Grapplearts: How to Organize Different Facets of Your Training

[Stephan Kesting]

Hi guys

A few days ago I did a strength and conditioning workout late at
night. I find it impossible to get to sleep right after strenuous
training, so I sat myself down on a treadmill and talked to a video
camera.

I wanted to share something I've noticed that many of the top MMA
fighters, coaches and schools have in common (and also how it applies
to submission grappling and Brazilian jiu-jitsu training).

You can see that late-night talk right here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XBI6SnLwH8

In case you don't have time to watch the video, here is a quick
summary of my main points.

Mixed martial art (MMA) training has three main areas:

1) Striking (typically boxing or kickboxing).
2) Takedowns and clinching (typically freestyle wrestling, Greco-Roman
or judo).
3) Groundfighting (typically Brazilian jiu-jitsu).

To improve in MMA you have to train each of these areas individually
AND blend them together.

Some people training in MMA just want to do full MMA sparring every
time – but I think that’s a big mistake.

It’s my observation that most good MMA fighters, coaches and gyms
combine everything all together (i.e. full MMA sparring) only a couple
of times a week. Most of the time they SEPARATE the sparring into the
different component areas.

By training the disciplines separately you:

1) Work on each discipline separately and find your weaknesses.
2) Improve the quality of your sparring partners.
3) Lessen the chance of injury.

This is also true for high level athletes training in other sports (in
the video I talk specifically about baseball and the decathlon).

Grappling and BJJ are the same, in the sense that they require you to
get good at different techniques, positions and strategies (e.g. guard
passes, submission, pin escapes, submission defense, sidemount
control, etc.).

Following the examples of mixed martial artists and other athletes,
you should train each of these areas with targeted sparring, AND also
mix everything together into free-form sparring sessions.

Take care

Stephan Kesting

P.S. Once again, that late-night chat is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XBI6SnLwH8