Sawtelle Judo in Los Angeles

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liuk3

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Can people please provide any feedback regarding training at Sawtelle Judo? Thanks in advance.
 
Poundsand and I are two f12 members who train there. What did you want to know?
 
Ippy said:
Is PoundSand still alive?
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I have my doubts unfortunately. I haven't seen him train for over a month, and he's gone radio silent on F12 as well.

RIP, brother.

Btw I wouldn't say Sawtelle teaches traditional judo so much as it is very "Japanese" judo, meaning very upright stance, constant attacking, and orthodox grips. It's very competition focused, so randori religiously follows every new change in the competition rules; it's not traditional in that sense.
 
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Just wanted to hear more about the school since it is very close to where I live. Thanks.

If you train judo along with something else, how do you balance things (i.e. How many days of each)?
 
they produce super duper legit judokas
 
RIP
liuk3 said:
Just wanted to hear more about the school since it is very close to where I live. Thanks.

If you train judo along with something else, how do you balance things (i.e. How many days of each)?
Click to expand...

It's a bit of a pain for me, as my judo and BJJ schools overlap on several days. I generally shoot for 2x both each week though.
 
liuk3 said:
Just wanted to hear more about the school since it is very close to where I live. Thanks.

If you train judo along with something else, how do you balance things (i.e. How many days of each)?
Click to expand...

I do 2 days of Judo and a day each of Karate and kickboxing, Looking to get Karate back up to 2 days because I'll be grading for BB soon enough and my Judo coach wants to get a Saturday morning randori session going too.

I'd train everyday if i could!
 
Zankou said:
I have my doubts unfortunately. I haven't seen him train for over a month, and he's gone radio silent on F12 as well.

RIP, brother.
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Ha, still kicking. Aggravated my pulled ass in the tournament I did, so been nursing that. Then a business trip, followed by a live virus vaccine where they recommended no close contact for a few weeks... I'll be back next week hopefully. :)

As for Sawtelle, I dig it. I checked out 4 or 5 places before picking it, and drive 25 miles to it... I would prefer less emphasis on competition rules (then again, in the first (and only) tournament I did, I grabbed a guys leg, so...), but the atmosphere and training are pretty cool. There is also a decent sized group that shows up all the time, which is another reason I picked it (for example, I stopped by Big John's judo class, and it was cancelled as nobody showed up) - sometimes verging on too big. The smallest class I've been to probably still had 10+ people, and the biggest was easily over 30. It's also tough to beat the price ($100/3 months, and like $20/3 months for an additional family member), although Sun Valley manages ($10 or $15 per month, + $5 or $10 for an extra family member).

I try to do 2 days each bjj and judo each week.
 
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Mistabutts said:
Train any stand up?
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I've been training in Thai boxing for over a decade. I stopped some months ago due to gym drama (unrelated to, but still affecting, me) and accumulating damage over the years.

Grappling is more fun anyway, and doesn't hurt as much. Plus the average judo practice where I train is roughly equal to, or greater, in intensity of each MT coach I've trained under. I used to hate those guys. Now I see they were just prepping me for the "gentle" way.
 
liuk3 said:
Just wanted to hear more about the school since it is very close to where I live. Thanks.

If you train judo along with something else, how do you balance things (i.e. How many days of each)?
Click to expand...

I just train judo nowadays. If I was younger and had less job/family constraints, I could crosstrain, but for now I just randomly stop by BJJ schools and train for fun.

Please stop by and check the school out. If you see a tall green belt with shaved head, that's going to be either me or Poundsand, so say hello.
 
Ippy said:
I've been training in Thai boxing for over a decade. I stopped some months ago due to gym drama (unrelated to, but still affecting, me) and accumulating damage over the years.

Grappling is more fun anyway, and doesn't hurt as much. Plus the average judo practice where I train is roughly equal to, or greater, in intensity of each MT coach I've trained under. I used to hate those guys. Now I see they were just prepping me for the "gentle" way.
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Fair enough! Aint nobody got time for gym drama.

I used to train kickboxing in a different gym to the one I'm (happily) in now and the politics and bitching were stomach curdling.

But my judo club always has the best team spirit/family mentality

Probably down to all the "hugs" in Randori haha
 
I love my judo club too. There's like two clubs that are actually easier to get to, but I go to this one just because I prefer the environment better.

No big egos. Nothing to prove. Just a bunch of people working hard.

Plus I think my coach is one of a few rokudan in the state.
 
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