BJJ Limbo

I've been training consistently for a little over five years and am a blue belt. I used to train about three times a week, but lately have been making it four or five nights. While I feel like I am progressing, I also can't seem to get over this "hump." At my old gym I was fortunate to be able to roll with higher belts, including a couple of black belts, on a regular basis. At my current gym, at times I feel relegated to training with only blue belts as a lot of the higher belts seem to only train with each other. I feel like I am able to compete with, if not dominate, most blue belts I roll with. I mean this in the sense of regularly submitting or at worse, maintaining dominant position over most guys my level in the gym. Before it gets said, I'm not the guy that keeps score at the gym, but I do feel that how you match up with guys your level and above is one of the few litmus tests of progression in a sport where you're consistently testing yourself against other competitors.

My problem is that as soon as I roll with a guy purple belt or above, I almost immediately get put in my place. While there are exceptions to this rule, it seems like any time I roll with someone of a higher rank, I get pretty soundly smoked. I understand that obviously these guys are better than me and probably "should" be beating me, but how do I begin to make the progression towards that higher level? I know "train more" is always the answer, and I have been trying to train as often as possible, but I'm interested in how people have broken out of their respective plateaus. Do you think it's better to train more with guys my level and try and refine my game from there, or pursue guys better than me as often as possible and let them beat the flaws out of my game? I almost feel like it is partly a mental thing, as I feel myself playing a tighter more defensive game when rolling with these guys and as a result I'm stifling my development when I roll with them. Or maybe I'm just nuts.

Anyway, I'd love to get some feedback on how guys were able to reach that next level and really begin to open up and develop their games, and what percentage you feel should be focused on training with higher belts vs guys at your level.

Remember that those higher belts are also improving. Sometimes we think that we should be catching up higher belts, but they're also getting better - sometimes that "gap" is maintained. You might be in fact be getting close to purple, but the purples are might be closing in on their browns.

James

You have to train with Not only people your level and above you need to train with noobs too. That way you can work on different things and bring them into your overall game. You won't progress as well if you only train with blue belts and occasionally a purple as you will of you train with whites blue purples browns and blacks.

Next time it's time to spar go with say a purple 1st then a blue then a white. Make an effort to train with different people. Also work parts of your game like bottom mount or give up your back to escape in every round or something along these lines. Only go for armlock from side control or only collar choke from full guard and force yourself to work to these positions and submissions.

By limiting yourself you will see a lot more other stuff that you can work on later Phone Post

If you spend all your time maintaining dominate positions with guys you're better than... How are you growing your bottom positions? You're going to need those positions to deal with the guys better than you.

Thanks for posting this. I am also exactly in the same predicament. Some people in the gym have told me that they believe I psych my self out when I roll with the purple's. It seems that when I roll with these guys, I believe that there is no way I can hang with them and go into a defensive shell. What we have to realize is that these purple belts are training at the same rate as we are. Thus they are improving along the same lines as us.

Meh. Im running close to 6 years now.

I always tend to be one of the most senior ranked of the class.

Im a purp.

The people in your gym are your R&D. I prefer to roll with the blues actually because they tend to be less spazzstastic than the white. And the higher up always seem to have a bone to pick.

I compete often enough so i dont really care much for 'pride' in the gym. If people use me as a metric, so much the better.

Anyways, obviously if you go all out it becomes ridiculously boring. But you want to create scenarios.

Obviously you can focus on technical offensive sequences.
You can play the rape victim and focus on securing a defensive posture or defensive sequences.
You can play with the time. Example youre losing 0-6 and you leave yourselve 20 secs to execute the turn around.
You can work on rythm. ( pumping techniques at a constant rate)
You can work on these "oh shit" moments. The little moments when you know youre about to lose the position and you need to think fast.
And then theres the what the fuck moments, when you just nullify his offenses or defenses not outright for the guy to reset to a neutral position, but him to progress to his next step in his technical sequence. Sometimes i get surprised by the next step.
etc...

Strange enough you can work on sequences religiously and people defend them in the gym because they learned how. But in a competition, youve better chances of a higher guy getting caught into it than a lower guy in your gym.

For example, in one of my offensive sequences ive got a brabo choke from the closed guard somewhere. And its pretty damn low percentage with the blues. And never got anywhere close to a guy my rank or higher with it. In competition, the guy just falls into it. I was like ' holy shit you must be kidding me'.

Anyways be creative.

Veek - Meh. Im running close to 6 years now.

I always tend to be one of the most senior ranked of the class.

Im a purp.

The people in your gym are your R&D. I prefer to roll with the blues actually because they tend to be less spazzstastic than the white. And the higher up always seem to have a bone to pick.

I compete often enough so i dont really care much for 'pride' in the gym. If people use me as a metric, so much the better.

Anyways, obviously if you go all out it becomes ridiculously boring. But you want to create scenarios.

Obviously you can focus on technical offensive sequences.
You can play the rape victim and focus on securing a defensive posture or defensive sequences.
You can play with the time. Example youre losing 0-6 and you leave yourselve 20 secs to execute the turn around.
You can work on rythm. ( pumping techniques at a constant rate)
You can work on these "oh shit" moments. The little moments when you know youre about to lose the position and you need to think fast.
And then theres the what the fuck moments, when you just nullify his offenses or defenses not outright for the guy to reset to a neutral position, but him to progress to his next step in his technical sequence. Sometimes i get surprised by the next step.
etc...

Strange enough you can work on sequences religiously and people defend them in the gym because they learned how. But in a competition, youve better chances of a higher guy getting caught into it than a lower guy in your gym.

For example, in one of my offensive sequences ive got a brabo choke from the closed guard somewhere. And its pretty damn low percentage with the blues. And never got anywhere close to a guy my rank or higher with it. In competition, the guy just falls into it. I was like ' holy shit you must be kidding me'.

Anyways be creative.



Good advise and good post

That's a long time to be consistently training and still be a blue belt...Maybe it's your approach to learning bjj. Think of it as a workflow or business process that needs improvement. As you role you want your specific techniques to be executed via muscle memory, but you do want to evaluate what you are doing. At what point in a roll did things start to go down the wrong path? What should you do to avoid or counter that? etc.

Higher level guys prob aren't even letting you get to the point where a move could work..Then you either need to force it b/c that's your game or you never get a chance to even force it.

A lot of this ends up coming right back to basics about grip, posture, letting the other guy get pants grips on you, staying on your back when you should be sitting up, etc.

Have you ever taken vids of yourself rolling and posted for feedback?

What has been helping me lately against people that are more skillful than me is taking the things that either work against those guys, or the things that almost work against those guys and drilling the hell out of what happens before, during and after those positions/transitions.

For example, there's one guy who gets the over/under pass on me constantly. Been happening for years. However, once he passes, I can sometimes get back to half guard and I'm able to get close to taking the back from deep half guard from there. So now when I drill, I'm focusing on getting to Deep half guard from the most common places I end up with him and drilling fast transitions from there to the back.

I'm also drilling a dragging move that I was able to use from over/under to get to the crucifix position. Drilling getting to the crucifix or top of turtle, then transitioning to back attacks from there.

Then, I go back and try the things i drilled on him again. I then break down what worked, what didn't work and what almost worked and go back to drilling from there. I also watch a lot of footage of the most successful competitive Black belts and study how they deal with the same situations, if there's footage of that available. Watch, study, drill, apply, study, drill, apply, etc....

mrgoodarmbar - That's a long time to be consistently training and still be a blue belt...Maybe it's your approach to learning bjj. Think of it as a workflow or business process that needs improvement. As you role you want your specific techniques to be executed via muscle memory, but you do want to evaluate what you are doing. At what point in a roll did things start to go down the wrong path? What should you do to avoid or counter that? etc.

Higher level guys prob aren't even letting you get to the point where a move could work..Then you either need to force it b/c that's your game or you never get a chance to even force it.

A lot of this ends up coming right back to basics about grip, posture, letting the other guy get pants grips on you, staying on your back when you should be sitting up, etc.

Have you ever taken vids of yourself rolling and posted for feedback?

Easy there pal it took me 6 years ti get my purple Phone Post

Baroquen Record - 
mrgoodarmbar - That's a long time to be consistently training and still be a blue belt...Maybe it's your approach to learning bjj. Think of it as a workflow or business process that needs improvement. As you role you want your specific techniques to be executed via muscle memory, but you do want to evaluate what you are doing. At what point in a roll did things start to go down the wrong path? What should you do to avoid or counter that? etc.

Higher level guys prob aren't even letting you get to the point where a move could work..Then you either need to force it b/c that's your game or you never get a chance to even force it.

A lot of this ends up coming right back to basics about grip, posture, letting the other guy get pants grips on you, staying on your back when you should be sitting up, etc.

Have you ever taken vids of yourself rolling and posted for feedback?
Easy there pal it took me 6 years ti get my purple <img src="/images/phone/apple.png" alt="Phone Post" border="0" style="vertical-align:middle;"/>


Come on man. Some people's journey is even longer. They take time off for whatever but if you've been consistent, 3 now 4/5 times a week. That is a lot to still be blue....
"I've been training consistently for a little over five years and am a blue belt. I used to train about three times a week, but lately have been making it four or five nights."

Not trying to bust chops, but you've got to reconsider your approach, the amount of training is there.

Thank you for all the awesome responses. Working from positions I'm not comfortable in is definitely something I need to focus on. Classes at my academy don't leave much room for drilling, as more focus seems to be on live or positional rolling, but I realized that I can still "drill" a position simply by putting myself there as often as possible over the course of a roll. Thanks again, you've guys have given me some great stuff to think about.

And as far as my rank is concerned, I moved about a year ago and had to switch academies. All of the guys I came up with at my old school have their purples by now. Whether it's the switch that held me back or just my general lack of coordination and athleticism, I don't know. But reevaluating my approach to the game is definitely something I'll have to take into consideration.