It's all about the "want-to"

If some of this is repetition of stories I have told you before, well, what do you expect? I have known you 21 years- how many worthwhile stories do you think I have? If it wasn't for recycling, I would run out.

So, hey Pumpkin -
Sorry I missed your call. We were at the Getty and then we went to mass and lit candles for you. Father Mike said he will send you an email before you fight.

As I was saying, before old age kicked in and I went to sleep ....

There are four things that determine who wins a judo match and the most important of them is who wants it the most. You might think that everyone really, really badly wants to win the Olympics, but that is not exactly true.

There is a difference between wishing for something and desiring that thing with all your heart. In Spanish, there are even different words, "Yo quiero" means I want but "Yo deseo" is more like you have to have it. Neither is the same as liking something "Me gusta" or loving someone "Te amo".

Wanting to win ranges kind of like that. There are people who like to win. Most of them don't make it to the Olympics. Those are the people who would like to win if it wasn't too much work and who go to practice and train hard except on Fridays when there are good parties, days it rains and the traffic is really bad, when they have a cold or their cousin's brother's aunt's nephew is getting baptized. Those people would really like to win the Olympics but you know that part about how it is 90% mental? Well, mentally, those people know they have not paid the price to win. Even if they don't admit it consciously to themselves.

There are people who want to win. They may even move across country like you did, however, they make their choices in a different way. Remember two years ago when you were deciding where you should move to train for this Olympics? You were calling everyone to find out what they thought about where they trained, turning it all over in your mind and you said,

"Well, I have a lot of friends in this place, I could be happy there, the weather is nice. I get along with this coach, and they would help me with funding in this place...."

And I stopped you and said,

"Which place would make your judo get better and give you the best chance of winning the Olympics?"

Without hesitation, you said,

"Pedro's."

And I told you,

"Well, it seems like you just made your decision."

Within two weeks, you had shipped your stuff to Boston.

I can guarantee you that not everyone makes their decision that way. A lot of people want to win but they make trade-offs with where their friends are, if the coach is nice to them, if they can get a free place to live there, etc. I know this because I have had dozens of conversations with up-and-coming judo players beginning long before you were born. When someone moves some place "for judo" because they "want to win the Olympics" but their choice includes all of those other factors, then I feel sad for them because I know their chances of winning are limited.

Some people really love to win and hate to lose. Those are the people who are at practice every day. They go every round. They move to the place that they truly believe will help them win. They make a lot of sacrifices, maybe delaying school or marriage, forgoing promotions at work. Those people are good and they win a lot. A lot of them make Olympic teams.

For the people who really want to, though, it is different, and I think only those people understand this. Winning is a need. It is that voice inside you that when you are behind in a match, when you are fighting someone who is technically better than you or is stronger than you, that just screams, "NO!" I like the French term, je ne sais quoi - I don't know what. It's something you can't describe but it makes one person stand out as different.

I always thought I really, really wanted to win. When I gave birth to Maria, I had some red marks on my arms and chest. I asked the doctor about it and he said that sometimes when a woman is in labor she is pushing so hard that the effort actually burst capillaries. This was an epiphany for me because I had been competing for years and never experienced that after a tournament even though I thought I had been doing absolutely the most that I could. It dawned on me that hey, if I could give birth, I could probably fight on an injured knee and in general do a whole lot more than I had thought possible. I did snap one of the ligaments in my knee in a final match the next year, kept fighting and won the match. Two years later, in the finals in the Austrian Open, I pinned the woman so tightly, when I came off the mat and took my gi off, I could see little red lines on my biceps from where I had actually burst the blood vessels in my arms.

A while after the world championships, about the time your dad and I got married, he said to me,

"You know, I was a little worried, because you only talked about winning. You didn't have a Plan B. I don't know what you would have done if you hadn't won."

I told him,

"Yeah, I didn't know what I would have done if I hadn't won, either."

It's all about wanting it so that it is the first thing that goes through your mind when your eyes pop open in the morning and the last thought in your head before you go to sleep. It is the wanting to win so bad that you almost feel like you'll go crazy sometimes. It is that completely illogical thing, the saying,
"A champion is someone who gets up even when he can't."
that makes absolutely perfect sense even though it doesn't. It is being stronger, tougher and faster than it is possible for you to be.

It is like the Sioux back in the old days, Erich told me, who would take a rifle and go out to battle saying,

"It's a good day to die."

I told Erich once,

"You know, not all Indians are Sioux,"

and he said,

"No, but they all want to be."

I don't know what it is, but whatever it is, you've got it, babe, in spades. I can tell it by that look on your face that says,

"That's my medal, b===, and you're not going to take it away from me."

You will win because that's so much of who you are. It's what you do.
See you soon.
Love you much,
Mom

Advice to my little pumpkin

It's been a long road to the top of the world, a lot of years since you were doing kata guruma in the hallway with your cousin, Mitchell. Now, there you are at the Olympics again.

I know you're not always the fastest to read your email, since there is usually something in it you don't want to do, like send in your USADA forms or mail bills. So, I thought I would post some of my maternal advice on my blog, since I know you read that. (Aaah! Cannot escape motherly comments, even on the Internet! Below is a stick figure of you running away with your arms up in the air screaming.)

\O/
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My little Pumpkin ...
RUN! Jimmy said run two miles every day and he said that Bobby Lee is there as your training partner and he’d better get out there and run two miles with you and take all the falls for you that you need and if Bobby comes back fat Jim will know that he didn’t do it, and he’ll make him wish that he had.

Okay, now that is out of the way. No one is neutral about you being at the Olympics. Some people are nervous, some are excited and there are no doubt some jerks out there who wish you’ll get thrown on your head in your first match and break your neck.

Time for some motherly advice….

Four things determine who wins any match, technical ability, physical ability, luck and how badly you want it. Out of those, I think luck is by far the least important and the ‘want-to’ is the most. Technical ability is usually pretty much of a constant (yes, I do teach statistics). At the six-year-old level, most kids can do one throw half-ass without falling over, in the ten-year-old division, they can keep their balance but seldom think of a combination and at your level everyone is aware of gripping strategies, leg picks, sankaku and matwork combinations. You’re not going to go into uchimata and catch Ueno with it just because she will be stunned thinking

“Gee, what is that throw where the leg goes between your legs? I have never seen that before. I must study that when I go back to Japan.”

Notice I didn't say you couldn't throw her, I am just saying the reason you can throw her isn't because you know techniques she doesn't know.

You will win because you have trained to get technically better for the last ten years. You have never accepted that you are good enough to stop improving, you have gone from Montreal to Boston to Japan to Europe working on getting technically better and better. You haven’t just taken what your instructors said and tried to be a clone of Jimmy, Jr. or AnnMaria or Israel. You have taken from people all around the world, kept what suited you and discarded what didn’t. You have created a technical style and repertoire that is uniquely your own, fit to you and therefore greater than the sum of all of the parts. Technically, you have everything you need to win. You have it because you wanted to win badly enough to get it. The "want-to" comes on long before the day you actually fight.

The second thing you need is physical ability. You were just blessed by God that you have the physical ability you need for judo. Judo requires strength and endurance. You have both. You were born with the perfect body type for judo, but you also poured hours and hours into weight-lifting. If either of them had trained like you, Maria or Jenn would just be a shorter version of you. Or, I guess, since they are older, you would just be a taller version of them. The difference is that you trained the way you did because you wanted to win the Olympics, where they wanted different things out of life.

Physically, there is no one in that division who is better prepared than you. I guarantee it. (Oh, did I mention that Jimmy said to remind you to go out and run two miles every day and that Bobby sure as hell better go with you if you need him to, even if it is at 2 a.m. )

Luck - yes, there is the luck of the draw, getting the person in the second round whose style just makes it easier (or harder) for you to beat. Having that person beat someone who is a weird style for you to fight first round. There is the bad luck of getting injured or catching the flu the day before the tournament. There is just making a mistake, crossing your feet and getting slammed for ippon when you are off balance. To a great extent, though, I believe that people make their own luck. You and I both know that there are people in Beijing right now that there is no conceivable draw or scenario that ends with them getting a medal. The only possibilities fall into the Alien-spaceship-drops-into-Olympic-compound-competitors-eaten-by-aliens category. You can fight sick or injured. That's why we made you fight in the Panamerican championships with a torn cartilage and in the European camps after you had mono. You came out of it with two medals. You can fight through sickness and injury if you want to bad enough. Even if you make a mistake, you can come back from it and still win, like that time at the Panamerican team competition where the Columbian caught you for waza ari and pinned you and you got out of it and threw her for ippon. You make your luck and most of the things that are completely luck happened long ago - you were born with physical and mental ability instead of some disability that would keep you from competing. You had good coaches all of the way along. You had kind people who donated money (and a great family that put in overtime hours!) to get you the funding you needed to travel. The luck already happened, Pumpkin, and it went your way.

All that is left is the want-to. That is the most important, as I said, and you have that, too, in spades. I'll write more about that tomorrow. It is almost midnight here, we had practice today, and I am tired. Harout got out of one of my pins for the first time. His matwork is getting better. I think there are not very many areas of life where a high school kid can hit somebody's grandmother in the face and everyone says, "Hey, way to go! Good job!"

They are all getting better. It will be great to have you home, not the least because every kid at the training center is tougher,better and has more talent in them than they realize. I am looking forward to having you home to help prove that to them.

Also, read your email because I put some things in there that perhaps aren't to be read by everyone who owns a computer, like about iguanas.

Love you much,

Mom

P.S. If you run out of stuff to read, the July issue of Growing Judo can be downloaded here. Since you complained in your blog one time that you never get to be on the cover of any judo magazine, I put a picture of you on the front cover!

Judo, death and life

"You'll be bothered from time to time by storms, fog, snow. When you are, think of those who went through it before you, and say to yourself, 'What they could do, I can do.'" - Antoine Saint-Exupery

Sadly, a lot of the people who went before me have passed on, have gone before me in the most metaphysical sense now. Isao Wada passed away this week. Services will be held on Monday at the Gardena Buddhist Church at 7:30 p.m. Wada-sensei was the real deal. With all of those people walking around with inflated ranks who want to be called sensei, he stood out, head and shoulders above. I have never known him to be anything but gracious and dignified, even on the rare occasions that he was angry. He was president of Nanka Yudanshakai and probably on every committee at one time or another. There is a lot of talk of judo politics, about how you "have to understand politics" to explain a lot of unethical behavior. I never knew Sensei Wada to speak a false word. He was the Head Instructor of Gardena Dojo, one of the oldest and largest judo clubs in the country. No matter who you were, no matter what race, gender, whether you were on the Olympic team or visiting from a small club in a small town, you were welcome at Gardena Dojo and he made you feel like it was their honor that you had trained there, rather than the other way around.

People call me a judo leader in the sport, but I have never been like Isao Wada, or Kenso Kiyohiro, who was the head instructor of Venice Dojo, and passed away a few years ago, or John Ogden, of Ogden Dojo, who died last year, or Frank Fullerton, the PJU Sport Director and former president of USJI, who died this month. Every single one of them, when they died there was no one who was anything but sincerely grieved. None of them were perfect - who is - but they were models for all of us in ways to be better people. Both Isao Wada and John Ogden had a terrific uchimata, something I could never do very well. Kenso Kiyohiro had a good seoi nage, which he passed on to his sons, Tracy and Marshall. Frank wasn't a great judo player, but he was a good referee, an honest one and he was a completely by the rules person. On the other hand, if there wasn't a rule specifically forbidding something he would do anything to help you out if you were an American and he thought you could bring home gold medals for the U.S. He was the most patriotic person I ever met.

Not only have many of my mentors and role models in judo passed away, but so have those in other areas of life. My doctoral advisor, my mentor in statistics, Dr. Richard Eyman, was another brilliant and scrupulously honest person. He passed away several years ago. Ironically, the university where he received his Ph.D. is now where I am the senior statistical consultant.

Lots of days, I feel that I am not ready to be the person people turn to. I am happy to have people like Wada, Ogden, Kiyohiro and Fullerton there. When I was young, of course, I thought I knew everything, was ten feet tall, bullet-proof and ready to take over the world. Now, every time we lose one of our elder statesmen and women (like Elizabeth Lee), I think, "Wait a minute! We still need you here."

Isao Wada's life was a lesson for a lot of people. He carried judo, grew judo and embodied judo for many decades. Now the people my age need to stand up to the challenge and try to be better people. It's up to us now. We have to be up to it, because soon, we are all that will be left.

Once a week or so, I teach a class at our Health Sciences Campus. To get to the classroom, I have to pass through the cancer hospital. Each day, I walk outside into another beautiful sunny day in southern California, see daughters escorting their mothers who are leaning on their arms for support, wives pushing their husbands in wheelchairs. So, maybe your child did not win the Junior Olympics, maybe the other coach made a rude remark to you, maybe you're mad at the judo club down the street.

Today would be a good day to get over it. We're alive. What a precious gift that is.

Sneakerdoodle Zebra Judo:Matwork tip, no one's head ever pops off, the video blog, will be posted tomorrow. The fact that Sensei Wada died was about a billion times more important.

If anyone has an article or photo of Sensei Wada for the August issue of Growing Judo, I would love to receive it. The July issue can be found here
http://judoforum.com/index.php?showtopic=28388

No one's head ever comes off: Matwork tip

SNEAKERDOODLE ZEBRA JUDO

No one's head ever comes off, this important tip for matwork seems to be missed by many people trying to escape from pins.

This week's video blog was filmed a week ago as judo is at camp in Big Bear this week. Next Thursday, Julia has her own idea on belt promotions, so you can check back for that.




P.S. There IS practice tomorrow morning, 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., West Coast Judo Training Center, 123 South First St., La Puente, CA. Show up !


P.P.S. July issue of Growing Judo can be found here

http://judoforum.com/index.php?showtopic=28388

(Almost) Everything I Needed to Know as a Mother I Learned at Judo Practice

... and most of the rest I learned from my mother and grandmother.

“A mother's love is patient and forgiving when all others are forsaking, it never fails or falters, even though the heart is breaking”

Nice quote from Helen Rice. Not sure it completely describes me. Although I love my children very much, I do believe that certain behaviors are less likely to re-occur if they are followed by a hard rap on the child's head. On more than one occasion, I have threatened to sell a child for scientific experiments or skin her alive and tack her hide upside the door as a warning to her sisters.

Despite all of that, they turned out okay. I learned a lot in college, I did get four degrees after all. Recently, though, I was watching a youtube video from last year of my daughter, Maria, receiving the Emerging Journalist Award from the National Hispanic Journalists Association.

What struck me is that the comments her editors and mentors made about her in the video, were the same comments Ronda's coaches make about her, that Jenn's friends make about her and that Julia's teachers say.

"Maria does not possess the deadliest sin in journalism - fear."

"This kid (Ronda) fears no one. She will throw it down with Olympians, national champions, anybody."

"The really cool thing about Jenn is she is not afraid to stand up to anybody and say what she thinks."

"Julia came up to me (the principal) and said she had a complaint about the way the other girls were treating a new girl in her class. She said, Yeah, she's a little bit annoying but she is not that annoying. They're being mean to her and that's not right."

Years ago, one of the students in an Educational Psychology course that I was teaching wrote a paper on Character Education. The state had something like six "pillars of character education" while the Catholic school curriculum had twelve. I don't recall all of the additional 'pillars' that the Catholic school had but I remember that two of them were courage - courage to stand up for one's rights and courage to stand up for the rights of others.

Maria's award was based on a series of articles she wrote in response to attacks on her for writing her articles in Spanish and English. In her acceptance speech she says,

"You need to know that you do have a voice ... and to take a stand for what you believe in."

Even in high school, Jenn knew to stand her ground. Maria warned her that grade school friendships don't stand up in high school, that everybody is like that. Jenn said simply,

"I'm not everybody."

When she was home last weekend, now a college graduate, her two best friends from elementary school and her two new friends she had met in high school all dropped by the house and dragged her out to celebrate life, friendship and being twenty-two. (Yeah, I hate 'em, too!)

There has been a lot of attention in the media lately about Fletcher Thornton resigning after the New York Times article on the multiple charges that he drugged and molested teenage athletes as well as related articles many other places, including the Associated Press. Credit, deservedly so, has been given to Ronda for first drawing attention to this in her blog and a post on the Judo Forum.

Yes, I am proud of Ronda for standing up, but some, no A LOT, of due has to be given to the girls, now women, who have come forward. One of them is a friend of mine from way back and the other is someone I have just recently met over the Internet. The courage they have shown to speak out knowing that, in at least one case, what was done to them has now become public knowledge, downloaded by thousands of people - it is pretty amazing. What Ronda did was lend her voice to stand up for the rights of others.

What Maria did in Fort Wayne was lend her voice to stand up for people in the community who cannot often speak out.

Jenn is equally amazing. When girls are under so much pressure in high school to conform, to fit in, to turn their backs on old friends, she never blinked. None of my girls have ever been perfect (unlike their mother!). In high school, Maria wore all the right designer clothes, was a cheerleader and on the track team. Ronda had a lot of trouble fitting in during elementary school and was very unhappy. Maria said,

"You just need to decide what part of yourself you are willing to give up or hide to be popular."

Laying on the couch in her overalls, Jenn piped up,

"That's easy to answer. Nothing."

When Julia, who had just barely turned ten years old, ran for student council, she had to stand up in front of the entire school of 300+ students and give a reason for everyone, even the seventh and eighth graders, to vote for her. She said,

"I think I would be a good Commissioner of Publicity because I am a good speaker, I am in the Debate Club, and I have three older sisters so I have a lot of experience speaking up loudly to be heard."

She got elected.

So, what did I learn from judo that I passed on to my kids?

Don't be afraid of anyone. Never back down. Your mother loves you enough to kick you out of the house and make you go to judo practice, debate club, soccer, cheerleading, computer animation classes - anything just to get off the couch and do something. Not exactly all the secrets of life, but it is not a bad start.

In other news...

Jim Pedro, Sr. told Ronda to take the post on her blog down. When I reminded him about that this week he said he didn't say it was wrong for her to post it, just that she needed to focus on the Olympics and that she HAD been training and completely focused so he was right. If you have not met Jim, one thing you should know about him is that he NEVER admits he is wrong. No matter what happens he can turn it around so it comes out in the end as if he is right. It is a gift he has.

Still, it was very cool to hear Jim won the Goodyear "Get There" award for his support of Ronda. This is an award for those who helped Olympic athletes get to where they are. They selected three "medal winners" from around the country and Jim was one of them. He deserves it.

Grumpy old people (and one young judo player)

If my friend, old and seldom grumpy judo coach Bruce Toups, is correct and the best classroom is hanging around an old person, Ronda ought to have several graduate degrees by now.

Jim Pedro, Sr. has had Ronda training these past few weeks until she could barely do anything by the end of the day but lay in bed and watch movies for a few minutes before dropping off to sleep. She is often convinced that her tombstone will read:

"Here lies Ronda Rousey. Her coaches trained her to death."

As much as it would probably pain both of them to admit it, Ronda and Jim agree on a lot. Each Olympics we see people after the Olympic Trials whose goal was to make the team. They have met their goals and are satisfied, training no harder than they were before the trials. There is certainly nothing wrong with setting a goal to compete in the Olympics and achieving that goal. That's just not Ronda. Jim has had her training harder than ever, and one of his big areas of focus has been conditioning.

This week, he insisted that she watch the movie, Million Dollar Baby. (Short plot summary: Young woman wants to be successful boxer. Grumpy old coach trains her really hard, she progresses, but in the last match she is injured and dies.)

He told her she needed to get that attitude. One day, she turned to him during practice and said,

"We're working out harder than that girl in Million Dollar Baby."

Jim answered without batting an eye,

"Yeah, well she lost. That's why you're training harder than her. You're going to win."

I think people misunderstand Jim's focus on conditioning. It is not that he doesn't believe technique is important. It is that he understands that you can do more judo techniques when you are in condition. Further, sometimes conditioning can make up for less than perfect technique. When I was younger, I often fought people who had better technique than me if you were measuring us like a nage no kata competition. If they could have gotten me moving, they maybe could have done a foot sweep or a beautiful uchimata. Unfortunately for them, I was strong enough to get a grip, lock them in one place, knock them down for a koka and do matwork. Who says matwork is not a technique? My matwork is full of techniques.

I see a lot of people with great technique who try to use that to make up for a lack of conditioning. I also see people who are in great shape who try to use that to make up for lack of technique. Both of those are just laziness, taking the easy route.
This is one of those lines Ronda has heard so many times she rolls her eyes every time I say it,

"It's a long way to the top of the world."

I can guarantee you this, the easy route doesn't get you there.

A few other lessons Ronda may have learned, these came from Bruce Toups, and I added in parentheses my advice.

• It's a bad idea to corner anything meaner than you. (Since you intend to own every square inch and corner of that mat, you better be the meanest thing out there.)



• If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging. (Judo advice: If you are in a match, you do something and you get countered or blocked, the next time do something different. While this may seem brain-dead obvious, watch a few matches at the next tournament and see how many times a person will, e.g., try tai otoshi, even when it is not working, because, well, tai otoshi is what that person does.)



• Words that soak into your ears are whispered, not yelled. (My children say I yell at them. This is a lie. What I do is say things they don't want to hear. As a parent and as a coach, there are two things I think you should say only sparingly and when you do, you better mean them - "I am proud of you", and "I am ashamed of you". If your opinion matters, those words will mean a lot to the person no matter how loudly or quietly you say them. If your opinion doesn't matter, you're wasting your breath."

Another bit of wisdom from Bruce was that I might want to consider retiring to the south because it is the only region of the country where, "He needed killin' " is considered a valid defense. I'm thinking about it.


-------------- Breaking News Links ------------------------

Accusations of molestation by USA Judo official, Fletcher Thornton, New York Times article

USA Judo: A voice on the web - is a New York Times blog on, in an Escher-type way, blogging, and how it is changing how athletes can communicate about the national governing body

Do not put your butt up in the air

In today's episode of Sneakerdoodle Zebra Judo, we emphasize that timeless judo adage,

"Do not put your butt up in the air".

As illustrated on the video, there are few situations in judo, as in life, when it is advantageous to stick your butt up in the air. If you are looking for one of those situations here, dude, do you ever have the wrong video!

Anyway, as you can clearly see, it is far preferable to settle your weight down and put your stomach on the mat.



Also included, a shout-out to Ronda. Oh, and pumpkin, we got your voice mail and we all feel really bad about your nipples.