I might update this post as I find better ways to present the information or discover new things. Last Updated January 4th 2025
I have abandoned the traditional way of teaching ukemi for around two years now. I have been having day 1 beginners joining the rest of class and doing constrained randori in most classes immediately. Many have messaged me to ask how I did it. This series is at least a year late due to my inability to decide on how to explain it and scrapping the last 3 drafts and videos I made in the past and starting from scratch.
The first part of this series will explain the anatomy of a fall and why ukemi makes falling suck less. Understanding these mechanics can help coaches design practices and adjust the risk tolerance for their students. The key point to making a new student learn and retain ukemi skills faster is to make the drills representational safely by scaling fear and the sense of loss of control. Solo ukemi drills almost never meet these criteria and decouples the falling from the fear and sense of loss of control. In my opinion, other proponents of this method of learning focuses on jumping directly to how representational the falls are to actual judo throws and not focusing on coupling it with the fear and loss of control.
The text part of this post below is meant to be notes that complement the video and is not meant to be used by itself.