Getting Good At BJJ

[Jason Mallory]

If you want to improve your offense it's good to spar with people below your level.

If you want to improve your defense spar with people better than you or put yourself
in bad positions with people below your level.

Thoughts ?

[Joshua Jarboe]

Seems like there's truth to this. I think I try to be mindful of this when I'm going up against a purple belt. Thinking "Man, I'm just going to get killed" isn't good for me mentally. Better for me to try to make him work for it.

I think the folks that are *at* my level are so helpful for fine tuning both too. They're always becoming immune to your attacks, so you have to find new avenues or find combinations that are simply difficult to deal with.

Another thing I like to do when I'm dealing with someone who is way better than me is present them with a defense that I can't deal with and figure out how *they* deal with it. And ask questions if I don't get it. lol

Learning jiu jitsu is hard...

[David Rosado]

I'm just a flakey white belt, but from my experience, the best training partners I had that helped me get better were all guys who were better than me. Burning through the fresh white belts did nothing for me. It was like, "cool, I know jiu jitsu." But it didn't make me feel like I was good at jiu jitsu. I felt like I was good at jiu jitsu when I could tap out a blue belt or flip the truck on a purple, or escape a sub. I never felt any benefit from tooling white belts. If anything, it made me feel bad like I was a bully.

My personal belief is that you get good at jiu jitsu by listening to your coach, getting as much mat time as possible, and training with guys who are better than you. There's a reason why Atos is such a killer team.

[Joshua Jarboe]

I'm just a flakey white belt, but from my experience, the best training partners I had that helped me get better were all guys who were better than me. Burning through the fresh white belts did nothing for me. It was like, "cool, I know jiu jitsu." But it didn't make me feel like I was good at jiu jitsu. I felt like I was good at jiu jitsu when I could tap out a blue belt or flip the truck on a purple, or escape a sub. I never felt any benefit from tooling white belts. If anything, it made me feel bad like I was a bully.

My personal belief is that you get good at jiu jitsu by listening to your coach, getting as much mat time as possible, and training with guys who are better than you. There's a reason why Atos is such a killer team.

True, but at the same time, getting reps on a new technique is really hard on someone that's better than you. Right? If you want to try new things (or revisit stuff you've forgotten and gotten rusty with), someone who is less experienced can be a great partner. Doesn't mean you have to bully them, win every roll, crush them, etc.

[Serge Bunimovich]

I use less skilled partners to work on new techniques, same level people to practice my A game, more experienced guys to improve my defense.

[Jason Mallory]

I use less skilled partners to work on new techniques, same level people to practice my A game, more experienced guys to improve my defense.

Working your A game against someone at the same level is a good point.

[Mike Nall]

I'm going to sound like a grumpy old man but I think some of this stuff is overthought. If you show up and train often with tough training partners, and you work hard with goals in mind. You're going to get a lot better at all aspects of the game. And if you're at a decent sized gym then you'll just automatically roll with people worse, equal, and better than you. I see people saying that you need to train with people worse, equal, and better than you to improve the most. It's true but it's also not some huge secret. It should just happen by itself if you train at a decent size academy.

I try my offense on everyone. Better than me, worse than me, doesn't matter. I work my defense on everyone if I have to. Clearly it happens a lot against people better than me, sometimes against people about the same as me, and not much against people worse than me. I realize I'm probably coming across like an asshole.

[David Rosado]

True, but at the same time, getting reps on a new technique is really hard on someone that's better than you. Right? If you want to try new things (or revisit stuff you've forgotten and gotten rusty with), someone who is less experienced can be a great partner. Doesn't mean you have to bully them, win every roll, crush them, etc.

Reps are what you do before you roll. I don't use my rolling time to get reps. I use my rolling time to test what I've learned. To clarify, I don't bully those that are less experience. I FEEL like a bully because it's too easy. Using tech on a resisting opponent is useful. Using tech on a clueless opponent isn't as beneficial. That's my point.

[Mike Nall]

Reps are what you do before you roll. I don't use my rolling time to get reps. I use my rolling time to test what I've learned. To clarify, I don't bully those that are less experience. I FEEL like a bully because it's too easy. Using tech on a resisting opponent is useful. Using tech on a clueless opponent isn't as beneficial. That's my point.

You are far from a bully if you tap out white belts. Very far from it. If it's not someone's first couple of weeks, it's important to roll against them. Otherwise you aren't really giving them the most benefit. They need someone rolling against them for real in order to best improve. Again, not for someone in their first month, but if someone has trained for 6 months, I think it's doing them a disservice to not roll for real against them. Does that mean you have to be a bully, or crossface the shit out of them, or body surf them when they turtle? No, but rolling against them with intent is far from being a bully. It's going to help your offense and it's going to help them improve faster.

Also, white belts don't always react in a predictable way. They don't always "play the game" so sometimes rolling against white belts especially when they're big, strong, and athletic can be a bit challenging. Sometimes it's hard to work certain techniques on those kinds of people and it's good to give it your all.

[Joshua Jarboe]

Reps are what you do before you roll. I don't use my rolling time to get reps. I use my rolling time to test what I've learned. To clarify, I don't bully those that are less experience. I FEEL like a bully because it's too easy. Using tech on a resisting opponent is useful. Using tech on a clueless opponent isn't as beneficial. That's my point.

I hear you. I guess for me, there are a LOT of moves for me to master and some of them, we're never going to do in my class. I'm never going to learn truck entries in class. Right?