Category: Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (page 1 of 1)

By far, the people who read the most Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu related posts on the internet are white belts. They’re followed by blue belts, but blue belts trail behind by quite a bit. Once a student reaches purple belt, that student doesn’t care about articles and videos nearly as much as he or she did back when they first began. Why? Because when a student first begins training, the BJJ world is one huge unknown. By the time the student reaches purple belt, there’s not much left to the imagination. I guess what I’m trying to say here is that white belts know virtually nothing while purple belts know virtually everything. Well, everything within reason. There’s always something new to learn, even as a brown, black, or coral belt.

I thought I’d write a post for white belts that has to do with training BJJ in a club and about some of what occurs in said club – primarily rolling during open mat. It’s something I’ve been noticing a lot lately, especially as I get older and slower. Basically, this article will pertain to purple belts rolling with black belts and what to expect from both. The reason I say this article is primarily targeted at white belts is because their number one question has always been, “When am I going to get better?” Hopefully I can answer that question below. Hint: it has to do with being a purple belt.

I’ll begin by letting you know that purple belts are very, very proficient at Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. I’ve already meandered through most of the ranks and I clearly recall exactly how I felt during each stage. I remember how I felt the moment I had my purple belt tied around my waist and I remember how I felt the day it was untied to be replaced by a brown belt. I was fairly young during this stage of my training. I had energy, agility, and I learned a lot. Purple belt is a strange time – it’s like I was good enough to roll with black belts at the beginning, but I’d lose nearly all of my matches. By the time I made it closer to brown belt, I won many matches against black belts. Purple belts are lethal on the mats for very good reason. I’ll explain that reason next.

Back when I first began training, it was like a bunch of guys in their 30s decided to get off their butts to do something. We were fairly young, but not young enough to compete against those guys who decided to begin training in their teens or 20s. But since we were the majority, the playing field was generally level. We trained, were promoted, and rose through the ranks to eventually achieve black belt; we felt pretty good about ourselves. The problem is…there is no problem. Well, there was no problem until recently. What I mean is if a 40 year old black belt spars against a 40 year old purple belt, the black belt will win the match almost every time. Of course, there’s always that off chance that the purple belt will get creative to sneak a submission in here or there, but by and large, the black belt will dominate.

Today, I notice that students are beginning their training during their younger years. My first club enjoyed a student body of fully matured men and a few somewhat matured (a little younger on average) women. That was 15 years ago. Today? We’ve got a lot of 20 somethings who are very strong and who are fast learners. What I’m finding is that these young students are absorbing information at lightening speed and then bringing that information along with their young bodies onto the open mat. And if that young, bright, strong student happens to be a seasoned purple belt, we older, slower, weaker black belts are finding it more and more challenging to find our taps as compared to when these students were white and blue belts. Rolling during mid-life isn’t easy.

That’s just my current predicament though – my own personal experience. The reason purple belts generally do so well against black belts still pertains to age, but in a much more insidious manner.

Consider this: Student A begins training BJJ at 35 years old. If it takes approximately 10 years to achieve black belt, that student will see that belt at 45. I’m here to tell you that the submission success rate between 35 and 45 years old drops dramatically, but nonetheless, Student A is a black belt at 45.

Now let’s consider Student B. This student also begins training at 35 years of age. If being a white belt lasts about a year and then being a blue belt lasts about three years, this student will turn purple at the age of 39. Give it a year of being a purple belt to acquire some more knowledge and if both belts go head to head on the mats, that 40 year old purple belt is going to give the 45 year old black belt a run for his money. That’s just the way it is. The human body begins falling apart at 45 and to have to deal with a fairly energetic and quite experienced BJJ player at that age – oh jeez. Now just imagine how awful the experience would be if the purple belt began training at 15 years old. Having him, at 20, go up against a 45 year old black belt – chances are the black belt would get destroyed. Unless, of course, that black belt is me. I’m very, very sneaky and I somehow manage to defend myself well.

So for all you white belts out there, here’s how it’s going to go: You’ll be destroyed the first few months of training. After your first year, you’ll become proficient and quite able to defend yourself against those who have never trained. Against those who have? You’ll still experience difficulty. That difficulty will begin to fade through the years until you reach purple belt. At that time, you’ll begin submitting other purples, browns, and some blacks. And right after you earn your brown belt, you’ll likely be on par with most black belts who are older than you. Older black belts don’t train nearly as much as they once did, are generally out of shape, eat more, have gotten lazier, slower, older, begin balding, are much uglier, and really don’t care about Jiu-Jitsu nearly as much as they once did. I don’t know one black belt over the age of 45 years old who’s still as obsessed with the sport and who’s watching YouTube videos as much as they were back when they first began. So if you’re looking to feel good about yourself and you happen to be a BJJ purple belt, go find yourself an older black belt who’s beginning to grow a belly and kick his ass. It’ll be the best feeling you’ve ever had.

I’ve been teaching Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu since 2017 and believe me when I say, my methods are ever-changing. I’m rarely content with the way I do things. If you’ve had the privilege of instructing as I have, I can almost guarantee you’ve felt or feel the same. It’s impossible not to. We’re very similar creatures, we instructors are. We’re talented and diligent and determined. And being these types of people, we’re rarely satisfied. Which is probably a good thing because each time we make a change, improvement is sure to follow.

I began training in Glastonbury, Connecticut at Giroux Brothers Martial Arts in 2008. I stayed with that club until 2013, when I moved to Palm Coast, Florida. While in Florida, I trained in St. Augustine at Fighting Chance Fitness for six months, after which, I moved to Maine. Finally, in the latter part of 2013, I began training at The Foundry BJJ in Farmington and I’ve yet to leave. And it’s at The Foundry where I began my teaching. Over the past seven years, I must’ve taught at least 100 students and that’s being conservative. During this span of this time, I’ve come to conclude that each club offers a wildly different type of student. Locales are quite unique. The students in Connecticut were so much more academic than those in Florida, who were so much more militarily and competition based than those in Maine, who are really very mixed with their approach and style. In Maine, I tangle with police officers, border patrol agents, college students, lumberjacks (also known as loggers), and school teachers. It’s a diverse crowd and my teaching style needs to reflect that.

The other instructors and I recently held a meeting with the owner of The Foundry, Mr. Seth Harris. Seth is an excellent instructor and club owner and takes what he does extremely seriously. He’s always on the hunt for better ways to do things, hence, our meeting. Basically, Seth wanted to let us in on some information and tactics he recently read about in a few books that pertained to teaching, learning, and how the brain works. I’ve actually read a few of these types of books in the past, so before even going into the meeting, I had an inkling of what we’d be discussing. Although, it’s been years since I’ve been exposed to this type of psychological literature, so the refresher was well received.

In the most basic sense, teaching Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu can be as simple as demonstrating a move and then asking the class to try it out for themselves. My approach has essentially evolved into this very style. I’ve tried all sorts of approaches and each and every time I attempt to get fancy, I find myself simply showing the class that something merely exists and then asking them to repeat after me. During the “repeat” session, the students screw everything up and I walk around and correct them. Eventually, they get it right and we all go home for the night.

BJJ really only consists of a few different aspects during class; first the demonstration by the instructor and his helper, then the trial and error by the students, and finally the open mat. That’s it. I’ve learned that if I attempt at offering theory and physics, my explanations fall on deaf ears. Either that or the students enjoy my labors, but after they’ve left class for the night, they forget everything I’ve said before they even reach the parking lot. It’s a shame really, this forgetting. But while it may be a shame, forgetfulness is a very real thing that needs to be addressed and Seth’s ideas are an attempt at addressing it.

Simply put, Seth explained to us that the human mind can only remember approximately four instructions at a time. Any more than that and it discards something it’s learned previously within the same set of instructions. So if a BJJ teacher demonstrates a complex sweep to transition to position to submission, the students will be all over the place as they attempt the series by themselves. I know this to be true because at times, I’ve offered too much during the demonstration period and I can recall the blank stares I’ve received in return. It’s not a fun place to be, so now, I make sure to keep any demonstrations I offer to my students very brief and as general and non-nuanced as possible, if that’s even a word.

Seth’s strategy goes like this: During the 10 minute warm up period we give our students before each class, have the students engage in sort of a positional sparring, but while doing so, give very specific challenges to each participant. Seth calls them games. For example, if one student’s goal is to, while in closed guard, pull their opponent’s arm across their body, if they achieve this goal, they’d stop and start over. And they’d “win.” As for the other student, their goal would be to do something else, such as perhaps resist the arm drag and hide the arm back towards their waist. Essentially, the objective is to have the students practice and challenge themselves with the crux of the future technique that will be shown to them during class. The gamification aspect is meant to keep the students engaged and challenged and whether they know it or not, learning. By the time the instructor gets around to actually demonstrating the technique or techniques, the students will have had their orientation to it/them and will have had enough practice time to have embedded the brief routine into their memories. This will avert the forgetfulness aspect I described above. It’s genius really and it’s purposeful as opposed to the wash, rinse, repeat style many instructors have become accustomed to, myself included.

As I mentioned above, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu isn’t tough to teach. And actually, in my opinion, an instructor’s job is to demonstrate that positions, movements, techniques, and theories merely exist. It’s the student’s job to run with those ideas to make them work. Marginal students will show up to class, practice, and go home, not to think about BJJ again until their next scheduled class. Gifted students will attend class, practice, go home and spend hours on YouTube and forums, visit other schools to train, take private lessons, and return to attend as many classes during the week as possible. I’ve seen it a thousand times – I’ve actually got two or three particularly gifted students in mind right now. These guys have become absolutely hooked on BJJ and over the past few years have made astonishing strides towards some legitimate proficiency. Strides so great that they’ve actually caught me in a few submissions and I’m rather tricky to catch, if I don’t say so myself.

In closing, I’ll say that I’m excited to add a bit of focus to my lessons and I think the gamification aspect of explaining techniques will go a long way in helping my students get the most out of what they pay for.

If you’ve been training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for more than a few years, you’ve certainly run into wear holes and tears in your gi or gis. I have. It’s pretty much an inevitability. I’m not sure how many gis I’ve owned since I began training in 2008, but I can tell you that each and every one of them has earned its stripes, so to speak.

Wear holes are different than rips or tears. Wear holes generally occur in the knee areas of the pants and elbow areas of the jacket and since most gi pants offer two layers of cotton for the knees, the outer layer is the one to suffer. The wear hole will pretty much end up looking like a hole with a bunch of threads lying one way or the other with a solid piece of material behind. As for the jacket, the wear hole will look like an actual hole. It’s important to fix a jacket wear hole as soon as it appears. It can grow rapidly if left untended to. Pant wear holes can remain for a few rounds, but will need to be sewn quickly too, lest they get worse.

Rips or tears occur along the seam lines of both the pants and jacket. When purchasing a gi, you’ll see advertisements for those with double or triple stitching along the seams. That’s great, but as time passes and as the gi gets washed and worn, the fabric begins to thin. Rips along the edges of the seams, not the seams themselves, are bound to follow. There’s really nothing a person can do about it, besides not wear the thing. And what’s the point in that?

During my early days of training BJJ, I’d experience a rip (usually in the pants) and simply throw the item away. These days, since I’ve learned how to use my sewing machine, I repair the rips. Again, rips generally occur along the seam lines of pants – and as for the jacket, down near the ends of the sleeves. Those sleeve ends wear out quickly because of the grips people attach themselves with. I’ve actually owned a jacket that was nearly torn completely from my body while rolling. I was sparring with an aggressive opponent and the moment he sniffed out the fraying fabric, he pulled and tugged and did everything he could to make things worse. I should have punched him in the face for it, but I would have paid the price if I had done so. He’s got about 80 pounds on me. Needless to say, the jacket didn’t make it out alive. It was too old and thin. I couldn’t have repaired it anyway.

I thought I’d write a quick post that describes some recent repairs I made to a pair of my Tatami gi pants. I don’t sew for beauty because, quite honestly, I don’t know how to. Early on, after learning how to use my sewing machine, I realized that I’m nowhere near expert level, so I’ve resolved to describing my projects as “unaesthetically pleasing, but as strong as iron.” That description works well for me and no one really cares one way or another. They’re my gis, after all.

Essentially, on one pair of pants, I had one tear along a seam on one leg and as for the other leg, a worn out knee, another rip along a seam, and a frayed hole adjacent to two triple-stitched seams that formed a corner. The pants are old and are in pretty terrible shape, but they’re my favorite pair. They’re extraordinarily broken in and I’ll do anything I can to make them last as long as possible.

My repair process goes like this: turn the pants inside-out, cut patches to their appropriate sizes (an inch or two larger on all sides than the hole), and then iron those patch pieces over the offending areas. Once the patches are secured, keeping the pants inside out, sew the patches to the pants by going back and forth in zig-zag formation. The goal is to flat-sew the patches to the pants so they never even think about coming off. The other goal is to make it so if the torn or worn area is ever stretched again, that sewn on patch will prevent any further damage.

As per my description, you can see that you don’t need to be a genius to sew patches to gi pants to make the pants last longer. All you need is a sewing machine and a few minutes to learn how to use it. I’m not under any illusion that my pants will have a long life, but I like to think I saved some money somewhere by not replacing them so soon.