Power Lifting VS Circuit Training

This is a question for grapplers particularly BJJ / Ground grapplers. In your experience which type of lifting program has helped your game the most? Power Lifting with explosive low rep strength or endurance based circuit training where you jump from one move to the other? Thanks.

 

That's too open-ended of a question. Whatever a grappler's weaknesses are, one is going to address that weakness better than the other.

Are you weak? Focus on the powerlifts. Is your local muscular endurance poor? Consider circuit training. And so on, for every training modality and every performance parameter.

 

Grappling itself was one of the best conditioning workouts I ever did. Circuit training seems redundant on top of that.

Powerlifting (or just engaging in a program of simple, heavy compound lifts) will efficiently increase your strength in a way typical circuit training will never do.

 

I think it depends on your body type and what you want more than anything.

I'm quite broad and have always planned on joining the military so power lifting is not what I need, so I instead focus on body weight exercises.

 

High tempo sparring is enough conditioning within the realm of BJJ/No-gi as is IMO. Technique and strength strumps technique alone. Do powerlifting ffs.

 

I agree completely. For cardio and strength endurance it's hard to beat rolling hard and drilling at a high intensity level. Fartlekking is good too. But if you're going to do anything outside the academy to get better it's hard to beat powerlifting style training. I've done Starting Strength, 5/3/1, and 5x5s. I've found 5/3/1 to work best for me, in terms of getting stronger but not being so high volume that it interferes with my grappling sessions. But you have to find what works for you, everyone's different. I did get good results from SS I was just tired during BJJ which is to be avoided.

 

You should look into what Eddie Bravo did for his metamoris rematch with Royler. He hadnt competed in forever, was getting on in years, has very little experience with conditioning in general, BUT he was in absolutely fantastic shape for the rematch in a drawn out grueling match. You may have to do a little bit of digging but I attached 2 videos for you. Eddie talks a lot about it in these videos and shows some of it as well. I think he did a ton of swimming sprints as his main conditioning tool but I believe he did circuits as well. Not sure about powerlifting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnKxXN88qUw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF0MpB89ELc

 

I believe both Cael Sanderson and Marcello Garcia agrees with you. Cael says back in college if he wanted to work on conditioning he would always just grab a partner and put in more time of drilling, half speed technique work, and of course a ton of live wrestling. He said aside from that he would throw in some calisthenics when he needed a change of pace. Me personally, I have seen tremendous gains in conditioning by supersetting rounhds of the UBE and the spin bike. Going in different directions and throwing in many different speeds, RPMs, resistance levels etc.

 

First video doesn't show or mention what Bravo did for training.

I'm not watching two and a half hours of the second one to find out what he did to train. And it seems as if you don't know for sure.

But here we are again. The TS asks which is better for one's grappling game -- circuit training or powerlifting. Your answer? Maybe swimming. Why do you bother posting?

 

Powerlifting by far. Grappling is a series of explosive movements followed by brief periods of "minimal" action. It's best to train for the explosive ones by just doing the basic barbell lifts. There is a BIG difference between just moving the barbell and doing it explosively and as hard as you can.

Oly lifts for just lightweight and moving it as powerfully as you can helps too.

 

John Smith (wrestler) is also a big proponent of this. I've heard interviews with his wrestlers at OK State talk about how when he was still competing no one could match his drilling pace. Try doing double legs back and forth with a partner as fast as you can for 3 minutes and tell me it's not as good a workout as circuit training.

 

Having done both with bjj, I'd have to say powerlifting. Makes it a lot easier to stand up in people's guards when you're strong.

 

The more I get into combat sports, MMA, and S&C the more Im starting to settle on a less is more approach. Like what Smith, Cael, Marcello and others are doing. Not less intensity or less work per se, but working smarter in addition to working hard. It kinda makes sense that these guys train this way and have always had insanely good gas tanks. I feel like once you start messing around with too many different training modalities and start using techniques that are too different than what your training for, your just spreading yourself too thin. Look at Sean Sherk, when he really got into caveman training sure he became more beastly than ever and was really impressive when doing caveman training. But there didnt seem to be too much carry over into his fighting endurance and he started getting injured like crazy. Paul McVeigh is a MMA guy and S&C specialist in the UK, he talks a lot about this and has tested it in his own fights.

 

I'm at the 10 month mark with SL 5x5, I'd like to change to a new program.

I've recently become interested in Barbell Circuit Training, but am still a little noobish on the matter. It's basically Crossfit with proper form, and measured forward progression right?

Also could you guys recommend some proven Barbell Circuit programs? My goal is to work on strength, and conditioning all in one training session. Sorry to derail you TS but I don't think my question needed a new thread.

 

Most guys here are going to tell you powerlifting. The consensus is that weight time should be spent getting stronger, and endurance should be improved through endurance work. But I think that's flawed logic, do whatever endurance helps you best, and if that happens to be curcuits fine. Maybe do both? Focus on strength with powerlifting, and endurance with curcuits if you feel its helps.

 

I've found "working strength and conditioning at the same time" to be largely ineffective. You try to do two things at the exact same and wind up doing both poorly, so come fight day you're weak with a poor gas tank.

It's fine to work s&c in the same session, just not at the exact same time. For example, you might be better served by doing your compound lifts, then going and doing some sprints

 

Most of the sports science literature I read says the same. If you're going to train multiple disciplines it should be something like the following order (at least according to Bompa):

• Technical/skill
• Speed/Power
• Strength
• Endurance

However I don't recommend doing BJJ rolling then lifting. Drilling then lifting would work perhaps.

 

Outside of more mat time, 'i've found power lifting type stuff to work the best. I feel like my gas tank is good and strength better than most. I personally don't deviate from my training schedule when comps are coming up, be it Muay 'thai or BJJ. FOr me Ive figured out what works and what dosent.

1: do lots of BJJ/MT
2/3: lift heavy 203x/week
2/3: running frequency6 days a week)

Does me well.

 

This is spot on. Listen to this advice. If you're going to do powerlifting and circuit training/any other conditioning, lift first. If you're going to do any plyos/oly lifting, do those before powerlifting.