinking all the time, but I was drinking in excess at the wrong times, you know, and I think that that s what a lot of people do sometimes is that
3
SPEAKER_02
They use it for the wrong reasons, you know, and I used to hear it.
3
SPEAKER_02
I hear it now all the time, you know, and is that, you know, I need to knock the edge off and I need to just forget.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I need to, you know, and you need to be in a fuzzy place for a while.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I had a lot of time in fuzzy place and I needed to get rid of that, you know, and I needed to clear my head.
3
SPEAKER_00
Where was that place, some of the lower points in your life that you ve reached mentally?
3
SPEAKER_02
I think, you know, definitely, you know, the fact that my marriage, first marriage didn t work, you know, and that was, you know, it s a mix of things that, you know, between us and then, you know, so that s not where I wanted to be at the time.
3
SPEAKER_02
the effects that it had on my son.
3
SPEAKER_02
And it took a long time for him then to come around and to trust me again, you know, and to have belief.
3
SPEAKER_02
He always had belief in me, but to trust me again.
3
SPEAKER_02
And then I think that that was low.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I think that when I look back,
3
SPEAKER_02
is that a lot of my bad decisions were when I was in that fuzzy kind of haze and that it got progressively worse.
3
SPEAKER_02
That got progressively worse to the degree where it was, you know, trying to hide it and trying to hide how much.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I was kind of a functioning kind of drunk.
3
SPEAKER_02
You know, I think you could probably say that.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I, you know, I was functioning.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was still able to, I was still training most days.
3
SPEAKER_02
Crazily enough, I was training to kind of mask it and cover it, and that was probably my savior.
3
SPEAKER_02
I remember I said to my wife, I said to Nikki, I m probably the fittest.
3
SPEAKER_02
If I m a drunk, then I m the fittest drunk in the world.
3
SPEAKER_02
She said, yeah, you probably are actually.
3
SPEAKER_02
I was in great condition for a drunk.
3
SPEAKER_00
So the fuzzy haze, where was your mind?
3
SPEAKER_00
Did you have periods of depression?
3
SPEAKER_02
I had periods of depression.
3
SPEAKER_02
I can honestly say that my depression wasn t that bad, although it s like anything that gives you an up, it gives you an even bigger down, doesn t it?
3
SPEAKER_02
I hated that feeling and also hated myself for letting it happen because I have got this really bizarre,
3
SPEAKER_02
I don t know whether you can call it a power, but I have the ability to be able to say, stop.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I can just, and that s what I did in the end.
3
SPEAKER_02
In the end, there was an incident when I was working for Belgian Judo, and there was an incident, it was Christmas, it was, I tell you exactly the day, it was 20th of December, and me and a Belgian coach, we got absolutely hammered.
3
SPEAKER_02
But we were at the wrong place and he got noticed.
3
SPEAKER_02
I remember they pulled me up in front of this board and I looked down at these guys and half of them were people I didn t want to be in that situation with.
3
SPEAKER_02
They re not people that I respected and they re not people that I trusted.
3
SPEAKER_02
So I said, if you re going to sack me, sack me, but I ll promise you now that I will just, this is it, I ll stop.
3
SPEAKER_02
I m just going to stop.
3
SPEAKER_02
I ve decided.
3
SPEAKER_02
On the way back in the car, I rang Nikki up, my wife, and I said, whatever you hear now, whatever, I m just going to stop.
3
SPEAKER_02
So that was it.
3
Stopped.
3
SPEAKER_00
You just saw the moment and said, stop.
3
SPEAKER_00
Stop.
3
SPEAKER_00
So that fuzzy place, what advice could you give to people about how to overcome that dark place, the depression, whether it has to do with drinking or not?
3
SPEAKER_02
I think if it s to do with drinking, all I can say is is that the two days or a week into not drinking,
3
SPEAKER_02
you ll feel different, you know, it ll make a physical difference.
3
SPEAKER_02
And you ll like that physical difference.
3
SPEAKER_02
Then from a mental perspective as well, because I think that you have a massive downer.
3
SPEAKER_02
I think that that must be because of drugs as well, because I had a situation with my brother.
3
SPEAKER_02
He was professional wrestling and the drugs was an element there.
3
SPEAKER_02
I d never touched a drug or even seen one in my life.
3
SPEAKER_02
but I d let the alcohol side go too far and then decided never to do that.
3
SPEAKER_02
Then I guess I had people ringing me up saying, how can we stop?
3
SPEAKER_02
When they say, can I have a word?
3
SPEAKER_02
Can I discuss something with you?
3
SPEAKER_02
I know then what they want to discuss with me.
3
SPEAKER_02
The thing is that I would say, if you stop,
3
SPEAKER_02
then feel the effects of it, and it will make a difference to your everyday life, and that will make a massive difference.
3
SPEAKER_02
And I think about anybody who is down all the time, is to find the cause of what s pushing you down, you know what I mean?
3
SPEAKER_02
And try and attack
4
SPEAKER_02
that.
4
SPEAKER_02
Somebody once said to me, they said, whatever you got, you know,
4
SPEAKER_02
We ve got something special.
4
SPEAKER_02
I mean, we have a great life and I ve had a great competition record.
4
SPEAKER_02
It could have been better, but it was great.
4
SPEAKER_02
But I ve had success with my business and we re still out there and we have a great life.
4
SPEAKER_02
We travel all the world and there s people out there that would live in your house at the drop of a hat, wherever you are.
4
SPEAKER_02
They drive your car.
4
SPEAKER_02
No matter what car it is, some people haven t got a car.
4
SPEAKER_02
Whatever food you re having and you re moaning about food, there s somebody out there that would take that and gladly eat that.
4
SPEAKER_02
There s always somebody worse off than you.
4
SPEAKER_02
I think that we tend to sometimes look at the things that we haven t got rather than things we have got.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s a skill probably just to be grateful for the things you have, exactly as you said.
4
SPEAKER_00
And sometimes the little things like food and cars and all that kind of stuff, just to have gratitude for, and family, all this kind of stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
But it s still, you know, having talked to a bunch of Olympic athletes,
4
SPEAKER_00
There is a, when you give so much of your life to winning and then you lose, sometimes even when you win, but when you lose at the very top, it s a tough, tough, like tough thing to go through.
4
SPEAKER_02
The most difficult thing I think for anybody is when they have to decide when to stop.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_02
I see the ones that are going to second Olympic Games and then third Olympic, and the ones that are there and they re holding on and they re in their 30s now, different to when they were 19 years of age, 30 something is different to 19.
4
SPEAKER_02
Then what are you going to do afterwards?
4
SPEAKER_02
Then how do you become just a normal person?
4
SPEAKER_02
You re never going to be a normal person.
4
SPEAKER_02
as such, but I think you ve got to do normal things, you know, and then you ve got, I remember the first time that when I finished competition, I had good sponsors.
4
SPEAKER_02
This was, you know, 40 years ago, but I had two really good sponsorships, Vitamin Company and also Judo Company.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I had a car and, you know, I had money.
4
SPEAKER_02
I just, and I was going all over the world.
4
SPEAKER_02
I was successful.
4
SPEAKER_02
And then I stopped.
4
SPEAKER_02
and they took everything back.
4
SPEAKER_02
They took my car, and they did it within two weeks as well.
4
SPEAKER_02
They stopped my funding, and the vitamin company said, thank you very much.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s been a great, we ve done well by you.
4
SPEAKER_02
Bye-bye.
4
SPEAKER_00
This was after your last Olympics.
4
SPEAKER_02
88 Olympics.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, 88.
4
SPEAKER_02
And that finished, and then that was it.
4
SPEAKER_02
And then it s right, okay.
4
SPEAKER_02
First time I had to go in there and buy a track suit and a pair of training shoes, and wow.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, those are different sitting there in the evening by yourself.
4
SPEAKER_02
So you go from seven days a week or six days a week going into the gym and, you know, you re working out the dojo and then you don t have to do it.
4
SPEAKER_02
You know, and that s why you get a lot of
4
SPEAKER_02
when they finish competition, they finish that 30 to 40, it s still, I mean, Ilyas is still doing it now.
4
SPEAKER_02
He s still in there and he s still, you know, because he can, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
4
SPEAKER_02
And it s natural.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I did exactly the same.
4
SPEAKER_02
And then, like I say, you just get to an age and you just think, well, I m just going to kind of take a step back.
4
SPEAKER_00
Which is why there s certain athletes like Ryo Kotani, never stops.
4
SPEAKER_00
It just dominates for 14 years.
4
SPEAKER_00
Probably one of the winningest athletes in judo.
4
SPEAKER_00
Seven-time world champ, two-time Olympic champ, medaled at five Olympics.
4
SPEAKER_00
So it s always impressive.
4
SPEAKER_00
Never stopped.
4
SPEAKER_00
Never stopped.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that s an option if you re like the greatest ever.
4
SPEAKER_02
It d be interesting, wouldn t it, just to see what they re doing now, you know, because at some stage you have to get a normal job.
4
SPEAKER_00
You do have to stop.
4
SPEAKER_02
You do have to stop, you know, at some stage you have to decide what you re going to do, you know, and we, you know, it s either into coaching, the judo is either to coaching or if you re not in coaching then it s into, um,
4
SPEAKER_02
something to do with the media.
4
SPEAKER_02
And, you know, I was lucky that I, it was just by accident, really, with the commentary.
4
SPEAKER_02
Somebody said, would you do a voiceover?
4
SPEAKER_02
So I did this voiceover, and that was back in 1982, I did that.
4
SPEAKER_00
So you ve been commentating since 1982.
4
SPEAKER_02
I did some voiceovers.
4
SPEAKER_02
I wouldn t call it commentating.
4
SPEAKER_02
But I did some voiceovers, and then I did some, we did some different
4
SPEAKER_02
European Championships, World Championship kind of events, and I did the voiceovers for it.
4
SPEAKER_02
The way that it was done, it was more narration.
4
SPEAKER_02
Somebody asked me to do an event, and when you listen to the intonation of the voice and stuff like that, it wasn t like it is now, but I guess that s just something that developed.
4
SPEAKER_02
Because then it was coming from the heart, and I started to get excited and just do my thing, and it was just me really, it s just my style.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, I ve listened to your commentary from a while back.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if it s the 80s, but it s still there.
4
SPEAKER_02
I think it s timing as well, isn t it?
4
SPEAKER_02
It s like, you know, you get your timing a bit better and know when to go in, when to come out, when to say something, when not, you know.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I think that in the early days, I tended to think, I tended to want to talk all the time.
4
SPEAKER_02
And you don t have to do that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Also knowing when to shut up.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s the key, isn t it?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, part of the drama is in the silence, building up to the setup and the throw and all that kind of stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
But also you re very good at, while radiating passion, being very precise and specific about the details of the throw and the setup and why something worked and didn t.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I think there s two kinds of commentating.
4
SPEAKER_02
You can commentate what you see, and then you commentate what,
4
SPEAKER_02
people can t see, you know, and so if you ve got somebody that is not really understanding of what s happening in the inner part of the game, so it might be a technical thing or it might be the tactical part of the play here that s going on, and if you can introduce that as well, then you ve got an advantage.
4
SPEAKER_00
Quick pause, I need a breath and break.
4
SPEAKER_02
Okay, good stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
So we just took a little break and went to judotv.com, which is, I guess, an IGF website.
4
SPEAKER_00
IGF is the organization behind a lot of the big judo events in the world.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I just signed up.
4
SPEAKER_00
You should sign up too.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s great.
4
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely, sign up.
4
SPEAKER_02
Cheaper the price, cheaper the price.
4
SPEAKER_00
And you can watch basically any match from the Grand Slams and go back through history, I guess.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I ve got to say, Lex, I mean, everybody, still people saying to me, oh, you know, we need more judo on television.
4
SPEAKER_02
They ve got judo on television every other week that they can access all of the top people in all the top events.
4
SPEAKER_02
And it costs a hundred dollars a year, you know, it s to access everything and they can play all the videos.
4
SPEAKER_02
I mean, we ve just accessed this here, uh, the Paris tournament, and we re going to have a look at Teddy Rene, but, um, you know, it s, it s so cheap at the price.
4
SPEAKER_00
So we re now in Paris Grand Slam 2024, Teddy Renner final.
4
SPEAKER_00
By the way, super cool, like you click on the draw, and you can just look at any of the matches.
4
SPEAKER_00
You can go to the bottom of the finals, you can go.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, to any one.
4
SPEAKER_00
Any one of them, that s so cool.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s really well done.
4
SPEAKER_00
Really well done interface.
4
SPEAKER_00
Anyway, let me at first ask the ridiculous big question, who do you think is the greatest of all time?
4
SPEAKER_00
Is Teddy Renner in the writing?
4
SPEAKER_02
He s the greatest judo winner of all time.
4
SPEAKER_02
Of that, there s no doubt.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I think if you asked him whether he was the greatest judo man in the world of all time, he would say, no, I m not.
4
SPEAKER_02
And he s not the greatest judo man.
4
SPEAKER_02
There are people with more beautiful judo in some ways, although he s got great technique, but he is the ultimate winner.
4
SPEAKER_00
10-time world champ, two-time gold medalist in the Olympics.
4
SPEAKER_00
I guess two-time bronze medalist.
4
SPEAKER_00
He s probably going to Paris.
4
SPEAKER_02
He s going after it again.
4
SPEAKER_00
So he s right here.
4
SPEAKER_00
He s right there.
4
SPEAKER_02
This is just a couple of months ago.
4
SPEAKER_02
And then last week, he was out again and he won again.
4
SPEAKER_00
You think he gets gold medal this time?
4
SPEAKER_02
There s people getting closer to him, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
Because he s obviously, you know, he s age-wise and the amount of time that he s been there, he s obviously somebody that is starting not quite at his best as he was when he was younger.
4
SPEAKER_02
But he, like I say, he still puts it on the line.
4
SPEAKER_02
He lays it on the line every single time.
4
SPEAKER_02
And then not only does he lay on the line, but he beats them all, you know, and last week he just beat Saito, who s a young up and coming Japanese fighter, and he beat him in the final.
4
SPEAKER_02
It was close and he did well.
4
SPEAKER_02
There are certain people
4
SPEAKER_02
The smaller ones actually, not the taller ones.
4
SPEAKER_02
Cause like, you know, we re saying about the big arm over the top that he likes and the dominant grip that he likes.
4
SPEAKER_02
There are people that can give him a hard time.
4
SPEAKER_02
Now for the Olympic games, he has two or three of those on the trot.
4
SPEAKER_02
It might work against him, you know, and it s by no means an absolute certainty that he s going to win the Olympic gold medal, but he s got to be one of the favorites.
4
SPEAKER_02
top favorite.
4
SPEAKER_02
No matter what happens now, Teddy Rene is the greatest winner.
4
SPEAKER_02
If you asked the great Yamashita, he would say the same.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yamashita was unbeaten in international competition and I trained with Yamashita a lot over a two-year period.
4
SPEAKER_02
and got to know him quite well.
4
SPEAKER_02
And he was one of the greatest of all times.
4
SPEAKER_02
For me, he was one of the greatest judo men.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I m talking about from a technical point of view, from a spectacular judo point of view, understanding the fundamental principles of how techniques work,
4
SPEAKER_02
Sometimes having, you know, different techniques that work for you, you know, so if one doesn t work and one particular direction doesn t work, you can change the direction completely.
4
SPEAKER_00
In case people don t know, Yamashita is this legendary Jidoka, heavyweight.
4
SPEAKER_00
Teddy Reiner, heavyweight, that s plus 100 kg.
4
SPEAKER_02
So he... He would have caused him all sorts of problems.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh yeah, that s cool.
4
SPEAKER_00
Who do you think wins, Yamashita versus Teddy Reiner?
4
SPEAKER_02
Yes, I think Yamashita wins.
4
SPEAKER_00
But, you know... Wait, wait, wait.
4
SPEAKER_00
Do you think Yamashita beats Teddy Reiner?
4
SPEAKER_02
I think so.
4
SPEAKER_00
Strong words, you think so, you think so.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yamashita is on the shorter side, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, and he finds it more difficult with shorter people, you know, and so it was, it would have been a very interesting confrontation.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I think if you asked Yamashita, he would probably say, you know, that Teddy Renner, he s very gracious, he s really gracious.
4
SPEAKER_02
It would be really good.
4
SPEAKER_02
It would have been an unbelievable matchup.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I ve got to say this, that, you know, Teddy Rene is the greatest winner of all time.
4
SPEAKER_00
Competition-wise.
4
SPEAKER_00
So it s interesting, both of them, maybe you can correct me, but have this Osorogare, which is kind of a trip that I never understood.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
It was a very tricky thing to do, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
It s very easy to do, maybe, as a white belt.
4
SPEAKER_00
You roll in, you can understand.
4
SPEAKER_02
But, like, to do it at the high, high, high level... You see any of the top guys now, especially if they re second time out, you know, so, like, they might catch somebody by surprise.
4
SPEAKER_02
They come out, they go, bang, and you go, that was amazing, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
But if they fought again, ten minutes later, you go,
4
SPEAKER_02
You re not going to catch me with that, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
You ve got a different situation here.
4
SPEAKER_02
And, and so it s slightly different, but the best fighters adapt like that.
4
SPEAKER_02
and they re able to see a situation, feel the situation, and they attack once, and then go again, and attack second, third time, and in the third time, they make it work.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, both Himasha and Teddy Renner with the Soragari, they ll just like hit it over and over in the match.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, sometimes it ll hit first time and it won t go, and then you make a readjustment of the way in.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s a little bit like, I mean, if you take a really easy way of understanding it, is if we re shooting at a target,
4
SPEAKER_02
And all of a sudden, you start moving that target.
4
SPEAKER_02
It s different hitting a moving target, but it s also different hitting a moving target that s trying to hit you as well.
4
SPEAKER_02
And that s our game, right?
4
SPEAKER_02
So we re not only trying to throw a moving target, we re trying to throw a moving target that s trying to throw us.
4
SPEAKER_02
So it makes it even more difficult.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, there s a few folks who you know what s coming.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s like over and over and over it s the same attack anyway with this Uchimara.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s like, it s different.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s not many people like that where it s like the same attack, I mean there s other attacks also, but they ll just go after the same thing over and over and over.
4
SPEAKER_02
When I watch great athletes, most of them can throw over both flanks.
4
SPEAKER_02
Not always going left and right, you know, although our sport always, I mean, the caters are always demonstrated left and right.
4
SPEAKER_02
So like if you demonstrate, if you do something on one side, you know, then can you demonstrate it on the other side?
4
SPEAKER_02
Right.
4
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
4
SPEAKER_02
So can you do it equally?
4
SPEAKER_02
No.
4
SPEAKER_02
But you do it differently on the other side.
4
SPEAKER_02
So when I m teaching, I don t teach left and right.
4
SPEAKER_02
So if I was teaching you to do a technique, first thing I d do is say, I need you to take a sleeve and a lapel.
4
SPEAKER_02
So I d let you decide what was left and right.
4
SPEAKER_02
Because often what happens is we impart on people,
4
SPEAKER_02
whether they re going to be left or right when we start teaching.
4
SPEAKER_02
You get a lot of teachers do that.
4
SPEAKER_02
They ll say immediately, what do you write with, left or right hand?
4
SPEAKER_02
It s no indicator actually as to how we do judo because I m left-handed and I do more predominantly right-handed because I lead off my strongest hand.
4
SPEAKER_02
Actually, most people do.
4
SPEAKER_02
Actually, left and right is a bit of a trap sometimes when we re teaching better to
4
SPEAKER_02
because we can go, so my point was, is that a lot of people can go both flanks.
4
SPEAKER_02
So they ll do something over this side and something over this side.
4
SPEAKER_00
But anyway, it was one-sided.
4
SPEAKER_02
He was one-sided, but he could switch it.
4
SPEAKER_02
So he had Cianaghi as well on the other side.
4
SPEAKER_02
So he could switch it if he had to.
4
SPEAKER_02
Oh, interesting.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
And by the way, your opponent in 84, was he righty or lefty?
4
SPEAKER_00
He was a righty.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that drop left.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Where did that come from?
4
SPEAKER_02
Well, I mean, again, it was, you know, he could have probably in other contests.
4
SPEAKER_02
He d hit me with it several times and I just stopped it, you know, and just at the wrong place at the right time for him.
4
SPEAKER_02
Right place in the wrong time for me.
4
SPEAKER_02
Right.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s life.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
All right.
4
SPEAKER_00
Let s let s watch some Taylor there.
4
SPEAKER_02
This is final of Paris Tournament.
4
SPEAKER_02
And this is against the Korean.
4
SPEAKER_02
The Korean had had a great day, actually.
4
SPEAKER_00
Again, shorter.
4
SPEAKER_02
Again, shorter.
4
SPEAKER_02
So he does find that difficult.
4
SPEAKER_02
Have a look at Teddy Renner.
4
SPEAKER_02
Teddy Renner is trying to catch the sleeve.
4
SPEAKER_02
He s after the sleeve and then the right arm over the top.
4
SPEAKER_02
That s the key point for Teddy Renner.
4
SPEAKER_02
And of course, what he has done, if he can t always catch the big Osoda Gary over his right-hand side, he s been doing something to the opposite side.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the Korean just went for a drop sale.
4
SPEAKER_00
and Teddy Renner block with the hips.
4
SPEAKER_00
He s a big boy.
4
SPEAKER_02
Like I say, there s difficulty always against somebody smaller, dropping with the sea and Aggies.
4
SPEAKER_00
Has Teddy Renner ever been thrown for a pawn?
4
SPEAKER_02
I ve never seen him thrown for a pawn, but
5
SPEAKER_00
He was thrown last week for a nice technique and he s being caught more and more.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s getting close.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
And Tseyev in the final of the World Championships, they had a strange situation there where Tseyev was a technique down and then pulled off a counter and they didn t count it.
5
SPEAKER_00
But then they overruled it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Unfortunately, I was commentating at the time, and I went for a score for Tseyev.
5
SPEAKER_00
And anyway, they overruled it, and then they awarded a second gold medal to Tseyev.
5
SPEAKER_01
What can you say about Tamerlan Bashaev, who also gave him trouble?
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, Bysshev and Tseyev are the two that could possibly go to the Olympics.
5
SPEAKER_00
So that was a close one there from Rene.
5
SPEAKER_00
That was closest that he d actually been.
5
SPEAKER_01
Oh, wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
So didn t have the sleeve and he relies on the sleeve greatly.
5
SPEAKER_00
Big support there in the French, in the crowd.
5
SPEAKER_01
And also, maybe can you explain the penalties for stalling?
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, so if they don t attack, if they ve got a grip and they ve got sleeve lapel or they got two hands on, if they re too passive and they don t attack, if they ve got dominant sleeve grip, they don t attack.
5
SPEAKER_00
That was quite close as well from the Koreans.
5
SPEAKER_00
So the Korean here, you can see is having a real go, you know.
5
SPEAKER_00
The penalties will come if they don t attack at the right time.
5
SPEAKER_00
Step outside the yellow area, they ll get penalized as well.
5
SPEAKER_00
that uh that s dedication for absolutely i mean it was really close wasn t it a nice little coach gary there from uh the uh korean and if they touch below the belt line with the arms so if they they re not allowed to grab the legs they ve stopped grabbing the legs
5
SPEAKER_01
Wow, the Korean s really going after it.
5
SPEAKER_00
The Korean s having a real good go at it.
5
SPEAKER_01
I guess every single person in that division is probably training for Teddy Rene, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
You think Teddy Rene s been there a long time, you know, and he s got another guy here in the final of the Paris tournament.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s got 18,000 people watching him.
5
SPEAKER_00
They re all on Teddy Rene s side.
5
SPEAKER_00
They want him to win.
5
SPEAKER_00
And the Korean s out there on his own with his coach.
5
SPEAKER_01
But also the pressure on Teddy Rene.
5
SPEAKER_00
Amazing pressure.
5
SPEAKER_00
We interviewed him after this and he said, I ve got pressure.
5
SPEAKER_00
People go, well, is he going to do it at the Olympic Games?
5
SPEAKER_00
Can I do it in Paris?
5
SPEAKER_00
He wanted to go to Paris.
5
SPEAKER_00
Really, the last Olympic Games should have been it, shouldn t it?
5
SPEAKER_00
It should have been the final one, but he s gone, no, I ve got to do another four years.
5
SPEAKER_00
Two penalties are on the board already for the Korean.
5
SPEAKER_00
That Korean is really having a great go.
5
SPEAKER_01
He s got a bit of a lift on him.
5
SPEAKER_01
He s going after it.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s really going after it.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, it s an amazing effort there from the Korean.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he s getting some last minute information.
5
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if you ve ever seen his coach stood next to him like that, but it s amazing.
5
SPEAKER_00
He s six foot six and he s about four foot six.
5
SPEAKER_01
He s a he s a full of passion.
5
SPEAKER_01
I love screaming.
5
SPEAKER_00
So golden score.
5
SPEAKER_00
How does golden score work?
5
SPEAKER_00
Can you say the golden score?
5
SPEAKER_00
So if it goes without any point on the board from a throw or a hold down or I m not strangle, then it goes into golden score.
5
SPEAKER_00
So two Shido s on the board apiece.
5
SPEAKER_00
One more mistake now and it s going to be all over.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh, that s it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Teddy Renne just manages to turn it.
5
SPEAKER_00
on the Korean and that went really against the run of play, didn t it?
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Because the Korean did better, you know, but you know, Teddy Renner is a winner.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he says, right, okay, let s have more, more cheering.
5
SPEAKER_01
Finds a way to, to score in the,
5
SPEAKER_00
And I have to say, you know, that even when he loses, you know, he s always graceful.
5
SPEAKER_00
He doesn t like it, but he s graceful.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, there was so much love there, celebration.
5
SPEAKER_01
It was great.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s great to see.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s great that he s doing it again, going after it, chasing the gold medal again.
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, he s chasing the gold medal.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s going to be in Paris, which is going to be even more fantastic.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, he s already the greatest.
5
SPEAKER_00
You said, you know, what has he got to do to be the greatest?
5
SPEAKER_00
He s already the greatest competitor judo s ever known.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that was even with the great Tani.
5
SPEAKER_00
So Tani was amazing as well.
5
SPEAKER_01
Are you part of the commentating team for Paris?
5
SPEAKER_00
I m part of the commentating team, but it won t be for IJF because it s independent broadcast.
5
SPEAKER_01
Have you ever had an athlete sort of come up to you and ask like, why did you say that?
5
SPEAKER_01
Or like disagree with your commentary?
5
SPEAKER_00
You know, I ve got to say that 99%, 99.9% of everybody is so grateful that I ve commentated their fights all the way through.
5
SPEAKER_00
They know if they ve messed up.
5
SPEAKER_00
So if I say something and I m never disparaging, really disparaging, you know, but what I will say is, you know, it was a great throw by the other guy or...
5
SPEAKER_00
It was a great match.
5
SPEAKER_00
And if they made a mistake, so if they walk out, they know that I will say something that will, you know, mean something.
5
SPEAKER_00
So nobody really moans about it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I try and talk the truth, if I can.
5
SPEAKER_01
So who else would you consider as some of the greats?
5
SPEAKER_01
So I personally just, because I love the standing Sayonara, Koga.
5
SPEAKER_01
So there s like, you know, the number of times he won the world championships and the Olympic games.
5
SPEAKER_01
but there s also how you won and how you won into fights and what you did.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s not necessarily about getting gold medals, it s about how you fought and how you represent the sport.
5
SPEAKER_01
And there s certain athletes like N-A-Y and Eliade that are going after the big throws.
5
SPEAKER_00
only after they d won a win by Ippon, you know?
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think that that is the difference, is they re the ones that come out there and it s a bit like, you know, when Tyson stepped out there, you knew what you were going to get, you know?
5
SPEAKER_00
And if they went toe-to-toe, if Tyson had somebody going toe-to-toe, somebody was going to get knocked out.
5
SPEAKER_00
And, you know, we got the same in judo when people go head-to-head and it s an open match.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I often talk about an open match.
5
SPEAKER_00
I say it s an open match.
5
SPEAKER_00
They re both trying to score.
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SPEAKER_00
Somebody is going to get scored on.
5
SPEAKER_00
Somebody is going to go, you know, and that makes it exciting.
5
SPEAKER_00
When they come out and they close up, you know, then that s not an exciting match.
5
SPEAKER_01
Is there a case for Ohno, Shohei Ohno, three time world champ, two time gold medalist?
5
SPEAKER_00
I think that, you know, judo wise, he s got to be one of the greatest because he had such versatility.
5
SPEAKER_00
He had,
5
SPEAKER_00
He could go right and he could go left.
5
SPEAKER_00
He could pick up.
5
SPEAKER_00
He could go to the ground as well.
5
SPEAKER_00
He won a lot of his earlier matches on the ground.
5
SPEAKER_00
empathy, you know, and how he presents himself sometimes, he falls down.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think that hopefully that should come with tutoring and, you know, how to be a great champion after, you know, it s not just about what you do on the mat, but what you do off the mat as well.
5
SPEAKER_01
This is to you a great champion is the whole package of.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
how you present yourself when you lose, how you represent yourself just... Yeah, I think it s how you present yourself afterwards, how you are with people, how much you can help people.
5
SPEAKER_00
I mean, people, kids, and, you know, they look up to these great champions because they want to be like them.
5
SPEAKER_00
So the worst thing is when you get somebody that s a bit of an ass and they re not presenting themselves in the right way.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I like to see somebody presenting themselves in the right way.
5
SPEAKER_00
I think that it s something that can be taught.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s something that normally comes with a little bit of experience, a little bit of age.
5
SPEAKER_00
I like to think that I m a little bit different now than I was when I was 19.
5
SPEAKER_00
Not that I was bad, I just think I was just,
5
SPEAKER_00
I see it often now, you know, just full of beans.
5
SPEAKER_01
You re a beautiful work in progress.
5
SPEAKER_01
What about Nomura?
5
SPEAKER_01
That I hear in the morrow.
5
SPEAKER_01
That s three time gold medalist.
5
SPEAKER_00
Never lost an Olympic fight.
5
SPEAKER_00
So there s nobody, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Nobody ever done that.
5
SPEAKER_00
You know what I mean?
5
SPEAKER_00
So that s got to be, it has to stand.
5
SPEAKER_00
He took two years off in between every Olympic Games and came back, did the right amount of events to qualify for.
5
SPEAKER_00
Not only did he having to qualify, he had to qualify through Japan.
5
SPEAKER_00
Now, Japan, remember, have got the greatest depth.
5
SPEAKER_00
So they got people coming through all the time, you know, and then he had to win the Japanese trials.
5
SPEAKER_00
I mean, we had a four-time world champion from Japan.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is when world championships was every other year.
5
SPEAKER_00
And this is Shozo Fuji.
5
SPEAKER_00
And he was the greatest middleweight of all time and never got to participate in the Olympics because he lost the Japanese trials.
5
SPEAKER_00
twice in two Olympic possibilities.
5
SPEAKER_00
So he had to qualify for Japan and then go to the Olympic Games and then do it there.
5
SPEAKER_00
So sometimes some of the best people in Japan can t get outside of Japan.
5
SPEAKER_00
Look at the situation they had with Abe and then they had Maruyama.
5
SPEAKER_00
Maniyama was, you know, and Abe were both the best by far in the under 66 kilos category.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is for the last Olympic Games.
5
SPEAKER_00
And they sent one to the World Championships, one to the Olympic Games, and they both won gold medals, you know.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
I mean, that s why the All Japan Championships is like legendary.
5
SPEAKER_01
There s these battles with Yamashita and all of them.
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, Abe and Maruyama, they had a trials in the Kodokan.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was 26 minutes, I think it was 26 minutes it went.
5
SPEAKER_00
They were battling it out for 26 minutes.
5
SPEAKER_01
That s great.
5
SPEAKER_01
If we can just go to, you ve trained in Japan.
5
SPEAKER_01
What are those randoris like?
5
SPEAKER_01
What s that training like?
5
SPEAKER_00
I touched on the danger, that danger of being thrown when you get hold of somebody or somebody gets hold of you.
5
SPEAKER_00
I often reflect, I often talk about it when I m commentating because I can see immediately.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s easy, isn t it?
5
SPEAKER_00
We re in the commentary chair or if you re in the coach s chair and you don t really understand totally, absolutely what s going on when somebody is being outgripped.
5
SPEAKER_00
And when they re in danger of being thrown, I mean, you know, if you re in danger of being thrown, the first thing you do is stick your backside out and defend by, you know, by not being in the position they want you to be in, all right?
5
SPEAKER_00
And so that s danger, you know, you feel the danger.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so in Japan, that was the place I used to go to train because I felt the danger and so my defenses would be heightened.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so somebody that was, I went two years, one Olympic cycle, I went two years, two months without having a score on me in any competition.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I went to one competition in the European championships, which I won, and I was struggling all the way through it and got scored on three times in my pool of, like my first pool of fights.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I was devastated.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I actually nearly lost the whole competition because I was more mortified about being scored on three times when I hadn t been scored on for two and a half years.
5
SPEAKER_00
I had this thing in my head about two and a half years.
5
SPEAKER_00
and then all of a sudden, I m not unbeatable.
5
SPEAKER_00
I almost lost it, completely lost it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Just so fortunate.
5
SPEAKER_00
Couple of things went my way and just came out, and I scraped and scratched my way to the final and won the final well.
5
SPEAKER_00
But that was my best match, but I almost lost it.
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, what do you do with the fact that if you go to Japan and you re getting, you re saying danger, like, you re probably getting- Getting thrown.
5
SPEAKER_01
Getting thrown in Japan.
5
SPEAKER_01
What does that do to your ego?
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, again, it s my, you know, that was a winning ego that had to adapt.
5
SPEAKER_00
I remember we went to the Case Joe, which police dojo one time, and they created this groundwork competition because they wanted to see me do the ju-ji, like how I went in and how I, yeah, the armbar, right?
5
SPEAKER_00
They wanted to see how I did it from underneath or over the top.
5
SPEAKER_00
They created this event.
5
SPEAKER_00
study the creature.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, they started it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Then Winner Stays On competition was happening at the Caze, Joe.
5
SPEAKER_00
I did about seven in and then my coach came in and said, no, it s finished.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s it now, it s finished.
5
SPEAKER_00
Suddenly we realized what was going on.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was going, no, no, no, don t stop it like that.
5
SPEAKER_00
It was one of those moments where
5
SPEAKER_00
you know, the boot was on my foot, you could say, you know, rather than the other side, the other way, because I had been to Japan in situation.
5
SPEAKER_00
I remember as a 16 year old, I got such a drumming.
5
SPEAKER_00
from one of the Japanese guys, older students, and he had a gold tooth.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so he was gold tooth to me, you know, and he was my nightmare.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I remember I kept coming out to fight him because he kept throwing me and I was crying and I was upset and I was like, and then that was another occasion where
5
SPEAKER_00
I got dragged away and I said no.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I wanted to go back and fight him.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I went back to the same dojo every year to fight him.
5
SPEAKER_00
He was on my mind.
5
SPEAKER_00
Morning, noon, night, he was on my mind.
5
SPEAKER_01
Gold Tooth was on your mind.
5
SPEAKER_00
Gold Tooth was on my mind, you know.
5
SPEAKER_00
And it took two years later.
5
SPEAKER_00
Two years to me from 16 to 18 was totally different.
5
SPEAKER_00
18 years of age, I was pretty competitive with him.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was standing up with him.
5
SPEAKER_00
19, he was in the groundwork competition.
5
SPEAKER_01
That s when the switch happened.
5
SPEAKER_01
Switch happened.
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, because I remember getting the arm lock and
5
SPEAKER_00
I didn t put it on immediately.
5
SPEAKER_00
I needed it to last.
5
SPEAKER_00
It had to last.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I spread, the whole thing lasted as long as I could possibly get it.
5
SPEAKER_00
And it was a long memory as I was looking down at him.
5
SPEAKER_01
And now he has nightmares about you.
5
SPEAKER_01
Now he has nightmares.
5
SPEAKER_01
I wonder what nickname he has for you.
5
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m hoping that he remembers me as... He has a photo of you.
5
SPEAKER_00
Do you know what?
5
SPEAKER_00
He probably doesn t say, just back of an eyelid, doesn t say a thing about it.
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, I mean, can you just speak to that training with those folks?
5
SPEAKER_01
You know, you said crying, just the frustration of being thrown.
5
SPEAKER_01
I mean, how do you, it s such a beautiful part of the process of becoming great.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I think it is just something that doesn t happen at this level.
5
SPEAKER_00
We were talking about levels.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then at this level, it never happened.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I went out in my first European cadet.
5
SPEAKER_00
And all of a sudden, I wasn t this top guy.
5
SPEAKER_00
I was in the mix.
5
SPEAKER_00
And then I had to work myself to the top of that mix.
5
SPEAKER_00
to the top of the next one, you know, because I went to the European Senior Championships.
5
SPEAKER_00
And, you know, again, you re not the top and, you know, you work your way to the top of that.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I think it is a frustration, you know, but I think it s that kind of hatred of losing and also
5
SPEAKER_00
being out of control.
5
SPEAKER_00
I think that the first time, first senior European championships I fought, I fought Nevzorov, but he was only one of my contests.
5
SPEAKER_00
Then I had to fight a Frenchman for third place, but he totally outgripped me.
5
SPEAKER_00
And I remember I was more upset, though I won the contest, I was more upset that he totally
5
SPEAKER_00
out, he did outgrip me and I was more upset and then I fought him a year later and outgripped him.
5
SPEAKER_00
All right, so it was one of those, you know, it was a learning process all the way through.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, that like frustration is like whatever that does to your soul, the building up afterwards is what
6
SPEAKER_01
It actually makes you better.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s fascinating.
6
SPEAKER_01
And do you think there s in Japan just killers there?
6
SPEAKER_01
They re like just the world doesn t know about.
6
SPEAKER_01
They just just.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s world champions in the dojo.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, there s people that never make it out.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, I remember we were training like so.
6
SPEAKER_00
And everybody that s that goes to Japan
6
SPEAKER_00
All my friends that have been world Olympic champions, they all know what I m talking about.
6
SPEAKER_00
They know exactly what I m saying, is that when we go to the dojos there, we all get thrown by people that never come out to be world champions.
6
SPEAKER_00
They re just in the mix, or they re going through three years of university, and then they go, we had a guy.
6
SPEAKER_00
We had a guy that came in.
6
SPEAKER_00
He was a business guy.
6
SPEAKER_00
He came in with his suitcase and his briefcase like that.
6
SPEAKER_00
He s got his tie up like that.
6
SPEAKER_00
So he decides he s going to come in and he gets changed and he s in his lunch hour.
6
SPEAKER_00
He s in his lunch hour, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
So he s got to be quick.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
So he comes in and he goes through, he s working his way through the whole of the British team.
6
SPEAKER_00
We re all lined up, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
He s just working his way through the whole of the British team and I know it s my turn next.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I get hold of him and I throw him immediately.
6
SPEAKER_00
Then it was what we were talking about when it happens in the first few seconds of the practice.
6
SPEAKER_00
So then I had four minutes of him coming at me and I m going up into the air and I m twisting off and I m like that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then, like, everybody s laughing at the side of the mat, or the whole British team, he s gone through the whole British team, and then he, ten minutes later, he s just tying his tie up like that, you know, and back to work, like, you know, imagine him sitting behind his desk in his computer.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m glad he didn t get out.
6
SPEAKER_01
Hopefully he listens to this.
6
SPEAKER_00
Hopefully.
6
SPEAKER_01
Anybody else I didn t mention as part of the greats that just kind of jumped you?
6
SPEAKER_00
Kashiwazaki sensei is my favorite of all favorites.
6
SPEAKER_00
He is what I would call a judo genius.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if you can get him up here.
6
SPEAKER_00
Can we get him up?
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
So going to 1981 World Championships.
6
SPEAKER_00
And, uh, and I ll talk you through the great Kashiwazaki.
6
SPEAKER_00
He was one year, uh, in great Britain and he was, uh, he was a guy that was so much a genius.
6
SPEAKER_00
All right.
6
SPEAKER_00
So you want the final of the under 60, 65 kilograms there, the one at the top.
6
SPEAKER_00
This is him.
6
SPEAKER_00
He is, uh, two weight categories below my weight category that I won the world championships same year.
6
SPEAKER_00
I won it.
6
SPEAKER_00
So this is, it s not, I m not sure if this is going to show his final of.
6
SPEAKER_01
This is the highlight.
6
SPEAKER_00
Watch this.
6
SPEAKER_00
This, this, this he did in the final of the world.
6
SPEAKER_01
For people just listening, he did an incredible sacrifice throw.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then he was on top for the, uh, for the new was a and renowned for his groundwork.
6
SPEAKER_00
And, uh, he, he was on top of against a really strong Romanian guy.
6
SPEAKER_00
All right.
6
SPEAKER_00
So his transition was just phenomenal.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Let me, let me go back and look at that.
6
SPEAKER_01
What just happened.
6
SPEAKER_00
So he s just showing you.
6
SPEAKER_00
So he does this, uh, coachy thing, uh, just to create space.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s his follow through into groundwork that is best of all.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then the Romanian, really strong, like I say, he d gone all the way through to the final of the World Championships, winning most by Ipon, I think, the Romanian.
6
SPEAKER_00
And he s defending really, really well here.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you can see that how persistent he is.
6
SPEAKER_00
He knows exactly what he wants.
6
SPEAKER_00
He s just got to get his leg out.
6
SPEAKER_00
Now watch, he ll tie the arm up and then he ll pull the top leg towards him.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then he ll push the bottom one off.
6
SPEAKER_01
Always working.
6
SPEAKER_00
With both feet.
6
SPEAKER_00
Always working.
6
SPEAKER_00
Always working.
6
SPEAKER_00
Re-adjust the balance.
6
SPEAKER_00
Still one leg trapped.
6
SPEAKER_00
Final of the world championships, good referee because he s refereeing something here that s happening, you know, that s going to decide as to whether, so he doesn t call it to stand it up at all.
6
SPEAKER_00
Watch him pull the top one now and he ll push the bottom one.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s a calmness on his face, which is great to see.
6
SPEAKER_00
Calm, pushes the bottom leg, leg out, job done, all finished.
6
SPEAKER_00
This is him again.
6
SPEAKER_00
Watch this.
6
SPEAKER_00
This is another technique that he does.
6
SPEAKER_00
Another sacrifice.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then just, again, sacrifice directly in, directly into the niwaza.
6
SPEAKER_01
Transition is everything, isn t it?
6
SPEAKER_00
In judo.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Well, in anything, really, but judo especially pays off.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, because we haven t got that long.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, we had more time here.
6
SPEAKER_00
They ve just brought more time back.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we ve got more time to transition in and to get the situation that we want and to get the attacking situation that we want.
6
SPEAKER_00
Because, you know, I remember I was teaching in America to some jiu-jitsu guys and they were saying, oh, we ll never give you our back.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I said, with judo rules, certain situations,
6
SPEAKER_00
It happens that, you know, when we try and do throws where we re facing away from our opponent, you know, so like, for example, Cienagis, if they fail, then the back is there, you know, and that s how we get the back.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s a different situation, you know, than going on your back in the guard situation.
6
SPEAKER_00
Totally different.
6
SPEAKER_01
Well, there are Travis Stevens.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t know how familiar with his judo but he s a really interesting example because he competed at the highest level in jiu-jitsu as well and his idea He s a big sanagi guy and he basically threw all that away and
6
SPEAKER_01
In the jiu-jitsu.
6
SPEAKER_01
In the jiu-jitsu.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like he took the sport from scratch for what it is.
6
SPEAKER_01
So he almost never did a standing seoi-nage, seoi-nages at all in jiu-jitsu.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, because it would leave his back all the time, you know, if it failed.
6
SPEAKER_00
But he wouldn t have the same kind of grip on the judogi or the karate, the jiu-jitsu gi.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
A little bit different.
6
SPEAKER_01
And so you have to kind of consider the sport, the art of it, and also the competitors, the styles and the culture of the sport if you want to win.
6
SPEAKER_01
If winning is the most important thing, then you re like, all right, well, let s, you know.
6
SPEAKER_00
But you learn the game, don t you?
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s what he did.
6
SPEAKER_00
He learned the game, you know, and I think that s credit to him, you know, and that s why I was saying about wrestling, you know, the wrestlers, I mean,
6
SPEAKER_00
good to learn the judo and for what it is and the mechanics and how it works.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then learn the wrestling.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I do the commentary as well for the freestyle and I will be at the Olympics for the freestyle and the Greco-Roman.
6
SPEAKER_00
So and I love the freestyle.
6
SPEAKER_00
Absolutely love it.
6
SPEAKER_00
But freestyle is freestyle.
6
SPEAKER_00
Judo is judo.
6
SPEAKER_00
I like to see people doing judo.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but there s a
6
SPEAKER_01
There s a rhyme to the whole combat thing.
6
SPEAKER_01
They re all, I mean, the body mechanics, it s all like fascinating echoes of each other in interesting ways.
6
SPEAKER_01
The details are different, but there s still two humans clashing.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we ve got some amazing crossovers with people like the Mongolians have come in with Georgians, and the Georgians do massive pickups and different techniques.
6
SPEAKER_00
If you ask the fighters whether grabbing the legs, a lot of them would say some of the wrestling styles, the Georgians and the Mongolians might say, yeah, I d like to be able to take the legs.
6
SPEAKER_00
A lot of them just adapted.
6
SPEAKER_00
You get Iliadis, for example.
6
SPEAKER_00
He just adapted.
6
SPEAKER_00
So he thought, I ll take my arm over the top and I ll just rip him out the floor that way.
6
SPEAKER_01
You know what I mean?
6
SPEAKER_01
They re still doing the big lifts.
6
SPEAKER_01
They re still doing the big ripping, but they just don t grab below the legs.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s weird.
6
SPEAKER_01
They figured it out.
6
SPEAKER_00
And they figured it out like that.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you would think it d take a long time, no.
6
SPEAKER_01
It was like a month.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, no, exactly.
6
SPEAKER_01
At the highest level, which is crazy.
6
SPEAKER_01
So you mentioned jiu-jitsu a little bit.
6
SPEAKER_01
What to you is an interesting difference between jiu-jitsu and judo that you ve observed?
6
SPEAKER_01
Because you re one of the greatest ever on the ground in judo.
6
SPEAKER_01
And so, you know, jiu-jitsu is primarily focused on similar type of stuff on the ground.
6
SPEAKER_01
So what do you see as an interesting difference there?
6
SPEAKER_00
They re a different approach, different time scale to them, and they have a different way in.
6
SPEAKER_00
So like ours comes from a standing position directly in, we ve got a time scale on it.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we have to, like the catch, I always talk about the catch because in judo terms, if you don t get the catch immediately, then the referee won t see the transition in and also the,
6
SPEAKER_00
continuation from plan A, B, C, D, you know, if something builds.
6
SPEAKER_00
So we have to build it.
6
SPEAKER_00
And we have to build it quickly.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I think in jujitsu terms, you have more time to build.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, there s a kind of patience, like, oh, if this doesn t work out, I could try a different thing.
6
SPEAKER_01
With judo, there s like an urgency.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s an urgency.
6
SPEAKER_01
And there s a ref watching skeptically.
6
SPEAKER_01
So you better show that you re making progress.
6
SPEAKER_00
You ve got to show the progression.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s why, you know, I always had a plan A, B, C. You see there with, you know, that was 1981 there with the great Kashiwazaki had
6
SPEAKER_00
had a progression.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, everything was, he knew exactly where he had to be.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was feel, you know, that wasn t by accident.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was, it was trained.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I think that that transition there and taking control of somebody s mistakes.
6
SPEAKER_00
So somebody might have made a mistake or not hit properly, or your defense has caused them to make a mistake and then you take advantage of it.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that is the difference.
6
SPEAKER_01
So one of the side effects of that, I don t know what the chicken or the egg,
6
SPEAKER_01
but judo people on the ground are much more aggressive.
6
SPEAKER_01
So probably because of the urgency, but just like there s an intention behind the progress you re making.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think jujitsu is more relaxed.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s more a culture of just finding places to relax and think of different control positions and take your time.
6
SPEAKER_01
And as a result, it s much, much less exhausting.
6
SPEAKER_01
So you can go for much longer.
6
SPEAKER_01
It feels like judo,
6
SPEAKER_01
is exhausting.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s that 10 second blast, isn t it?
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like doing sprints all the time.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that is really hard.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s a special kind of condition you need.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you need to be able to catch it and know when to go and when not to go.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I think also, I was going to ask you, you think it make a difference?
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, certain jujitsu
6
SPEAKER_00
you can t just throw yourself on your back into the guard.
6
SPEAKER_00
You have to throw into the situation.
6
SPEAKER_00
So you have got, I mean, I know Roger Gracie, he decided that he was gonna learn judo.
6
SPEAKER_00
He saw the importance of being able to throw for the transition in.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so he came to the Budokai and he was learning off Ray Stevens and they were doing really a lot of judo.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well, he s a fascinating study because he does the most basic stuff.
6
SPEAKER_01
And he does it well.
6
SPEAKER_01
Like we did another level of well.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s like Yamashita.
6
SPEAKER_01
Everyone knows what s coming with Haja Gracie, but he just does it anyway.
6
SPEAKER_01
I guess the best people in the world.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s crazy.
6
SPEAKER_01
He s like everybody in jiu-jitsu at White Belt learns the techniques he s using, and he just does it.
6
SPEAKER_00
Amazing, isn t it?
6
SPEAKER_00
But he has about a thousand ways in.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and the thousand ways there s in the details.
6
SPEAKER_01
So it kind of might even look the same to people, but there s, I mean, he finds a way to choke people.
6
SPEAKER_01
So he s on top of them, mounted in a sort of judo pin position.
6
SPEAKER_01
And you know, everyone knows what s coming next against the best people in the world.
6
SPEAKER_01
And you should be able to defend it, but nobody can.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s crazy.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think there s the power element as well, you know, that you don t realize how, you know, when somebody is directed in a particular way, then you have that kind of element of absolute power.
6
SPEAKER_00
You can only feel like when Roger s doing a technique,
6
SPEAKER_00
I think that you would only feel it if he did it on you, you know, then, then you can feel it.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s not something that happens, you know, like so tricks is one thing, but actually being able to do something really well.
6
SPEAKER_00
from a power point of view.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like you say, he only does those few things, but he does them really, really, really well.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I don t know what that is about.
6
SPEAKER_01
Actually, judo pins is a very interesting case study as well, because people are able to feel so heavy.
6
SPEAKER_01
One of the things judoka are able to do is pin.
6
SPEAKER_01
extremely well.
6
SPEAKER_01
And it makes you realize that it s not about the weight.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s about some kind of technique that makes people feel like they weigh 1,000 pounds.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s about weight distribution and change of balance.
6
SPEAKER_00
A lot of people don t realize that there s huge changes of balance on the ground.
6
SPEAKER_00
Massive.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know what it s like.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, you re a jujitsu man.
6
SPEAKER_00
The detail of the techniques is what really interests me.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I m always looking at small ideas, I m always looking at the jiu-jitsu, and it fascinates me.
6
SPEAKER_00
I would have done jiu-jitsu for sure, but I wouldn t have forgotten the judo way in to the techniques.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think you ve got to differentiate the two, but I would have loved the jiu-jitsu.
6
SPEAKER_00
I would have absolutely loved it.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, but it wasn t as prominent then, you know, the weather there was it came from.
6
SPEAKER_00
It came from a mistake, me getting beaten in a particular contest.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I went, I m not going to be beaten again on the ground.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s how it happened.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
Well, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
The story of your life is like a loss creates
6
SPEAKER_01
The Phoenix Rises.
6
SPEAKER_01
Well, it was 1978 and it wasn t a mistake.
6
SPEAKER_00
It was a particular movement and I was fighting weight up from my normal weight.
6
SPEAKER_00
stayed in the same position for one second too long, got caught and... Choked?
6
SPEAKER_00
Sangaku, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
Triangle.
6
SPEAKER_00
Triangle, triangle.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I said, I literally, just the same as I said to you when I said, I m not going to drink anymore, I came off and I said, I m never going to get caught on the ground again.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, never going to lose on the ground ever again.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I never lost in my whole competitive career again.
6
SPEAKER_01
Wow, but yeah, I shouldn t mention that there s nothing like a pin from a judo person.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t actually know if people in jiu-jitsu have made sense of that, like loaded that in.
6
SPEAKER_00
But it s not part of the game, is it?
6
SPEAKER_00
The pin, it s submission.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but control is part of the game, and nobody controls a human body the way Judo people do on the ground.
6
SPEAKER_01
They have understood the science of control, and I think control is extremely useful in Jiu-Jitsu as well.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s just that people don t, because there s so many other domains of exploration.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s interesting.
6
SPEAKER_01
Especially when you apply Jiu-Jitsu
6
SPEAKER_01
the fighting setting, so mixed martial arts, that control, that side control, that pin control is really, really, really important.
6
SPEAKER_01
So, but then you add punching to the thing and it becomes- That puts a whole different thing on it, doesn t it?
6
SPEAKER_01
I mean, there s an alternate history where you would have been part of the early UFCs if time was a little different, you know, maybe a few years later.
6
SPEAKER_01
because your style of judo and jiu-jitsu and the transitions and the aggression, all of that would have worked really well in the early UFCs.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m sure I was being set up at one stage by one of the graces, and that was when he was winning all the matches, but he came in with a couple of the cousins to one of my seminars.
6
SPEAKER_00
Nice.
7
SPEAKER_01
And he was one of the first ones, wasn t he?
7
SPEAKER_01
That s how I love to see the kind of UFC, because it was different martial arts, different skills.
7
SPEAKER_01
And, you know, I mean, he d get close and he d just choke them out or armlock them or, you know, armbar them.
7
SPEAKER_01
And that was brilliant.
7
SPEAKER_01
For me, that was a revelation.
7
SPEAKER_01
That was how I saw it.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s a fascinating science experiment, which aspects of different martial arts work well and not when they clash together.
7
SPEAKER_00
And it did turn out that Newaza
7
SPEAKER_00
Worked well.
7
SPEAKER_01
It was the key, wasn t it?
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it was a big missing link in our conception of fighting.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s the neutralizer of size and a lot of other components.
7
SPEAKER_00
It just blew people s mind.
7
SPEAKER_00
Like, okay, it s not just about size.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s not just about big guys swinging hands.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s a lot of other components.
7
SPEAKER_00
And the groundwork is really, really important.
7
SPEAKER_00
And of course, there s a fujidoka that succeeded in the UFC since then, which is always interesting how they adapt.
7
SPEAKER_00
When you take off the gi, how can you still throw people?
7
SPEAKER_00
How can you still do control?
7
SPEAKER_00
How can you still take advantage of the transition on the ground?
7
SPEAKER_00
Ronda Rousey is a good example of somebody that took advantage of that.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I think one of the biggest things
7
SPEAKER_01
for the judoka is we ve never, you know, there s no strikes.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s the biggest shock, if you wish, you know, that when you get punched in the face and you re not used to that, you know, that s not what we re used to.
7
SPEAKER_00
Some people are able to get punched in the face better than others.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, for sure.
7
SPEAKER_00
Then again, there s Ronda Rousey, who doesn t need to get punched in the face.
7
SPEAKER_00
She just gets in close, throws a person, and armbar right there.
7
SPEAKER_00
And Kayla, you know, Kayla s good as well.
7
SPEAKER_00
Kayla Harrison, that s another incredible person.
7
SPEAKER_00
She could have probably been just winning Olympic gold medal after Olympic gold medal, but chose to- Whatever, you know, she decides.
7
SPEAKER_01
I mean, Ronda as well, you know, whatever they decided to do, they re great athletes.
7
SPEAKER_01
They hate losing.
7
SPEAKER_01
I don t know anybody that hates losing more than those two.
7
SPEAKER_01
They don t like it.
7
SPEAKER_00
And Kayla Harrison, like, I don t know anybody that works as hard as her.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s a crazy, crazy, crazy work ethic.
7
SPEAKER_00
Well, let me ask you about training.
7
SPEAKER_00
Again, Jimmy Pedro said he learned a lot from you.
7
SPEAKER_00
He learned how to do a Taito Shin, the Armbar Jujutsu Katami, but he also learned from you training methodology, so.
7
SPEAKER_00
What s he talking about?
7
SPEAKER_00
He told me about this.
7
SPEAKER_00
What s your approach to training throughout your career and as it developed?
7
SPEAKER_01
I always wanted to train harder than anybody else.
7
SPEAKER_01
I still train now every day.
7
SPEAKER_01
If I don t train, do something, I do an hour of my physical work and I still go on the mat a little bit.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, I m 65 now.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I m not doing really heavy stuff on the mat.
7
SPEAKER_01
But I still liked to train.
7
SPEAKER_01
And when I was 21, 20, up to 30, I was one of the best trainers.
7
SPEAKER_01
But, you know, Jimmy Pedro was one of the best trainers as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
He was one of the, he s one of your dream athletes.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, when Jimmy Pedro stepped through your door,
7
SPEAKER_01
And he was just a kid.
7
SPEAKER_01
He was just young when he stepped through my door.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I had a lot of full-time trainers.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I had up to 20 really good athletes that were training hard.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I only wanted hard trainers.
7
SPEAKER_01
Give me 10 that trained hard rather than your one prima donna that you re skillful, the one that
7
SPEAKER_01
you know, could do it.
7
SPEAKER_01
I just I wanted 10, you know, or 20 really hard trainers because you can do so much with them.
7
SPEAKER_01
You can make champions.
7
SPEAKER_01
You can make them world champions.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, if you ve got somebody that was a special talent and they wanted to work hard, then you had a special athlete.
7
SPEAKER_00
Well, we say hard trainers.
7
SPEAKER_00
What do you mean?
7
SPEAKER_00
Are these people that just like,
7
SPEAKER_00
that every single day are able to just grind it out, do Randori, do the training, do the boring things, just keep going back.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, when the going gets tough, you know, and I think that that was him.
7
SPEAKER_01
He had a special mentality and, you know, and the thing is, you see, when you ve got him in your dojo,
7
SPEAKER_01
Even when you re tired, when somebody is tired, what an example to the others.
7
SPEAKER_01
He d pull the other ones in as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
I had somebody that when everybody was tired and everybody was sick of it, and everybody just wanted, and he d still be there, so they had to do it.
7
SPEAKER_01
So that was, for me, a win-win, you know.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I had all the Americans, actually.
7
SPEAKER_01
I had Bobby Berland and I had Michael Swain and I had Ed Liddy and I had them all coming to visit me at different times.
7
SPEAKER_01
Jimmy was there.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, they wanted to be the best.
7
SPEAKER_01
In the end, we had such a great club atmosphere.
7
SPEAKER_01
They wanted to come
7
SPEAKER_01
for the hard work.
7
SPEAKER_01
They knew that if they came, they were going to be dragged out and we were going to do physical training and it s physical training like they hadn t done before.
7
SPEAKER_01
But it wasn t just a physical training, it was the judo and the skill side of it as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I always had a great empathy with the US
7
SPEAKER_01
team, Olympic team.
7
SPEAKER_01
So a lot of your Olympic medalists have been through with me, you know, and so I m proud of that because we had, you know, some great times and they re still great mates now.
7
SPEAKER_01
And so in New York in a couple of weeks time, I m going to have everybody is going to be there.
7
SPEAKER_00
They re all coming in.
7
SPEAKER_00
All old friends.
7
SPEAKER_00
All old friends.
7
SPEAKER_00
And new friends.
7
SPEAKER_00
So what s a tough week look like at your peak?
7
SPEAKER_00
Physical training, randoi, is there days off?
7
SPEAKER_00
Are you training like twice a day?
7
SPEAKER_01
Twice a day.
7
SPEAKER_01
So we do the preparation training, we do the running, we do the weight training, we do the skills in the morning as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
The skills is, for me, one of the biggest advantages that any full-time trainers can have.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because what happens is, is that with most clubs, you re trying to fit everything into that hour and a half or two hours.
7
SPEAKER_01
You know, you fit your skills, you fit your, your physical training and your, your sparring and your, you know, everything s in there all grouped in.
7
SPEAKER_01
So the biggest advantages of having a full-time group is that you can split your skills and your skills lay your foundation.
7
SPEAKER_01
So the biggest advantage is being able to work specifically on things without having to worry about getting to
7
SPEAKER_01
do your, you know, your randori or your sparring, or then you ve got to go out for, you just do the skills.
7
SPEAKER_00
Well, when you talk about skills, like what is, say your specialty is a tai otoshi, what, are we talking about Uchikomi doing a bunch of fists, working with bands, are you doing throws, are you actually just having conversations about, like, specific, like, tiny details of throws, like, what does skills mean?
7
SPEAKER_01
All those things about doing your repetition practice, making sure the repetition s correct, you know, there s good repetition.
7
SPEAKER_00
So when we say good repetition, does it, would you call me when you re just fitting the throw versus doing the throw?
7
SPEAKER_00
Where do you land on the value of both?
7
SPEAKER_01
And getting it moving, you know, so one of the biggest, most important things is getting it moving.
7
SPEAKER_01
If we do something static, again it s that static target, you need to get it moving.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you need to do a repetition and also you need to do a correct repetition because if you re doing a hundred repetitions that are not correct,
7
SPEAKER_01
And repetitions under pressure, too much pressure without somebody overseeing those skills to make sure that you correct the skills.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because if you re doing a skill, if you re doing it 99 times incorrectly, all right, then a repetition doesn t make perfect.
7
SPEAKER_01
Repetition makes permanent.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you gotta make it as perfect as you possibly can.
7
SPEAKER_01
So actually, that skills group there is the most important thing.
7
SPEAKER_01
And what I used to do is oversee it.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I d oversee it to make sure that it was done properly.
7
SPEAKER_00
So you re watching the footwork, you re watching the gripping, and just constantly adjusting.
7
SPEAKER_01
I ll give you an example, Jimmy Pedro.
7
SPEAKER_01
Jimmy was one of the hardest when he was 19 years of age.
7
SPEAKER_01
He s always asking me to practice, always.
7
SPEAKER_01
He s always on me all the time.
7
SPEAKER_01
I do groundwork with him.
7
SPEAKER_01
Could I put him on his back?
7
SPEAKER_01
No.
7
SPEAKER_01
I was all on him and he ll tell you, but he just wouldn t go.
7
SPEAKER_01
He was going to be great without a doubt.
7
SPEAKER_01
I wanted everybody on with him.
7
SPEAKER_01
Everybody.
7
SPEAKER_01
So everybody went on with him, you know, and it only improved their game and it improved him.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then with, you know, small technical things that have stayed with him that we were doing with the Jujutsu Katami that was passed on to Kayla and then gone on, you know, to Ronda.
7
SPEAKER_01
And it s all small things that I can see sometimes that, you know, it s passed on.
7
SPEAKER_00
What about the Taitoshi?
7
SPEAKER_00
He said he learned a lot from you from that.
7
SPEAKER_01
And he does it differently.
7
SPEAKER_00
And so I should mention that s one of the trickier throws.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I still don t understand.
7
SPEAKER_00
It is a tricky throw.
7
SPEAKER_00
I don t understand.
7
SPEAKER_00
So for people who don t know, boy, how would you even explain it?
7
SPEAKER_00
It doesn t make any sense.
7
SPEAKER_00
When you just look solo, the movement you make is quite simple, but how you get a person to be off balance, how you actually get them to be thrown, and when you do throw it successfully, it looks like a whipping motion that s effortless.
7
SPEAKER_00
It makes no sense.
7
SPEAKER_01
It makes no sense.
7
SPEAKER_01
Other than it s every technique starts with the hands.
7
SPEAKER_01
So it s what we call Kazushi and you know, you re pulling somebody off balance, getting them moving, pulling them off balance.
7
SPEAKER_01
Tai otoshi means body drop.
7
SPEAKER_01
So it s basically two legs across your partner s body.
7
SPEAKER_01
I ve got my back to you, all right, and I ve already pulled you off balance with my hands.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then I m going to just flex my legs up just as you re coming onto my back.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then you re going to go over, you know, if I coordinate it all right.
7
SPEAKER_01
If it doesn t get coordinated right, then you re going to come right on my back and try to rip my arm off, you know.
7
SPEAKER_01
So, yeah, I ve got to get it right.
7
SPEAKER_00
What was, if you can convert it to words,
7
SPEAKER_00
some secret ingredients that allow you to pull it off at the highest levels, the Taito Shu.
7
SPEAKER_01
The hands start every technique.
7
SPEAKER_01
So getting the repetition right, first of all.
7
SPEAKER_01
So you need, to get the repetition right, you need a good partner.
7
SPEAKER_01
So actually training your partner to react in the right way is just as important as learning the throw.
7
SPEAKER_01
So actually what happens is, you know, we could get a lesson of beginners.
7
SPEAKER_01
We teach the throw and then go, right, off you go.
7
SPEAKER_01
And 90% of them will get it wrong because their partner s not reacting in the right way.
7
SPEAKER_01
So half of it is to get the person to react
7
SPEAKER_01
as they should.
7
SPEAKER_01
So if I was doing it with you, you and I, first thing I d teach you to do is to react the way I want you to react.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then I d react the way that you want me to react.
7
SPEAKER_01
All right.
7
SPEAKER_01
So then we d have success with it rather than you leaning back in the wrong way or resisting or frightened you going over.
7
SPEAKER_01
So, you know, so actually that s why nine times out of 10 people get the technique wrong.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s actually fascinating to me, because in the United States, where I came up, judo, I mean, the level of judo is not comparable to the level of judo in the rest of the world.
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Of course, the Pedro Center is an exception to that.
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Certain athletes, yeah.
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Certain athletes, like, I mean, when I trained recently with Jimmy Pedro, it s like, even like the 16-year-old kids are just all deadly, so it was terrifying.
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But, you know, I remember the Russian national team came through Philadelphia.
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And one of the things that really impressed me is just how much easier Judo was, training Judo with them.
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They moved correctly, as like Uke said, as the people getting thrown.
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every aspect of their body movement was correct, in terms of it felt right to be throwing them, to be training with them, everything about the gripping, about the position of their hips, about the shoulder, everything.
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It was fun, it was easy, and I always felt like I was learning.
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So I think all of that is loaded in, I guess.
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into proper training, so you re developing through the throws, you re developing the right technique.
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Yeah, you have to develop between, you know, I always had training partners that I trained with up to each Olympic Games, and we worked together for the, we did the skills together, and then we, you know, we worked together in order to make techniques work, and we got it moving as quickly as we could.
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And one of the worst things that I see is, and I see a lot of YouTube stuff with coaches.
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Here we go.
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Don t even start me on that.
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Don t even start me on that.
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You re laughing because you know what I m talking about, right?
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SPEAKER_00
I m actually laughing because I m enjoying you talking trash.
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But you talk about technique.
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Yeah.
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Well, you know, the coaches and their clipboard
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guys, you know, with the clipboards and the stopwatches.
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And, you know, they got these kids running up and down the mat and then doing uchikomi of something that s technically incorrect, you know, 10 times and then running up and doing another 10 at the other side, you know, and actually mixing everything together.
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And it s just a mess, you know, just a technical mess.
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That said, some of it is conditioning type stuff that you were doing.
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So what is the hardest type of physical conditioning you were doing?
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Probably ran too much.
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When I was a kid, if I could go back now, I wouldn t run as much.
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And I ran hard, and I ran strong.
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And I remember doing the London Marathon one time.
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I said, I m never going to do it again.
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I ve never.
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But I ran, you know, and I was trying to.
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The problem was when I did the London Marathon is I was trying to beat three hours.
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It s that desire to win again.
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It s totally insane.
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You know, it was insane.
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And I went out through half marathon in what I thought was a good time.
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Anyway, I got to 16, 17 miles and totally blew.
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So you went out too fast.
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Yeah, I went out too fast.
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And then you just.
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I died.
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Absolutely just.
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I died.
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I got in.
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I crossed the line.
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I remember seeing this bridge over there, right?
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And the bridge, it was the finishing line over the bridge.
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And I had to get there.
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It was the longest bridge I ve ever, ever walked over.
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It was like walk, run.
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So I got over the bridge and I took one step over the line like that.
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And there was a guy over there and he was trying to rush everybody through, you know, and he was going, come on, come on, come on.
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There was people behind you.
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Get your hands off me.
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Get your hands off me now, because we re going to fall out, you know.
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And I couldn t move.
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I couldn t move.
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I was white.
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It s amazing that you made it to the finish line, though.
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I did.
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I got over there.
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And, you know, Donald Duck passing me was a tell.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh, there s a person dressed as Donald Duck?
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SPEAKER_00
Donald Duck, yeah.
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But the thing was, I still crossed over 338.
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I crossed over 338, but I lost 38 minutes in the last four miles.
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So that bridge, longest bridge ever.
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So you regret the run?
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SPEAKER_01
So anyway, I would do the running a little bit differently, but we ran hard.
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We did the weight training.
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We did good weight training.
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It was all conditioned.
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So, I mean, it was never the same training all the time.
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SPEAKER_01
So, it was always, we d have certain phases building up.
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It was scientifically done.
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It wasn t just out there, run, weight training, judo, same judo all the time.
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It was always pretty scientific.
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Good variety.
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SPEAKER_01
It was a good variety and it had build up and it had a speed phase and it had a power phase and it had, you know, like a base condition.
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SPEAKER_00
What about the randori?
7
SPEAKER_00
Was there a method to the madness there?
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SPEAKER_00
How much randori did you do?
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A lot.
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So the most important thing for me, I mean I see now that there s a lot of people out there that are not getting enough randori.
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They re not rendering enough.
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And there s a lot of sports science people and they re running and they re weight training and they re doing it all to death.
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SPEAKER_01
And there s not enough judo.
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SPEAKER_01
And the only ones, you know, like you have a look at some of the Eastern
8
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countries are getting together.
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They re having these mass camps.
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And the Japanese, they have just massive people that they can do that.
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SPEAKER_02
They re doing probably 50, 60 randories a week.
8
SPEAKER_02
Wait, what?
8
SPEAKER_02
50 or 60 a week.
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Wow.
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The average person is getting together.
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SPEAKER_02
I mean, when I was doing randories, when I went to Japan, it was just purely for
8
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60 randa is a week.
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SPEAKER_01
How much is each one?
8
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How long is it?
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SPEAKER_02
So they were five minutes then.
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SPEAKER_02
They re four minutes now.
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SPEAKER_01
But that s a lot, especially given the level of the competition there.
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SPEAKER_02
Well, you can do it in Japan because it s fairly light.
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They throw you, they throw you, you throw them.
8
SPEAKER_01
There s like a level of like you re moving at like a close 100 percent, but the actual power in the force is not quite different in Korea.
8
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Korea was harder.
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It was more physical.
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So you couldn t do 50 renderers in Korea.
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You d die.
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Yeah.
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So you d do 30.
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Wow.
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But you need the rendering.
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And so I chased the renderers.
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So I chased them into training camps.
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I traced them all over my country.
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So I was getting 40 to 50 a week in my club.
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And then I would go to training camps and add more.
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And I honestly don t think that they do enough now.
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A lot of countries.
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Somebody who doesn t know Randori is live training, so.
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Yeah, sparring.
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SPEAKER_01
Was there a few people you remember that were just like really tough to go against?
8
SPEAKER_01
You mentioned Gold Tooth.
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SPEAKER_01
Is there others like it?
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Gold Tooth is pretty horrific.
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Yeah.
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Oh, you got him in the end.
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I got him in the end.
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I suppose I should say, not just tough, but just good training partners that you like.
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Great training partners.
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I remember with Nishida, and Nishida was, I mentioned him earlier,
8
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said he was one of the best.
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I mean, he was just such a great technician.
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I would go there to his dojo and he d ask me to practice.
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He d finish the practice and you know that he would always say, another one, we ll do another one.
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SPEAKER_02
So you d go, yeah, because you had to make out that you weren t that bothered that you had to do another one.
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SPEAKER_02
So you do another one back to back, and then he d go sometimes, let s do another one.
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SPEAKER_02
So you d end up doing 15 minutes with the same guy who could possibly throw you at any time, and that was hard.
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SPEAKER_02
But I remember those particular guys, and there were plenty of those.
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What do you do with the exhaustion that you re feeling in those?
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Like, how deep did you go?
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SPEAKER_01
You have to dig deep.
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SPEAKER_02
And I think that that was the great thing about having certain, like, European training camps were more physical.
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SPEAKER_02
So I remember, you know, that we would have
8
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European training camps where you d fight Germans, and then the Dutch, and then the French, and then the Russian.
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You d have all sorts of different styles and people there to fight.
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That was something then you d have to dig in at a different place, come out of there.
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SPEAKER_01
Where do you go mentally when you, how many times have you gone there where you re really in deep waters, exhaustion-wise, in competition, actually?
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SPEAKER_02
Competition, it s happened.
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SPEAKER_02
So sometimes you go past where your forearms are absolutely blown.
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I remember the final of Czech.
8
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tournament that we had and fought a Frenchman in the final.
8
SPEAKER_02
My forearms were so blown, I couldn t shake his hand.
8
SPEAKER_02
Then I remember they were solid, absolutely solid, and they had lactic acid in them.
8
SPEAKER_02
I remember I stood on the rostrum and they were giving me things and I couldn t grip them properly.
8
SPEAKER_02
So I was saying, put it under my armpit or chin.
8
SPEAKER_02
Trying to hold it, I couldn t hold anything, you know.
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SPEAKER_02
So there are times when I really had to go really deep.
8
SPEAKER_02
I remember fighting two East Germans the same day, one of the competitions, and the number one and the number two East Germans.
8
SPEAKER_02
And that was another day where I had to really dig.
8
SPEAKER_01
deep that s the the fascinating thing about some of these tournaments is if you get if you go full distance on several matches in a row the way you re seeing in the finals are two people that have like fought a lot that day yeah
8
SPEAKER_02
And we have golden score now, you know, so we see a lot of guys, you know, that going into golden score and they ve done one contest of four minutes and then they go another four minutes.
8
SPEAKER_02
And then, you know, we ve had some go into a third four minutes.
8
SPEAKER_02
This is all back to back.
8
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It might be in the first round.
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SPEAKER_02
It might be in the final, you know, and we ve got some now that are coming out and you can see the stats and the ones that winning golden score.
8
SPEAKER_02
So we got a Japanese Hashimoto.
8
SPEAKER_02
He s the Japanese representative now.
8
SPEAKER_02
Uh, instead of Ohno, cause Ohno s finished.
8
SPEAKER_02
So Hashimoto s coming out.
8
SPEAKER_02
He was in a tournament last week and he went to look up.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
8
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Just have a look at him.
8
SPEAKER_02
So Hashimoto s in white here.
8
SPEAKER_02
All right.
8
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And, uh, great example there.
8
SPEAKER_02
Well, I m glad we got onto that, you know?
8
SPEAKER_02
So, I mean, he has got great technique.
8
SPEAKER_00
Hashimoto.
8
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Effortless.
8
SPEAKER_02
So you can see exactly what we re talking about.
8
SPEAKER_02
That great, um, timing.
8
SPEAKER_02
And again, uh, you know, sometimes he backs them up to the edge and then, uh, he ll wait for them to come back in.
8
SPEAKER_02
Towards they don t want to step out to get a penalty.
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SPEAKER_01
I guess that s a cross group.
8
SPEAKER_01
Toto should see that wrong.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_02
Cross grip, different grips.
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SPEAKER_02
Oh, great examples there.
8
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Just, just what we were talking about.
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Making it look so easy.
8
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
8
SPEAKER_02
So he s going to be their representative, uh, at 73 kilograms, looking and back him up again.
8
SPEAKER_02
And again, just catching him as, as he pushes back.
8
SPEAKER_01
So push, push, push, and then.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, action reaction at his best there.
8
SPEAKER_02
And a slight change of direction, he sometimes goes down onto his knee there, which is siatoshi.
8
SPEAKER_02
It turns from taiotoshi, which is springing up, to siatoshi that s going down.
8
SPEAKER_00
Oh, the title of the video is, his taiotoshi is a work of art.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, this is him at his best, showing him doing what he does best.
8
SPEAKER_02
But he had to go three times into golden score last week.
8
SPEAKER_02
and dig deep.
8
SPEAKER_02
and lost one of them, I think.
8
SPEAKER_01
But you re still going at it.
8
SPEAKER_01
You talk about all those training sessions.
8
SPEAKER_01
Nikki, your wonderful wife, told me that you were looking, you were going all over, like from target to target, looking for workout clothes, because your luggage got lost, because you had to get a workout in.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, you know what?
8
SPEAKER_02
I realize that if I m a miserable git, then she ll get me into the gym, you know?
8
SPEAKER_02
And the thing is, is that I m better if I get in there for an hour and I just do something.
8
SPEAKER_02
at least 30, 35 to 40 minutes cardio.
8
SPEAKER_02
And then I do some weights and more high repetitions.
8
SPEAKER_02
It s not so much heavyweights now, but more functional stuff.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, you travel all over the world for the commentary of these competitions.
8
SPEAKER_01
So is this sometimes a challenge to figure out how
8
SPEAKER_02
Well, you know, during COVID, they closed all the gyms, but we were still going out.
8
SPEAKER_02
We were one of the first ones out.
8
SPEAKER_02
The judo was some of the first out.
8
SPEAKER_02
The competitions were behind closed doors.
8
SPEAKER_02
So we were in the hotel.
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SPEAKER_02
The gym was closed, so we couldn t use the gyms.
8
SPEAKER_02
So we had to look for other ways that we could work out.
8
SPEAKER_02
So most of the hotels that we were in were high-rise hotels.
8
SPEAKER_02
So we were in the steps, we were doing the steps right the way up, you know.
8
SPEAKER_02
So I started it and so I started off with me going up and then one or two of the others and the referees started to go up with
8
SPEAKER_02
So in the end, we d have this trail of people going up the steps and down, and every place we went to, we had the steps.
8
SPEAKER_02
So yeah, that was an interesting situation.
8
SPEAKER_02
So we were sick of steps in the end.
8
SPEAKER_01
What advice would you give to beginners, people starting out in Judo, how to develop their game?
8
SPEAKER_01
how to find the beauty in the sport and the art of judo.
8
SPEAKER_02
If you put 10 people in a room and said, right, get on with it, you d have mayhem, right?
8
SPEAKER_02
And I think that
8
SPEAKER_02
whatever sport you re doing, you need good instruction, good teaching, and a good club atmosphere, you know, somewhere that s not so intense that winning is the only thing.
8
SPEAKER_02
And I think that if you look at 90% of the people that practice martial arts are doing it for pleasure, so they want to get pleasure.
8
SPEAKER_02
So you need a club that s got a bit of a mixture, you know, they ve got a direction to go into competition if they want,
8
SPEAKER_02
And then the rest is for fun and to enjoy it, but with really good instruction.
8
SPEAKER_02
Because with really good instruction and a good foundation and a good base, you get more enjoyment because you have more success.
8
SPEAKER_02
And let s be honest, the more success we have with something, the more we like it.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and great technique is a way to really discover the beauty of the art.
8
SPEAKER_01
And so great teaching is really important there.
8
SPEAKER_02
Great teaching is so important.
8
SPEAKER_01
What about, what does it take to get from the early days when you started judo to world-class level?
8
SPEAKER_02
I think that with most, I mean, you do hear, don t you, you know, if somebody s been doing judo for eight years and then they re in, and I think it happened, one of the French, Chameo, she went to the Olympic Games in 2012 and she d been doing judo for eight years.
8
SPEAKER_02
But then she started to lose, so she had a relative success early on, and the Olympics was one of them, she got a silver medal.
8
SPEAKER_02
But then she went off the boil and then she came back and now she s been there for, she s still competing, and she s been there for well over 13 years at the very top.
8
SPEAKER_02
So I think that any foundation, it s like anything, if you lay a really solid foundation, generally it lasts longer.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but that foundation again, is that technique or is there, what does it take to build that foundation?
8
SPEAKER_02
I think technique, you get away with murder.
8
SPEAKER_02
With technique, you can get away with having bad condition, but I mean, you get found out in the end, but you can go out and you can win certain things by doing really nice technique.
8
SPEAKER_02
But I think if you ve got the mixture, if you ve got the whole package, then you can go the whole way.
8
SPEAKER_01
So for people who somehow don t know, you ve commentated some of the greatest judo matches ever,
8
SPEAKER_01
You ve done Grand Prix s, you ve done all these events, Olympics, championship, everything.
8
SPEAKER_01
Just looking at the history of judo, what stands out to you?
8
SPEAKER_01
What events stand out to you?
8
SPEAKER_01
What are some good memories that popped to your head?
8
SPEAKER_02
I think some of the Paris tournaments.
8
SPEAKER_02
are amazing because the crowd, they re there, they re on the mat, they re all judoka, they re well-educated to the sport.
8
SPEAKER_02
Every time somebody twitches, they re very biased towards their own, which is you expect.
8
SPEAKER_02
But sometimes I haven t been able to hear myself speak.
8
SPEAKER_02
That s very unusual.
8
SPEAKER_02
You ve got headphones on and you re blocked out.
8
SPEAKER_02
Sometimes Teddy Rene has been walking out there and the crowd are going crazy and they re on their feet when somebody twitches.
8
SPEAKER_02
Then you get the crowd silences.
8
SPEAKER_02
We had one of those last week.
8
SPEAKER_02
You know, everybody s cheering their man, and then bang, their man goes over.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and there s silence.
8
SPEAKER_00
Silence, nothing like that.
8
SPEAKER_02
And of course, we were commentating, we were going, that was a bit of a crowd silencer, you know.
8
SPEAKER_02
But yeah, that happens.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, that is a surprising thing that, at least it was to me, that Paris and France is really big on judo.
8
SPEAKER_01
Massive.
8
SPEAKER_02
And there s always surprises.
8
SPEAKER_02
Paris is great.
8
SPEAKER_02
In Japan, for the Olympic Games, the biggest surprise was Ono getting beaten in the team event.
8
SPEAKER_02
Now, Ono is the greatest judo man, pound for pound, probably one of the best.
8
SPEAKER_02
And he won the Olympic title.
8
SPEAKER_02
And then they went into the team event against France.
8
SPEAKER_02
And Ono lost to a, he s not run-of-the-mill German, but the German, you know, it wasn t certainly Olympic title-esque, and beat Ono.
8
SPEAKER_01
Managed to throw him.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well, the team stuff is fascinating, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s fascinating, yes.
8
SPEAKER_01
It changes the dynamics of the whole thing.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s, I mean, it s funny you say Paris, it really makes it
8
SPEAKER_01
really big deal that this Olympics is being held in Paris.
8
SPEAKER_02
And they ll be the team to beat, French team, because they have the best balance of the weight categories.
8
SPEAKER_02
They have the best balance with their people that are world and Olympic champions and qualified men and women.
8
SPEAKER_02
So three men, three women, they have the best balance out of anybody.
8
SPEAKER_01
And an educated audience.
8
SPEAKER_02
Educated audience, home grounds.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s gonna be awesome.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s gonna be mad.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s gonna be super fun.
8
SPEAKER_02
It will be super fun.
8
SPEAKER_01
You nervous?
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
All right.
8
SPEAKER_01
Do you get nervous?
8
SPEAKER_01
I do.
8
SPEAKER_01
I get nervous, I get nervous.
8
SPEAKER_01
I do as well, I get really nervous.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m nervous right now.
8
SPEAKER_01
But given, especially because it s the Olympics and you don t want to, you want to celebrate people properly, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, it s everything for them.
8
SPEAKER_01
And a lot of people, especially like the finals matches, it ll be watched millions of times, the highest of stakes, all of this.
8
SPEAKER_02
Played over and over.
8
SPEAKER_02
And I find that with mine, I m now a little bit more careful.
8
SPEAKER_02
So I ll celebrate a massive throw and then have empathy to the one that s been thrown, because it s not the best feeling in the world, especially in Olympic finals.
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_02
Can you imagine that?
8
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_02
Must be terrible.
8
SPEAKER_01
Must be terrible.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_02
Just reflecting.
8
SPEAKER_02
So, no, I have a bit of empathy there and I just, I try and say the right things because they always do come up to me and say, you commentated my fights.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you re the voice of the biggest triumphs and the biggest tragedies for these athletes, for the world that watches and admires these athletes.
8
SPEAKER_02
No pressure.
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You re the voice.
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Don t screw it up, yeah.
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Don t screw it up.
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Your voice is in my head when I watch these, you know, it s fascinating.
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It s fascinating.
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But you re a master of it.
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It s a huge honor.
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that you would talk with me.
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Thank you for everything you ve done for the sport of judo, for the Olympics, for just sports in general, just celebrating greatness in all of its forms.
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Thank you for talking today, keep going.
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I can t wait to listen to you in Paris.
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Thank you for having me and it s just been an honor to be here with you.
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Thanks for listening to this conversation with Neil Adams.
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To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description.
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And now, let me leave you with some words from Miyamoto Musashi.
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There s nothing outside of yourself that can ever enable you to get better, stronger, richer, quicker, or smarter.
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Everything is within.
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Everything exists.
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Seek nothing outside of yourself.
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Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.