So What Are The Differences Between Judo And Sambo?

Sambo and judo work and look very much the same, except the attire…

But what exactly are the differences between the two sports? I’ll be answering that today on this article.

Compared to sambo, judo has no:

Leg attacks

Be it straight up takedowns that involve grabbing the legs, like a double or single leg, or submissions, you can’t do any of that in the sport of judo.

And contrary to what you might think, shooting for takedowns isn’t that common in sambo just because you can, when compared to throws, primarily because of the way the scoring system works, which I’ll explain later.

But the thing that really strikes the difference between these two combat sports is all the leg submissions you can do.

And because many of these attempts are done after a successful takedown or a throw, the rolling nature of it looks incredible, honestly.

Now with that said, the ankle locks and knee bars you do have to be done in a straight fashion. For example, you can’t do heel hooks.

Advanced point system

The thing about judo is that the point system it has allows for little error – in other words, it’s very easy to lose a match. Get dropped on your back just right, whether the opponent does one of those annoying rolling throws or not, and you lose.

The scoring system in sambo works completely different; some might say even much better than in judo.

To start with, you can only win a match in an instant if the opponent you throw ends up more or less flat on its back (just like an ippon) and you are also left fully standing.

This is huge – what this does, essentially, is prevent instant victories over those stupid throws like drop rolling seoi nages. I hate those things:

A throw like that would still score you 4 points in sambo, and an 8 point difference from the other player is a decisive victory for you, but the point I’m trying to get across here is that for a throw to end a match like that, it needs to be done cleanly.

To understand this system better, I’d highly suggest watching this video:

I competed in sambo once.

The dude I was fighting with dropped me good, and while the stuff he did would score an ippon in judo, because he fell with me to the mat (I think he did something like a harai goshi), he didn’t win right there.

I was able to bounce back, and eventually win by points.

I don’t know, at that time it just felt like a more fair way to judge a match. Maybe it’s for the better, but judo’s scoring system is there for a reason.

But judo has chokes!

This is the main difference that, I think, will weird out most judokas or BJJers.

I don’t know the exact reason for it, but in sports sambo you can’t apply any sort of chokehold to submit your opponent.

From what I understand, the rules are made like that so it could be different from judo.

The leg locks you can apply do make up for it, but still… Not being able to do chokes does take away a lot.

With that said, this only applies to the sports kind sambo. Combat sambo, in which you also can strike, has no ban regarding chokes.

If sambo is all that great, why isn’t it as popular as judo?

I think this has most to do with the fact that judo is an olympic sport first and foremost, and both of these sports work very much alike.

Now again, sambo does differ quite a bit from judo, but not as much as BJJ compared judo.

So in turn, many gyms who do train sambo also cross-train judo, as there is more competition in the latter.

And this is just the case in Eastern Europe – the level of sambo competition is that much more scarce in North America.

I’ve read up on more than a few people saying that if they had a sambo club nearby, they would train there in a heartbeat.

Though even if one could find a sambo gym in close proximity, many of them are just MMA gyms altogether, and don’t just specialize in teaching one thing.

In conclusion

Because it’s hard for a throw to end a match right there, ground work in sambo is much more prevalent, as you can end the fight in an instant with a submission.

And it’s not like the same isn’t true in judo, it’s just that specializing in throws is generally much better of an idea.

I think in that sense, sambo is a more well rounded martial art, in regard to how important the takedowns and ground play are.