There’s a photo from the night I passed the final stage of my British Judo Association 1st Dan grading. I’m standing on the mat at Ford Judo Club in East London and I am the first person 6th Dan Jon Debono has graded under the new IJF standard. I am wearing a new black belt picked up at the Kodokan in Tokyo when I made my “pilgrimage” last year. I’m 51 years old. I’m grinning like an idiot.
Looking back on that photo and some of the other marks of my occasionally bumpy journey have made me smile more than I entirely like to admit.
I run Kinetic Zen. I’ve held a, hard earned, Krav Maga black belt (from legendary instructor Alan Predolin) for years and I’ve been teaching self-defence to adults and kids in Islington for over a decade. I’m a credentialled, experienced martial artist. But proper judo, the kind that gets tested, had always felt like unfinished business.
I’d trained on and off for years. A knee injury in my early twenties playing ice hockey put my Judo on hold for a few years. I earned a blue belt a couple of times through various organisations. I understood the principles and have long loved the systematic way judo is organised and taught. But I’d never earned my Dan grade. The BJA Competitive 1st Dan is not a ceremonial grade; there’s no “years of service” pathway. It requires a strong understanding of the 15 throws in the nage no kata (performed left and right handed) and the underlying lessons in each technique and sequence. You have to earn your points in competition against Judoka of the same rank who want their Dan grades too! And finally the new technical exam requires you to demonstrate your proficiency in a large variety of throws, groundwork, counters and transitions.
I kept finding reasons not to do it.
The honest truth is that most of those reasons were disguised versions of one reason: I was afraid of finding out i was too old and broken to perform at the level i needed to really excel.
I’m telling you this because I suspect some of you reading this have a version of the same thought. Maybe about judo. Maybe about BJJ. Maybe about walking through our door for the first time in your forties, fifties or sixties and being the least experienced person in the room.
That feeling is real. It’s also not a reason to stop.
A few years ago a good friend and one of my favourite people to share a BJJ mat with offered to mentor me through the process of focusing on the final road to judo black belt. Daniele Teti, one of the UK’s leading kata performers, who competes nationally and trains with some of Europe’s best clubs offered his time and support. It was the last push I needed to really knuckle down and focus. Daniele is patient, methodical, and completely uninterested in ego. He is also, at 60-plus, still actively competing and still learning. Watching someone of his technical level treat every session as an opportunity to get better was its own kind of education.
He organised the grading. He came as my uke, the partner who receives the throws. On the night, at Ford Judo Club, in front of a panel of examiners, we performed together.
I got a 10 for soto makikomi which had been the throw to almost derail my blue belt. I got a 7 for sankaku jime, which I like to think was a philosophical disagreement between judo and BJJ (Yes I know I need to work on my humbleness and growth mindset). There were two moments where I confused techniques under pressure and the examiners gave me the opportunity to point it out myself and correct them. They were generous. The club had a warmth and a respect for people’s judo journeys that I’ll remember.
I walked out with my black belt.
The Kodokan belt was Daniele’s advice, by the way. He told me to order one. I didn’t fully understand why until I was standing there holding it. There are things that mark a real moment in your life, and it turns out a belt from the place where Jigoro Kano invented the art is one of them.
I don’t tell this story because I want you to be impressed. Most people reading this will have done things that are far more difficult than passing a judo grading.
I tell it because I spent years thinking I’d probably left it a bit late, and I hadn’t. Because the people who helped me: Daniele, Sensei Richard, my pal Kenton, the coaches at Ford, the examiner who let me correct my tai otoshi, were unfailingly kind and took my journey seriously even though I was not a young competitor.
And I tell it because this is exactly the school I believe we continue to build at Kinetic Zen
Not a school for people who already know they belong in a martial arts gym. A school for people who are still deciding whether they do. A school where a 51-year-old Krav Maga instructor can start over as a judo white belt and work through it, honestly, without pretending it was easy.
Abbie O’Toole, our lead BJJ coach, currently competing at the IBJJF World Championship in Los Angeles, comes from the same tradition. She is world-class, and she is also one of the most patient, ego-free coaches I have ever seen with a complete beginner. The culture is the same across everything we do.
If you’ve been thinking about it, come in. Your timing is good enough.
Adult BJJ classes run Monday, Wednesday and Saturday at Norman Street, EC1V. Kids classes from age 5+. Free trial available at kineticbjj.co.uk
Interested in judo? We run regular guest workshops and are building our judo programme: drop us a line on WhatsApp.