Progress can never come quick enough in Jiu Jitsu. Everyone who trains is dying to get better at grappling, however very few really seem to excel in our sport. It is generally thought that to achieve competence (I dislike belts but the best way to put this into context is to liken competence to purple belt) will take many, many years however I believe that it can be achieved in FAR less time with the right approach.
Am I offering shortcuts? No. There are no shortcuts in our sport. There is only time. That IS the secret. TIME. You MUST put in the necessary time in order to become proficient at our sport. There are ways to maximise your time and results and this is what I suggest.
So, how much time is really necessary to achieve competence?
Lets work out the math of training and what QUALITY time it takes to become good.
If on average it takes 5 years of training 3 sessions per week (1.5 hour sessions) to achieve competence, that is a total of 1170 hours. That is a huge chunk of time to invest into your sport. Now lets also take into account the inevitable injuries, holidays and time off that will most certainly happen in those 5 years and round the number down to 1000 hours.
Let us also take into account the forgetfulness of little details and even whole techniques that come with training only 3 sessions per week. (I was shown MANY different techniques in my first 5 years of training, however many have been forgotten or scrapped for better ones. This is why learning from a good instructor is paramount to your individual success). Lets assume you have a good instructor and lets only remove another 150 hours of wasted time due to forgetfulness from this equation making our total 850 hours.
Now, this one is controversial however I fully stand by this opinion. Lets take out a significant amount of hours for rolling. Now while rolling is fun and it is great to test your skills, thats all it really does. Remember this article is about getting supercharged results and rolling doesn’t bring about anywhere near the results as study and live drilling. We want to maximise your results and make you a monster as quick as possible. Lets say in your 1.5 hour sessions, you’re given 30 minutes of rolling. So, lets subtract 1/3 of our hours to take out the rolling making our total 566 hours. Lets also take out the inevitable socialising that will take place during the sessions and other miscellaneous wasted time that will occur and reduce this to 500 hours.
500 hours. 500 hours of QUALITY time learning and honing your craft. Thats what it takes to become good. Now what is quality time? Quality time is either furthering your understanding of the sport (study/instruction) and time practicing the precise movements of our sport (drilling).
Now the good news is, that all of these things don’t necessarily need to be done at the academy. You can study at home (via youtube or video instructionals) and you can drill the basic solo movements which hold together our sport (various hip escapes, granby rolls etc). Its also no secret that flexibility, dexterity and balance GREATLY help Jiu Jitsu. For example look at BJ Penn and Geo Martinez. Both received black belts in around 3 years and they are incredibly dextrous, flexible and have great balance. Time invested into these skills will give you considerable return on investment.
The other thing to consider is purchasing a grappling dummy, these are relatively cheap and can be used to DRILL certain techniques, not roll. If you want to practice balance and become better with pressure in rolling, another wise investment is a CXT trainer (combat x trainer) or if you’re strapped for cash, buy a yoga ball to practice on.
Now, the secret formula for becoming great at Jiu Jitsu is…
NO DAYS OFF!
You heard me. NO days off. You can do SOMETHING every single day to become better at your craft. Whether it is watching an instructional, drilling your favourite move 50 times on the grappling dummy, practising your knee on belly balance on the yoga ball etc. Think about all the extra hours that come with this! If you invested half an hour a day to your craft, thats 182 extra quality hours per year! if you want to become good at Jiu Jitsu, you must become OBSESSED. That is the secret. There are no shortcuts. How long it will take to get good is up to you…
So, what have you done today to better your Jiu Jitsu?
