MASAHIKO KIMURA

The man who defeated Helio Gracie
By Jim Chen, M.D.

Masahiko Kimura (1917-1993), judo 7th dan obtained at age 29, is undoubtedly the greatest Judoka to ever live. He stood 5'6" (170 cm) tall and weighed 185 pounds (84kg). Kimura was born on September 10th 1917 in Kumamoto, Japan.

At age 16, after 6 years of judo, Kimura was promoted to 4th dan. Kimura became the All Japan Open Weight Judo Champion at age 20. He maintained this title for 13 years without suffering a single defeat during this period. He reportedly lost only 4 Judo matches in his lifetime. Kimura's remarkable success can in part be attributed to his fanatical training regimen. At the height of his career, this involved a thousand push-ups and nine hours' practice each day.

In 1951, Helio Gracie, Brazilian champion for 20 years challenge Kimura, to a judo/jiu-jitsu match. The loser was determined by tapping out due to a choke or armbar, or by being knocked out of commission. There were 20,000 spectators present. Presumably, Kimura was to be killed by Gracie. During the fight, Kimura threw Gracie repeatedly with ippon-seoinage (one arm shoulder throw), osotogari (major outer sweep), and haraigoshi (sweeping hip throw). Kimura reportedly threw Gracie repeatedly in an effort to knock him unconscious. However, the floor of the fighting area was apparently too soft to allow this to happen. Kimura also inflicted painful, suffocating grappling techniques on Gracie such as kuzure-kamishiho-gatame (modified upper four corner hold), kesa-gatame (scarf hold), and sankaku-gatame (triangle choke). Finally, thirteen minutes into the bout, Kimura positioned himself to apply a reverse ude-garami (arm entanglement, a shoulderlock). Gracie refused to submit, even after his arm broke, forcing Kimura to continue the lock on Gracie's broken arm. At this point, Carlos Gracie, Helio's older brother, threw in the towel to end the match to protect his brother's health. In 1994, Helio admitted in an interview that he had in fact been chocked unconscious earlier in the match, but had revived and continued fighting.

As a tribute to Kimura's victory, the reverse ude-garami technique has since been commonly referred to as the kimura lock, or simply the kimura, in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and, more recently, mixed martial arts circles. Kimura passed away on April 18, 1993 at the age of 75 from lung cancer.

source: judoinfo.com