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2004 Judo Olympian Dr. Rhadi Ferguson and Navy SEALs Deliver Mental Toughness Training To College Athletes

Dr. Rhadi Ferguson – 2004 Olympian

Boca Raton, FL and Coronado, CA (PRWEB) February 21, 2011

As part of the Navy’s effort to attract top minority talent, all 13 members of the CIAA—the nation’s oldest black athletic conference, established in 1912—have agreed to participate in the “Mental Toughness, Never Quit” campaign.

The training will occur during on-campus “Mental Toughness” seminars this month and in March at each school, as well as follow-up “Mental Toughness” conditioning and team-building events at the Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base in Virginia Beach, Va. The base events will take place during spring football camp, a time in which the teams assess their talent and provide conditioning for the upcoming fall season.

The SEALs will provide players with a unique look into how mental preparedness is essential to winning.

One of the key facilitators of the program is 2004 Olympian and undefeated Strikeforce Mixed Martial Arts Fighter, and World Class Strength and Conditioning Coach, Rhadi Ferguson.

Dr. Ferguson has a compelling story and intriguing background which brings and interesting element to the Mental Toughness training seminar series. As a graduate from a Historically Black College (Howard University) and an exemplar in academia and sport, Dr. Rhadi Ferguson exemplifies what mental toughness is all about.

One of Dr. Ferguson’s Olympic Teammates is CIAA track and field coach and living legend, George Williams. When asked about the program Mr. Williams said, “I am excited that the Navy SEALs and the athletic directors of the CIAA have joined this mutually beneficial effort to share mental-toughness skills with the members of the CIAA,” George Williams, athletic director at St. Augustine’s College, a CIAA school, said. “From my 38 years of experience in the CIAA, and as the 2004 Head U.S. Olympic Track Coach, mental toughness is always key in developing success in athletics and life.”

And Dr. Ferguson couldn’t agree more. “As an Olympian, I recognize the need to push through tangible and intangible obstacles which life presents and which seem impossible to overcome. It is my desire and goal to provide a harmonious perspective to the student athletes as a graduate from a HBCU which will allow the message of Mental Toughness which the Navy Seals and I are delivering to have an even greater effect on the lives of the student athletes in the CIAA.”

The goal of the program—which includes goal-setting, visualization, positive self-talk and emotional regulation skills—is to provide valuable training to athletes while exposing them to potential career opportunities within the SEAL Teams.

“We need a strong force of mentally tough, culturally-diverse SEALs,” Cmdr. Brodes Hartley of the Navy SEALs said. “We need the broad spectrum of thought and perspective, and the cultural insights that come from that diversity, to keep us on the cutting edge as warriors.”

CIAA/Navy SEALs seminar schedule

Bowie State University 7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 22

Chowan University     6 p.m. Wednesday, March 23

Elizabeth City State University 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 9

Fayetteville State University TBA

Johnson C. Smith University     6 p.m. Monday, March 14

Lincoln University of Pennsylvania     TBA

Livingstone College     TBA

St. Augustine’s College 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 8

St. Paul’s College     7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 17

Shaw University TBA

Virginia State University     7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 15

Virginia Union 7 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 16

Winston-Salem State University 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 16

Contact:

Dr. Rhadi Ferguson

info(at)rhadi(dot)com

(561)-929-8302

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, Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.
Vocus, PRWeb, and Publicity Wire are trademarks or registered trademarks of Vocus, Inc. or Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.

Back in the 80s I entered a judo dojo for the first time willing to learn as much as I could on judo and its techniques. I was a semi-professional soccer player and was used to kick the ball on both sides. Even though I was and am left handed my best kicks were on the right. Therefore I already had a strong inclination to that side. When I started my judo training, as happens in most dojos around the world, I was taught all techniques on the right and nobody even dared to tell me, that it was possible to practice them also on the other side 

I first found out about the opportunity to go for my judo techniques also to the left when I entered my first competition after two years of hard training. Under the stress situation represented by the fight and the opponent I was going to face I automatically stood in a left guard position and without even knowing what I did I went for a natural counter-attack in tani o toshi to the left. I was quite puzzled I had won my first fight with a technique I had never performed and on the side I had never practiced before.

I had to think it over and over: what had happened? I asked my fellows on the judo technique I had performed, they all said: “Great tani otoshi to the left!”. Interesting first of all I did not know what technique tani otoshi was, second I had never performed a technique on the left! The matter needed further attention and I decided to explore it by training everything I learned on both sides. I was a natural left handed fighter with no technical knowledge nor skills on that side.

At the beginning I was quite mad, that nobody had taught me anything on my favourite side. But after many years thinking back about this experience I must say I was very lucky: when I entered the dojo the first time I had no idea nor any clue about judo and its techniques, so I learned everything from scratch on my wrong side, which means that today I can perform everything on both sides and from a technical point of view I am even better on some techniques on the right. Nevertheless I am still a nasty left handed fighter! 

The  important thing I learned was to always try whatever I was taught on both sides. But overall it helped me to shape my body evenly and gave me a strong feeling of balance. Even in real life, off the mat I started to do things with either side, things that as a left handed person I would have never done with my right.

If you want to balance your body, however hard it will be, you should always perform your judo techniques on both sides. If you want to learn more about judo and shaping your body you should visit judo techniques

Applying Law of Gravity to Judo

(PRWEB) July 1, 2005

In judo it is important to throw your opponent by making use of his loss of balance, the law at work here is the law of gravity. We know that Sir Isaac Newton discovered the law of gravitation by seeing an apple fall from a tree. All bodies in the universe attract one another. For instance, the earth attracts the bodies near and around it. In turn they also pull the earth.

Since the power of attraction, according to Newton, is proportional to the mass of the body that attracts, the larger the mass of the body, the larger its attraction. All bodies near the earth fall to the earth because it has an immense mass. An airplane or a bird starts to fall to the ground as soon as its power of flight is exhausted. The force of attraction between the earth and a two-pound weight is twice that between the earth and a one-pound weight.

The attraction between the earth and a body is called gravity. When gravity is represented by weight units, it is called weight. Now let us consider the application of the law of gravity to judo. The heavier the opponent, the more difficult it is for you to move him horizontally. It is even more difficult for you to move him vertically. On the other hand, a larger gravity acts on him to make him fall.

In judo gravity may be represented as a force pulling the opponent downward. If you want to make him fall, you make him lose his balance;that is, you cause his center of gravity to go outside the base. Then the gravity that acts on him works for you to make him lean or fall. Let us study the action of the law of gravity by illustrations.

Lets assume that you and your opponent are standing face to face. When your opponent advances towards you to take hold of you by the left lapel. At the same time you withdraw as much as your oponent advances. If your oponent is mentally or physically unable to let his advanced foot advance again, he will lean forward, lose his balance, and fall.

Also, it is obvious that the same thing will happen when the stability of the legs supporting the trunk is taken away. When your opponent takes a larger step forward than usual, you merely sweep his advanced foot away in the direction of his advance,(de-ashi-harai, or advanced foot sweep). By doing this, you will drop him with the gravity acting on him directly.

Finally let us consider a case in which the opponent is downed by the nullification of his resistance to gravity. It may be difficult for you, because of the weight advantage of your opponent, to lift him with your arms. But it is easy to support him at the center of gravity with your loins as he leans forward. Look at the seesaw in the above figure.

A long board is supported at the center of gravity, so that the gravity on one side is equal to that on the other. Thus a slight force can rotate the board around the fulcrum. After making your opponent lean forward, support him at the center of gravity with your loins. No matter how much weight he may have, a slight pull can rotate him around your loins. To support your opponent completely at the center of gravity with your loins is the key point of such hip throws as o-goshi, o-tsuri-goshi, ko-tsuri-goshi, hane-goshi, etc.

Visit http://www.realniches.com/archives/category/judo/page/4/ to know more about Judo techniques.

Visit http://www.realniches.com/archives/2005/06/most-important-techniques-in-judo.html to learn the most important techniques in Judo.

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©Copyright 1997-

, Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.
Vocus, PRWeb, and Publicity Wire are trademarks or registered trademarks of Vocus, Inc. or Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.

Developed in Japan by Jigoro Kano in 1882, Judo was originally designed to help physically weak people overcome those who were much stronger. From this noble and obscure beginning a great sport was born. Now a modern, progressive Olympic sport, Judo has evolved considerably from its roots in the Tokyo Kodokan.

First seen as a demonstration at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1932, Judo did not become an official Olympic sport until the men’s category was introduced by the Japanese at the Tokyo games in 1964, with Anton Geesink of the Netherlands winning the gold medal in the men’s open weight event. The women’s and Paralympic categories were introduced for the Seoul Games in 1988.

In keeping with other martial arts, Judo is sub-divided into weight classes as well as being differentiated by gender and grade. Each gender is divided into seven weight categories, with men’s weight categories starting at under 60 kg then 60 – 66, 66 – 73, 73 – 81, 81 – 90, 90 – 100 and over 100 kg. Women’s weight categories are under 48 kg, 48 – 52, 52 – 57, 57 – 63, 63 – 70, 70 – 78 and over 78 kg.

The grading system in Judo also competitors to be more equally matched at events. The Judo grading system incorporates nine different colour belts, starting at white, then red, yellow, orange, green, blue, brown, black and red/white striped. The red/white striped belt denotes a grade of sixth Dan or higher. Competitive Judo is broken into two categories, blue belt lower and brown belt or higher. It is rare for competitive events not to be organised this way. To attain Dan grade in Judo, judoka must be at least 15 years old. To progress to a second Dan grade judoka must be minimum age of 20 years old.

When competing, there are up to five ways that an individual match can be won. These include throwing your opponent and landing them flat on their back, forcing your opponent to submit with either a choke, strangle or arm-lock, holding your opponent flat on their back for 25 seconds, referees decision and by points. To win by referee’s decision, the match needs to have finished with both judoka level on scores after five minutes and an additional three minutes of golden score. Golden score is the scenario whereby the first scoring technique wins. The scoring techniques are known as ippon or full score (throwing to flat on back, hold-down or submission), waza-ari or half score (landing your opponent on their shoulder/side of body or holding down for 20 seconds) and yuko (hold-down for 15 seconds or throwing onto the side of the leg).

In Judo competitions two bronze medals are awarded alongside the silver and gold medals. When a judoka loses the semi-final of an event he/she must fight what is known as a repecharge bout against the finalist’s defeated opponent from the quarter final. The winner of this match is awarded a bronze medal. Currently, Judo is the only Olympic sport to offer two bronze medals.

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Judo, just as its name implies, namely means “tender means “. The Judo partially originates from one kind of ancient times Japan warrior spatial hand fight technology: Jujitsu. The Judo through throws down the match in the place wins the competition, it is the Olympic Games competes the only permission use to suffocate or to turn escapes method and so on joint comes the uniform match the project. The Judo is one kind of antagonism very strong athletics movement, and it emphasized contestant adept degree which grasps to the skill, but non- strength contrast.

The Judo became the Olympic Games event in at 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games. At that time Japan was allowed to additionally build a event as the Olympic Games host country, thereupon Japan has chosen the Judo. The Tokyo Olympic Games only supposed 4 ranks the competitions, the Japanese contestant have won three gold medals.

The Judo competition requests the contestant to the match four limbs, the neck to make “locks in the arm”, “clutches the neck” and so on the movement, throws the match but actually or the suppression in the place, admits defeat until the match or clearly throws the match pours in the place, only then gains the victory.

Male, the female Judo separately the 18th session of Olympic Games and in 1992 at the 25th session of Olympic Games is listed as the event in 1964. At the Olympic Games, the male contestant scores points and wins the competition the time is five minutes, the female is four minutes. If both sides have not scored points, then victor will be defined by three referees according to majority vote. Each weight rank project all is equipped with a gold medal, together silver medal and two bronze medals. At the Sydney Olympic Games, some 400 contestants attend the Judo competition; they no longer will wear the white tradition clothing, but will wear white clothing, blue color clothing. Each rank contestant first will divide to two groups carries on the single elimination series, then group first two will enter the semi-final, the victor capture the champion. Perhaps the athlete is for emphasize the Judo movement is the movement which any stature people all can participate, at the Sydney Olympic Games the most noticeable two Judo contestant stature phase difference is indeed disparate.

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