The concept of a ‘Judo tree’ is easy to grasp. Your favourite or main technique, your ‘tokui-waza’, should be connected to all of your other techniques. Your tokui-waza forms the trunk of the tree, around which you build your branches. These branches are various other techniques that form combinations into and out of the main throw.

According to Kanamaru, the idea of ‘Judo trees’ can be traced right back to the early years of the sport when the techniques and skills were first being developed. The founder of Judo, Shihan Jigorō Kanō regularly held demonstrations to promote the art and its underlying principles.

Kano frequently used uki-goshi to illustrate the core principle 'Seiryoku Zen'yō', maximum efficiency, minimum effort. However, after being repeatedly thrown with the same technique, Kanos’ Ukes began to formulate an effective defence. Their reaction led Kano to devise a new technique in order to deal with this defence. This was a recurring situation, each time, Kano’s development of a new technique was guided by how his Ukes tried to avoid the last. This dynamic between Kano and his students, not only led to the formation of the first Judo tree but also created the foundations of the original syllabus of throws ‘The Gokyo’.

As Kano’s tokui-waza was uki-goshi, this technique forms the trunk of his tree. Translated as the ‘floating hip throw’, uki-goshi belongs to ‘Dai Ikkyo’ the first group of the Gokyo, and is also demonstrated in the nage-no-kata. Using the hip as a pivot over which to throw Uke, it is very similar in form to the major hip throw o-goshi, the difference is in the hip placement.

When performing uki-goshi, Tori’s hips only go halfway across those of Uke, so instead of being thrown completely over the top, Uke more or less slides off the hips as they are rotated. Viewed from straight ahead, we can fully appreciate the efficiency of this technique as opposed to o-goshi. The hip placement means very little lifting is required to execute an uki-goshi. As soon as Tori makes contact with their hip, Uke effectively ‘floats’ into the space and falls very quickly to the tatami as they are rotated.

To defend against this attack, Kano’s students began jumping around the technique, anticipating the entry of the throw and hopping around to avoid it. They would try to overtake the momentum and maintain their position in front of Kano. Although this fairly successfully avoided the throw, the jump meant they lost contact with the tatami, thus making them vulnerable. As a result, Kano developed harai-goshi.

This forms the first branch of Kanos’ tree and is a great example of renzoku-waza. These are combinations where the second technique continues in a similar direction to the first. As soon as he felt Uke start to jump, Kano simply lifted his leg, catching Uke on the rise, sweeping their legs whilst continuing to rotate in the same direction as the initial uki-goshi. This solution proved very successful.

That is until his students became familiar with harai-goshi and again devised a way to stop themselves from being thrown. This time, they defended against Kanos’ attack by dropping their weight backwards and adopting the defensive posture known as ‘Jigotai’. Notice how Uke’s belt level drops when the attack is launched. This signals the lowering of their hips, and therefore centre of gravity. They bend at the knees, keeping the back straight and head up. Uke also pulls Tori in close with their arms in an attempt to kill the forward momentum of the throw. However, Kano again found a way to counteract Uke’s reaction, momentarily coming back out, switching his lapel hand to a high grip, dropping his hips and immediately launching tsuri-komi-goshi, the drawing hip throw. This technique forms the second branch of Kano’s tree.

Once his Ukes’ had assumed a strong Jigotai position, it was imperative that Kano destroy their balance once again, in order to be able to throw them successfully. To do this, when he felt the Jigotai, he withdrew from the harai-goshi attack, switched his grip to better control Ukes head, and using speed and the element of surprise dropped his centre of mass right underneath Uke as he turned back in for the tsuri-komi-goshi.

Kanamaru says that in modern day Judo, although players have many more branches to their trees, they should ideally plan to grow their own tree in a balanced way, to produce strong branches in all directions
When you do randori, your opponent is always reacting, attempting to defend against your techniques, so you can make use of these reactions to connect with other techniques.

Can you apply the Judo Tree philosophy to your own Judo?

Check out the breakdown of Kanamaru’s own fascinating Judo Tree in his seoi-nage series.