Kosen Judo and the
'Old' Kodokan Judo

The Kosen Judo came on as around 1930^th Dr. Kano, who was the head of Japanese Olympic committee in addition of been the head of Kodokan and the first head of Japan baseball federation, started to promote Judo with an aim to inclusion into Summer Olympic program.

Dr. Kano saw sport Judo not only as means of preparation for bare-hand combat, but as a discipline study tasked with body and character building.

One of the principal virtues of sport is the fairness. The other is the popular appeal. When students of Kano brought his Judo to different corners of the World, they did it in their own version, based on their individual strong skills and preferences. The good examples are Vasili Oshchepkov in Russia and Mitsuyo Maeda in Brazil.

While working to unify Judo in the time of its diversification, Dr. Kano opted for a way of codifying techniques and restricting areas that wasn’t universally understood.

One of this restricted areas was ground fighting – newaza. For accidental public newaza is not appealing: it lacks the spectacular amusement of high amplitude throws and its subtle technical moves require personal experience to be understood or even noticed.

But for well versed judokas newaza is very appealing: proficiency in newaza secured tournaments success. So, Kano waved restrictions on newaza for established university Judo clubs and Kosen Judo has been started on its own path.

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