Ukemi means “The art of falling” or “Practicing receiving technique.”

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When we have new students we always start by teaching rolls and I thought it would be good for us to try and think about our own ukemi and how we started out and what helped us along the way.

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This might give new students things to consider when they are trying to figure out things like rolls and break-falls.

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When I started I was noisy, I hit the ground hard consistently and even though it really didn’t bother me I still knew I needed work.  I think I had an easier time than most because of all the football/wrestling I had done. Falling didn’t bother me.

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One thing I began as a personal challenge was to roll as quietly as I could. It helped me smooth out bumps and areas of my rolls that were taking too much of the fall.  I know some people slap the mat with their arm when they role and this is fine, but I never have because I got in the habit of listening to how much noise I made and using that to try and smooth out as much of my own ukemi as possible.

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Once I even realized I was developing a habit of using my free arm to grab loose areas of my gi to prevent them from making noise as they brushed on the mat.  This got me in trouble when I started training with Bill Perkins Sensei (In Lawrence, Ks). He never gave you any warning as to when you needed to break-fall and once while in an unannounced break-fall I slammed my elbow on the ground because I was grabbing my gi with my free hand.

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So, what I’m saying is that even if rolling is easy for you, you can still probably benefit from some improvement. You can always pay more attention to the way you fall and roll. Maybe you can relax more to make it more effortless, maybe you can get in the habit of breathing out when you roll or maybe you can try to roll quietly; just don’t overdo it and slam your elbow into the mat on accident!