A place for working adults to train judo

Judo for everyone -- including adults!

In many places, not just in Malaysia, judo is a children's and youths' sport. I've often asked people why they think this is so and the most common reasons given are that adults don't have time for sports like judo and adults don't want to feel sore the next morning when they have to go to work.

All this may be true but there are adults who like to go play badminton. That takes up time too. As for soreness, once you are training regularly and your body is used to it, the soreness isn't that bad anymore.

I think the main reason is more mundane. It's a commercial issue. Judo just isn't a very popular sport, compared to something like badminton. From a purely commercial standpoint, it probably makes more sense to have a children's class.

Judo might not be a popular sport like football or badminton but many parents do have the impression that judo is a good sport for their kids to learn. As such, judo for kids is not a very hard sell, especially when compared to judo for adults.

That is probably the reason why so many clubs focus on children. But KL Judo started life as a judo club for working adults. We've since opened up a children's class, which is going well, but the majority of our members are still working adults.

This makes us unique as a judo club. If you're an adult and you want to play judo, you want to go to a place where there are lots of adults training in judo. There's no point in you going to a place full of kids and where there's only one or two other adults on the mat.

The other day I got a query from a prospective new member who says he wants to take up judo. He said he decided to approach our club because we specialize in judo for adults.

Conversations with people like him affirm that we have indeed carved a nice niche for ourselves. There may be only a small demand for judo for working adults but we cater well for that demand.