Te Guruma
A lifting hand throw (te-waza) in which tori grips over the opponent's shoulder, elevates their near arm to break their base, then steps the back leg in deep and picks them bodily up off the ground, …
- Judo: Te Guruma, Hand Wheel
- Japanese: 手車
Description
A lifting hand throw (te-waza) in which tori grips over the opponent's shoulder, elevates their near arm to break their base, then steps the back leg in deep and picks them bodily up off the ground, using the hands to steer and rotate them before setting them back down to the mat. Unlike Kata Guruma, the opponent isn't carried on the shoulders — the lift and turn are driven by the arms and hip penetration, hence "hand wheel" rather than "shoulder wheel." Comparable in idea to some variants of Sukui Nage, but Te Guruma lifts from an upper-body grip rather than scooping the legs.
Common Applications
Set up from a shoulder/lapel grip: elevate the opponent's near-side arm to open a gap, step the back leg in deep between their legs, and lift as you turn — the hands work like a steering wheel to control the direction of the drop rather than muscling straight up. A reference technique from The Canon of Judo (Kyuzo Mifune), not one of the Kodokan's original 40 or current 67 throws. Currently illegal in IJF competition judo under the 2011 rule changes restricting leg grabs/below-the-belt attacks, so its main home today is BJJ/no-gi, self-defense, and historical/kata study rather than sport judo competition.
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