Judo is a Japanese
martial art and
combat sport founded by
Jigoro Kano (1860 – 1938) in 1882. It was introduced to Canada by Japanese
migrants in the early twentieth century, first in
British Columbia and then in the
Prairies,
Ontario, and
Quebec as
Japanese Canadians who had been
expelled from the Pacific coast during the Second World War
resettled in other provinces. The pattern is different in
Atlantic Canada and
Northern Canada, where judo was typically introduced 5–10 years later and migrants from
Europe played a more significant role.
Beginnings in British Columbia Before
World War II (1939 – 1945) most people from Japan or of Japanese
ancestry in Canada (23,149 according to the 1941
census) lived in British Columbia. About a quarter of that population lived in
Vancouver, and the majority of the Vancouver residents lived in the neighbourhood known as '
Japantown' or 'Little Tokyo', which was made up of about six blocks centred on Powell Street and bordered by Alexander, Jackson, Cordova, and Main. It was a distinct Japanese area with its own stores, banks, and theatres until all people of Japanese ancestry living within 100 miles (161 km) of the Pacific coast were expelled, their property was confiscated, and the majority were
interned in 1942 (see '
World War II and Japanese internment' below). The area is now part of the
Downtown Eastside. There were several public '
jujutsu' exhibitions and matches in
Vancouver beginning in 1906, which may have included or actually been judo since it was often referred to as 'Kano jujutsu' at the time. Judo may also have been practised privately in Vancouver as early as 1910, and Sataro Fujita reportedly taught judo in the city around 1914.
Shinzo Takagaki, a
Kodokan yondan (fourth
dan) who promoted judo in many countries, reportedly moved to the United States with the intent of becoming a professional
wrestler. He was admitted to Canada to study at the
University of British Columbia in 1924, but never attended classes and instead competed in wrestling matches, taught judo, and also issued the first
shodan (first
dan) certificate in Canada to Kametaro Akiyama in 1925. Fujita and Takagaki did not settle in Canada, however, and neither established a long-term school.
Tai Iku Dojo Shigetaka "Steve" Sasaki emigrated from Japan to Vancouver in 1922 at the age of 19 and worked as a
shop assistant to study business. In 1923 he began attending local judo-versus-wrestling matches and was extremely disappointed to discover that they were fixed and badly misrepresented judo (it is unclear whether Takagaki was involved in any of the matches in question). Sasaki was
nidan (second
dan) and had been a judo instructor at
Yonago High School in Japan, so he held a meeting with Vancouver's Japanese community to gauge their interest in establishing a non-profit
dojo that adhered to judo's two fundamental principles: ''seiryoku zen'yō'' (精力善用, 'maximum efficiency, minimum effort' in
Japanese) and
jita kyōei (自他共栄, 'mutual welfare and benefit'). After a year of planning, meetings, and fundraising, Sasaki opened Tai Iku Dojo (体育道場, 'physical education training hall') in 1924. It was difficult to secure an appropriate location and the first practices were held in the living room of Kanzo Ui, one of the dojo's sponsors, at 500 Alexander Street in Vancouver. A few months later it was relocated to a larger location in the 500 block of Powell Street (the dojo appears to have had more than one address on Powell Street over the years, and was recorded as 403 Powell in 1932). Over the next several years new branches of Tai Iku Dojo were established in
Steveston (where Tomoaki Doi and Takeshi Yamamoto had already started a club but asked for Sasaki's help),
Kitsilano,
Fairview,
Haney,
Mission,
Woodfibre,
Chemainus,
Victoria,
Duncan,
Whonnock,
Hammond, and
Vernon. Sasaki or his assistants helped with the instruction at all of the clubs.
RCMP training For nearly a decade all of the judoka at Tai Iku Dojo's various branches were
ethnically Japanese. In 1932, however, the commissioner of the Vancouver
Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) detachment attended a judo tournament and was so impressed that he replaced his officer's
boxing and wrestling training with judo. Sasaki saw this as an important opportunity to promote judo throughout Canada and taught the initial cohort of eleven RCMP officers personally at the detachment gymnasium at 33rd Avenue & Heather Street, on the site now known as the Heather Street Lands. This helped generate more interest in judo, and people from outside the Japanese-Canadian community began participating in tournaments in 1933. In 1936 all eleven officers in the first cohort were promoted to
shodan, and in 1937 a six-man team of RCMP judoka placed second in a tournament. RCMP judo training ceased in 1941 after Japan entered the Second World War (see '
World War II and Japanese internment' below).
Jigoro Kano's visits to Canada , Alberta on their way to the
Berlin Olympics in 1936
Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo who was also an accomplished professional
educator and a member of Japan's
House of Peers, visited Canada three times. During the first visit in 1932, when Kano was on his way back to Japan from the
1932 Summer Olympics in
Los Angeles, he honoured Tai Iku Dojo by renaming it Kidokan (気道館, 'place of
intrinsic energy' in Japanese), and all other dojos in British Columbia became branches of Kidokan. The second visit was in 1936, during which he asked Sasaki to accompany him to
Berlin to make a presentation to the
International Olympic Committee (IOC) and participate in a subsequent judo demonstration tour in Germany, France, England, the United States, and Canada (Sasaki had to return to Vancouver after a month in Berlin to attend to his business and judo obligations). Kano's last visit to Canada was in 1938, on his way home from meetings with the IOC in
Cairo. He died of
pneumonia later that year on the
Hikawa Maru, mid-voyage from Vancouver to
Yokohama.
World War II and Japanese internment Japan's
attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 began the war between the
Japanese Empire and the
Allies, including Canada. This sparked fears of a Japanese invasion on the Pacific coast in a context of already long-standing anti-Asian
racism (Japantown was targeted during the
1907 anti-Asian riots in Vancouver, and most Japanese Canadians did not have the
right to vote until 1949, for example). On 25 February 1942 the
federal government invoked the
War Measures Act to order the removal of all Japanese Canadians residing within 100 miles (160 km) of the
Pacific coast, even though about 77% of them were
British subjects (
Canadian citizenship was not instituted until 1946) and 61% were Canada-born
nisei. 21,000 Japanese Canadians (over 90% of the Japanese-Canadian population) were
expelled from their homes, and their
property and personal possessions were confiscated by the
Custodian of Enemy Property. 700 men labelled as 'troublemakers' were sent to
Prisoner of War Camp 101 in Angler, Ontario near
Neys Provincial Park, 2,150 single men were sent to road labour camps, 3,500 people signed contracts to work on
sugar beet farms outside British Columbia to avoid internment, and 3,000 were permitted to settle away from the coast at their own expense. The remaining 12,000 were relocated to government internment camps in the
BC interior or elsewhere in Canada. When the war ended in 1945 the government gave interned Japanese Canadians two options:
resettlement outside of the 'Japanese exclusion zone' (within 100 miles of the
Pacific coast) or 'voluntary
repatriation' to Japan (despite the fact that most Japanese Canadians had been born in Canada). The majority agreed to move elsewhere in Canada, but approximately 10,000 refused to move and the government issued an order to
deport them. 4,000 people were deported to Japan before the policy was abandoned due to public opposition. Japanese Canadians were prevented from returning to the exclusion zone until 1949. By then most of them had established themselves in other places, and there was nothing to go back to anyway because the Custodian of Enemy Property had sold all of their property and belongings. In 1988, after more than 40 years of lobbying by activists, the Canadian government issued a
formal apology to Japanese Canadians for their internment and partially compensated those who were still alive for their confiscated property.
Spread to other parts of Canada Japanese Canadian expulsion and internment was pivotal in the development of Canadian judo because it forced judoka to settle in other parts of the country. About a third returned to the Pacific coast after 1949, but most found new homes in other provinces, and by 1951 39.6% lived in
Ontario, 33.1% in
British Columbia, 21.8% in the
Prairies, 5.2% in
Quebec, 0.2% in
Northern Canada, and 0.1% in
Atlantic Canada. Dojos opened in the Prairies, Ontario, and Quebec in the mid-to-late 1940s and in British Columbia in the early-to-mid 1950s, and the centre of Canadian judo shifted from
Vancouver to
Toronto, where a significant number of judoka had settled after the war. The pattern is different in Atlantic Canada and Northern Canada where there were very few Japanese Canadians, judo was typically introduced 5–10 years later, and migrants from
Europe played a more significant role. Many early dojos were housed at the local branch of the
YMCA, which also provided short-term accommodation, assisted with finding employment, and coordinated social programs for resettled Japanese Canadians. Clubs at
military bases,
RCMP barracks, and
universities were also common.
Alberta Alberta's first judo club was founded in 1943 in
Raymond, Alberta by
Yoshio Katsuta and
Yoshio Senda, both of whom moved from BC to Alberta to avoid being interned. Katsuta was born in Japan and had received his
yondan (fourth
dan) from the
Kodokan before immigrating to
Ocean Falls in 1937, and Senda was born in
Mission and had earned his
shodan (first
dan) under Eichi "John" Hashizume and Yoshitaka Mori a few years before moving to Alberta. There were about 30 mostly Japanese Canadian students at the Raymond club, and practices were held in the reception room of the
Raymond Buddhist Church. A year later, Hashizume (Senda's instructor in Mission) and a Mr. Kuramoto opened a dojo in
Picture Butte. After the war, more than 300 displaced Japanese Canadians decided to stay in southern Alberta, and Senda established the Kyodokan Judo Club at the original
Lethbridge YMCA building at 4th Avenue and 10th Street South in 1952.
Manitoba Glen and George Pridmore, two brothers and police officers from the
St. James area of
Winnipeg, started a nominal judo club at the Central YMCA in 1937, but they reportedly taught a mix of
jujutsu and other
unarmed combat techniques and called it 'judo' because it was a popular term at the time. The club appears to have closed at some point and then reopened in 1947. Tomatsu "Tom" Mitani, who was born in Japan and moved from British Columbia to
Manitoba to avoid internment in 1942, visited the Pridmore's club in 1948 and assigned two of his
ikkyū (first
kyū / brown belt) students to assist them (it is unclear if Mitani had been teaching judo during the six years since he had arrived in Winnipeg, but the fact he had students suggests that he was). Glen Pridmore left Winnipeg in 1949, and by 1950 Mitani had taken over the YMCA club and established branches with the help of Ron Fulton, Jack Kelly, and Jimmy Iwabuchi at Carpiquet Barracks, the
RCAF base, and the
RCMP barracks on Portage Avenue. The branches lasted about a year, and in 1951 Mitani moved the YMCA club to the RCMP barracks. Bob Demby started another, short-lived judo club at the YMCA, which was followed by a self-defence class organised by Ron Fulton that slowly became a judo club over the years. In 1952 Mitani established The Manitoba Judo Institute with the help of Harold Shimane and Noboru Shimizu, on the seventh floor of the McIntyre Block on Main Street. There was a club at the RCAF base again as early as 1956, organized by
Flying Officer Vinsel and
Leading Aircraftman Delasalle, and supported by Mitani (it may have operated sporadically or had different incarnations, as a 1960 article reports that it was founded by
Masao Takahashi in 1958). The first club outside of Winnipeg was established at the
Brandon YMCA in 1953 by Harold Starn, a former British
special forces soldier who received his judo training from Japanese prisoners he guarded in
Burma during the war.
Ontario The first judo club in Ontario was established at Prisoner of War Camp 101 in Angler, following
Japanese internment in 1942. The Hatashita Judo Club had several locations after it was established, including the basement of a restaurant on Carleton Street and a storefront at 131 Queen Street East. Dojos were also established outside of Toronto, such as Masatoshi Umetsu's Seikeikan Judo Club in
Burlington, founded in 1946, and often in small towns such as
Dryden, where Hiroshi "Rush" Mitani opened a club in 1952.
Masao Takahashi, who had been a student of Kamino in Kitsilano and Katsuta in Raymond, organised a judo club at
RCAF Station Rockcliffe in 1950, and did the same at several other RCAF bases when he was restationed.
Quebec Hideo "Harold" Tokairin and Yutaka "Fred" Okimura moved from British Columbia to
Montreal after the war and started the YMCA Judo Club in 1946. Okimura also established the
McGill University Judo Club at the request of the Department of Athletics in 1950, making it the first organized university judo club in Canada. In 1952 Kametaro Akiyama, Okimura, and Tokairin opened the Seidokwan Academy of Judo on Rachel Street in a recreation centre un by the local
Catholic parish. It was the first long-term community dojo in Montreal, was sponsored by many of the city's Japanese Canadians, and provided most of the instructors for the McGill club. Seidokwan changed locations several times over the years, but did not close its doors permanently until 2019.
French judoka Marc Scala operated several dojos in Montreal in the early 1950s; the one located at 1423 Drummond Street went by the names "Canadian Academy of Judo" in 1953 and "North American Academy of Judo" in 1954, and was likely associated with the Downtown YMCA, which is directly adjacent to this address. Outside of Montreal,
Bernard Gauthier began teaching judo and jujitsu in
Gatineau and the surrounding area in the late 1940s, and established the Kano Judo Club in
Hull in or around 1947. He also taught judo across the
river in
Ottawa, Ontario at the YMCA, the
University of Ottawa, and
Carleton University. At the Club's request, Frank Hatashita sent Vern Fagan to Saint John to instruct for almost a month in March 1956, and its members began making trips to Toronto to learn more at Hatashita's dojo. The Club also received guest instruction from
Jon Bluming, a
Dutch martial artist who was teaching judo in
Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1958, and another dojo was established in
Fredericton by
RCMP Sergeant Melrose around the same time. In 1959 Schell, Harry Thomas, John Crawford, Ken Meating, and Doug Kearns left the YMCA Judo Club amicably to establish the Judo Shimpokai (named by
Gunji Koizumi in collaboration with
E.J. Harrison, the club's honorary president) at 15 Sydney Street, Saint John.
Yukon It is difficult to determine when judo was first introduced to
Yukon, but it was taught to members of the Forest Girl Guards and Junior Forest Wardens as part of their
physical education in 1950, and courses were offered at the Whitehorse Gymnasium in 1953. The first dedicated judo club was the Keno Hill Judo Club in
Elsa, founded in 1960 by Laurie Wayman, who had earned his
nidan (second
dan) at the
Budokwai in
London, England, and received financial support from the Budokwai to purchase mats. It is likely that Wayman was an employee of United Keno Hill Mines Ltd., given that many club members were employees and Wayman's successor as instructor, Fred Thode, was a Project Engineer for the company. The club had 100 members at its peak.
Return to British Columbia The Japanese-Canadian exclusion zone remained in effect until 1949 and judo did not return to the Pacific coast until two years later. Outside of the exclusion zone, the
Vernon Judo Club was established with a police permit in 1944 by Yoshitaka Mori, who had been Hashizume's assistant in Mission (in a 1986 recollection,
Shigetaka Sasaki wrote that in or around 1929 Mori went to Vernon as the head judo instructor for the Vernon Farmer's Association). This makes it the longest continuously operating judo club in Canada. Sasaki moved to
Ashcroft in 1946 and opened a dojo there in 1948. After moving three times in three years, a major fundraising campaign led to the construction of a community centre in Steveston that opened in 1957, where the dojo remained until moving to the new Steveston Martial Arts Centre in 1971.
Other provinces and territories The spread of judo to other Canadian provinces and territories is less well-documented. In
Saskatchewan, where Japanese Canadians introduced judo in the mid-to-late 1940s, it followed a similar pattern to Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec. The
Moose Jaw Judo Club was established around 1945 by Dave Pyle and Joe Guild, who had learned judo from two Japanese men interned at
RCAF Station Moose Jaw during the war. The first dojo in
Saskatoon was established at the YMCA by
RCMP officer Gene Traynor in 1953, in the original YMCA building at the corner of 20th Street & Spadina Crescent. The pattern was different in
Atlantic Canada and
Northern Canada, where migrants from
Europe played a more significant role. In
Nova Scotia, Dutch martial artist
Jon Bluming taught judo at the YMCA and
Dalhousie University in
Halifax for about a year before moving to Tokyo in 1959. Perry Teale opened a dojo at the
Stadacona naval base in 1960, after earning his black belt under Frank Hatashita during visits to Toronto. There were judo clubs at
RCAF Station Summerside and the University in
Prince Edward Island by the 1960s, but the dates of their establishment and people responsible are unclear.
Newfoundland and Labrador's fist dojo appears to be the
Memorial University Judo Club, founded by
Yves LeGal in 1968. In the
Northwest Territories (NWT) the first dojo appears to be the
Yellowknife Judo Club, founded by Kurt Roder in 1968. He was assisted and possibly succeeded by Louis Tetteroo, who coached teams at the 1972 and 1974
Arctic Winter Games. Judo
Nunavut is a program and club at
Aqsarniit Middle School in
Iqaluit that focuses on at-risk youth and was founded by
Mario Des Forges in 2001.
Overseas military bases There was at least one club at an overseas Canadian military base as early as the 1950s, the Kubokwai Judo Club at the
Royal Canadian Air Force base at Baden-Baden, Germany. Richard "Tug" Wilson was the instructor in the late 1950s (he returned to Canada and was a member of the
Winnipeg RCAF Judo Club by 1961), followed by
Masao Takahashi in the early 1960s.
Organization Before the war,
Shigetaka Sasaki's Tai Iku Dojo / Kidokan was the
de facto governing body of judo in Canada since nearly every dojo in the country was one of its branches. Circumstances were different after the war, and in 1946 Atsumu Kamino established the Canada Judo Yudanshakai (black belt association) in Toronto to help organize the administration of judo, including grading. Three years later, however,
Bernard Gauthier of
Hull, Quebec created the Canadian Judo Federation and had it
chartered as Canada's official judo organization, which was recognized by the
International Judo Federation (IJF) in 1952. Gauthier was not associated with the Japanese Canadians who had established judo in Canada or the
Kodokan, and had instead learned judo through a Mr. Shimizu from the
Japanese Embassy in Ottawa,
Mikinosuke Kawaishi's books, and lessons from Marc Scala, one of Kawaishi's students who had moved from
Paris to Montreal in 1950. There was some cooperation between the two organizations, but the Yudanshakai decided to reorganize in 1956 when Gauthier alone represented Canada at the first
World Judo Championships in Tokyo. The Canadian Kodokan Black Belt Association (CKBBA) was chartered in 1956, with Sasaki as its president; its name used '
Kodokan' instead of 'Judo' to differentiate it from Gauthier's organization and give it authority. In 1958, reportedly after the IJF was unable to contact Gauthier and the CKBBA provided last-minute representation at that year's World Judo Championships, the CKBBA was granted membership in the IJF and replaced the Canadian Judo Federation as the sole official governing body of judo in Canada. Nevertheless, when the
International Olympic Committee announced in 1960 that judo would be included in the
1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Gauthier lobbied the
Canadian Olympic Association (COA) to allow his organization to select the judoka who would represent Canada at the Games. The COA held a hearing to determine which organization should have jurisdiction, and decided in favour of the CKBBA because it had members across the country and Gauthier's Federation was essentially limited to
Quebec. The CKBBA has remained the
official governing body of judo in Canada since that decision, and legally adopted its long-standing common name
Judo Canada in 2011. Provincial associations were also established in every province by the end of the 1960s, in 1973 in the Northwest Territories, 1974 in Yukon, and 2001 in Nunavut, two years after it was separated from the NWT. The number or judo clubs in Canada increased significantly during the 1950s and 60s, especially in
Ontario and
Quebec in large part due to the efforts of
Frank Hatashita and
Raymond Damblant, who both played a role similar to
Shigetaka Sasaki in the pre-war period. Hatashita, who first learned judo in British Columbia and later trained with Sasaki and Kamino at Tashme internment camp, moved to Toronto and turned judo into his full-time business after the war, making him the first
professional judoka in Canada.
Nicknamed "Canada's Mr. Judo", he promoted judo outside of the Japanese Canadian community by putting on public demonstrations and clinics, writing articles for newspapers, publishing the monthly
Judo News Bulletin (which was renamed
Canadian Judo News, then
Judo World), and even appeared in a 1955 episode of the
CBC television show
Tabloid meant to introduce
Japanese culture to Canadians. Hatashita also played a major organizational role, sponsoring close to 100 judo clubs across Ontario, and serving as President of the CKBBA and Pan American Judo Union and Vice President of the International Judo Federation. Damblant was Hatashita's counterpart in Quebec. He moved from France to Montreal in 1959 to help promote judo in the province on behalf of the
French Judo Federation. Damblant began travelling around Quebec's regions to provide instruction and help organize local judo associations, and he consolidated the provincial administration of judo by reorganizing the Quebec Kodokan Judo Black Belt Association in 1966 and serving as its first President. When Damblant first arrived in Quebec there were only 10 dojos, and he is credited with spearheading the infrastructure that led to about 120 clubs and 10,000 judoka in Quebec today. While participation in competition was delayed, women had been able to practice judo in Canada since Sasaki opened Tai Iku Dojo in 1924, though it was uncommon before the war. A 1960 article in
Maclean's magazine titled "Judo Tightening Grip on Canada" reports that "scores" of women had taken up judo by that time.
1964 Olympics Jigoro Kano was the first
Asian member of the
International Olympic Committee (IOC). He had reservations about adding judo to the Olympics because of the Games' focus on
sport and encouragement of
nationalism, but he did not object to it and in 1937 the IOC decided that judo would be a
demonstration sport at the
1940 Olympics in Tokyo. Those Games were cancelled due to the war, however, and judo did not make its Olympic debut until 24 years later at the
1964 Olympics in Tokyo. This was the first time an Asian sport had been included in the Games and it generated significant interest in judo worldwide. Coupled with the Kodokan's long-term efforts to spread judo around the world, judo became the first Asian martial art to gain a worldwide following. Some countries put significant effort into readying their judo competitors for the 1964 Olympics, but Canada was not one of them. In fact, the
Canadian Olympic Association (CAO) did not plan to send any judoka to Japan until Frank Hatashita, who was President of the Canadian Kodokan Black Belt Association at the time, led a publicity campaign to add
Doug Rogers to the Olympic team. Rogers won the silver medal in the heavyweight category: it made him famous in Japan, sparked "a boom in the sport in his native land", The
National Film Board of Canada even sent a crew to Japan to produce a short film titled
Judoka (1965), which
documents Rogers' post-Olympics life and intense training under the famous
Masahiko Kimura.
Organizational development In its early years the Canadian Kodokan Blackbelt Association (CKBBA) was entirely dependent on membership fees and donations. In the early 1960s, 80% of its funding was based on dues from 986 members: 309
yudansha (black belts), and 677
mudansha (non-black belts). Frank Hatashita became President of the CKBBA in 1961 and held the position until 1978, overseeing major organizational changes including recognition and funding from
Sport Canada, more domestic competitions and greater participation in international tournaments, and the establishment of a national office in
Vanier, Ontario with a paid professional staff.
International competition Since Doug Rogers' success at the 1964 Olympics, Canada has sent at least five and as many as fourteen judoka to every World Judo Championships and Summer Olympics, except for
1968 when judo was not included in the Olympics, and 1980 when Canada
boycotted the Moscow Olympics in protest of the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan (see '
List of Canadian judoka' for the names of everyone who has represented Canada at the World Judo Championships and the Olympics, and '
Competition' for medal results). Rogers won bronze at the
1965 World Judo Championships, and some of his Canadian contemporaries won medals at other international tournaments—especially the
Pan American Games—but no other Canadian made it to the
podium at the highest level again until
Kevin Doherty and
Phil Takahashi from
Ontario won bronze in their respective weight categories at the
1981 World Judo Championships, and
Mark Berger from
Manitoba won bronze at the
1984 Olympics.Canada's most competitively successful judoka is
Nicolas Gill, who won bronze at the
1992 Barcelona Olympics, silver at the
2000 Sydney Olympics, and bronze at three World Championships. Gill was coached by
Hiroshi Nakamura, whose Shidokan Judo Club in
Montreal served as the National Training Centre until 2014. Canada has also hosted a variety of major international judo tournaments, including the Pan American Games (
1967,
1999, and
2015), the Pan American Judo Championships (1992,
2007,
2012, and
2015), the 1996 World University Judo Championships, the 2000
Commonwealth Judo Championships, and the
2001 Jeux de la Francophonie. The two highest-level tournaments hosted in Canada are the
1976 Olympics in Montreal and the
1993 World Judo Championships in
Hamilton, Ontario. The Olympic judo tournament was held at the
Olympic Park Velodrome (now the
Biodome), which was considered a poor venue choice because the spectators were at least 60 metres (197 feet) away from the mats on the other side of the
cycling track.
Judo for people with disabilities Judo is also practiced by people with
disabilities, most commonly
visual impairment. While judo for the visually impaired is often referred to as 'blind judo', it includes athletes with three different
levels of visual impairment (ranging from blind to partially sighted), all of whom may compete against one another so long as they are in the same weight category. It became a
Paralympic sport in 1988 for men and 2004 for women, and the only differences from Olympic judo are that competitors take hold of their opponent before the start of the match and the mat has different textures to indicate zones and the competition area. Judo for the visually impaired has a long history in Canada. It is unclear when visually impaired judoka first began training in Canada, but
Bernard Gauthier established the
Ottawa YMCA Blind Men's Judo Club sometime in or before 1952, when he claimed that it was the only judo club for the blind in the world. Dedicated clubs are rare, however, and in most cases visually impaired and non-impaired judoka belong to the same clubs and practice together. People with other disabilities also practice judo, and
Judo Canada has established guidelines for including judoka who are
deaf, have
special needs, or have
intellectual disabilities. Sometimes this takes the form of dedicated clubs, such as the now-closed Jita Kyoei Judo Club at the Community Head Injury Resource Services in
Toronto, which catered to people with
Acquired brain injury. Canada was first represented in international competition for the visually impaired by brothers
Pier Morten and
Eddie Morten at the European Open Blind Judo Championships in 1987, and both brothers won bronze in their weight categories the following year at the
1988 Paralympics in Seoul. Pier, who is the first
deafblind person in the world to earn a
black belt in judo, also won bronze at the Paralympics in 1992 and 2000, making him Canada's most competitively successful disabled judoka (see '
List of Canadian judoka' for the names of everyone who has represented Canada at the Paralympics, and '
Competition' for medal results). Some disabled Canadian judoka compete in the non-disabled domestic and international circuits.
David Miller, for example, is legally blind in one eye and won the Canadian National Championships in the +95 kg category and represented Canada in the open weight category at the
World Judo Championships in 1995.
Present day Today there are about 400 judo clubs and approximately 25,000 judoka in Canada, and it is most popular in Quebec where there are around 120 clubs and 10,000 judoka. That popularity is partly driven by the success of
Nicolas Gill, who still receives attention in Canada's
French-language press more than 15 years after his retirement from competition, and
Antoine Valois-Fortier's bronze at the
2012 London Olympics, which began a new era in high-level Canadian judo. This has led to major changes. In 2014, Judo Canada moved its National Training Centre from Shidokan Judo Club to the Quebec National Institute of Sport at Montreal's
Olympic Stadium, where the national office was also moved after Gill became CEO of Judo Canada in 2016. The new training facilities have twice the mat space of the previous centre, a weight and conditioning room with new equipment, and sport science specialists on staff. Gill, who coached the national team from 2009 to 2016, said that "the equipment is of better quality and the space is much better. There's no possible comparison. In the current sports system, it's a step in the right direction. The athletes were visibly excited about their new training facilities". Two other Regional Training Centres have also been established at Kyodokan Judo Club in
Lethbridge, Alberta and the
Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre in
Scarborough, Ontario. While Valois-Fortier did not place again in the 2016 or the 2020 Olympics, he won silver at the
2014 World Judo Championships and bronze in
2015 and
2019, making him Canada's second-most competitively successful judoka at the highest levels after Gill. Other Canadians have also had recent success at the highest levels.
Christa Deguchi, who was born and resides in Japan but has Canadian citizenship
through her father, joined the Canadian team in 2017 and won bronze in
2018 and gold in
2019 at the World Judo Championships, making her the first Canadian World Champion.
Priscilla Gagné won bronze at the 2018 IBSA World Judo Championships and silver at the 2019
IBSA World Games, eight Canadians won medals at the Junior (under 21) or Cadet (under 18) World Judo Championships, and
Jessica Klimkait won gold at the 2021 World Judo Championships in the -57 kg category, the same as her domestic
rival Deguchi. At the
2020 Paralympics,
Priscilla Gagné became both the first Canadian woman to win a medal and the first Canadian to win silver in Paralympic judo. ==Ranking==