JudoNotes

Mike "Scientist" Heller took these great photos the other night. I wish I could have been there!

Everyone from Oishi Judo passed their promotion tests yesterday:

• Arthur Zolotarevsky made shodan, with Will Heinrich as his uke.
• Milton Chacon made shodan, with Jeff Summa as his uke.
• Dan Withers made shodan, with Mike Pollice as his uke.
• Sensei Dave Williams made sandan, with Jeff as his uke.

Matt Crane was on hand as an alternate uke and Paul Virtue provided moral support.

Congratulations to all! Group photos and two video clips below.

It was great to see Germain as a shodan.

Sensei drew these feet on the bottom of a mat for the kids to practice footwork with.

On a vaguely related note, I've added photos of Sensei's artwork to the dojo web site. See the links on the left-hand side.

Thanks to Paul Virtue for iPhoning me these photos of Kevin passing the kata portion of his shodan test, with Shintaro Higashi as his uke. Congratulations, Kevin!

Belated congratulations to Alberto Botero on his promotion to yellow belt. I meant to post this on October 25, when this photo was taken.

Yotam has updated this series of photos from his stay in Japan.

He's also posted photos from this month's shiai at the Kodokan, including Thomi's win by osaekomi. Click the photo below to see that series. It must be quite a thrill to compete in that great hall.

[Click the photo to see the entire series.]

Here are Paul and Jeff a few minutes after Sensei gave Paul his black belt.

[Click the photo to go to the Flickr page]

Hearty congratulations to Reuben and Abigale, whose first child arrived on Tuesday, May 27 at 10:01 AM. Reuben writes:

Her name is Lucy Knapp Govender and she arrived very happily weighing in at solid 6 pounds 15 ounces (not sure if there is a Judo weight category for her !!!) and she measured 21 inches long which I am reliably informed is "tall" for a newborn. In any case, I promised Sensei and Barbara that I would bring pictures but it seems I will most likely not be at the dojo for a while until my wife and I get into some sort of non-sleep-deprived schedule.

Click below to see what a beauty she is: