Any med students that train BJJ?

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I'm heavily considering medical school now that I've just graduated from college. One of my big concerns about it is whether or not I'll have any time whatsoever to train (even if it's just 1-2x a week, max). I was just wondering if there were any med students or even doctors around here that have been able to pull off some sort of BJJ/MMA training (not necessarily for comps, but leisure).
 
I don't think she starts for a couple of months. I could be wrong though. I saw an ad of Hillary's saying she's getting ready for med school and is traveling around doing seminars before she goes in (perhaps its an old ad, not sure).
 
Graduate school > BJJ; don't let BJJ dictate whether or not you go to med school, work BJJ around med school and not med school around BJJ.

To answer your question, I have met guys in med school who train BJJ, but they definitely don't make every class.
 
AboveThisFire said:
Graduate school > BJJ; don't let BJJ dictate whether or not you go to med school, work BJJ around med school and not med school around BJJ.

To answer your question, I have met guys in med school who train BJJ, but they definitely don't make every class.
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Well, it's not like I'm not going to go if I can't train, but I'm also deciding between med school and PT school. I have a lot of concerns with both avenues (such as time with patients and scope of practice) but I just wanted to know if med students here had time to train even with the heavy courseload.
 
My wife had time for martial arts during med school, no problem. It's residency where I couldn't have imagined her training much (she stopped when we moved for residency anyway, but I don't see how she could have put much time in). Most residents struggle to keep under the 80 hour work week limit, often lying about it when they go over so they don't get their program in trouble.

That being said, I'd love to see more docs involved in BJJ. While I've met pre-med/med school types that do it, I don't know any docs active in BJJ. (Not that I know a lot of people...)
 
I'm a 3rd year medical student right now. During your first 2 years, you will be able to train a fair amount (I probably averaged 3x/week), as long as you have good time management and get all of your studying done. The tricky part is the last 2 years, which is much more like residency, in that you spend the vast majority of your time in the hospital, basically working. How much you are working depends upon which particular rotation you are, with some worse than others. However, you don't really have much of a say in your schedule and when you get to leave, and the long hours make it much more difficult to find time for the gym. Often, you might have some free time but your gym/team won't have practice that morning, night, etc. On top of all that, you still have to study of course.


Cliff notes: Yes, you can train BJJ/MMA in medical school, but I wouldn't plan on making a run at the Mundials. It's hard, and you're very busy.

PS Medical School is AWESOME. Seriously.
 
Yeah I'm a med student currently training twice a week. Could probably manage more but I don't think I'd get away with 5 times a week. As long as the classes are in the evening can't see why it would be an issue.
 
You can definitely fit in BJJ in pre-clinical years 1-2 and as a 4th yr, 3rd year will be VERY difficult given your workload. Prioritize keeping up with extracurriculars like BJJ which can preserve your sanity during your medical training. Good luck future Dr.
 
I will be doing a B.Sc. in Biology next year and I want to join BJJ. My main concern was time. Glad to see that people in med school can fit in 3 classes a week.
 
You will definetly have time to train in med school. I'm currently an intern and still managing to train 2-3 times per week (though I am in an extremely easy program). Just make it a priority to set aside several hours a week for bjj; having a hobby will help maintain your sanity. I trained roughly twice a week throughout med school without any problems.
 
Heya. I'm doing my internship [year 6 of 6 year course :D] at the moment, but still managing to train 3-4 times a week.
Does help if you have a flexible gym/club with different sessions you can turn up to.

On a side note, anyone know of reasonable cheap and safe accommodation in Torrance area or halfway between UCLA main campus and Torrance ?
Am heading to California in 2 months to do a medical elective and hopefully boost my bjj training. We only have like 3 blackbelts in my whole country [new Zealand]. lol.
 
FirstNobleTruth said:
.

PS Medical School is AWESOME. Seriously.
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Wait until internship, I bet your tune changes with the quickness.

Residency will be the time you will really have difficulty training. I am just now regaining the time to attend class 1-2x per week as I am a senior resident and my schedule reflects that. However, there are still several months where my clinical duties don't allow time to train.

Couple that with a wife and family and it can get really tough. You may not be able to train as much as you'd like, or even at all for a time, but you make do.
 
don't doctors cherish their hands or something?
 
bora y said:
don't doctors cherish their hands or something?
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My feeling is the moment I begin to worry about my hands, injury will ensue (ie: bringing it on yourself). If I use sound technique, my hands should not suffer at all and haven't yet. Don't know about the others, although I am not a surgeon, thankfully.
 
As far as med school, I agree with the previous posters with some exceptions. Anyone smart enough and with a strong enough work ethic to get in to med school can certainly find the time to train although not as frequently as in college. And while technically you have more "free time" in the first 2 years, in reality if you want to be at the top of your class you will spend the majority of that "free time " hunkered down with books.

If your goal is to go into a less competitive specialty then this is unnecessary but if you even think that you may want to go into ortho, derm, optho or any surgical subspecialty then I hope you can deal with hitting the books 5-7 hours a day. I suppose there are those who can rank at the top of their class with less time but I certainly wasn't one of them and don't know of anyone else in my class who was.

Depending on what field you choose, residency can range from "kind of hard" to "soul-crushing-sleep-deprivation-hell-I-just-want-to-quit-and-what-was-I-thinking hard". Not much time to train during the latter.

I chose to go into Emergency Medicine and have been in practice for 10 years. While there are certainly many downsides to the field (night shifts, drug seekers, complete idiots who call the rescue squad for dental pain) on the whole its interesting, pays well and affords more free time then most specialties. Anyway, I hope that puts things into perspective for you. If you want to know more just PM me and I'll be happy to share my experience with you. Good luck.
 
driftz said:
Heya. I'm doing my internship [year 6 of 6 year course :D] at the moment, but still managing to train 3-4 times a week.
Does help if you have a flexible gym/club with different sessions you can turn up to.

On a side note, anyone know of reasonable cheap and safe accommodation in Torrance area or halfway between UCLA main campus and Torrance ?
Am heading to California in 2 months to do a medical elective and hopefully boost my bjj training. We only have like 3 blackbelts in my whole country [new Zealand]. lol.
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Try one of the many shuttle buses around the area my friend.

And will you be staying in Westwood?

If so, i highly recommend training at Robot Jiu Jitsu, which is about 1.5miles from UCLA's campus. Black Belt instructor Tim Peterson is a very talented instructor and competitor.

There is also the Rickson Academy not far from UCLA as well.
 
SexPanther said:
Wait until internship, I bet your tune changes with the quickness.

Residency will be the time you will really have difficulty training. I am just now regaining the time to attend class 1-2x per week as I am a senior resident and my schedule reflects that. However, there are still several months where my clinical duties don't allow time to train.

Couple that with a wife and family and it can get really tough. You may not be able to train as much as you'd like, or even at all for a time, but you make do.
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I'm sure. There's days I hate my life as is. But, I think "the juice is worth the squeeze."
 
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