KL Judo 3.0

To grow and improve we have to think out of the box

KL Judo 1.0
KL Judo 1.0 was when we started out in Cheras. It was our first foray into trying to set up a different kind of judo club. When I say "different" I mean it on many levels. There are basically two types of judo clubs in Malaysia. One type are the government-funded clubs like those in sports school and ATM, which are well funded. The other type are those related to state associations. These are usually privately funded but not very commercial in nature. Most barely break even and many get by through the help of benefactors who want to support judo.

I couldn't help but notice that the situation is very different in Singapore. Over there, they don't really have state-funded judo clubs. All the clubs are private endeavours and most are run commercially (with great success, I must say). Many of the clubs there have several branches and are present in community centres, secondary schools, junior colleges and universities. So, it's really quite an active judo scene there. I wanted to build a club that was closer to the Singapore model but that's not easy to do of course. If judo is a niche sport in Singapore, it's super duper niche in Malaysia.

Most of the clubs in Malaysia are very Japanese-centric and their teaching style is based on the Japanese system. But the situation in Japan is totally different from that in Malaysia. In Japan there are many judo players. If you go to a university with a strong judo program, you can easily find 50 black belts on the mat to do randori with. In Malaysia, you wouldn't be able to gather 50 black belts for randori if you brought the whole judo population together. So it is really not practical to look at the Japanese system which is geared for a different demographic where judo players are plentiful. Rather, it makes more sense to look at countries where the judo population is small.

Have a look at what Israeli Coach Shany Hersko and US coach Jimmy Pedro have to say about not mimicking the Japanese but instead, creating their own training systems to suit the conditions in their respective countries.

This is what we have to do too. Take a long hard look at our situation here. It's very different from Japan or France or Brazil where judo is popular. We have to come up with a system that suits our needs.

I, myself, was trained in the West. I have been to Japan for competition and I did visit one of the judo universities to do some randori but my competition training was in the US and UK, where judo is not a big sport. Naturally, I am inclined to adopt some of their training philosophies.

I also wanted to create a club where adults could do judo. Most of the clubs in Malaysia cater to kids and young teens. The focus is very stacked in favour of junior athletes. Adults find it challenging finding a place to train. I have a new student who told me she went to one local club where all the players were kids. I also have a black belt whose home club consisted of kids and just one other adult. So, there is a need for a club that university students and adults could train in. That's a huge challenge on its own -- university students have got assignments, exams, active social lives and a tight budget to contend with and working adults have got 9-to-5 jobs and families to take care of. That doesn't leave much time for judo. But I do believe there's a market for it.

KL Judo 2.0
In order to bring my ideas to fruition I needed to partner with an organization that believed in my vision and would help me make it a reality. I was introduced to the good folks at Muayfit Damansara Perdana and after discussing with them, I felt they were the right people to go with. We negotiated a deal which made it practical and affordable for my members to train judo there and also gave them value added benefits like use of the training equipment (there's a gym on the ground floor).

We've only been there for a few months and so far we are very happy with the partnership. Membership hasn't grown as much as we'd like but that is due to some of the limitations of the current set up, which is going to change (for the better) very soon.

KL Judo 3.0
Although I'm not at liberty yet to reveal the awesome details of what we have planned in the coming months, I can say I had an excellent discussion with the good folks at Muayfit on ways we can improve things for everybody -- for the gym owners, for our club as an organization and for our individual members. Hopefully, once we implement the new ideas and programs, we will see a spike in membership, which is necessary for the club to grow. Some things still need to be finalized but once done, I will detail all the wonderful new things that we will be introducing. Suffice to say for now that if we are able to get these ideas of the ground, we will be offering a very special proposition for judo enthusiasts in this country. It will be a very unique judo club, unlike anything you have ever seen. Stay tuned.