Starting Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Part 1: Conditioning

by Flipper

Writing this article, I think I should make one thing clear- I am by no means an expert in BJJ (or, for that matter, any other grappling art). I have only been practicing BJJ and freestyle wrestling for roughly 8 months. However, I have stuck with it, and I am still new enough to remember most of the early struggles I had in picking up the sport.

Before I began BJJ, I considered myself in good shape and well prepared for training- I worked out 4 days a week for roughly 2 hours a night combining running and a full body strength-training plan. My first two weeks of class were spent sucking wind after nearly every drill and sparring session, and feeling weak as a kitten when pushing or pulling on someone during a fight. Very little will prepare you for the cardio aspect of BJJ, as a good portion of it is understanding when someone is actually attempting to attack you versus someone simply stalling or toying with you. It can take a few weeks to remember to breathe normally and not exert all of your strength from the start of a match. Any decent instructor will teach you patience and focus eventually, but many newcomers assume they can’t excel in BJJ because of early experiences like those.

The first question most people ask (and usually the most misunderstood) is what kind of strength or conditioning do you have to be in when starting BJJ. Newcomers generally learn about the sport from watching UFC, and expect you need the body and conditioning of Randy Couture or such to start. In short, this is wrong. I have trained against 50 year old man with string-bean physiques, and against muscle-bound body-builders (I even trained against a man with half an arm- and he brutalized me!), both were capable of going full speed and full strength against me. A bare level of health and conditioning is, of course, required (as it is for any high energy sport), and you will find that the more athletic/stronger students in a class early on will have an advantage in any sparring situation. However, BJJ is one of the most technique-centered arts you can practice, and it is very common for the “less athletic” to catch up to people, especially if those more athletic students try to rely too much on their beginning physical advantages.

The short of it: in terms of exercising and conditioning, you should probably meet the following conditions:

• No major medical issues that will result in trauma due to high amounts of exertion
  
  
• No severe back, neck, knee, shoulder, or elbow joint issues
  
  
• A basic amount of flexibility: able to basic toe-touches, arm circles, and the like
  
  
• Ability to run/jog a mile (or perform similar aerobic exercise) for roughly 10 minutes

And really- that’s it. Being able to do more would be great, but from most of the other students I’ve seen, you won’t see any major drop-off in the difficulty of your first few weeks unless you are the type of person who participates in 2-3 sports at a time or wrestled in high-school or college (and those years haven’t passed you by). However, over time you will find regular training to be an incredible form of exercise- your conditioning will improve, as will your functional strength. Since starting eight months ago, I have slowed my lifting/running schedule to 1-2 times a week at most, but at the same time I have lost 15 pounds, improved on my running endurance, and increased my upper body strength. All it takes is patience!