Benefits of judo for children & adolescents

Strength and Conditioning Journal
December 2011 (Vol. 33, pp 60-63)

Judo founder Jigoro Kano understood the potential physical and health benefits of judo and, therefore, worked to have it included as part of Japan's physical education system. Judo has recently become part of the national curriculum in Japan, as outlined by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sport, Science, and Technology.

In support, judo is a safe contact sport for children, and the scientific literature has demonstrated that the practice of judo can improve cognitive performance, enhance motor learning, and increase the sense of well-being and life satisfaction among youth participants. Furthermore, research has shown increased cardiovascular fitness, anaerobic capacity, flexibility, strength, power, and improved body composition with judo training.

Judo has been mentioned as one of the safest contact sports for children. Matsumoto and Konno reported a positive correlation between judo participation and both life satisfaction and quality of life in U.S. adolescent judo players. Furthermore, the well-being and life satisfaction scores from the young judo players in this study were higher than comparative non-judo participant norms.

Aerobic capacity in junior judo athletes has been shown to be greater than non-athletes, as well as soccer players and gymnasts. This adaptation may manifest itself in the previously described cardiac changes displayed by older judo athletes and would be of benefit during training and competition by maintenance of high-intensity activity, delayed fatigue, and enhanced recovery.

The rate of motor development in young judo players has shown to be steadier than healthy controls during the ages of 11–17 years and may be at its peak during the ages of 11 to 12 and 14 to 15 years. During this same timeframe, young judo athletes exhibit greater handgrip strength and pull-up performance than age-matched non-judo athletes. Jagiello et al hypothesized these differences, and the linear strength increases specific to the upper body are the result of the “directed loads applied in the process of the athletes' training.”

Participation in judo has also shown to be beneficial in an even younger population. Studies by Sekulic et al and Krstulovic et al showed that nine months of judo training in 7-year-old boys (B) and girls (G) improved shuttle run performance (B: 10%; G: 13%), sit-up endurance (B: 30%; G: 46%), sit and reach (flexibility) (B: 34%; G: 45%), and flexed arm hang (B: 72%; G: 76%) to a greater degree when compared with children engaged in recreational sporting games. Both conditions were shown to similarly augment coordination, shoulder flexibility, speed, and cardiovascular endurance.

In a follow-up publication, Krstulovic et al noted that 7-year-old male judo participants gained more weight, increased flexibility, and improved both sit-up and flexed arm hang performance more than soccer and track and field participants over the course of nine months of training. The authors determined that judo training improves specific indices of fitness in children.