Judo Club Challenge, Concord, ON

Judo is different from other martial arts: it is relatively modern (it has been first introduced in 1882) and is an intellectual child of only one man, Jigoro Kano.



He extensively studied jujitsu under several masters and recognized that with techniques aimed at injuring, disabling or even killing your opponent it cannot be a competitive sport. Jigoro Kano then decided to review the techniques. He removed all the dangerous techniques, added some of his own, revised the rules and came up with a new discipline, which he called Judo (“the gentle way”). Now Judo is an Olympic sport practiced by millions of people around the world.



The first dojo, called the Kodokan, was situated in an old temple and had only 12 mats. Today, the Kodokan has over 500 mats and over a million visitors each ear.