Moraci Brings a Lifetime of Groundwork Knowledge to Riga

Moraci is a special guest at the first standalone Ne-Waza European Judo Championships in Riga, bringing more than five decades of coaching experience to the event. His journey in Judo began as a teenager, when a black-and-white film featuring Anton Geesink sparked a fascination that would shape his life.

He first stepped onto the tatami with curiosity and enthusiasm, but soon found something far deeper than sporting competition. For Moraci, Judo became an educational path built around commitment, respect, discipline and perseverance, values he learned through his own masters.

Over more than 50 years as a coach, Moraci has dedicated much of his work to passing that experience forward. More than 30 of those years were spent training Judo instructors and working with national youth teams. Technical instruction has been central to his career, but so has sharing the principles established by Jigoro Kano.

His accumulated knowledge has also taken shape in two books. The first, Judo: Game, Education, Olympic Sport, is designed as a teaching manual for instructors and coaches. It presents Judo as both a competitive discipline and an educational method, covering physical, technical, tactical and methodological elements. The book also includes videos accessed through QR codes, connecting traditional teaching with a new generation of readers.

His second publication focuses fully on Ne-Waza. Written to encourage deeper study and teaching of groundwork, it offers a practical reference covering around 90 techniques, hold-downs, armlocks, strangles, turnovers, entries, combinations, variations and preparatory exercises. It also includes an extensive technical dictionary intended to make terminology clearer and more consistent.

The Ne-Waza book is aimed at both athletes and instructors and has been published in Italian, English, French and Spanish, with Japanese terminology presented in rōmaji. For Moraci, the two books represent the result of a lifelong relationship with Judo and a way to pass its technical, cultural and educational value on to future generations.

For Moraci, Judo’s lessons have always extended far beyond the tatami.

Source: EJU.net

Image source: EJU / European Judo Union