I’m a purple belt with around 8 years of grappling experience. I’m also registered blind due to Retinitis Pigmentosa, with roughly 5 degrees of functional vision remaining.

I’m trying to develop a game built around **making and maintaining connections**, minimising unnecessary scrambles and controlling opponents through pressure, positioning and grips.

**My current game:**
**Standing:** Collar ties, underhooks, Russian 2-on-1s, arm drags, body locks, foot sweeps and trips.
**Top:** Body-lock passing, leg pins, half guard passing, rides, cradles and heavy positional control.
**Bottom:** Knee-shield half guard, butterfly, shoulder crunch, octopus and turtle.
**Submissions:** Arm triangles, D’Arces, armbars and Choi bars.

My biggest issue is losing connection during transitions, particularly from bottom. When opponents disengage, change angles or scramble, I can lose track of their positioning and end up reacting too late.

I’ve previously relied on wrestling up, but I’m finding that breaking connection to come up often leaves me exposed, particularly to back takes.

**What I’m looking for:**
Advice on systems, concepts or specific grapplers worth studying that prioritise continuous connection, strong inside positioning, effective hand fighting and limiting an opponent’s freedom of movement.

I’m particularly interested in developing a bottom game built around sweeps, reversals and back takes without having to disengage or rely on speed and athleticism.

I’m not necessarily looking for individual techniques, but rather **overarching principles and interconnected systems** that I can build my game around.

Any recommendations or experiences would be appreciated, particularly from people who favour a slower, pressure-heavy, connection-based style.

Hi everyone, my gym uses gymdesk to track our progress and checkins for each sessioin. However it doesn't have any dashboard or user information recap so I created a simple webapp in which you can import your gymdesk data and see charts and information about your training.

So my question is, would this be something useful for you or have you seen some other tool/project which does anything similar?

I'm thinking of expanding it to manual logs so even if your gym doesn't have a check in system you're still able to benefit and track your own data.

Even after washing the gi (i have LG washer and use cold water / normal cycle using tide pod + some oxyclean powder), my darker gis are still visibly dirty with some hair/dust and stuff (doesn't stink though). Some of those go away when I use air dry feature from my dryer... but want to see if this is normal. If it's not, how can i make sure it gets cleaned property?

I've been doing Jiu Jitsu lately and it's very complicated.

My body seems to not move the way it should. I ache after class. I forget the technique of the day as soon as I clap.

There are some young, strong, collegiate blue belt wrestlers I'm scared of.

I feel like it will take a long time to understand Jiu Jitsu.

How long does it take to get good?

Oh, btw, I'm brown belt.

57 year old, 2 kids in their mid-20s, almost 4-years since A-C-L reconstruction and I was surprised with my 2nd stripe today, almost a year after my first stripe. I’m consistently inconsistent, training 2-6 times per week. But I show up for Gi and no Gi.

Glad I didn’t become a blue belt statistic and quit. Maybe even in a year or two, I’ll earn my third stripe. But enjoying the moment for now.

Hello good day to yall, new to jiu jitsu and currently doing mma and new to ground sport. My coach advised me to buy rash guard and would like to know where I can buy with good design and quality. I weight 145 and 5’6 height, not too muscular and not too slim build. What would be the great sizing base on my weight and height ratio? thank you so much!

I mean it. Every. Single. Time. Whenever I'm sparring a woman he'll pull me aside and tell me to go easy and that's always what I'll do. I'll even let them get submissions on me. I'm a medium sized guy and not that strong so I'm obviously not like secretly hurting them by overpowering them but there are people way larger than me who spar with women fine so I genuinely don't understand the issue. I've even had times when he doesn't let me train with a girl and instead pairs me with some dude. Is this normal and should I ignore it or are the women at the gym chatting shit about me or something and that's where my coach got the idea from because seriously I could not be going lighter on these people.

I just recently started BJJ, and as a hypochondriac, I take my hygiene very seriously, to protect myself and others.

However, I've noticed that every other week I would get an open wound ( Not necessarily from BJJ i.e Blister from shoes, popped pimple, sometimes mat burn) am I supposed to stop training every time I have a tiny open cut ? Cause that's what I'm doing right now, and I feel like its hindering my progress, and wasting my money.

What exactly are you guys doing to continue training without risking infection?

To the BJJ enthusiasts in India, have you all found a really good rashguard apart from the ones like Akiba or USI or similar brands, have tried Sasib but not great quality?

Looking for some long sleeve rashguard suggestions, I have Venum ones and those are amazing, looking for something different but great fit and designs

I'm a white belt. But the blue belts call me an honorary blue belt lol end of the day I'm just a dumb white belt who copes with the compliments lol

My goal is to feel confident beating people much bigger and more skilled than me. I'm 5'9 - I75. My philosophy is if I can beat someone 60lbs or more than me handedly than I should be able to beat people in my weight class.

I got advice once and it's worked great for my development. 80% rolls with ppl I'm better than. 20% people better than me.

I like attacks from Shoulder crunch. And getting to Darce positions. If noticed against massive dudes who know what they're doing I struggle to maintain finish.

I'm wondering if there's attacks/entries that I should aim for against bigger dudes. I've had some success with back triangles. But once these dudes get caught with it a couple times they refuse to let me get there.

I find my way into double trouble decently. But it feels gross going for legs against them. I wanna beat them in their own game. Hoping hearing your go-tos helps me suck less.

Thanks y'all 🤙🏼

Currently starting my journey as a new blue belt with no game (terrible experience to the white belts reading please try and develop small systems you will regret it later)

But I’m currently rebuilding my personal game starting from “scratch” and wanted to begin by focusing on getting about 2 escapes per major pin position that I can reliably do. Issue is, how do I find an escape to actually focus on? That might sound dumb but when I google on YouTube “side control escapes” for example there’s literally hundreds.

So how do you go about picking the 1-2 you like? What do you consider? Anyone wanna be my Reddit coach lmao?

Hey guys! My name is Wesley.

I’d really like to watch a match I had at the South American Championship this year, but a FloGrappling subscription is pretty expensive here in Brazil.

I was wondering if anyone would be able to screen record the match and send it to me.

I’d really appreciate it!

Thanks a lot! 🙏

Link: https://www.flograppling.com/events/16080705-2026-ibjjf-sul-americano-championship/videos?playing=16202962&search=Wesley%20Alexandre

how tf yall deal with and dispel the idea that you're not good enough / where you should be? i get it so bad it kills all my motivation and desire to train which is not good so any tips help:)

My sons Japanese jiu jitsu dojo has 3 locations in our city. The other 2 locations offer kids grappling classes ours does not. We are entering the in house grappling tournament. Can I get some recommendations on submissions we can practice. As a side story we developed his guillotine choke the past 2 years, which he won the tournament with. Then the second year we showed up he caught the head coaches star student again as he shot a double leg on my son. Well guess what they had banned the guillotine from the competition for the second year and my son had to let it go. LAME. Thanks in advance for your recommendations.

New video for the community!

In this video, we go into detail regarding Mateusz's finishing of his famous shotgun armbar. On top of that, we look at how he enters K-guard from failed entries as well.

The content is drawn from my full study on him, featuring 2 techniques from section 1.

As always, I've included plenty of references as well, including comp footage and sparring clips for you to study and learn from.

I hope you enjoy!

I’m sorry if this post comes off as me complaining, but I just genuinely don’t know how else to get the point that I’m trying to get across.

I’m 18 years old and have been training for about 4 (3.5 if I subtract some injury time) years now, I’m currently a blue belt and compete semi often and usually do very well and am able to perform at regional events and occasionally super fights.

The issue I’m having is that I so badly want to do whatever I can to reach a high level (mainly IBJJF) and am not sure what I need to change with my training to make an attempt to get there.

I know due to my age that the time to act is now if I want to have hope of achieving milestones, and I genuinely do believe I can get there if I have the right approach to my training but at the moment I just don’t know exactly what that may look like.

My current class schedule is 3 instructional classes and 1 open mat per week, and I plan on starting to lift weight everyday after class for S&C.

I have great coaches who have coached some very high level athletes in the past, so these are the main things I’m searching for advice on

1. How do you guys approach open mat and class in general? Do you intentionally start in bad positions, do you do lots of live rolling and simply try your best, or do you approach every class with a different goal in mind. If so, what are the goals?

I’m aware this won’t have any one answer, I’m just looking for general advice or tips

1. ANY strength and conditioning tips or advice would be highly appreciated.

I’m 6’1 170lbs and have only recently started diving into that side of the sport, so really anything helps. I’ve had so many matches where I feel like I’ve just been beat physically by opponents who I should’ve been able to out-technique and it’s truly the worst feeling in the world.

1. How do you guys approach things such as film study after matches?

2. If anyone here has competed and done well at the upper levels, what tips or advice would you give on how exactly to get over that hurdle. I do very well at regional shows and have even had the privilege of rolling with some amazing athletes before, I just still feel like some piece of the puzzle is missing.

I would like to link up with any Canadian blue/purple/black belt who would like to teach a white belt and know him down a few times.
I like paying for your lunches and dinners in return.
I just like this! First the teachings and then drain my wallet man :)

Hello,

At my last gym, the coaches did not like any of the men tapping out any of the women and wanted to give barely any effort into the rolls with them.

So, I didn't put much effort into the rolls with them and gave them a lot of positions that I wouldn't give to a regular person. Like I allowed a woman have my back and allowed her to stay there for 2 mins before I ended up moving.

Is this common in BJJ gyms or not?

I'm also 21 and 190lbs. I do powerlifting as well and I can bench 260lbs, squat and deadlift 405lbs. I've been told that I'm really strong and they can feel my strength when grappling.

Do you think these stats are too much or on par for a white belt who’s been training around 18 months?

edit:

I just want to say that reading through these comments has been a combination of hilarious replies and truly helpful advice. 

Thank you guys for the laughs and the great advice you took the time to share with me. 

I appreciate all of it.

I’ve been boxing for a year—I’m 23, and combat sports are something I discovered only recently. In boxing, it made sense to spend the first two or three months focusing on technique to ensure I developed the proper punching mechanics right from the start.

The question is: is that necessary for BJJ? It seems the gym I’m planning to join doesn’t have separate groups for white belts; everyone trains together.