Observations on China: The same, the good, the bad and the simply different

China was different than I had expected, a paradoxical statement since I really was not sure what to expect. From some accounts, I had expected to see depressed, oppressed people living in squalor. I saw some of what appeared to be that, but no more than in Los Angeles. We have skid row, crack addicts and gangbangers, so although it is always a beautiful sunny day in paradise, it isn't heaven in the City of Angels, either.

Of course, there have been lots of reports in the press about how the city was "cleaned up" for the Olympics. If that meant new parks, new construction, new gardens, then that is not a bad thing. There were certainly signs that all is not as shiny and nice as portrayed. I am a nosy person, as anyone can tell you, and although I don't speak a word of Chinese, I have visited a lot of countries and I always make it a habit to walk around the neighborhoods and off the beaten path. When I looked behind the huge canvas BEIJING 2008 banners stretched everywhere, I invariably saw vacant lots that we would call eyesores back home. So, yeah, Beijing was a lot like L.A. or any other city with millions of people.

The traffic was about as bad as Los Angeles on an average day, that is to say, better than Tokyo, New York City or San Francisco and worse than just about every other place on earth. Several people told me that cars were only allowed on the road on certain days. If this was half the cars, I can't imagine what traffic is like under "normal" circumstances.

Some reports said the Chinese were the friendliest people they had ever met. Others said it was mostly phony and the government had instructed them in everything from hygiene to proper smiling. To me, they seemed like people everywhere, if you were nice to them, they were nice to you. I didn't try being a jerk to people as an experiment to see what would happen.

Everything in China is a lot more labor intensive. For example, every morning there would be hordes of people out sweeping the streets with long brooms. In Santa Monica, all of those folks would be replaced with one guy in a big machine. I wonder what would happen if we quit giving people welfare and paid them the same amount to clean the streets. Santa Monica Beach could sure use some cleaning.

There sure are a lot of people in China, which explains the labor intensiveness. For example, if you needed someone to drive a visitor around and the visitor only spoke English, you would look for an English-speaking driver, right? In China, you are just as likely (maybe more so), to hire two people, one a driver and one who speaks English. Everything in China seemed to be like that. There were exceptions, of course. We met one very fascinating gentleman who owned a hotel, a restaurant and was a judo coach. In most cases, though, a job one person would do in the U.S would have five or seven people doing it in China.

The good
Lines were much shorter than I expected, particularly given that the Olympics were going on. When I was ready to go to the airport at 4:30 for my 8:00 a.m. flight, our Chinese hosts thought I was crazy. This is another thing I like about the people in Beijing - they don't get up early. When I came down to the lobby, the only person awake was Jim Pedro, who had just come back from jogging, and he IS crazy.

It was about an hour drive to the airport from the hotel, and I figured if it was two hours to get on an international flight in L.A., I should be there three hours early in Beijing, since it is a bigger city, during the Olympics, etc. The very polite driver and equally polite interpreter came downstairs an hour after me, shaking their heads. When the interpreter told me leaving at 6 a.m. would be plenty of time to get to the airport, I thought she misunderstood when my flight left. Even leaving an hour later than I wanted, I was through security and waiting at the gate an hour and a half before my flight took off. With two or three times as many people doing screening, baggage handling, checking passports and taking tickets. Again, I wondered what would happen at home if the people receiving disability payments were instead given some training and a job checking passports or directing people to the correct line.

The bad
None of this is to suggest that I intend to move to China any time soon. There are about a hundred ways in which the U.S. is more comfortable, beginning with the plumbing. I feel no urge to be politically correct here. Let me be frank. Those squat toilets are NASTY. They smell and there was urine on the floor everywhere that I went. (And it was there when I went in so don't go blaming me.) And who came up with having the toilet paper OUTSIDE the toilet? Is this supposed to teach you some life lesson about advance planning?

Chinese dudes, some advice - if you are so convinced that you must squat down to pee, however unfriendly it might be to people with bad knees, go to Japan and study what they do. They have those squat toilets, too, but theirs aren't gross.

Food - I already talked about the food. My niece said that Americans will deep-fry anything. Maybe she is right but I would have taken a deep-fried twinkie over that stuff any day. After a week, I was home sick for Dunkin' Doughnuts and french fries. It beats raw flatworms all to hell.

The different
I think coaching must be very different in China because I got a lot of questions about Ronda's coach, Jim Pedro, Sr., who came to Beijing. I got the impression that even when I answered their questions people were still confused.

"He let her live at his house? Why?"
"She was only 16. She couldn't live by herself."
"She cooked and cleaned for him, right?"
"Ronda? My Ronda? No, are you kidding! He cooked for her."
"Why?"
"To make sure she ate right."
"Why would he care? Is he her father?"
"No, her father died when she was little. He's her coach."
"Is he her uncle?"
"No, he's her coach."
"Why would he care about her?"
"He's her coach."
"How much money are you going to give him as a bonus since she won a medal?"
"Every time I offer to give him money he gets mad at me."
"Why does he coach her then?"
"Because he cares about her."
"Why?"

There were about 100 other questions like this. I'd be very interested to find out what coaches are like in China. From the puzzled looks I got from people, I think it must be a very different system.

===========REQUIRED JUDO TIP==================================
Winning is a habit. Don't go to tournaments over your head and especially don't spend a lot of money to do it unless you just happen to have loads of extra money lying around. (If the latter, please send some to the USJA Development Fund. We even take credit cards. Call Katrina at the USJA office at 877- 411- 3409, toll-free, even. We'll put it to good use. I swear. )

If the senior nationals happens to be in your hometown and you are a green belt, or you are 13 years old, going to the Ladder Tournament and the Fall Classic is the day before, by all means, give it a shot. The absolute worst that will happen is you'll get an extra match or two.

Spending a lot of money and taking days away from work or school to fight 45 seconds in one match is no less stupid for the number of people who do it. Gary Goltz suggested I tell someone this and he would listen to me. I have been telling people for years and they still don't listen. I will try again. Here is your plan:
Go to the local tournaments. Win.
When you are winning all of the local tournaments, go to the regional ones, like the San Jose Buddhist, Golden State Open, Ocean State, etc. You know the major tournaments in your area. Win.
If there is a major tournament in your area - USJA Winter Nationals,All Womens Tournament any regional event, junior nationals - go. Don't be stupid, it's right there.
When you are winning the regional tournaments, go to the senior nationals and similar tournaments, e.g., the Hatashita International in Ontario, Canada. Win.
When you are winning the nationals, go to the U.S. Open and Rendezvous. Win.
When you are winning everything in North America, go to Europe and Japan. Win.

Why do people skip tournaments like the Golden State Open, Northglenn Invitational and Ocean State right in their own backyard and then go to the senior nationals? Why do people who cannot place higher than third at the senior nationals spend $2,000 to fly to Paris to compete in one of the toughest tournaments in the world?

There are two possibilities:
1. People are stupid.
2. Some people are not that interested in winning. They want the experience of being in Paris.

Recognize these are two different things. If you really want to win, all I can say is that I followed the plan above and so did Ronda. We both won a lot. That doesn't mean you can't go to Paris, but I suggest you separate your competition from other motives. I wanted to go to the Bahamas, Hawaii. the Costa Rican rainforest, and on a couple of cruises. So, I did. It was all way cool. It didn't have anything to do with judo and I didn't pretend otherwise.

If you are not winning, don't spend a lot of money going to tournaments. Spend it going to camps where you can train several hours each day and get better. Unless you are already beating almost everyone in the U.S. (as in, you have medals from the senior national championships) don't spend your money going to Japan or Europe for camp (unless you just happen to want to go those places and have the money). Win here. Then, go there and win there.

How to Win and Why

Why to win

It was a nice weekend, beginning with my little one winning the Golden State Open. Today, I was throwing away trophies and came across the trophy from when Ronda won the Golden State Open in 1998, exactly ten years earlier. Somewhere else in the pandemonium in the hallway was a 2002 Golden State Open first place trophy and another from 2005. Years ago, Ronda threw away all of her second and third place trophies, but now even with just the first place awards, they have started to spill out of the closets again. Then, Julia is starting to come into her own and winning on top of that. For a while, I kept all of the international ones and all of her special awards, like Athlete of the Year from various organizations. Finally, those have started to go, too.

"Mom, did I win this one or did Ronda?"
"If we can't remember who won it, it can't be very special. Throw that in the box that goes into the dumpster."

I remember a time when I would feel so bad for my little kid (whichever one it was) that went home without a medal or a trophy. Jennifer, who told me as early as eight years old,

"I hate all sports and you will never make me like them,"

almost never came home with a medal. It wasn't that she had no athletic talent. I am sure if she'd had the interest, she could have been on the Olympic team with Ronda.

So, was I a terrible parent to make Jenn play soccer, basketball, judo and join the swim team? I kept looking for a sport she would like and never found one.

Am I a terrible parent that I routinely fill the dumpster with my other kids' medals and trophies, telling them, "This is not a warehouse."

What my kids learned from competition:

1. You don't always get what you want.


2. You can do things you thought were too difficult for you.


3. You will improve in anything that you work at.


4. Winning feels good.


5. Losing sucks. (Well, it does.)


6. If you lose, you can train harder and try again.


7. You were born into the wrong family if you are looking for someone to accept excuses for not getting what you want out of life.


8. If you really don't enjoy doing something, you can quit and find something else you like better. (Ronda quit swimming. Somehow, that did not ruin her Olympic chances. Jenn eventually quit all sports, moved out at 19, graduated from college at 21 and is living in San Francisco. Despite her irrational choice of location, she is reportedly not gay and has an alleged boyfriend to prove it. If she brings him to Thanksgiving dinner, we will acknowledge that he exists.)


9. You'll be a whole lot better off physically if you exercise. (Jenn may not compete in any sports but she does walk a lot and get a lot of exercise. Just look at her - is she beautiful or what?)


10. Win or lose, tomorrow, your family will still love you, it will be another beautiful sunny day in paradise and it will still be someone's turn to change the guinea pig cages.

How to win

Over the past two weeks, I have had the opportunity to watch the Olympics and then the Golden State Open, a tournament that ranges from five-year-olds to senior E-level divisions. It provided a good contrast for what distinguishes those who win at the international level from the average judo player.

Winning starts with technique. Yes, technique is not everything but it is one of those necessary-but-not-sufficient conditions. I have yelled at Julia about a thousand times to get her left foot back more when doing harai goshi and I will yell at her a thousand more times, I am sure. I remember when Ronda was the same age telling her over and over, "Your shoulders always go forward. When you do o soto gari or uchimata, your shoulders always go forward."
Hint: With little kids, and maybe even adults, I have always found it much preferable to emphasize what they SHOULD be doing, e.g., put your left foot back, put your shoulders forward, instead of "Don't have your left foot in front" or "Don't lean backward."



Not surprisingly, even at the senior level, the technique at the Golden State wasn't as good as the Olympics, and the further you went from the senior black belt divisions, the worse the technique. Some of the younger kids had only one or two throws they tried and those not very well.

At the training center, I use the analogy from gymnastics a lot about "sticking" a landing, where the gymnast lands smack on both feet and stops, instead of stumbling and taking two steps after the landing, or landing and almost falling over, etc. In judo, we need to "stick" our techniques.

There isn't an easy way to get good technique. You need to practice it over and over, not just throws on the crash pad but throws on the mat, throws while you are moving in every direction.

People who win aren't snobbish about how. I had good technique. It was matwork technique which made a lot of people look down their noses at me. Yet, when I would do that roll-over choke that Gary Butts calls the Rousey Roll, I whipped over, landed in a pin and choke at the same time, and then switched to an over hook for a tighter pin, and I did it in a matter of seconds. As long as the referee's hand went in my direction at the end of the match, I was cool with the fact that I didn't throw for more than a koka. Masae Ueno, who won the 70 kg gold medal, threw Hernandez of Cuba with a leg pick. The Mongolian player who beat Kenji Suzuki the first round and eventually won the gold medal threw everyone with a double-leg take down - morote gari. Hernandez, who won the 70 kg silver medal, threw most of her opponents with a double-leg or ippon seoi nage. At the Golden State, I saw players throw someone for a yuko or waza ari and then get up instead of follow through for the pin or armbar. Several of those players lost by getting thrown or pinned later in the match.

We need to train more and train harder. Crystal Butts is one of my favorite judo players for the same reason she is NOT a lot of other people's. She has an attitude. Whenever I tell her to go an extra round, or do more throws than other people she gives me "that look". She fails to realize that, having experienced three teenage daughters, one teenage niece and a ten-year-old, I am immune to any and all looks from teenage girls. The thing I like about Crystal is she will always do more. She won't do it graciously, but she will do it. I can't remember a single practice she ever missed. However, when we were doing newaza one day, it struck me - Crystal does not have a feel for matwork. I thought about this a lot and my conclusion was that her problem was that she was 14 years old. She just needs more hours on the mat. On a good day (which one never has after 50), my matwork fit the description of Anakin in the first episode of Star Wars,

"... His reflexes are so fast - like he knows things before they happen."

When I was younger people gave all sorts of Zen reasons for this, none of which I bought into. It's like that good and evil drill in the last Sneakerdoodle Zebra Judo - if you have done that drill 10,000 times when someone does an inside turn to escape from kuzure kesa gatame, you automatically hook the arm, make a wide step with your leg and switch into kami shiho gatame. When you swim, you learn to move in water. In gymnastics, you learn to move in the air. In matwork, it's the same, learning to move in another environment, when you are not on your feet, and you have another person moving at the same time. It is moving in air most of the time, even if you are only a few inches off the ground and on top of the other person. My point, and I do have one, is that you get that feel by hours and hours on the mat.

Train harder because it brings commitment. When I was in Beijing, I asked Jim Pedro, Sr. why he thought the Cubans won and he said,

"They train harder than us."

I persisted that it can't be that simple. Somewhat irritated, he answered,

"You always ask me that about people and I tell you they train harder and you don't want to accept it. That's what it is. Every one of them is a hard match because they train harder. They are in condition to take advantage of every opportunity. They spend more hours on the mat and they train harder."

(I think he may also have added something about shutting up and quitting bothering him so he could watch judo.)

He is right. (Don't tell him I said that. He already thinks he is right all the time and does not need any encouragement.) If you spend more hours on the mat, you will have more time to work on technique, you will be in better condition, you will have more time to work on tactics. If you fight HARD and get beat into the mat, when you get out there, you are going to be determined that no one is going to beat you. At the Golden State, I asked Tyrone Taketa what he thought the difference was between the Olympics and the competitors there and I was interested to see that he said exactly what I was thinking. I can't remember the exact words but it was along the lines of they were committed and expected to win.

When Ronda went against the Hungarian to get into the bronze medal match and went in to her o soto gari , she intended to make it work. She wasn't thinking, "I hope this works," or "This probably won't work". I am pretty certain that her real thought was "I'm throwing you." Period. I have seen pictures of it - it was a knee drop o soto - where both her knees were in the air and Annette's feet were both off the ground. That's commitment. Part of that commitment comes from having given up over four years of her life, training in Massachusetts, Japan, Spain, running at 6 a.m. a thousand times, having Jim yell at her until she cried to train harder, lift more, fight harder. You need to commit in practice to commit in the tournament. You need the will to win not just on August 23rd at the Fairgrounds but on Monday morning when you get up and run, and every other Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday an Sunday for years on end.

HINT: Be careful who you ask that commitment of. That is going to be part of the subject of my talk on Friday night at the coaches' conference - when to push harder, how to GRADUALLY develop an athlete appropriate to his or her age.

Judo for Kids: Questions answered and the good and evil drill

I get a LOT of questions from parents, often apologizing for taking my time and worried that they are overbearing parents. If you are worried about it, you probably aren't. It is perfectly fine to ask people about how to help your child. I do it all the time and I think most people do. Unfortunately, we don't live in communities with three generations of our families like a century ago, so now we have to ask people on the Internet.

Two really common questions are:

1. How do I get my child to be tough? Judo is a tough sport. Ronda is tough as nails and my nine-, ten- or eleven-year-old is not that tough. Should I be worried?

2. How do I help my child get better at judo.

Answer: Does your child cry easily? Is he or she too shy to talk to other children? If so, your kid is just as tough as Ronda was at 10 or 11, which is why I put her into judo.

Development is a graduated process. I say this all the time. Ronda swears I put her in with giant monster black belts when she was younger. Actually, her first tournament was a novice division, white and yellow belt girls. She won by all ippons. Her next few tournaments she also fought in the 11-12 year old novice division. Because she is left-handed and came from swimming so she was already in good shape, she won a lot in the novice divisions. When she was still a white belt she had probably won a half-dozen tournaments by all ippons, so I put her in the 13-16 open division, where she came in third place after losing to two, older purple belts, both of whom won the Junior U.S. Open in their weight divisions that year. Ronda cried in the corner for half an hour after she lost.

Success breeds success. I did NOT move her up into the open divisions until she was winning in novice. Then, I had her do both the same tournaments, so even if she lost a couple of matches, she came home with a gold medal and a bronze one. By the time she was no longer in the novice division, she was winning the open division for her age group regularly. One answer to making your child tougher is to gradually increase the challenge level as he or she meets each one.

There is a LOT more I will write about in the next few posts.

This week's Sneakerdoodle Zebra Judo features a matwork combination drill that Julia and I call the Good and Evil Drill. I stole this from Jim Pedro, Sr. who taught it at a clinic years ago. I already did this combination - well, the last three steps anyway - but the way he broke it down into steps for teaching was a great way to teach little kids and beginners. Oh, by the way, I do know that the pin at the end is kami shiho gatame, I made a mistake, yes, I feel shame, no need to write me and rub it in.

We have a couple more videos that were Julia's ideas and after that I will do a couple on drills I did not steal from anybody but made up myself. Ronda will be home by then, so maybe we will get her to do the Chokey-chokey song and drill.

Volunteering, Judo and Other Things in Life

After coming back from China, I coached at the West Coast Training Center the next day, slept 11 jet-lagged hours the day after that and still had a paper that needed to be finished by Monday for publication in the proceedings of a software conference where I will be presenting. I worked on it for 17 hours straight and submitted it on-line at 2 a.m. Tuesday, Gary Goltz, the king of all salesmen, talked me into coming out to a showing of the Tokyo Olympiad, sponsored by Nike, where we did a 45-minute judo demonstration that included a match between me and Ashton.


(Note to self: Fifty-year-old grandmothers should not be lifting young women half again their size up on their shoulders because even if they throw and armbar them, said young women pop out of bed all springtime fresh-looking and go jogging the next morning while the aforementioned grandmothers try to move while groaning, "What the hell was I thinking?" and "Ooh, my arthritis! Where's the aspirin?")

Since I had already been to two practices and a demonstration in the four days since returning from China, I decided to skip practice tonight and clean the house. Yes, I know that sounds as if I have lost my mind, but lately, I have had an epiphany of sorts. It started with a couple of comments that Ronda made in the middle of a really long post on her blog.

First, she mentioned Sayaka's remark that 100 yards away from the stadium where people were battling it out for a gold medal, people on the street didn't even know judo existed. Second, she pointed out that the day she competed was just Wednesday. It didn't stop being Wednesday because the 70 kg women fought in the Olympics that day.

Judo is great. I have been involved in it one way or another for 38 years of my life. I have fought in everything from the 12 and under white and yellow belt division to the world championships. I've coached at all levels from preschoolers through college and held positions from committee member in the local black belt association to president of the largest state governing body to vice-president of the United States Judo Association.

As far as all of the organizations, my involvement has a very simple motivation. Back in 2004 when Jimmy Pedro, Jr. was running for president of USA Judo, I told Jim Pedro, Sr.

"All I want is for judo in the U.S. not to suck. You and your son are part of that not sucking. That's why I am supporting you. It has nothing to do with liking you or not."

Actually, I like Ron Tripp, the current president of USA Judo. He's smart, he's funny and a nice guy to have a beer with. However, on all dimensions from ethics (come on, we had a child molester on the board of directors for years ) to the abysmal showing in the Olympics (as I said in my last post, if it hadn't been for Jim Pedro, Sr.'s athletes, we would have had exactly ZERO medals out of the 224 given out in the last four Olympics - 14 divisions times four medals times four years (for those of you who don't know, there are two bronze medals given out) our general performance as a sport can be summed up as "sucking".

Where do volunteers come in? First, if it wasn't for volunteers, we would have no judo at all. I try very hard - and unsuccessfully - to return every email and voicemail message that I get. Currently I have 326 messages in my in-box. I will probably set aside Sunday and get it down under 200. Often, I will get email from judo coaches, parents and athletes around the country saying,

"I can't believe you took the time to answer my question."

I try, because you ARE judo. I have been somewhat discouraged with some of the people in our judo organizations lately because, in my opinion, they are losing sight of the fact that judo will live or die based on that person who has a dojo on the corner, that parent who drives his son to practice, that coach who volunteers at the community center. Having a title, having a high rank, doesn't increase the number of judo players - offering a class at the YMCA does.

I went to the absolutely beautiful Doheny Library at USC today to get a couple of books. Doheny has NINE FLOORS of books and magazines and is one of, I think, 26 USC libraries. I am sure they have over a million books in their collection. I took two books I really wanted and decided to pick up the third one at the engineering library after I finished these. Like everyone else, I have the option of being a volunteer at judo activities, or reading any one of the million books in the library or cleaning my house.

Speaking to another very nice man yesterday, I said that if I could not trust people in his organization, I would not work with them ever again. He said,
"Oh, you don't mean that."
I said,
"Oh, but I do."

I don't think he understood it. Even my friend, Gary Goltz, seemed unclear. He said,
"AnnMaria, when you say you will never work with someone again, you sound like a loose cannon, like you are threatening people and no one likes that."

What Gary didn't quite get is that I was merely stating a fact. Like any other volunteer, I have a lot of options. I can give back to my community through volunteering at my church, my child's school, my local judo club, my state organization, Save the Whales, Save the Freckled Three-Legged Iguanas (okay, I just made that one up but you get my point).

At the showing of the Tokyo Olympiad, I ran into my old team manager and former Tenri homeboy, Dr. James Wooley. I reminded him of the time after he had retired from competition when I asked him if he was depressed he couldn't compete any more and he said something like,

"Oh God, no! I had a great run and I loved it. Two Olympic teams, Panamerican Games, everything else, but now I'm done, I have a practice, a wife, a son, I couldn't be happier."

At the time, at my great pinnacle of wisdom at 23 years old, I thought he was just putting a good face on it, that of course everyone who could not compete any longer was depressed because their life was essentially OVER.

Well, I retired from competition at 26, married, had children, got degrees, a career and was very surprised to find that my life was not in fact over but was just beginning.

I told Jim Wooley that I had not decided whether to run for the USJA Board in 2009 or not but that I had decided for sure that I was absolutely done after that. I asked his advice and he said,
"I think you are exactly right. You and Jim Pedro have done an enormous amount. Your share and more. Whenever you feel you want to hang it up and go fishing or sit in front of your computer or whatever you do, you have earned that right."

I know that I am not more important than, deserve more votes than or any way different from the rest of the volunteers in judo. I do what I do because I enjoy doing it, trust the people I work with and believe I am making a difference toward 'not sucking'. Whenever any part of that equation changes, I will quit volunteering with that group, forget all of their names, and instead probably read a book or clean my house or walk down to the ocean where the sun will be shining on another beautiful day in paradise.

And it will still be Wednesday.

So, that is why I always try to call and email everyone back and thank them for being involved in judo. Because, if you get disenchanted with us and go fishing, our organization will have one less valuable person and we will be the lesser for it, while, for you, it will still be Wednesday, regardless AND you'll have fresh fish!

Observations on Coaching an Athlete to the Olympics

I've had a lot of respect for Jim Pedro, Sr. for a long time, but it increased considerably over this trip to the Olympics. Jimmy has had athletes in the last FIVE Olympics. This year, he had Ronda, who won a bronze medal, Daniel McCormick (who placed 9th)and Taraje Williams-Murray. In 2004, he had Ronda (who placed ninth), Taraje, Alex Ottiano and Jimmy, Jr. (who won a bronze medal). In 2000, he had Jimmy Jr. (who was the 1999 world champion) and Alex. In 1996, he had Jimmy, Jr. (who won a bronze medal). Despite having had athletes on the last five Olympic teams and having coached EVERY American who has won an Olympic medal in the past 16 years, Jim Pedro, Sr. has never been selected as the Olympic Coach. He has never been allowed to stay in the Olympic Village. Instead, every four years, USA Judo selects three or four other people, most of whom have zero athletes on the team and none of whom have ever coached an Olympic medal winner. WTF???

Ronda lived at Jim's house for nearly two years, and he has moved her in from time to time since then when she needed that extra help to avoid all distractions. When the whole story about Fletcher Thornton having molested a bunch of underage players came out before the Olympics, Jim had Ronda move into his house where there was no Internet access, no cell phone coverage and not even a home phone. THEN, he arranged for a judo player from Slovenia around her weight to come also and had them train three times a day while he monitored every aspect of her performance.

Last year, there was a trip scheduled to a training center in Japan. I expressed my concern (I am sure he would put it that I nagged him unmercifully about it!) to Jimmy that unless she had a coach - HER coach - there to watch her during practices, to identify the problems she had with specific players and develop strategies to work on those when she came back it would be a waste of time, just Ronda training with random Asian players. Jimmy said,

"If Ronda wants me to go to Japan with her, all she needs to do is tell me. I don't think she needs me."

The next practice, Ronda walked up to Jim and said,

"I want you to go to Japan with me."

He booked a ticket.

Yet, Jimmy managed to focus on what he could do to help Ronda win, when any normal human being would have been eaten up with the unfairness of it all. It was possible to get passes for friends and family to get into the Olympic village.

I am sure Jimmy would have liked to have gone, since it was only open to athletes and coaches during the last Olympics in Athens. Ronda was focused on competing when I saw her Tuesday (she fought Wednesday) and she did not get around to getting his name on the list, so he ended up not being able to go over there before he left for home. Normally, he would have taken her to task for that, but as a coach, he understood she needed to make weight, work out and think about the tournament. He put what was best for her ahead of what he wanted, even though he had flown thousands of miles to get here and was on the outside for the fifth time.

I can only imagine how Jimmy must feel about a system that never picks the only coach who has produced Olympic medalists, yet, I never heard him say one negative word about Israel Hernandez, the coach who was in Ronda's chair during the Olympics. Talking down the other coach only hurts the athlete's confidence - sort of like divorced parents putting each other down. There must have been great temptation for Jimmy to yell out instructions to Ronda during her matches, but Jim realized that is a real distraction for the player. Several times, Kayla Harrison, one of Ronda's teammates from Massachusetts, stood up and said she was going to go talk to one of the staff members from USA Judo and try to get Jim coaching credentials to get down on the floor. In desperation, she offered to get one of the athletes to give him their badge so he could go down on the floor and talk to Ronda. Jim told her,

"I am NOT going to go down there. If Ronda needs me, she knows I am here."

Before her bronze medal match, Ronda did come over to the stands where we were sitting, and Jim was able to yell instructions to her before her match.

After Ronda won the bronze medal, she came up in the stands to hug first me and then Jim. Israel also came up in the stands to shake Jim's hand and thank him for the opportunity to coach Ronda in the Olympics.

Several points came to mind after this experience:

• Jim was able to put Ronda's needs before his own both before and during the tournament. This is probably one reason he has had so many Olympic athletes come from his program


• Even at the time when he had the most reason in the world NOT to help her out of resentment, i.e., she was fighting for a medal in the Olympics, coached by someone else and he didn't even have a pass to get to the floor to talk to her, he STILL went out of his way to give her any advice he could because he cared about her winning more than his own feelings about the situation.


• This time was not as bad as four years ago in Athens, when even the coaches from other countries commented that Ronda was looking up in the stands at her coach for guidance. There is a big difference between 17 and 21 and she was more self-assured this time.


• There is something fundamentally rotten and corrupt in our selection of coaches for the Olympic team and it is so endemic that people just accept it. "Yes, the guy who has coached all of our medalists from 1996 -2008 and has had players in the last five Olympics is not an Olympic coach and never has been. That's because it is so political." Doesn't that bother anyone but me? Maybe there is a reason China won 18 more gold medals than we did so far. The only thing I can really do as an individual is not join USA Judo, not sign up my little daughter, not go to their junior Olympics or support them in any way. So, I don't. It may be only a little I can do to protest unfairness but I do what I can.


• If you want to coach an American athlete to an Olympic medal in judo, it seems all you can do is care about that person greatly and not expect to get anything back. Not that I do not greatly appreciate the help Israel Hernandez gave to Ronda as one of the Olympic coaches, because I know he sincerely did everything he could to help her. Still, it is a little too bad that the photo of her hugging her coach in all the papers is of Israel and not Jimmy.

I think I will call him in the morning as all I can really do is let him know I really appreciate what he has done for her - that, and send him cigars!

Judo player uses for parents

I am in China this week. Julia helpfully (?) filmed this episode of Sneakerdoodle Zebra Judo with me in advance.

The Restaurant of Disgusting Things

China has beautiful architecture and art. Too bad you can't eat it.

During my junior year of college, I was a foreign exchange student in Japan, living with the wonderful Saito family in Nerima-ku while I attended Waseda University. Mr. Saito told me one day, in the context of talking about how terrific his wife was (did I mention they were a wonderful family?) that there is a Japanese saying that the best houses are American, the best food is Chinese and the best wives are Japanese.

All I can say is that Mr. Saito must have gone to a different country than the one I visited which was also coincidentally named China. We did eat at a couple of good restaurants, both owned by the kind gentleman who hosted our group in China. In a lapse in judgment, we decided to explore our environment and branch out to random Chinese eating establishments. This adventure, which was entirely my fault, made clear to us all why there are so few fat Chinese people.

I am a big believer in experiencing the culture wherever you go, and not eating just at McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Doughnuts every day while you are in Beijing. Thus, Ronda, Jim and I ended up in a restaurant with me pointing at random things on the menu. After trying several of the dishes, Ronda commented,

“I don’t know how to read Chinese but I am going for the translation of that sign out there as being ‘House of Disgusting Things to Eat’”.

The rice and something that the waitress suggested that tasted like orange chicken were both pretty good. It actually was chicken, too, according to our waitress.

Let me try to describe the rest of it. There was this mess of green stuff that looked like kiwi, had the texture of cactus leaves, which I actually like to eat and recommend as low in calories. Unfortunately, the cactus resemblance did not extend to taste. Did you ever try chewing on a blade of grass as a kid? Imagine if someone took a bowl of that grass, cut it into leaf shapes, poured maple syrup on it and threw in a tablespoonful of dish soap.

Ronda took one bite and asked,

“You didn’t actually pay money for this, did you?”

Ever the optimist, I suggested,

“Maybe you are supposed to just eat part of it, you know, like artichokes, where you scrape off the top part of the leaves.”

I tried it, without success. There was no part of it that was edible in the usual definition of the word.

When they brought the next plate out, Jim Pedro pushed himself back from the table and exclaimed, aghast,

“What the Christ! AnnMaria, when I got up to get a beer did you order a plate of koala’s balls?”

Ronda immediately chimed in,

“I can’t eat those. I’m a vegan now.”

How convenient. For the record, the plate of small, light brown round things was not koala’s balls, or, at least, I don’t think so. They tasted more like pinto beans soaked in lye. When I assured her they were most probably vegetarian, Ronda tasted a spoonful and promptly announced,

“I think I’m going to throw up.”

The next plate of things was something I thought from the picture in the menu would be eel, which I happen to like. Ronda and Jim took one look at the plate of grey, slimy stuff the waitress laid on the table, both of them just laughed and shook their heads saying,

“Oh, no.”

Me, being the food adventurer, had to choke down a piece. I wish I had gotten the name of this dish so I could recommend that you not try it. By the taste and texture, my best guess is that it was the intestine of some barnyard animal left in a vat of snails to be crawled on over night to provide flavoring and extra moisture.

Hot tip: If you are in China and they bring you a plate of something grayish with white streaks, slimy and resembling tossed flatworms – don’t feel the obligation to taste it. You aren’t missing a damn thing.

The fruit salad was good, and had recognizable fruits in it. Even the unrecognizable ones tasted good. Ronda wouldn’t eat it, though, because she was convinced the sauce had egg or milk in it because it was white. Apparently vegans have a color-coding system. Who knew? I pointed out that tofu was white but she responded that I had lost all credibility in the food category with the plate of flatworms.

Jim said,

“Now you know why I had beer for lunch. Here, have a glass.”

The beer was pretty good, and I don’t usually even drink beer.

As we left the Disgusting Things Specialty Restaurant, it occurred to me that the only things I really liked so far were beer and rice. If I lived in China, I would have to become either an anorexic or an alcoholic.