Kaze Uta Budo Kai Forum Archive

Anybody that talks with me about exercise knows that I like taking several breaks during the day to walk 7 to 12 flights of stairs. I think it is a great exercise for judo for a lot of obvious reasons, such as leg/hip/core strength, cardiorespiratory fitness, and flexibility (from moving several times a day rather than sitting at a desk).

The one thing I didn't like about this exercise is that half of the time spent feels wasted when walking DOWN the stairs. That was until a few weeks ago when I came up with a new twist: walk down the stairs with my eyes closed.

Note that it is cheating to use the hand rails (or your hands at all).

Actually, I didn't start all at once. At first, I would take the last 4 to 5 steps of each flight with my eyes closed. After a few days I started doing a whole flight at a time, but I would count the steps. Then I started doing it without counting steps. Now I am doing several flights at a time with my eyes closed without counting steps. Several flights at a time is really hard because you cannot line yourself up straight at the beginning, and it is funny because each step feels more perilous... but hey, blind people do this all of the time, right?

Anyway.. I do not know for sure if this helps my randori, but I am definitely getting better at walking down stairs with my eyes closed. It seems like this skill should benefit judo.

Hah, my balance is so bad that if I started walking down stairs with my eyes closed and no hand rails, they'd find me unconscious at the bottom after a nasty spill. 😀

Walking down stairs, especially slowly, does exercise a completely different set of muscles and ligaments. My wife sometimes goies downstairs backwards because she has bad knees.

you can buy those wobbly air filled pancakes which will certainly help you build your balance but if you have a 2X4 you can also use some duck tape and fixate either a rounded object to one side and then try standing on it with both your feet.I do this while in front of the heavy bag and do boxing,or kicking and for judo I also use a belt to pull on and grasp to move the bag around while maintaining my balance...for Aikido I push the bag and let it come to me and I will do shomenate or simply wedge the bag away from me...