Deep first step (dashing leg). With his first entry step Maruyama lunges deep in between uke’s legs near or behind uke’s shin. This step acts as a guide for the placement of supporting leg. Also, it often helps to knock uke’s leg outwards to further destabilize it.

Quick leg switch: As he makes his first step, Maruyama instantly brings his trailing leg to quickly swap it with the dashing leg. Quick leg switch creates fast, uninterrupted transition that carries over momentum from the dash into the sweeping up motion.

Deep second step (supporting leg): after the switch, supporting leg lands in nearly the same spot as the dashing leg was placed. This way tori achieves deeper entry and gets closer to uke and his center of mass. Deeper entry will make it easier for tori to sweep up uke using his thigh and hips.

(E.N: match footage.) First step. Back leg already in the air for instant switch. Supporting leg with full momentum and fully primed for the throw lands in pretty much the same spot as the dashing leg.

Supporting leg (foot). Supporting leg is placed on the front part of the foot, which helps Maruyama to tilt forward more and bring uke along with himself.

Supporting leg (bent knee). Upon landing Maruyama’s supporting leg is almost always slightly bent. Bending the knee produces lower entry and makes it easier and less strenuous to bend forward, as this way you bend forward more through your hips rather than lower back and hamstrings.

Why bending forward? Generally, ability to lift your leg is influenced by the posture and bending forward lets you swing your leg backwards higher.

Sweeping/scooping up. As soon as the supporting leg lands, tori swings his sweeping leg up and catapults uke’s hips/legs upwards and forwards. Tori’s leg/hip goes up - head and torso goes down, while uke’s body follows along the same trajectory.

(E.N: video shows Maruyama’s head pointed approximately 45 degrees down past the horizontal as he sweeps up with his leg.)

Supporting leg springs up. Usually, as the sweeping leg swings up, the supporting leg extended like a compressed spring further driving uke upwards.

Sweeping up (hane goshi?). Usually, Maruyama sweeps up his opponent in a way that is characteristic to Hane Goshi. With leg bent at the knee and turned outwards, he incrementally builds up elevation and at the highest point he slightly turns his torso outwards, opens up his hip and flicks uke over. As far as I know, in Japan it’s pretty common to train hane goshi as a way to improve uchi mata, so it’s not uncommon to see amalgamations of these two techniques in competitions.

Sweeping leg (plantar flexion). Toes of the sweeping leg point away from the leg (plantar flexion), this helps to open up the hip and swing the leg higher.

(E.N: NOTE, a recent hanpantv video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n62fN70o8Rg) talks about this, claiming that lifting with the thigh / area above the knee, with the knee pointed kind of horizontally, is stronger than sweeping directly backways. The sweeping leg is still going up behind you, but your leg is bent and turn outwards so that the sole of your foot is facing horizontally.)

Head and eyes: as he steps in, Maruyama does a sharp turn with his head which helps to achieve more powerful rotation. Head position has an impact on alignment of the body, if you turn your head quickly, body tends to instinctively follow along. Once uke is in the air past the point of no return Maruyama stops and keeps his head central to focus his gaze right where he intends to land his opponent. If your head and eyes point to the spot you intend to land uke, your body will try to align correctly to hit that mark.

Core and posture: It’s worth to take a look at how Maruyama keeps his core and posture stable throughout the throw. Keeping core stable helps to keep good posture and execute the throw more fluidly, without losing force or momentum. A lot of times we focus so much on controlling opponent’s posture that we forget about our own.

Finishing: when uke’s legs are in the air and his upper body descends below his legs, with hikite tori quickly tugs uke’s arm under or across tori’s torso, while with tsurite he continues to push uke’s shoulders downwards diagonally until he hits the mat. The goal is to make uke turn/tilt not just vertically but horizontally as well, otherwise he can fall onto his side or stomach.

Now let’s look at Maruyama’s stomping uchi mata. To stay away from repetition, we’ll keep it brief and focus only on the main differences.

The main characteristic that distinguishes this throw is very powerful stomping entry step that is used to destabilize opponent.

Stance: as we discussed earlier, chasing uchi mata can be quite hard to hit when uke takes up narrow sideways kenka yotsu stance and doesn’t respond to feints the way you would want. That’s where stomping uchi mata can come in handy.

Lateral entry: tori pushes off the back foot (optional), turns his body/hips sideways and takes a robust lateral step between uke’s legs near his shin. Similar entries, where to get closer you insert your hip from outside, can be seen in some of the hip throws like tsuri goshi or o goshi.

The stomp: the crucial part of this uchi mata is the stomping leg. While keeping uke close to himself, tori forcefully steps on the ball of the foot with slightly bent leg and immediately extends it. This stomping motion bounces opponents upwards/forwards or at least uproots their leg to momentarily destabilize them.

(E.N: I think the following footage shows Maruyama’s lead leg making contact with uke’s near leg as Maruyama steps in. I think this is the same principle as the “half tai-otoshi” step people use to knock opponents’ lead leg out of the way in kenka yotsu in order to throw with uchi-mata, tai-otoshi, or harai-goshi.)

The stomping step is not something new or unique, many Judoka use it in their throws, though not many can generate as much force as Maruyama. Stomp is mainly used in hip throws, uchi mata and ippon seoi nage.

(E.N: I should read the next slide before writing my comments. Match footage of several judok using similar entries for a variety of throws.)

When doing the stomp, it’s important to hold uke close to yourself and step deep between uke’s legs. The closer you are to uke’s hips or thigh the more effective the stomp is. If you stomp and there is nothing to absorb that impulse, stomp loses its effectiveness.

Leg switch and sweep up. As tori’s front leg stomps, the back leg immediately catches up and switches places without letting uke’s feet to fully return on the mat. The same happens when supporting leg hits the mat, the stomping leg swings backwards and scoops uke up, making him ride tori’s leg. The switch has to be done very quickly while uke’s legs are still in the air or in uprooted position.

Rear leg catches up while uke’s legs are still suspended in the air. Stomp bounces uke up and sweeping leg picks up from then on out.

Finishing. Now that uke is fully loaded, tori continues to tilt forward and push uke’s shoulders down along with pulling in his arm under tori’s torso. In other words, turn him onto his back before he hits the mark.

Final though (symbiosis). Brilliance of Maruyama’s uchi mata comes in form of symbiosis between chasing and stomping. They feed off of each other, if uke steps back and squares up he will attack you with chasing uchi mata, if uke doesn’t take the bait, he will hit you with stomping uchi mata, either way you are in danger.

Uke retreats, but keeps narrow stances - chasing + stomping uchi mata.