Whatever your age or ability, warm ups are a key part in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and always take part before class. Whether it’s a 10 minute routine to relax and warm up your muscles, or a tiresome half an hour to improve your conditioning and cardio, the point is that everyone does them. Whilst warm ups are universal throughout all BJJ gyms, there are also different types of warm ups and it this is dependent on the tone of the school. This and more will be discussed in more depth below.
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Standard warm ups
Typically a warm up will take around 15 minutes. Some practitioners, especially those who are older may still claim this isn’t enough to truly warm up your body. However, the reality is that 10 minutes is typical in most gyms. With this said, if you are extra cautious about getting a good warm up, then you can always get to the gym ahead of class to make sure you get a warm up suited to your needs.
Anyway, a standard warm up usually requires a few minutes of jogging, forward rolls, shrimps down the mat, technical stand-ups and is then followed yoga stretching. All of these exercises are done relatively quickly and are designed to target all areas of your body. Although most practitioners don’t believe drilling is strenuous, you can still pull muscles if you don’t warm up whilst drilling.
This is particularly more likely during cold weather where your muscles are more prone to getting injured. In brief, a typical warm up is designed to get your blood going and has four main elements; cardio, body weight exercises, dynamic movements and yoga. With these out of the way you should be ready to begin training.
Flow rolling as warm ups
Especially common at open mat, the idea of flow rolling is to help warm you up in a BJJ setting. This should not represent a typical roll and isn’t designed to physically push you. Instead, the idea is to warm up and lightly simulate a BJJ roll. Here, you should allow your partners to sweep and pass you and equally you should do the same to them. If your partner gets greedy and tries to amp up their aggression then you should stop to avoid injury if you aren’t warmed up. Similarly, you should not flow roll with people who cannot be trusted.
Whilst flow rolling won’t provide the benefits of weight training or yoga that most conventional warm ups include, it does have benefits of its own. As it directly mimics your main objective (BJJ sparring), it’s good for your cardio and body movements. Not only this, but you can sometimes throw in new moves and treat it like a drilling session.
Competition class warm ups
One of the main goals of competition class is to simulate a competition setting. With this in mind, flow rolling isn’t done here, nor is the idea to be as technical as possible. Usually, the idea of competition class is to improve your cardio, conditioning and mental spirit. Because of this, competition class warm ups are typically more challenging and brutal compared to a regular class.
For instance, you may find a competition class warm up is closer to 30 minutes. This is designed to really open up your lungs and improve your stamina which is a key aspect of competition. With this said, the warm ups here are often closer to military style training rather than standard BJJ stuff. You can expect to do bear crawls, sprints, burpees and more in these classes. Obviously, the intensity depends on each gym, but these warm ups aren’t for the faint hearted and are usually with more serious competitors in mind. Whilst these warm ups may be gruelling, they are designed to improve your body for competition.
The Kurt Osiander method
Kurt Osiander is undoubtedly a maverick in BJJ and has his own set of beliefs. One of these is to have a very hard warm up which lasts around 30 minutes. In brief, this sounds familiar to the competition class warm up which has been mentioned above. In doing this, the idea from Kurt’s perspective is to tire out his students before training. Whilst you may get a rest whilst drilling, the idea is that when sparring comes around, you’re already tired which forces you to use technique.
Similarly, if you do this warm up enough times, it may go from feeling very tough to feeling somewhat normal. With this done, his students would then have improved their cardio and conditioning to the point of perfection. This style may not be suited to everyone, especially elder people or hobbyists. However, it serves its purpose in building endurance and mental toughness which are key aspects of the art.
Gracie Barra warm ups
Gracie Barra gyms often follow the same template which is carried out throughout the world. For example, one week the syllabus may focus on mount escapes, the next guard passing. Similarly, Gracie Barra has their own version of warm ups. For example, these usually involve a mixture of star jumps, snakes and stretches. Typically lasting 10 minutes, they are similar to most standard gym warm ups and aren’t too intense.
What is unique about these moves is that they are always the same in most Gracie Barra gyms and always follow the same pattern.
10th Planet warm up drills
10th Planet is another large BJJ organization. Like Gracie Barra, 10th Planet has its own unique set of warm ups that are closer to drilling rather than standard warm ups. Usually, these will have a coded reference such as ‘D2’ which will have a set type of moves to drill. This is almost like flow rolling but done by everyone in a drilled setting.
For example, you may begin by sweeping from an open guard, then passing and submitting, only to be reversed and then your opponent does the same on you. Done in a gentle style, the idea is to warm up the body whilst simultaneously improve the fluidity of your technique. On the one hand, this may not increase strength or cardio massively, but it will undoubtedly improve your movement. According to some, this is their preferred way of warming up as it builds repetition into your patterns of movement.
What happens if I don’t warm up?
This has been done many times and is definitely not recommended. Whilst younger, more athletic BJJ players may get away with skipping a warm up, it isn’t ideal. Especially if you jump straight into sparring. For some, this may be a tempting prospect, especially at an open mat. However, for others, it can lead to injuries as your body isn’t warmed up and your muscles are stiff as a result.
Not only this but if you don’t warm up and open your lungs, you may feel lethargic in your first roll. This may sound counterintuitive, but by working up a sweat, it will improve your sparring due to being more fluid whilst also enhancing your cardio. For instance, many competitors will have a decent warm up before competing. The idea is to avoid your inner and outer body from freezing up due to being too static. With this in mind, warm ups are important in all areas of BJJ and can be costly in both performance and injuries if avoided.
Cool downs
After training, you can opt to do a cool down. Whilst many gyms will simply end the class straight after rolling, others have a 5 minute cooling period, or at least the option to if wanted. Typically, older practitioners will use this time to cool down and ease their muscles back to normal. However, many younger people will simply skip this part and head towards the changing rooms.
In short, it’s a good practice to get into, but many people are too lazy or lack the time to do a proper cool down. Unlike warm ups, cool downs are mostly all yoga based. The idea isn’t to work up a sweat or start hitting press-ups. Instead, the idea is to stretch out muscles and avoid stiffness. It would be interesting to see the longevity on the mats of those who do cool downs as it seems good towards your body, but is still ignored by most people.
Warm ups done wrong
Like everything in life, there’s such a thing as doing something wrong and right. To be more precise, the point is you can have efficient warm ups and inefficient ones. For example, some gyms will literally have 10 minutes of jogging in circles. Obviously, this is great for cardio and will work a sweat. However, it isn’t really targetting all areas and is mindless in this sense.
So, whilst jogging is good, it shouldn’t be the only part of warming up. Similarly, you shouldn’t expect to do 200 press ups and that’s it. In other words, a good warm up will have a mixture of all elements including cardio, weights, movements and yoga. If it doesn’t have these aspects, then it’s probably inefficiently done.
Summary
In summary, warm ups differ from gym to gym. Some may do 5 minutes of light cardio and body movements then get straight into drilling, whilst other gyms may dedicate half the classes time to building a BJJ-style warm up. Whatever your beliefs, it’s probably best to find the right option for you. If you want more out of a warm up then show up earlier and do solo drills, but if you want less then you may have to select your teachers wisely.
To conclude, warm ups are an important part of BJJ. In doing warm ups – you basically set up your body for sparring which is a very intense form of exercise, so it’s best to be as prepared as possible. Not only this, but after several months of consistent warm ups, you will improve your overall athleticism and conditioning for BJJ.
