Bulletproof For BJJ Podcast
Discussions on improving your BJJ, navigating mat-politics and all aspects of the jiu jitsu lifestyle. Multiple weekly episodes for grapplers of any level. Hosted by JT and Joey - Australian jiu jitsu black belts, strength coaches, and creators of Bulletproof For BJJ App. Based out of Sydney, Australia
Bulletproof For BJJ Podcast
Achieving Success In BJJ While Overcoming Life's Obstacles
From the heartland of the sport in São Paulo, to the middle of the US in Missouri, we answer some questions from listeners of all walks of life. How do you maintain progress with life's ever-everchanging circumstances, what to do when you feel yourself transitioning from young calf to old bull, and how to train when you know you becoming injured directly affects your livelihood. You are in for a treat with this QNA episode.
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A good martial artist does not become tense but ready. Essentially, at this point the fight is over.
Speaker 1:So you pretty much flow with the goal.
Speaker 3:Who is worthy to be trusted with the secret to limitless power. I'm ready.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Bulletproof for BJJ podcast. We've got a Q&A episode for you guys. If you want to leave us one of these, go to the website podcast page. Record us a voicemail. First one coming in from Gustavo let's go. Hey, in my mind I'm having a fucking hard guess in from Gustavo. Let's go. Hey, in my mind I'm having a fucking hard guess at where Gustavo comes from, please.
Speaker 1:Hello guys, Gustavo from São Paulo, Brazil, here, Please help me out. I am 30 years old. I've been lifting for a couple of years and a year and a half ago I started training under Mestre Everdão Legar, watch Coab team and amazing team. I always get to roll with people my size, my weight category or higher White color, red and black belts Like there's I could even say there's too many black belts over there.
Speaker 2:Maybe yeah, amazing.
Speaker 1:Like it just helps me keep pushing my game. However, at the end of this year, I'm getting married and moving to countryside. According to the internet, there is a local community site. According to the internet, there is a local community, but, uh, one black belt and mostly kids. Any tips on how to keep evolving my game and also, as a white or perhaps blue belt at the end of the year, how to to help this small community?
Speaker 2:Fucking cool. There you go. Funnily enough, shout out Kohabi, I've been there. Do you know the team he's talking about? Yeah, I went out to Kohabi with Serginho Moraes, who's from there, and also Alex Monsalve, and they did a seminar out there. It was crazy. We did it in this little church hall. It was incredible. So shout it. In this little church hall. It was incredible. So shout out mate. Fuck Gustavo, with the quintessential Brazilian accent. I love it. I looked on the internet.
Speaker 4:It was so good, I love it.
Speaker 2:It's beautiful.
Speaker 4:Thanks for your question.
Speaker 2:The fact that we're getting a call from Sao Paulo is nice.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, that's my jiu-jitsu home, right there.
Speaker 2:So he's moving to the country he's moving to the country, and I mean Kohabi's already pretty far out right.
Speaker 2:And so the challenge here in terms of keeping your learning going when you've gone from a gym that has all these black belts to a smaller gym that might only have one black belt, you just need a senior leader who's great with jiu-jitsu.
Speaker 2:The thing that you do need to do is have a bit of a mission or a plan for yourself. So if you're almost coming up for your blue belt, you've been on white belt for a while, you've got some idea, and I think picking a game that you admire or you love and really working on that and getting as much information as you can on that will be key. And I think another thing that will help you is, when you get the chance, going back to your old gym or going to new other gyms is a way to keep your game evolving, even though there may still be like a good, good jujitsu at the gym you go to, um, you've got to find ways to keep yourself developing. Yeah, um, yeah. So gustavo talks about this gym which we've both encountered in Brazil, with the inverted pyramid, so many black belts.
Speaker 4:Where there's heaps of black belts and then there's like hardly any beginners.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and Gustavo, what I can say confidently is that the majority of jujitsu in Australia is the opposite.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:You have a coach who is a higher belt often black, but not always and then they pick up a group of people that want to start and the team builds from there.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And, like we know, numerous teams that have grown and evolve to be full of savage grapplers and multiple colored belts, multiple black belts, by following this approach, and I really think that it can't be overstated that if you've got one or two people that are passionate and can teach good jujitsu and that they want to share it, that you will build that as well.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2:And so, um, your training is going to change, right, you're not going to be fighting for survival, like you probably are often at your gym now, but it will change. And I think, like JT said, if you've got a bit of a strategy around what you want to get out of it, I think, if you're prepared to like, take that change on and and help to grow the culture in this new town, uh, I think you'll create something special. You know, whatever, maybe it'll be very different from that first year to say the second, third year, so on. Yeah, definitely. And look, there's not always going to be someone your size. You're saying you, you're able to find roles in your own people, your own size. There is value in that, not if you are on the lighter side and you have to roll bigger people, even though I always advocate for you to roll people your own size. This will force you to really work on your technique and your game, and this may force you to actually be better at Jiu-Jitsu, because you don't have as many, even weighted rolls. I actually think it could be a good thing. But, bo Sochi, good luck, my friend.
Speaker 2:Hey, you know what the gym is full of? It's full of people who are messing around on machines and lifting weights and stuff with no real plan about what they're trying to get out of it, and this results in people using the gym for like 12, 18, 24 months and not really getting anything. As a result of that, we have created the Bulletproof for BJJ app so that you do not have to go through this process of no results. The Bulletproof for BJJ app equals instant gains when you start training your strength and flexibility specifically for jujitsu. You can take a two-week free trial right now. All you gotta do is go to the app store, download the Bulletproof for BJJ app and start training. And the best part is JT and I will be there to coach you along the way. And if you don't love it, we offer a 100% money back guarantee. Go get it, we'll see you on the inside Onwards.
Speaker 3:Next one coming in from Dan hey guys, thanks so much for the podcast and for your program, really like the mobility and strength stuff I started doing a few months ago. I'm a purple belt from Missouri in the States. I'm going to be 45 years old this coming year. I started doing BJJ when I was like 38, 39. I've always been fairly athletic, usually doing endurance stuff, and then got hooked on BJJ.
Speaker 3:Here's my question, and it's kind of a mentality question as I'm getting older, I'm not able to keep up with some of the training partners who are younger than me that I've started out with and I know, logically, that this is just part of life and that they're going to start to surpass me and so on, and you know everyone's different as far as their progression. What I'm curious about for you guys, probably being a little bit younger than me but soon facing kind of a similar thing what are your thoughts about staying positive and just kind of like the mentality that you go into training with, knowing that, um, you know, age is coming, there's going to be some things that have to change in the game, and just kind of accepting that, uh, some explosiveness and some speed and some things that you took for granted aren't always going to be there um so yeah, man, I feel it.
Speaker 2:This is poignant. I mean trying to make me cry over here. Fuck you, you can start on this. You're trying to make me fucking angry over here. Bro, you start, joe, look, uh, dan, my view is that, um, you're spot on, I totally feel where you're spot on, I totally feel where you're at and I I, you know I'm I'm in that zone now and have been for some time the we're all going to time out at some point. Yes, we're all going to Peter off physically. You know, like if you just keep drawing the line long enough, it's going to happen, right.
Speaker 2:So the way I see it is, you can refuse to acknowledge that and constantly battle with trying to fight the younger people or trying to fight against your own inadequacies or whatever, through hard-headedness, until the point where you just cannot, and then you get injured. Or then you just get so fed up with jiu-jitsu that you quit, or, like a lot of people who I've seen who up with jiu-jitsu that you quit. Or like a lot of people who I've seen, who still train jiu-jitsu very productively and very effectively at an older age. You can see that that's coming, and then you can change the way you approach your jiu-jitsu. And so, while I'm not saying like that, you know you should still be holding yourself to a standard, but the standards may change. So, as an example, where you might've once just been like I'm going to fucking dominate this guy, you might have to be like this guy's probably going to dominate me unless, like me fighting to not get tapped here, me fighting maybe to move through positions and be comfortable defending that's going to be the win for me today against this guy. And so it's really changing, then, what you're trying to get out of the training. Not that you would do that with everyone, right, and you could adapt your game and all those things but I think that, like changing what it is that you're trying to get out of it is the key in this, in my view. Yeah, and well, I would actually. I agree with Joe, but I want to reframe.
Speaker 2:Based off what you said, it sounds like you're someone who's looked after their fitness, even though you've come to jujitsu later in life. And, yeah, you can definitely feel the difference between someone who's 21 and someone who's 41. But really the difference is life and I don't think the amount of time you spent in your life should other than, say, physical injury. It shouldn't necessarily mean an advantage for the younger person. I feel the advantage for the younger person is they've experienced less loss, less information for them to doubt themselves and they have less responsibility. So they play much more carefree, they play a wilder game, they go for things that you're like, oh, I wouldn't do, that you might hurt yourself. You know, because you've got all this learned information and as somebody you know I'm 42 this year I push back on the idea that, oh, you just got to accept you're not going to be explosive.
Speaker 2:You're not explosive because you don't train to be explosive. Now, speed is the first thing that you lose as an older person, but it's also the acceptance of you're not training to be a certain way. Now you may just not have time. This is, I find, the biggest thing as an adult. The older you get, you generally have more responsibilities. So you can't be doing sprint training and Olympic lifting and fucking all the things right.
Speaker 2:But I would say that if you modify your training not just your jiu-jitsu training, but what you're doing in the gym you do stay younger. We do see this that people who lift weights consistently, they stretch, they do cardiovascular activities, whatever that looks like they are younger on a cellular level. How you think about that is up to you. I have the mentality that I'm going to fuck everyone's day up. That's just me, and it's got nothing to do with age. That's just me because I'm insecure, over-competitive kind of person. I don't care what age a person is. If it's a competitive role, I am absolutely fighting for the win and it's just a frame of mind. So if we're talking about something which is like more psychological, if you want to approach it in a certain way and that works for you, that's great.
Speaker 2:But I think that you don't necessarily have to accept that everything deteriorates Over time. Certain things diminish, but I believe it's more about time and responsibility than it is. Just like you don't necessarily have to accept that because you're older, you're lesser in any way. If anything, I'd say there's a lot more to your advantage than a 21 year old. That's just my take on it. That's fair.
Speaker 2:I don't think he was saying you know that I see myself as any lesser, though it's just like no, but he's saying they're more athletic. That's that's training. Like 21 year old hasn't done your reps 21. Like it's been shown that older athletes are fitter and stronger Old man strength is proven. Tendon and ligament strength takes 10 years, you know. Cardiovascular strength, like endurance, takes two, four, five years, like there's many, many examples of older athletes smoking younger athletes. It's up to you, man, I think, how you want to steer it and shape it. Like Joey said, if you want to approach it in a different way and that's sustainable for you, that's really good. Yeah, I think whatever keeps you in the game is key, but what keeps me in the game is the idea of giving people nightmares. So do what you will with that Next one coming in.
Speaker 4:Hey Joey and JT. It's Justin from New Orleans, louisiana in the US. Shout out.
Speaker 4:Love what y'all do following the program. I'm 42. I've been training for about I don't know a year and a half, two years on the blue belt and one of the things that I'm kind of coming to is, you know, being a little bit older. I come out of the trades, so, you know, not patting myself on the back, but I'm really strong Respect of the trades. So, you know, not patting myself on the back, but a really strong um, I can go to war with these guys who are, you know, 20, 23, 25, 28, whatever they are, but, uh, I can't afford to be injured. Um, you know, I got two little kids and the wife and, and have to have to keep going and do all the things. And I'm trying to figure out, you know, if it's a conversation with the coach who owns the gym or what have you how do I keep doing this thing and keep progressing, keep learning, but also not destroy myself. You know, I, I, uh, I've I've gotten into a few situations where you know'm limping around because I got into a situation and I snapped my heel down and kind of strained the sole of my foot.
Speaker 4:The whole thing is bruised. It's the whole question of are you hurt or are you injured? Right now I'm just hurt. I can still work. It just hurts. So what do you think I ought to do with that? Thanks a lot, okay, so what?
Speaker 2:do you think I ought to do with that? Thanks a lot. Okay, not a dissimilar sort of no, but this question has arisen before, which is we had the conversation about tradespeople being strong, and you know a Q&A episode talking about like stonemasons, yeah, of that on our channel was but what if your income the house above your head, the roof depends on your ability to physically work? Yeah, then the cost is higher. Right, it's a different story, I think for tradespeople, as tough as they are, you cop an armbar or you twist your wrist, you can't work. Yeah, this is a huge challenge In terms of that, because both Joey and I our our work, uh, as as trainers, coaches, different things.
Speaker 2:You have to physically demonstrate a squat. You have to physically demonstrate an overhead position. If you can't, even though people understand oh yeah, you're a jujitsu guy, you also if you can't demonstrate what you've talked about, guy, you also if you can't demonstrate what you've talked about, the respect for what you have to say goes down. Like you, if you can't show a certain ability, now for you it's very. You know you need your body for your work. My advice is that you would reduce your training volume slightly and you have to really choose your training partners, and even elite level people experience this that they can't train with everyone because they need their body for competition, to win money and their reputation. They start to be very selective about who they trust Like training partners that they can go pretty hard with but they know are not going to do some crazy shit and hurt them. So my advice is actually as much as you can talk to your coach, I would slightly reduce your training volume, because I actually think that is a big contributor to injury. Did he indicate what it was? No, uh. And then I would go further and say you need a a kind of tight circle of buddies who you can train with and you trust. I think that's key. Yeah, yeah, feel your situation. I would very actively avoid training with certain people.
Speaker 2:I do this myself. It's just people that I'm like no, no, no, and very new people too, yeah, yeah, and it's actually not thrown shade on any of those people. Sometimes it's what I know happens to my mind when that cunt passes my guard. You know Like it's like oh, there's something about this guy that fucking greats me, and then I sort of I become like A certain way, yeah, like an idiot when we're rolling and I'm like I don't want to go there. It's not good for me and high injury risk, sure. But here's, here's, and I'm just thinking about this more and more, and I and I so I've been coaching a lot lately and over the last year and a bit I've been in my coaching but also in my training, I've been doing a lot more positional sparring and in my mind, positional sparring is way safer than just rolling free. Rolling, yeah, yeah, it way safer and it is a way more effective way to learn jiu-jitsu.
Speaker 4:Would you?
Speaker 2:say it's a constraints-based game. Joey, I would say there are constraints in there. So by virtue of that, yes, I am an ambassador of the ecological approach. Call me Joey Souders.
Speaker 4:I hate.
Speaker 2:Joey Souders, but no, I love Greg Souders.
Speaker 2:And if you're not familiar with that, justin, like it's just like going, hey, I want to start with you on my back and I just want to work my back escapes. Yeah, um, I would actually choose my partners and then I would do a lot more position and you just do that in a row, you just go, bro, can I start in your whatever fucking half guard? Because I'm working on, yeah, dancing motherfuckers from half guard, sure you know, and your train partners will always oblige, because it's like, oh, yeah, cool, yeah, I was gonna start standing, but yeah, let's do it like you got something you want to work on, um way, safer man. And then obviously you have a design, a desk, like a predetermined end point, which is okay. Well, if I pass your guard or if you sweep me, let's restart, yeah, and you can just fucking do that, and I just think it controls things a lot more and it makes the whole game smaller and easier for you to stay controlled with as much as you can control margin of error like lower yeah, tighter, that's great.
Speaker 2:That's such a good good tip for sure. Um, maybe I'd fucking love if you could. Well, you know, maybe, if you take that information, give it a try and come back to us in a couple weeks, man, let us know, either in the comments, message us or send us a follow-up message to let us know how how the approach works. Yeah, and that goes to anyone that leaves us a question, like we always want to know how you receive our advice. You might be like, hey, boys, that's the stupidest fucking thing anyone's ever said to me. Like fine, fair, I tried it. I love to hear it. I broke my spine. Yeah, sorry, I suck, that's what you did Unsubscribe.
Speaker 2:Hey, leave us a voicemail for the next Q&A episode. Go to the website bulletproofofbjjcom, hit the podcast page, record us a voicemail. We you.
