Hello all,
SIGN UP SHEET WILL BE SENT AT 20:00 TODAY (SUNDAY 17TH)
By now you’ll be thinking “Wow that judo club that looked so cool is taking forever to get going. I was promised I’d be learning to fight in no time! What’s the deal?”
Well, the thing is, we ran into quite a few issues that wouldn’t have been entirely damning by themselves, but all decided to ambush at once. We’re now starting to move past them.
START DATE
We finally got approval from the Union to train. Unfortunately our coach has to leave the country this week so we’ll be missing another couple of sessions (we’ll try and make up for lost time later in the year) but we can still fit in our very first session this Monday 18th October.
CLOTHING
As you can tell, we’re getting off to a rough start this year. Besides the time issues, we also found recently that our stock of gis (that we lend to beginners before they make the decision to commit long term and buy their own gi) has been misplaced over lockdown. Oh well, they were due to be replaced anyway. We’re in the process of restocking, so until they’ve arrived we ask that you come to practice in a robust t-shirt and tracksuit bottoms, or whatever you’re comfortable wrestling and being thrown in (if in doubt, look up ‘no gi judo/jujitsu’). It won’t be proper judo, and sparring will be a bit limited, but you can still learn basic techniques and falls.
If you own a gi/uniform designed for judo, jujitsu, sambo, or any grappling based art, please do wear that. Gis/uniforms designed for karate, taekwondo, or any purely striking art will risk being torn when we do start training with grip.
ATTENDANCE/NUMBERS
We’ve learnt from past years that crowding on the mat can be a big issue. Therefore, we’re asking that people sign up to individual sessions until we have numbers manageable enough that you can just turn up on the day. For now, we’re limiting the numbers to 20 on the mat per session. We’ve had a lot of interest, so we ask that you don’t sign up for more than one session a week if you’re a beginner. That way more people can get a first taster session. Advanced people: there are fewer of you, so you can sign up for more than one. A couple of you offered your services as training assistants for beginners, but for now just train as regular, and leave all 20 spots in the beginner sessions for beginners.
We will be sending out the signup sheet by email at 20:00 today (Sunday 17th) for the two sessions tomorrow (Monday 18th). Each session will have a limited number of 20 each. Don’t worry if you don’t make it! You can join at any time. As explained below, one session will be for beginners, one will be for intermediate/advanced people.
NEW TIMETABLE
Our new timetable, which can also be seen on our instagram page @icjudo, consists of the following:
Beginner sessions
Mondays 20:00-21:00 Activity Space 2
Wednesdays 16:00-17:00 Activity Space 1
Intermediate/Advanced sessions
Mondays 21:00-22:00 Activity Space 2
Wednesdays 17:00-18:00 Activity Space 1
It is our hope that this way the sessions will be more suitable to your skill level, and we will get to train more people in a more focused manner. It is of course a matter of your own discretion which session you choose to attend.
Please arrive up to 10 minutes early to the session. The earlier we can set out mats and get changed, the more of the allotted hour can be used for judo. If you get lost or suddenly can’t come email us or send a dm to our instagram.
FEES
As a consequence of both how much interest we’ve received and how much training time we’ve lost, we’ve been forced to slightly adapt our membership system to stay afloat. We’re only offering one free taster session before you need to pay a £5 mat fee per session. We will still be lending gis for free (when we have them) until you decide to get your own along with a judo licence. We’re still working out the details of further membership, so please ignore that for now on the Union Activities website.
We again apologise for the delays and for anyone who turned up this past week expecting there to be a session only to find an empty hall. We also apologise as we’re still forced to miss a couple of sessions to come. Soon enough judo will be back to a regular, well-managed training schedule with an amazing coach and enthusiastic members.
Regards,
Nicolas