5 Exercises To Improve Your Jiu jitsu

Hey ! I’m Bobby Collins. I’m going explain what are the 5 Exercises To Improve Your Jiu jitsu.

Before we get into it, a quick intro about me. I’m a BJJ Brown belt in Fall River, MA and I’ve been a personal trainer for the past 15 years. I run a Strength and conditioning program for Jiu Jitsu athletes and Enthusiasts. If you like to lean more about that program, you can go here

5 Exercises To Improve Your Jiu jitsu

Fundamental vs specific Training

When it comes to training in the weight room. We want to work fundamental/general strength and conditioning.

Specific sport training for BJJ is a waste of time.

The intensity, the quality of movements will never be enough to actually see a transfer over to Jiu jitsu.

You instead want to build a big base of quality movments, as well as develop strength, power and muscular endurance through these fundamental movments.

Then as you do BJJ, you’ll be able to increase your performance on the mat, pick up new techniques much quicker and be dominant on the mat. BJJ is where you’ll build the specific strength . The weight room is where you lay the foundation for that.

Specific training although seem to make sense on the outside, is a waste of time.

We don’t want to make our strength exercise to look like Jiu jitsu, bust instead look at Jiu jitsu .

Develop the broad movements and qualities we need for jiu jitsu. This is where, the 5 Exercises To Improve Your Jiu jitsu come in.

I talk about this concept in this article too, if you like to check it out.

Movements in BJJ Aren’t So Different

Something , I hear often is how different the moves from BJJ are to other sports.

I have to strongly disagree …

If you look at the basic movement of humans , which repeat them self in life and almost all sports.

They are squat, hinge, single leg , upper push and upper pull, as well locomotive.

These movements happens constantly in BJJ. I’ve actually made a few videos pointing , some of them out.

A few ones that come to mind.

Guard is basically a squat pattern, lying down.

Collar and sleeve is really a 1 Arm Row.

Take down is a single leg pattern.

Arm Bar is hip hinge like hip thrust.

If you were to train the 5 major patterns at least 2x a week. You probably see major improvements in your BJJ performance and get banged up a less.

5 Fundamental Movements

Now, that we know how important the basic movement patterns are.

Let’s go over them. You’ve probably heard some of them.

Squat pattern. This when you bend at the hips and knees fully. There are many different squats. It’s important to figure out, what the best one is for you.

Upper push pattern. This is any exercise where you push something away from you . Example: pressing, dips and push ups.

Hip hinge Pattern. This is where you move mainly through the hips. This will target your hamstring, glutes and lower back mainly. Things like RDL variations, back extension, hip thrusters , KB swings etc

Upper Pull Pattern. This is anything, where I pull something towards our self. Think of things like rows, pull downs and chin ups.

Single leg pattern. This is where we do strength exercise on 1 leg at a time. Think of things like split squats, lunges, step ups, single leg squats and single stance exercise.

In the next part, we are going to over, how to pick the right variations for each moments.

5 Exercises To Improve Your Jiu jitsu Movement pyramid (no exercise is A requirements)

Now, that we have the movements broken down. Their are skills to each one of these moves. Based on your ability to move, mobility issues and training history. Should determine, where you should start.

For example a brand new person should never start with a back squat or if your shoulders are junk. The back squat might just be bad variation for you.

For each movement , I’ll go over how I start people and progress people.

The squat

Body weight>Goblet Squat>Zercher squat>Front squat>Safety bar squat>Back squat

Hip Hinge

Body weight>MB/DB good morning>DB RDL>KB deadlifts>Trap bar deadlifts/RDL>sumo deadlifts>Regular deadlifts

Single Leg

Step up>split squat>Reverse lunge>Bulgarian split squat>Forward lunge>Side lunge

Upper Push

Push ups>Landmine Presses> DB Floor Presses>DB Incline Press> BB Bench

Upper Pull

Seated Rows>Ring rows> Bench Rows>1 arm Rows>Lat pull downs>Bent over rows> Chin ups/pull ups

This is usually how I progress these, but based on how my clients come to me , we may start in the middle and jump on around as needed.

The basic idea you will see is we start we variations that are:

• Easy to learn.
• Start from a very stable position.
• Will ingrain good movement mechanics, that will lay the foundation.

Another thing is if we do a movement, that doesn’t go well. Say, that we struggle with or causing some pain.

We will regress the pattern, until we can do it well and do it pain free. Then by getting strong at that movement, it will help us progress later.

Movement variation consideration for Jiu jitsu

When it comes to movements variation for Jiu-jitsu , I think of two things

1. Variations that reduce the damage BJJ does. For example our spine is often rounded in BJJ, doing exercises to open extend the spine and upper back. Will Help reverse some of the damage done by staying in one kind of position so much.
2. Variations that help develop area of strength, that are needed in BJJ

If we can build strength and muscle around the places that often get hurt. We improve our chances of staying healthy. To me those areas are : the shoulders, knees, lower back and elbows.

So we want add movements that will get these areas strong and resilient.

Then we want think about BJJ and what we need .

We want strong posture muscles, so our posture can’t be broken so easily. So it makes, since to build the upper back. I also like to do lower body variations that train a strong upper back posture like Zercher variation and heavy RDLs.

BJJ is a lot of pulling, so it makes since bias a lot pulling exercise like different row, pulldowns and chin up variations.

Many submission are finished by use of our hamstring, glutes and adductors. Doing movements that strengthen those areas like RDL Variations, hip thrusters , and back extension make a lot of sense.

Here are some of my favorite varations for each movement type.

Squat

Zercher Box squat

Safety bar squat

KB Squat

Front Squat

Hip hinge

Trap bar deadlift

Sumo deadlift

RDL varations

Back extensions

Hip thruster

Single leg vartion

Steps ups

Sid elunges to box

Bulgarian split squats

Sled dragging

Upper push varation

Landmine press vartion

DB Inlicne Press

Ring push ups

Weighted push ups

Cable Presses

Upper Pull varation

Ring Rows

Seated Rows

T-bar suproted Row

1 arm DB row

Bent over row

Neutral grip pulldowns and chin ups

Hopefully, you realize the importance of building your strength and conditioning program around the 5 fundamental movement patterns.

If you want to get strong and explosive for BJJ, be sure to check out my coaching program below