What to do if the shinpan get it wrong?
 

Your there to fight. Shimpan is there to judge. If the shimpan make a mistake the only person to tell them is the head shimpan (cant remember name) who sit outside shiajo.

But i think your shiai was not a very large or important one so maybe your opponent was truly helping, tho discouraged.

Don't worry about thing that are not in your control.

Sometimes bad decisions fall in your favor, sometimes they fall against you.

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If the shimpan are true to their Kendo they will do their best to learn from their mistakes.

My take is when I shimpan, I put myself in the competitors place. So in the case you presented, would you have rather won/lost to an in/correct point, or the scenario which played out.

So in short, in this case the decision was not in you control so don't worry about it, but if the future if you find yourself in a similar situation shimpaning, remember back to what you have experienced and use that as part of your decision process.

Being shinpan is hard - very hard.

no and no...

It happens....nothing you can do about it without making a scene.

It is possible to raise a question on suspicion of misapplication of rules.

On the other hand if you are complaining that your hit did not score then just walk it of - you can't do anything about it.

Ah, so the fukushin called a point for you but on the wrong target. It would be possible for your manager to raise a question and clarify the issue, but there would be no gain in it.

I think in honour of defeating this worthy opponent you should wear his bogu at future Taikai and Marry his Wife!!!


OK seriously...are you sure the Fukushin didn't just "muddle" what he had meant to say and had actually meant to award your men in the 1st place?...can you post the video?

spirit of what now???

To take this a step further...

You really shouldn't even be on here questioning calls by referees. I guess though that if you are, an internet forum is the best place. Never know though, those refs might be reading all this.

Trsut me, I've cried many bitter tears over losing matches without ever having been hit.

It all balances out.

I look at my medal collection and think that I would have twice as many if not for bad calls.

Then again, I'd have half as many had I not been given a bunch of bad calls going my way. I've won many matches on forearm Kote, Gogi gone bad inexperienced refs messing up... Did I feel bad about winning that way? Nope. It makes up for the last time I lost that way.

When I ref, the best thing I try to do is call points the way my Sensei taught me and to make sure that the better player on the court that day who scores the clean points wins. Have I ever messed up? Of course I have. Critically on a couple of occasions. However I have been the ref in the finals or semi-finals in any tournament I have gone to in the last decade or so due to my body of work.

So rather than dwell on this, move on and you'll see that something will happen to balance this out.

I wouldn't cry too much over it either. My personal believe is if I lose a match like that I need to train harder. That way I become stronger and have more control over my matches to make it easier for the shinpan. Many people in the U.S. don't have that much experience doing shinpan. I also train (shinpan, go to shinpan seminars and watch videos not just the kendoka) to make myself a better shinpan so hopefully someone doesn't loss and feel bitter about shiai, shinpan or kendo. Especially younger people or newer people to kendo you don't want to discourage them by too many bad calls. I've seen different video of myself in those close matches. Some where the other shinpan have clear view of me scoring and the other person maybe hitting my arm or sometimes nothing then looking raising the other persons flag. Sometimes looking at the other shinpan first to see what color or just making a quick decision. I don't think it is a good idea to post the video and kind of call out these shinpan. A big part of being shinpan is showing diginity and other people having confidence in your ability to judge. So posting this video and exposing Joe Blow that maybe judges one or two tournaments a year won't do any good for both of you. You didn't see Eiga go around complaining about the shinpan after his first loss to Miyazaki. He practiced harder and won the next year.

The moral way is to get back to the dojo and practice. Even if the shinpan made a mistake (which you say you didn't realize until after reviewing your own video), there's no point in giving it any further consideration. Any objection made at this point is either, whining, or telling a shinpan how to do his job. Neither position is admirable.

sean

As pretty much all have said, don't worry about it and don't try to correct the shinpan. If they aren't sure they will gogi and if it is a question of rules they will ask the shinpancho. It is human to make some mistakes. It is up to you now to go back to the dojo and practice hard for the next time.

Ya shimpan have their job to do you have yours.

Could you imagine in the middle of a very important shiai if a shimpan called yame and said "NO, no no.... your hitting men wrong... give me that shinai. Like THIS, THis, See elbows straight thats how you hit MEN. OK? OK. Hajame!"

Actually... I have seen something like that.... It wasn't a really important shiai though.

I was surprised.

I'm a little confused. If the situation is simply a "clerical" one, meaning a mis-attribution of a point to the wrong target, but to the right player, usually that gets corrected by a judges meeting (assuming that either the head of court, if there is one is paying attention).

I agree though, most of the time I've been taught that the players cannot and should not question the call of the shimpans. One time, when I fought an opponent and he won, he came up to me later and said that in his opinion he thought that the scoring point was an aiuchi, and he felt that he didn't think it was a clear win.

I thought that he was particularly gracious. I said that these things happen and that I didn't mind losing that way.

I have seen coaches question calls though. There is a formal mechanism for that but its rarely used unless it is an "clerical" error, as opposed to a question regarding the quality of the judging.

Ive never seen correction of technique, but i have seen "warnings" to competitors when they have their shinai rotated a little too much, or illegal techniques, and sometimes improper rei/stepping into the court (and even stepping out or waiting for the opponent to fix equipment). Its usually one warnings and then either hansoku if its illegal, or they just dont award any points/ignore. To have technique corrected in shiai, would be embarrassing.

Vitalis sensei(7th dan) had a nice speech about shiai ettiquette.

When you score a point show proper zanshin. If the point isn't awarded then don't complain on it.

Don't look at someone else for not awarding you a point, use ki-ken-tai-ichi, proper posture and technique and finish with good zanshin because just hitting someone isn't worth an ipon.

Vitalis sensei visits our dojo every now and then.

Odinot sensei (6th dan) says: it's better to lose by showing good kendo then to win with bad kendo.

Bad kendo also would be taking a discission of the shinpan in doubt. He would be very upset if any of us would do such thing.

Like some mentioned. You're there to show kendo against another kendoka and the one who scores the first ipon according to the shinpan wins.

This is why they have 3 senior kendoka's doing this.

And you wonder why the shimpan didn't get you right either?

Nobody is perfect.

Maybe you're understanding what everybody is saying wrong.

You're there to show your best kendo and to win by scoring a point, showing proper ki-ken-tai-ichi followed by zanshin.

According to kendo ettiquette you follow the instructions the shinpan give you.

You should do your dojo and sensei proud by following kendo ettiquette and respecting the discissions the shinpan makes.

As said before, you're there to show your best kendo and the shinpan is there to make sure all goes the right way.