Training frequency: less is more?

[JohnSouth]

First of all, Not all of us are cut out for mediocrity. Sad to say, but moderation leads to mediocrity. If you want to be really great, then the sacrifice is great.

Secondly.. rolling when you are 50? You could easily die in a car crash tomorrow. What would you say on your death bed? Glad you played it so safe? Or glad you fuckin went for it!

Something to consider.

Edit:

Most people don't ever come anything close to "maxing out their potential." We don't work hard enough.

We'll you'll be pretty sad if your joints are wrecked at 30. Then what you gonna do? Be great?

Forget about your death bed, think about how sorry you'll be when you're good but not GREAT and can't even move because of so many problems. If everyone else is training 3x a day what you gonna do? Train 4x a day? It don't work that way.

If anything I can tell you this: you will regret doing stupid shit that you think will get you some kind of glory when you don't have the talent for it. I've been high level at a few things and it's not all it's cracked up to be, a lot of times people hate you for it and you miss life.

This is not necessarily how to be a champion, I've noticed MY progress is better but if my progress is faster compared to my peers then necessarily I have a better shot at it than them.

 

[Vitamin C]

Dialing back your training and seeing immediate improvement means that you probably needed better rest/recovery/or even possibly nutrition. You may be eating more volume or just more well on those days without training in your schedule.

To extrapolate that to mean that dialing back your training volume is better for your progress than more training volume with better rest/recovery/and nutrition is silliness though. It could be any one of those things, and seeing the improvement simply doesn't tell you what it is. Instead, training smarter, more professionally, will result in an increased capacity for overall volume. If you had every variable controlled and optimized, and willing to devote the time to training, more training is of course better than less. This shouldn't even be up for debate.

The fact is though, most of us have to balance the rest of our lives with training. How we determine that balance, and the sacrifices we are willing to make will naturally vary individually.

 

[JohnSouth]

My experience is similar to that of the OP. There are a lot of myths going around and one of them is that you need to train 5 days a week to get good. In my experience this only helps top level technical grapplers whose only weakness is technique.

My game was messed up because I was running out of gas. Anyone who says you need to be rolling more to increase your gas tank has no freaking clue what they are talking about! While you are rolling, the fight could end due to factors totally unrelated to your gas (eg. submissions) so by rolling you really are not training your particular weakness. My coach told me to do cardio to the point where I am out of breath. I started to incorporate that 3 times a week with weights and my BJJ has improved tremendously. I am now rolling 3 times a week and I am a much better grappler.

This is true and that was my problem too, I had bad cardio.

But the cardio came up gradually and my cardio is good.

You need a balance of strength and cardio. You don't want to destroy your muscle mass and a guy with a fast metabolism is going to be a cortisol nightmare high intensity cardio every day.

I think it would be better if they offered technique sessions every other day instead of every day max intensity warmups and rolling, then I could train more.

I also started training Judo and I think that gives me an edge as opposed to more of the same.

 

[JohnSouth]

I agree with most that more training is better IF you can properly recover from it.

But some people are not being honest with themselves.

If you are injured all the time something is wrong, you need more balance in that case because you are hitting the same things too much.

 

[JohnSouth]

You don't think Mozart practiced much?

He did practice hard as a little kid but then he didn't bother much. Playing piano was not his priority even though he was one of the best.

He often composed his symphonies and piano concertos in his head while traveling.

Many good musicians don't touch the keyboard for months at a time, others have to train every day. That is an individual thing.

Depends what you can get away with but some extremely talented people memorize their pieces on the plane while en route to the concert hall.

That's not something you practice, you are born with it or not.

 

[JohnSouth]

The post wasnt started about asking how to prolong a non competitive career as long as possible, it was about was "is the old school way of training bjj as much as you can the best for getting as good as you can?"

I will bite though. How many of the worlds best BJJ practitioners were physically wrecked by the time they were 30? I would bet you at least 90% of world champions in bjj still train regularly after the age of 30. These guys all employed the "Byzantine training methods" that you believe are inferior to a modest 3x per week module that has propelled you to blue belt at 30.

For overall general health I would mostly agree with you. At a certain age, it does become a lifetime sport which is a marathon. However, this thread was not addressing longevity, it was adressing potential. You do not maximize potential doing something a few times a week, despite your feelings about Mozart.

There is a tendency to focus on world champions but the reason those guys aren't fucked up is their unusual genetics.

People forget the also rans who reached a high level at a relatively young age but now can't go any further because of injuries.

 

[Dirty Holt]

There is a tendency to focus on world champions but the reason those guys aren't fucked up is their unusual genetics.

People forget the also rans who reached a high level at a relatively young age but now can't go any further because of injuries.

The discussion is about which method is best for developing one's jiujitsu to the highest level. Why would you not focus on the highest level practitioners of the sport when focusing on examples of the highest level of jiujitsu?

If you think the world champions in BJJ are sitting on some kind of genetic ace in the hole, I would highly disagree. For every BJJ champ you can show me with unreal genetics there is one who is most likely, just average. There are just as many Pe De Panos and Miyaos as Cobrinhas and Vieras.

 

[Rod1]

An amazing amount of weird theories in the this thread. It seems pretty simple to me: if you want to be a champion, train like the champions train. That means 10+ sessions of BJJ a week plus cardio and strength training. If you want to be a normal person and have fun with BJJ, train as much as you feel like and if you're dead tired then skip a day. Listen to your body. But the more you want to approach champion caliber, the more you'll have to train like they train which means more sessions and more supplemental work.

And for the record, with the possible exception of Holt given that he's actually trained at Olympic intensity, none of us have pushed ourselves hard enough to know what our true genetic potential is. That's the lamest excuse for not improving and/or not working hard that I've ever heard. You train 3-4x a week with lifting and maybe a few runs, you're not scratching the surface of what you can achieve just from training more, much less butting up against your natural physical limitations.

Agreed completely i trained 2 years under an olympic coach was a teenager with no social life or anything and i lived with my coach we trained 6 hours a day counting S&C.

However i was young and i slept a lot like a mofo, i dont think i can handle half of what i did back then with my current job and marriage.

 

[Rod1]

don't even bother what?

Sailing up to England, raping women, taking slaves and burning monasteries

 

[Perfect form]

If you train with correct form Grappling is all you need. Training with bad form is not training, it's abuse.

 

[Einarr]

don't even bother what?

Breathing.

Sailing up to England, raping women, taking slaves and burning monasteries

Good, wholesome, old-fashioned fun.

 

[JohnSouth]

The discussion is about which method is best for developing one's jiujitsu to the highest level. Why would you not focus on the highest level practitioners of the sport when focusing on examples of the highest level of jiujitsu?

If you think the world champions in BJJ are sitting on some kind of genetic ace in the hole, I would highly disagree. For every BJJ champ you can show me with unreal genetics there is one who is most likely, just average. There are just as many Pe De Panos and Miyaos as Cobrinhas and Vieras.

No, this discussion was started by a 30 year old blue belt who has a job.

Talking about world champions you are leaving out all the talented crippled guys who's bodies gave up on them because they thought they had to do x to make it. They did it a few too many times and now they have to find something else to do.

There's all different sorts of genetic variations, some people are fast learners and others are physically sturdy or athletic. The fast learner does not need the same reps as the heavy boned neanderthal.

The old school style is basically to over train and whoever is genetically best suited to surviving over training wins.

 

[ironwolf]

Are you insinuating that more weight lifting and less BJJ practices per week has made your techniques cleaner, more varied, more effective, and has improved your defense?

When it comes to BJJ training, more is more. There is no way in hell 3 practices a week and a few lift days is better for your bjj than 8 practices a week. If your body breaks down so badly at 5 days a week that you are overtraining, then the issue is not too much bjj, its extremely poor recovery due diligence (diet, sleep).

Most oof us ordinary folks have to go these things called jobs.....

 

[berimBOWLoh]

the less i train the better i get in my mind.

 

[FlexLuthor]

Most oof us ordinary folks have to go these things called jobs.....

Some of us make it happen anyway. With a job. There are even guys who have families and make it happen.

You train however much you want to improve.

 

[mtruitt76]

Most oof us ordinary folks have to go these things called jobs.....

Which is all the more reason to spend what free time you have on BJJ practice to get better at BJJ

 

[SAMURAI SPIRIT]

I totally agree that if you are a pro or a high-level competitor then you have the option of building your life around BJJ. I am one of the average folks who leaves for work at 8, comes back at 6 and then has to make it to BJJ and finally come home to a kid and a pregnant wife who both need time and attention. For the commoner, BJJ is a different lifestyle.

In my situation I have to view BJJ as something that I could SUSTAIN for as long as I can without it effecting my job, my family life and social commitments. This is a totally different art than giving something 100%. In my case how many percent I give depends on how many percent is LEFT after I do the REAL thing that my life depends on.

I have the choice of 5 training days. I have tried various combinations. I have tried 5 BJJ days and no conditioning day. This has not benefitted me as much as 3 BJJ days and 2 conditioning days on which I combine weights and cardio. The 3 x 2 split allows for optimum recovery from weights and best recovery from BJJ.

Here no one is saying that my 3 days of BJJ and 2 days of conditioning is BETTER than Rudolfo Viera or Marcelo Garcia. If that was the case then I would be the world champ and I would be choking everyone in panams etc. The point that I can stress from my experience is that the 3 x 2 split enables me to progress and sustain myself in a better way that 5 days BJJ split with no conditioning days. I think that was the premise of the OP and I agree with his conclusion.

 

[Badger67]

Just my two cents: either your GPP wasn't prepared enough to begin with, muscling too much within a technique where it isn't warranted, or, mentally you need more time to consolidate the motor patterns; I find with people who weren't generally active/athletic in their child/teenage years will have this problem.

 

[wordspeaker]

Learning takes time to crystallize.
All you are doing when you take breaks is enjoying the benefits of the training you did before you took the break.

If you keep rolling, for the most part, this should happen anyway. 2 weeks later you start hitting stuff you drilled 2 weeks ago.

Its not because you took a break. The same thing would happen if you kept going.

It just feels different because you took a break.

If you drop your training long term, this sensation will fade. As you wont have this wealth of prior learning and practice constantly crystallizing to pull on.

In saying that, I think that one does need period breaks in learning to allow you to temporarily strip back bad habit, to act more more consciously and to therefore improve the quality of the habits you are forming. This is very important in all learning, but this is much more easily underdone than overdone.

p.s. it happens learning everything. Even languages. but total immersion is the best way to learn. But when you take a break for a year, your skills actually do improve on the break.
As the knowledge crystallizes in your brain.
Not as much as if you'd been practicing, but they do improve (once you reacclimatize a bit, of course)..

 

[anaconda]

I totally agree that if you are a pro or a high-level competitor then you have the option of building your life around BJJ. I am one of the average folks who leaves for work at 8, comes back at 6 and then has to make it to BJJ and finally come home to a kid and a pregnant wife who both need time and attention. For the commoner, BJJ is a different lifestyle.

In my situation I have to view BJJ as something that I could SUSTAIN for as long as I can without it effecting my job, my family life and social commitments. This is a totally different art than giving something 100%. In my case how many percent I give depends on how many percent is LEFT after I do the REAL thing that my life depends on.

I have the choice of 5 training days. I have tried various combinations. I have tried 5 BJJ days and no conditioning day. This has not benefitted me as much as 3 BJJ days and 2 conditioning days on which I combine weights and cardio. The 3 x 2 split allows for optimum recovery from weights and best recovery from BJJ.

Here no one is saying that my 3 days of BJJ and 2 days of conditioning is BETTER than Rudolfo Viera or Marcelo Garcia. If that was the case then I would be the world champ and I would be choking everyone in panams etc. The point that I can stress from my experience is that the 3 x 2 split enables me to progress and sustain myself in a better way that 5 days BJJ split with no conditioning days. I think that was the premise of the OP and I agree with his conclusion.

It also really depends on what you are trying to accomplish, and what your measurement metric is.

If you are trying to get as good as possible at bjj, I would say use all 5 days for bjj. You will get better in the long run than training 3x per week.

If you want to balance being in as good as shape as possible and being good at bjj, then do what you're doing.

It's all about priorities.