Bulletproof For BJJ Podcast
This is the official podcast of the Bulletproof For BJJ movement. Hosted by JT & Joey. Each episode the founders break down problems that Jiu-jitsu people experience, giving guidance and tips to improve your training for BJJ. With the goal of helping every body on the Brazilian jiu-jitsu path reduce their chance of injury, improve their strength and mobility to become more resilient.
Bulletproof For BJJ Podcast
Do you compete in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?
Ever wondered how to optimally train with partners of different skill levels? Or how often you need to compete to really call yourself a BJJ competitor? Get the uncontested 100% factual never wrong answers from the bulletproof boys.
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A good martial artist does not become tense but ready. Essentially, at this point the fight is over.
Speaker 1:So you pretty much flow with the goal. Who is worthy to be trusted with the secret to limitless power? I'm ready.
Speaker 2:Hey, what's up guys? Welcome to the Bulletproof for BJJ podcast. Today it's a Q&A episode, so we're graced to have some epic voicemails from you guys and we're going to answer them. Now we do three questions on this episode. You might have heard some of our previous q a's excellent questions, sometimes obscure, but always something that we're pretty certain there's, like many other people out there wanting to know an answer to. Definitely so. If you're experiencing anything on your jiu-jitsu journey whether it's something about the politics in your gym, uh, your expectations along the path, something about your training, gym technique stuff hit us up. Um, we're down to answer all of it and even if it's something that we're not educated in, we will still give you an answer. We still we, even if we don't know, we'll make it up. We cannot be held back. No one will stop jt from giving a response, an opinion, absolutely. It's science, guys. And if you go to the Bulletproof website, which is bulletproofforbjjcom, hit the podcast tab, scroll down, record us a voicemail, chuck it on there and then we'll play it on the show. Now here's the deal. We do get a lot of questions coming through our Instagram and our Facebook and all that, and it's totally fine. We love you guys doing that, but what we do always ask is, if you are going to ask us to give you our time to help you with your particular dilemma, we ask that you also go and record a voicemail, right? So if you're going to ask the question on one of those other platforms, do us the favor of doing the voicemail piece, because that allows us to share the response with the world, and this is a nice flow of things. Shares the benefit to all.
Speaker 2:Do you find you get thirsty at training? I do. I do all the time. I'm a sweaty human and I need to hydrate. Now the biggest problem is, by the time you're thirsty, it's a little bit late. You need to hydrate, and that's why we got Sodi. Sodi is sponsoring the show. We've got all the colors of the rainbow, great flavors here. We've got salty citrus, salty pineapple, salty berry and my favorite, salty grapefruit, and they will be releasing two new mystery flavors soon. So why do we need this? It's going to prevent our muscle cramps, it's going to help our energy delivery and it's also going to mean you're less tired, which is an advantage when you're training. If you want to maximize your jiu-jitsu and feel good when you're rolling, you need to get sody and when you purchase, enter the code bulletproof 20 at checkout for 20 off. Oh yeah, first one coming in from loki hit it coming in from loki hit it hi.
Speaker 3:I'm loki from ireland. I love the podcast. We do jiu-jitsu for about a month and train two days a week. I have a skilled blue belt as a twin that I sometimes drill with, but she does very complex moves that I don't understand and the problem is she won't drill simple escapes or submissions that I want to drill. So my question is how can we both benefit from drilling and get better together at different levels, or is complex moves going to help me as a white belt?
Speaker 2:yeah, thanks, guys wow, that sounds like. It sounds like family bullying did he say?
Speaker 2:is it a friend? A twin? It is a twin. I believe I heard a twin Sorry if I misheard that Loki, but it sounds funny because it's like so he said she right, so it's a sister, who's better, who's a blue belt. You're in it for a month, you train twice a week. And she's like look, I'm not going to show you anything that's going to help you, but I'm going to go go platter the shit out. I gotta maintain this edge. And then he's like how do I get out of it, sis, you don't. So she's just getting the reps in and you're just like this is mysterious bullshit.
Speaker 2:This is what I'd say you, I think, if to have the benefit for anyone, because I've I've had drilling partners who were, you know, universes above me in jujitsu skill, but they did say to me okay, what do you want to work on? And we would spend five minutes working my thing, and then they'd spend five minutes working their thing and I wasn't trying to understand what they were doing. All right, sit the showers, that's it, solid session. But that's the thing I think you have to say look, twin, listen here, twin. If we're going to work on this together, I need some stuff I can work on. Can you just show me some basic shit? Also, can you show me a counter to that crazy move you just hit? I think that's a fair exchange. Yeah, yeah, I reckon, um, you could like, it will definitely like you could be working on really complicated stuff that is not directly going to benefit your jiu-jitsu in the most express way, but that's still going to be a benefit. Right, you're going to get pulled along. You're going to be exactly like building like neural connections and shit and piece and stuff together that is going to help you. So if that's all that's on offer, I'm going to say take it. But a better way to do it would be to establish hey, this is what you're going to work on and this is what I'm going to work on.
Speaker 2:Now, the dilemma that Loki might be having is that he doesn't know what he needs to work on. He just knows that's way too hard for me, but I need something else. And Sis might also not know what he needs to work on. Right, she might be like look, I just want to do this fucking thing. I don't know how to fix your problem. Here's what I'm interested in one or two things that you can be working on in your time during these drilling sessions and a simple way to do it. If your coach couldn't give you insight on that, you could sign up to something like submeta, sure, and you could start Lachlan Giles's fucking close guard series and go to lesson one and there's going to be like three or four things in that that you can drill right away and then, when you feel ready for the new shit, go to lesson two and say, hey, sis, let's do half of our session on what you want and then half on what I want, and you just follow what Lockie's teaching you. Yeah, submetaio from the man himself, and there's lots of other options for learning on there. But yeah, I think in any good training relationship it is the sharing and it doesn't mean your sister has to be the teacher you. You do actually have to take that on yourself a bit. So whether you get it from your coach or you get it from online, definitely, uh, ask for what you need. We'd love to hear how you go with that, by the way, what you end up doing.
Speaker 2:Today's episode was brought to you by parry athletics. They are our preferred apparel sponsor. They've been sponsoring the show for some time now and they do the best gear in the game. They do the best training shorts for the gym or on the mats, and they always have awesome designs for all of their custom rash guards. Now, if you would like to get yourself some Parry Athletics gear, we can get you 20% off when you use the code BULLETPROOF20. That's right, folks, you get 20% off when you use the code BULLETPROOF20. Get some you. Next one coming in, chris what up Griff Yo?
Speaker 4:Hey lads, love the pod. Chris from Ohio in the States. I'm a 55-year-old blue belt, been on the mats for about five years, been dealing with a shoulder injury which has changed my game. Less offense, so I'm working on my guard retention more. Shout out to JT. My question have you had an injury where you've trained through that has changed your game, and after the injury, how did you get back to your previous game? Thank you, keep up the great work. Cheers, chris. Thank you, keep up the great work.
Speaker 2:Cheers, chris. What a legend doing the thing. 55, no easy feat at that age. Gotta respect it. Like start, you know blue belt like obviously started around 50s, I'm guessing. Yeah, that's tough.
Speaker 2:I had a hip injury where I could not play guard on my normal side. So I usually play like De La Riva on my left side, reverse De La Riva on my right kind of usually end up on my right side. I fucked up my hip for numerous reasons and therefore I had to rehab my hip and therefore I couldn't play my guard like that. So I had to do the other side. And what's crazy is, even though I have always trained techniques like armbars, both sides back takes whatever you do, have a preferred side standing or guard, but then training the opposite side it I fucking got better at jiu-jitsu incredible, who thought it was possible, even though I was still kind of injured and working around it just and you know, you've probably experienced this too, joe where you're like, oh, I don't usually do that there and then you go to the position and it's so much more awkward, oh yeah you yeah.
Speaker 2:You give it.
Speaker 2:I don't know 10, 20 reps and you're like, oh, it's getting a bit more fluid when you get back to your preferred side, it's so much easier. It is so much easier. So for me it was guard and playing varieties of open guard, and the injury forced me to train both sides. Well, it forced me away from my favorite side, so my less developed side got better. My whole guard fucking went up levels. It was incredible. So also, I hope your shoulder's getting better soon, chris, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:I guess when I had my first knee surgery and I came back to jiu-jitsu, like prior to that injury I had been playing a lot of x guard, right and um, so that was just kind of out. It was like, no, x guard doesn't feel good off the table, yeah, but it didn't I. I would kind of say that I just fumbled around without a game, probably focusing more on top position I guess, and and and like half guard and stuff for a while, and then now I've just found my way back to x guard. So I couldn't, you know, it hasn't been like a deliberate thing, but one second.
Speaker 2:I remember at some point you were saying that you felt your leg was a bit dead, like it wasn't active right it was unintelligent, unintelligent and that you had to cultivate that again, like you, because we trained a little bit at that time and you were saying, yeah, man, that that leg, when it's on the inside it doesn't feel like it's working, but now it's come back. Is that right? Yeah, it has. I would say it hasn't come back. You know to what it was kind of thing, but it's definitely a lot better and I think that that was probably just time using it again and rebuilding that coordination, you know. Yeah, but also because it lacked a lot of flexion.
Speaker 1:Which you need.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so I was always used to just like throwing that hook in, you know like butterfly hook, like I could just weave it in real nice and easy. And then all of a sudden I couldn't, and so my legs like stuck on the outside and so I was just like, well, fuck it.
Speaker 4:I'm going to fucking do something else. I'm just like well, fuck it, I'm going to fucking do something else.
Speaker 2:I'm just going to let you pass then and try and escape north-south, like, yeah. So I probably didn't take the most deliberate way back, but we got there to some degree eventually. I would say I have learned more from injuries than anything else, whether it be health and fitness, from learning all the rehab processes the shoulders, knees, shoulders, knees, hips, back, neck, you name it and then also just learning how to work around it, and I think that's actually what's pretty awesome about jiu-jitsu. It's a bit of a double-edged sword, but because it has so many different positions, techniques and stuff, a variety of movements, I say you can work around your shit. So even if your shoulder's bad, you can do some kind of footwork stuff, or even if your knee's bad, you can do some other positional stuff, and you can stay learning while you work around it, and I think that's the beauty of jiu-jitsu. Yeah, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2:Besides the technique, there is a shitload of things to learn from injury. Huh yeah, huh yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, do you suffer from sore and swollen knuckles after a hard class of jujitsu? I have the answer for you the finger team, custom designed by our friend, the group physio. Now these wraps are specific for your fingers, wrap them around, work them through and reduce the swelling so you can recover faster and be back on the mats in no time. You can get 20% off when you use the code BULLETPROOF20 at checkout. Go to thegripphysiocom.
Speaker 1:Next one coming in from Roberto Yo, joe and JT, how's it going you guys? I hope everything's going good on your guys' side, fam.
Speaker 4:This is.
Speaker 1:Rob from Tucson, arizona, and my question to you guys is how often would one have to compete to be considered a BJJ competitor, as in, if I which I currently am a white belt, if I wanted to become a blue belt, how often would I have to compete in order to be considered a white belt? If I wanted to become a blue belt, how often would I have to compete in order to be considered a blue belt competitor versus a blue belt hobbyist? And just for context, I don't have any prior grappling experience. I do have some striking experience and just recently, about a month into my BJJ journey, I got my first stripe and I desire to get in a competition as soon as possible, just for the experience, nice. And I'm just wondering what would you guys say? What would be your advice? What's your perspective? Uh, if you guys have any tips, advice, suggestions, comments, I'd be more than welcome to hear about it. Thank you guys, hope that you guys are doing good. God bless you all and your families.
Speaker 2:My guy, rob from Tucson. What a legend Bringing the energy. Thanks, bro, gang gang. Competitor's going to compete, gangster's going to gangster. It's a very subjective question. It is, rob, because I guess the only opinion that matters is your coaches, or yours actually. Yeah, yeah, right, and so my view of what a competitor is is the person that is almost constantly chasing competition. They're like all the competitions in my city. I travel regularly to get outside of that and compete Every opportunity I can. I'm doing Like competition for them is almost. It's a part of their training.
Speaker 1:It's part of their learning process.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and, and, and. I would say, like these days when I'm, when I'm thinking of, like the that person. It was different in our time. You could probably compete about once every three months well, at that time there was probably only a comp every three months to six months that's right, whereas now it's like a competitor is probably at least every month they're jumping into something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, matt, what's your view? Look, I haven't competed in BJJ in a very long time. I still identify as a competitor. I'll fucking throw down. I'm fucking on the streets, man, I'm competing. Everywhere we're at breakfast I'm competing. I'm always competing. I mean, it's in my dna as an insecure, middle-class white male to compete and assert dominance. Now, look, man, I would say you're a white belt. The enthusiasm is fucking awesome. I love it.
Speaker 2:I think if you are thinking about competition and you're using that as part of the way you approach Jiu-Jitsu, then that will just be a different mental approach to someone who's just coming to training every single day because you're looking at what's effective. I don't think volume of competition is necessarily the measure, but if you're someone who wants to get better at competition, the more you do it, the better you're going to get. But what I have observed from people way better than me is they were constantly working on a game, testing it in competition, coming back, reassessing that shit and just using that as their iterative loop to get better. That's what I think is different with a competitor. A competitor is just really focused on what works best for them. Now, there's a lot of different ways you can do it. But I would say, if you're someone who enjoys that, that is a great way to experience jiu-jitsu, because I think you'll get better quicker. That's my take on it. If you're doing competitions regularly, you, sir, are a competitor.
Speaker 2:God bless, rob. Appreciate the question and the energy mate. What a legend, hey. Um, there it is. Guys, you have a couple things. Leave us a voicemail, go to the website bulletproof of bjjcom. Hit us up with the voicemail. Uh, go to the podcast tab and we'll play it on the next episode. But also, if you're digging the show, do us a favor, tell a friend about it, share it on your stories, do something like that helps to get the word out there, helps to grow this thing, and you know we feel pretty confident that we're doing a half decent job, yeah, and so you putting the word out there helps us to do that for more people. Thank you very much. Appreciate y'all.
