Author: thegrapplinglab

The difference between a novice BJJ player and a veteran BJJ player is how much cognitive activity is needed for certain tasks. A beginner will have to dedicate a huge amount of cognition into just simply moving their bodies around, and the left over cognitive energy will have to be used on just understanding what is going on in that moment (what’s the opponent doing? Are they trying to pass my guard? Which way are they going to pass?). A veteran player will be able to put minimal amount of cognitive energy into movement – and will be able to put most of their brain into tactics and strategy (or what they will eat for dinner after class.)

New practitioners will have to engage in cognitive activity in order to process information during each roll – the student must consciously think about what to do and how to do it. During this stage the student will make a lot of mistakes, which is natural and should be expected by both the instructor and the student.  The student will also not be able to identify or fix their mistakes, so the instructor will need to tell them what they’re doing wrong and how to do it right. During this stage of development of a student, instructors must give lots of attention and instruction in order to grow the student into a blue belt.

As the white belt transitions to a blue belt, they will understand the basic objectives of BJJ, and will know a handful of moves to attempt to complete their objectives. When a white belt is transitioning into a blue belt she will be able to associate specific cues (either seeing a familiar position, or feeling a specific motion) with movements required to achieve their goal, whether the goal is to pass guard, sweep, or submit. These specific cues will be instilled through many repetitions and classes.

The blue belt will be able to perform with fewer and smaller errors due to acquiring basic fundamentals and mechanics of a skill, although they will still have much to improve upon. As the student improves through purple, brown, and black they will be faster at associating cues with movements and able to perform automatically.  It will only be after years of training that a practitioner will be able to engage in autonomic execution of maneuvers.

When a beginner is learning how to attack with a triangle choke they might only be able to complete the motion of setting up the choke during drills against a non-resisting partner. The triangle set-up will be formulaic and robotic due to the student only able to consciously following instruction. The beginner will not be able to use the triangle choke during rolling sessions because they have not begun to associate the movement of the opponent with valid entries for the triangle. As the beginner drills and rolls more the beginner will be able to associate cues of the opponent, such as one arm in and one arm out, with entries to the triangle.  After many years of practice, the student will be able to non-consciously understand when they can use a triangle and non-consciously attack since the skill has become automatic.

In order to progress through these stages of development, a student requires many repetitions of movement to find best way of solving each positional motor problem given the infinite number of external conditions one might encounter due to the fact that movements are never reproduced exactly. The student must drill positions and techniques with as many different body types and levels of resistance as possible. These drills must be changed in ways in order to not present themselves the same way twice, as a large component of learning is “The student must also attempt to use the techniques and maneuvers drilled during live rolling sessions in order to experience as many modifications of the skills as possible.  

An instructor must take great care in order to take into consideration the behavior and thought process of a beginner student in order to tailor the instruction, feedback, and practice conditions to suit the student. The instruction portion of class should also be structured in a way to maximize the student’s learning in the shortest amount of time.

In order to teach a beginner BJJ, you must understand how a beginner learns. While some coaches will try to show a 5-10 techniques in a session thinking they are teaching their students, this only serves to overload most practitioners (personally, I have noticed that after 3 moves I start forgetting key details) . As an instructor, you must take into consideration the behavior and thought process of a beginner student in order to tailor the instruction, feedback, and practice conditions to suit the student.

The skill level of different belt colors varies dramatically, for examples competitive blue belts may be able to compete at a similar level as a hobbyist black belt. This is due to differences in starting abilities of practitioners and promotions based on mat time. However, in general there are clear distinctions between lower and higher belts. For our purposes, a lower belt is a white or blue belt and a higher belt is purple and up.

A higher belt is more consistent in their performance. While a lower belts’ performance can fluctuate dramatically day to day, a higher belt will have learned enough to perform similarly well every training session. A higher belt will have more stability in their game, with internal (thoughts, feelings, fatigue) and external factors (humidity, heat, cold) affecting him or her less. A higher belt has more persistent skills, being able to be away from training for months or years and still being able to perform relatively well during training. A higher belt will also have more adaptability, being able to adapt their maneuvers and movements against new opponents and new contexts, and able to improvise techniques. A higher belt will also need to pay less attention to their motor commands and will be able to assign more attention on strategy.

The transition from a lower belt to a higher belt is very slow, with vast improvements in skills and abilities during the early stages of training. The rate of improvement is logarithmic, with the greatest increase in skill occurring at the earlier years. A huge amount of learning occurs during the beginning few months of a person’s BJJ career.

In many gyms students are placed within the already occurring curriculum and are expected to learn along with students who are already learning. This is not optimal for new students as they lack a basis for understanding why techniques or movements are used. The new student will not understand what they are supposed to do or why they are supposed to do something when instructed to do so. In order to jump start a new student’s development, beginners should be informed of the following:
⦁ What the objectives are
⦁ What is allowed to meet the objective
⦁ How to move their bodies in order to meet the objective

BJJ beginners will often find it difficult to learn the motor skills in BJJ, such as sprawling, hip bumping, and break falls. Learning submissions and sweeps may seem incredibly difficult, and executing these moves during rolling may seem impossible. However, as training time increases executing skills during drilling will become easier, and executing these moves during sparring will become second nature.

A common belief among coaches is that the only way to improve is “mat time,” with many believing in the myth of expertise being obtained after 10,000 hours of mat time. While it is true that students will become better at BJJ as time spent drilling and rolling increases, the total amount of time poorly correlates with skill improvement.

As you train, you will find that there will be dedicated practitioners who will stay as a white belt for many years despite hundreds of hours of mat time accumulated. You will also find the rare individual who will start their BJJ career able to roll competitively with higher belts. This discrepancy between skill level and mat time exists due to the inherent abilities that are possessed by people. If someone has wrestled before they will have a lot of well-developed skills that overlap with BJJ. If someone decides to do BJJ after a lifetime of sedentary behavior, they will have to develop skills from the ground up.

Learning BJJ is hard for everyone, but it will be harder for some than others. However, approaching training and drilling sessions with a scientific approach will allow us to optimize skill learning. Many students are on a limited time schedule and must sacrifice time with their family or performing important job functions in order to attend BJJ classes. It is imperative that classes are structured in a way to optimize skill learning and increasing performance of a student. The goal of an instructor should be to maximize the student’s learning of BJJ. Every warm-up and drill should be structured in order to maximize the learning process of a student. Any part of class that is not catered in a way to help a student progress should be critically evaluated.

Motor control is the process in which humans learn to coordinate their muscles and bodies in order to create a movement. Motor control lays the coordination foundations for movement. Motor learning is the process of learning the actual coordination of specific motor skills. 

The question is this: when do you consider a skill learned? You may have noticed that you can execute a technique during practice against varying degrees of resistance, but won’t be able to execute the same technique during live rolls. After hundreds of repetitions of a technique you still will not be able to execute a technique. Why? Is this a problem with drilling or a problem with learning? In this series I will present ways to improve skill learning and optimize performance. 

BJJ COMPLEXITY

BJJ is one of the most difficult martial arts to learn due to the complexity of movements and strategies involved. During live rolling sessions, two practitioners must try to move and reach their movement goals while their opponent is actively trying to stifle their advancement and achieve their own movement goals. Each practitioner must try to time their movements to take advantage of their opponent’s balance, and to find stability as their opponent tries to destabilize them. Every roll is unique due to the varying anthropometrics of each practitioner (mass, height, limb length) and the near infinite strategies one may adopt for each roll. Each practitioner must understand how to control their opponent by gripping their gi or limbs, or taking advantage of lever points inherent in the human body. 

It is often difficult for new practitioners to become proficient in grappling because most people do not have much experience moving around on the floor after they learned to walk. Other martial arts are much easier to pick up since the basic posture is upright and standing, while the postures for BJJ mostly consists of lying on the ground with your back against the floor or with your front against your opponent. Moving from these positions and postures is extraordinarily difficult for most new practitioners, and you’ll find that many times a beginner will not be able to complete the warm-up section of class – particularly shrimping and crawling sequences. Learning these basic movements will enable a practitioner to quickly improve their BJJ. Once a new practitioner is comfortable with basic movements, they will quickly discover that those basic movements only provide a starting point for more complex movements and actions. The level of complexity in movements quickly increases from basic movements to such movements as inversions and basic gymnastics. 

The other reason BJJ is one of the more difficult martial arts is due to the complexity of the strategy involved in each roll. Every position has many different available movements and maneuvers, and each maneuver will chain off into different maneuvers. Every technique has a counter-technique, and every counter-technique has a counter-counter-technique. All of these strategic choices must be made in real-time while under pressure of an opponent who is actively trying to achieve their own goals. 

No sport consists of a singular skill, but many different skills that are put together to create a game. In team sports such as basketball or football each player is given a position in which they have to learn a set of skills to accomplish the goals of the position. In BJJ however, each player must learn the skillsets required for every position. Each student must learn the movements and techniques associated with every position of the sport and become a threat in as many positions as possible.