Episode 328: Do you have a special warm up you do before Competing? Do you psyche yourself up or need to calm your nerves? JT & Joey discuss the importance of mobility checks, why elevating body temperature is crucial, and which specific exercises set the stage for victory. This conversation is not just theory; it's a practical guide complete with personal anecdotes and proven strategies that will help both newcomers and veteran grapplers alike. Having your body ready to roll at 100% intensity is a fine balance between not being quite ready because you are holding back and over cooking yourself getting too hyped. Having a well practiced ritual which gets you both physically and mentally in the sweet spot is key to mastering competition performance.
Episode 328: Do you have a special warm up you do before Competing? Do you psyche yourself up or need to calm your nerves? JT & Joey discuss the importance of mobility checks, why elevating body temperature is crucial, and which specific exercises set the stage for victory. This conversation is not just theory; it's a practical guide complete with personal anecdotes and proven strategies that will help both newcomers and veteran grapplers alike. Having your body ready to roll at 100% intensity is a fine balance between not being quite ready because you are holding back and over cooking yourself getting too hyped. Having a well practiced ritual which gets you both physically and mentally in the sweet spot is key to mastering competition performance.
A good martial artist does not become tense, but ready. Essentially, at this point, the fight is over, so you pretty much flow with the goal. Who is worthy to be trusted with the secret to limitless power? I'm ready, man. I'm so pumped because I am hydrated by our good friends at Sodi. Sodi are an Australian brand who are keeping all the best athletes hydrated. Or maybe you're just a thirsty human and you are trying to be a bit less thirsty. This is my favorite flavor. This is salty grapefruit, seriously underrated, very fresh. Now, essentially, we are human walking oceans. We need to have sodium, potassium and magnesium in our blood and that's what these guys have done. So, jason Cale at Sodi, put together this beautiful product, what these guys have done. So, jason Cale at Sodi, put together this beautiful product and you, my friends, can get a discount when you order with the discount code BULLETPROOF15 for 15% off, and you can stay very hydrated. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another Bulletproof for BJJ podcast.
Speaker 1:
Pre-comp warm-up. How do you get your body ready to roll at a competition in a short amount of time? Now this question has come up through our community. One of our people has said I got a comp coming up and last time I went into the comp I wasn't warm. I got absolutely bashed first round and it sucked and I just didn't know what the right thing to do was. To get ready for a competition level role. It's not just a normal role, it's not just showing up training, it's like I've got 10, 15 minutes. How do I do this? Yeah, so I thought it would be a good topic for us to talk on, because I think there's a few boxes that you need to tick when you've only got a limited amount of time.
Speaker 1:
The first tricky part, warming up at a comp, is that the schedule's not all generally not running smooth never and so you might have an idea of when your division starts. And then you get to the bullpen and it's like I'm on you and they're like no, no, come back. Then you're like fuck. So you eventually get there. And then they're like, yeah, yeah, you'll be up soon. And you're like, okay, great, I'll start up. Sometimes soon might be an hour and a half from now. Yeah, that's right. So you really I think you've got to be a little bit flexible on a comp day and know that sometimes you're just not going to get a proper warm-up. Yes, but let's say you're like okay, I think I'm on in like 15 minutes or so. Yeah, what's the process going to be? And I guess you do often.
Speaker 1:
You do, hopefully, get that thing where they're like oh, like you can step into the matted area Now you'll be on after. These guys Like that's letting it know that you're. Uh, that that might know you're here, bro. My number two. Thank you, sir. No, you can adjust it for yourself whatever you want. Jt fucking with the knobs. Your number two. Yes, number one. Thank you. But yeah, so you know. Okay, let's talk about it. Okay, so I'm a bit more of a hype beast, so I need to be a little bit more Slap in the face type deal.
Speaker 1:
But there's three parts to the warm up that I think you need to address. One is you need to do a check. You need to do a joint check. You've got to be like how's my knees, how's my ankles, how's my hips? Because maybe, for whatever reason on that day, you're like oh, left knee's fucking acting up. What's going on there? So you need to actually pay attention to that. So you need to be able to run a check on the body.
Speaker 1:
First stage is mobility, like just getting your body moving so that you know, okay, wrists, elbows, shoulders, neck, everything's good. The way I was analogizing this to a friend of mine who was asking about comp prep was it's like a Formula One car. You know they've got a team of 15 people who come down, they check the tire pressure, they check everything. They just good to go bang, bang and out the gate you go. You need to be able to do that very fast. So, whether it's joint articulations, wrists, elbows, shoulders, hips, neck, you need to just one set of everything doing all the major joints wrists, elbows, shoulders, neck, hips, knees, ankles. So you're like all right, everything's working. Next step is we need to get warm. Now you will always see, always see, people doing a million versions of a jumping jack. Yeah, people love a jumping jack, just the. You know, because this was.
Speaker 1:
Let me just give you a very quick summation of jumping jack history. It comes back in like 1926 or something. A lot of soldiers were destroying their Achilles trying to run in packs. You know, they got a 50 kilo pack on their back in boots in cold conditions. They just go all right, just go Run and they would tear their Achilles. They're like shit, this is no good. We need something to get the blood going, and that's where the jumping jack came in. Okay, now, okay, for lack of a better option, sure, but you have better options, my friends. So what would I encourage you to do?
Speaker 1:
We want to be doing movements that are going to engage your body in a coordinated way. So, for example, doing a lunge with a twist is a really good way to get your ankles, knees, hips, back, all working together. This is one of the movements we use as our warmups in Bulletproof for Biggie J program, because it gets your shoulders engaged, your hips engaged, in a coordinated way that will elevate your body temperature but also prepare your body for action. That's just one movement now. We don't. We're not going to necessarily spell out the whole workout here. We will do a separate video at a later date but what I wanted to say is this you want to practice a coordination you're going to use on the mat. So another thing you might see is people pummeling. They might have a training partner or they're there with their coach. So it's specific to you're going to wrestle, you're going to grapple, yeah, and good to get that. Body-body contact too, yeah, yeah, a little bit of that. It wakes you up whether you're feeling the gi or it's no gi. Whatever it might be, it is specific to what you're doing. Your body temperature is going to come up, but the muscles you want engaged are going to work. I think this is an important piece of this.
Speaker 1:
The next step is if your goal is to play guard or your strategy is to play guard, you need to do a little bit of something off your back. But typically most tournaments don't have a warm-up mat, unless it's like a big comp like an ibjjf, or a big, serious comp like an adcc, where they'll have a warm-up area. Most you're just doing it on wooden floor, fucking basketball stadium. But that's the game, right, that's just what it is, yeah, so you've got to get down on the floor and and do a little bit of leg pummeling and and do a bit of like inversion work. If you don't have a coach with you, you don't have a training partner with you. Doing a little bit of work to to invert and prepare your neck and spine for those movements under no resistance is actually good. Yeah, I'm not endorsing solo drills, just saying but we just want to prepare your body for what's coming next. No, don't do it. Shut the fuck up.
Speaker 1:
It's called a warm-up and then so, first step, mobility. Second, specific movements to elevate the body temperature. Third step engage the nervous system. So you want to do something that is not only going to elevate your heart rate but is also going to excite your nervous system. You need to be awake and ready to go. So, whether that be a hop, a jump, either, like actually shooting, like a wrestling shot, something which is actually dynamic in nature, to get your nervous system explosive. You need that, and if you're not sweating a little bit before you get on the mat, I think you're not ready. Yeah, you do want to try and have that, just that light sweat broken.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I'm with all of that. It's all very adrenaline driven, right. Yes, it's, you're getting very nervous that you approach the bullpen. They're like, oh yeah, you might be up soon, start. And then you're like, oh shit. And then so for me there, I always feel the need to move instantly. Yeah, so I'm doing a lot of hopping, yes, a lot, and a lot of shaking, shaking, and it's, it's really interesting, like if you're feeling, like if you're feeling that kind of rush of nerves which is just your body getting excited, right, yep, shaking and moving is a really effective way to just settle that. Yeah, yeah, so I'll be shaking around.
Speaker 1:
I like big arm swings, big hip swings, like dynamic stuff. So I'm kind of thinking I'm almost thinking at that point like I probably couldn't run a diagnostic on myself because, well, because I got all the adrenaline, so this, I'm like everything feels fucking great, you know what I mean. Like, oh, my bad knees are feeling awesome today, kind of thing. Um, but yeah, like cossacks squatting, just getting blood moving around, yes, and then, yeah, and then I like the specific stuff. I generally I was always really bad with that and I think it's just because I don't know, I don't know why, I just know why I never warmed up with a partner Right, so I never did any like warm-up, gripping or grip breaking and countering and all that kind of stuff. And looking back, I think that would have been really helpful Potentially.
Speaker 1:
Here's a trick I did do once at a comp in Melbourne. Do tell I did. I was warming up with like I was shooting, okay, like shooting like a bunch, because I was just like I need something explosive, right, to get the nervous system excited. Yeah, so I was going to shoot a bunch and I knew that the guy I was competing against, that his coach was watching me and I mean I wasn't doing it for him. I was just aware that he was watching me warm up the psych out and I came out and that guy and armbarred him. It was great. The guy was like all ready for the shot and I was like, oh, boop, straight into like close guard height. It was awesome Psych.
Speaker 1:
So, yeah, you know, like, I think like movement is a really good way to get those nerves out and getting the blood pumping, and that getting the blood pumping is warming you up and helping you break that sweat. Yes, I think it's a must, because if you don't, otherwise you walk out and you're like stiff and cold and and the first couple minutes is your warm-up yeah, then maybe it's too late because you're down on points or you you're fucking submitted by then. You know, yeah, now there is a. There is a small like caveat on this, or maybe it's a huge caveat, depending on how you are as a human, because some of you might need a lot of warming up, some of you might need slapping in the face, but for some of you you'll calm. You seen that at a comp like slapping in the face, yeah, slapping on the back, like it's just, yeah, pain evokes adrenaline, yeah, and that's that's how it goes, like whether you're hitting yourself in the chest. Now, this is something else you should know as a little trick, when you see people like gorillas beating themselves in the chest and this is also something I learned that you should not do to an attacking opponent is shove them in the chest, because when you actually directly strike on the heart, there is some receptors in the heart, because when you actually directly strike on the heart, there is, uh, some receptors in the heart that spark adrenaline. So it's like actually a first aid thing if you don't have, like an epi pen or whatever to do the um, the thump, which is just fist, oh, wow, on the chest, on the heart, because that will actually create a release of adrenaline, wow. So when you could be like turbo charging your opponent, yeah, you don't want to get them more g'd up, or maybe you do, I don't know, but you know, when you see rob whittaker just beating on the heart like he's, he's pumping himself up, you know there are people out there who this will not work for in terms of getting too much adrenaline when I walk out. I like to do this one. Oh, of course you do. It's sick.
Speaker 1:
Step onto the white belt division, but that said, it's not. This isn't so much psyching out your opponent, as joey has done. This is more about you understanding yourself, because you might only need a bit of a warm-up and you're good, like my body's warm, I feel fine, because you want to make sure you're saving the majority of your energy for that role. Because the first role is always super intense. You know, like it doesn't matter who I talk to and at what level, you've got to get that first role done right, because your forearms get super pumped. First match is the hardest. First match is super tough because once you're able to win that, okay, all right. Once you're able to win that, okay, all right.
Speaker 1:
I'm psychologically and physiologically in a good mode. I can keep going now, yeah, but obviously you don't win that first match, your fucking day is probably over, unless you're doing a round robin. But what I want to say is this the psychological side of this is it talks about optimum arousal. I'm not talking about getting your heart on right here. I'm talking about you having peak arousal, the right amount of excitement that you can pay attention and do what you need to do, as opposed to just being like just fucking mad dog and then you can't even focus, like me, on a podcast. Having had five coffees, you know you need to be able to have enough, that you're good, you can operate, but you're not. You're also not too low, because the thing, the thing, not too low, but not too high, too high, yeah, and everybody's different, right.
Speaker 1:
So for you, joey, it sounds like because, from what you mentioned before, I'm a calm guy, yeah, you just show up and you're like I'm good here, yeah, and then you just get on and you do the thing. Yeah, I just, I just want to be not too nervous, yep, and I want to feel like, yep, like kind of body's limber, I'm good and that's it. I want to go into a psychotic rage. That's my zone, that's my place of calm. When I see black and white and I can't hear anything and everything moves in slow-mo. I love it. That's my peak arousal, that's borderline explosion. So what are you doing to get like? So, after you've done, say all that warm-up piece, what are you doing then?
Speaker 1:
For me, music is really important, so this is something they taught us with sports psychology, with Taekwondo, you want to go, you want to play the same music every time. Right, like you have a soundtrack, yeah, Like montage. No, you have the track that you use for this phase of your warm-up, this phase, that phase, and then you need to be listening to the same music every time before you step out, right, and then you know earphones are off and you're zoned and you are literally brainwashing yourself to have this elevated state. Because here's the hardest thing about jiu-jitsu competitions and this is something people don't talk about You've got to do it over and over and over again. So even though, say, compared to a marathon, jiu-jitsu rounds are short, but if you've got to do that five or six times across multiple hours, it's huge. Like it's managing your energy is fucking hard, because you G yourself up, you have this big fucking energy output and then you've got to calm back down and you're going to do it again, yeah, and again, and again, and that's really that's hard to maintain.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I think there's definitely a place for, like, once you've done that and you've gotten through, let's say, a couple of matches, you don't necessarily want to keep doing that, because sometimes then it's like hey, you got, you got like the. The time between matches is getting shorter and shorter. Yeah, you never. And so then it's like just sit down on the side and try to catch some breath. Yeah, drink some water, you don't even need to warm up. Maybe when you hop up it's like do a few squats, jump around just for a moment, yeah, just to like get the blood moving and then step on the difficulty.
Speaker 1:
This is the juggle If do too little, you can cool down and then you start to get stiff or you start to feel the injuries a bit. Yeah, oh shit, I'm not feeling good. Or you eat. You gotta wait for ages, right, maybe there's eating is a bad one. You're like oh, what do I eat? You know, maybe I have a little bite of this music bar, a little meat pie. Yeah, god, that guy's got a bag of snakes. It's all gone. Where did the bag of snakes go? Oh, the other guy took them. Here's hardest thing. We're not going to go into the nutrition side of things. You're so naughty I am Stealing other people's snakes. Hey, man, you offered. You didn't say there was a limit. It's a whole bag of snakes. I'm a grown-ass man. It's a small obese child in a grown-ass man's body. But here's the thing you need to be able to have a repeatable sequence. And so the music piece was part of that was even if you're fatigued, you play the music and that you know triggers you, you're the sleeper agent. Yeah, okay, kill time, because that's the thing for me.
Speaker 1:
I was trying to explain to a friend of ours who is competing in the adcc trials my process, because they were saying they often feel like they're not psyched up enough or they're not engaged enough, and I said I kind of have a low level of contempt. I'm kind of get myself to a point where I'm like why are you? Why do you think you can beat me? I'm here to, I'm here to beat you. If you think you can beat me, you're a fucking idiot. Like there's. There's a level of contempt in there which makes me feel not aggressive, but it makes me feel like I don't like this person. There's a bit of a vibe like I've got to show you this is not a good idea. I'm going to beat you, whereas for a lot of people that's not part of their psychology, they're not even thinking that. So just tell me on that, what would your like? Where would your mind go. Let's say you come out with that and then dude takes you down past your guard side control and you're getting dominated, yeah, do you still maintain that frame of mind? Yeah, pretty similar. Or does it adjust? No, no, no, Definitely no, no, no.
Speaker 1:
Obviously, having a strong psychology is a part of your warm-up, like mentally preparing yourself for a thing is important. You also have to be prepared for when things don't work. Yeah, and that's got nothing to do with physical warm-up, that's being able to maintain your composure. My default mode in my mind is always like, okay, I'm in a bad spot, but as soon as I get out of this, you're fucked Right, like I'm always thinking, thinking I can get out of this, I can do this, and you know, that's probably why I've been choked out so many times. Yeah, right, I can definitely get out of this. You gotta one way or another. I'm getting out, I'm getting out of consciousness.
Speaker 1:
But you know, and I have had a couple of times where, uh, maybe I'd exerted too much energy in earlier matches, hadn't paced myself, get to finals and get fucking smashed, I mean, but that's a hard one, isn't it? Because you almost like hindsight's a beauty, if you don't exert enough energy. You're not making the finals, that's right. What are you going to do, right? Yeah, but there is an efficiency that you have to find for yourself with warm-ups. It's a bit like when we're at the cafe pre-podcast and JT is just like test, running the whole podcast on me and I'm like are you going to be okay for the finals, bro, because I know I'll be showing up? Joey's got me in a mental body triangle. I'm like I can still get out, but no, I think when you're thinking about what you do, the worst thing you can do is not warm up.
Speaker 1:
Going out onto the mat cold this is a problem, yep, and the thing is often jiu-jitsu tournaments are not set up well to. The bullpen is not actually a very conducive area for warming up. No, people have their bags and their drink bottles and people are often buying real estate. People have their bags and their drink bottles and people are occupying real estate. People are pacing up and down, staring you down, like I kind of just get into like a solo rave. I'm just like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. I'm just like big energy, yeah, and then it's only once I go to like your mat officials. Like you're. Next, I'm like, okay, kill mode, fucking matrix music. Yeah, like I, you know I have to go to a place of, uh, intense focus. But that's the thing.
Speaker 1:
If you've never done this before and you're about to go into your first competition, it is worthwhile having two or three moves up your sleeve that, you know, get your body right. And it is a bit different for each person. Yeah, so for me, there always has to be a dynamic jump of some sort. That's the the thing that really gets the nervous system going. There has to be a jiu-jitsu specific thing. Whether it's pummeling or like doing like a leg entanglement or whatever it might be. I have to have that jiu jujitsu specific thing. And then I always do joint articulations. Yeah right, always, always. But yeah, once you've done that, once you've done that first match, you're pretty good. Yeah, so yeah. And then it's just a case of, like trying to stay limber. Yeah, because once you've limbered up, it's there. If you stop doing anything, you'll cool down. But if you're just moving around lightly, like kind of never stop moving, I find that that's super helpful.
Speaker 1:
Actually, one of the wild things I saw actually in Rio many years back, when Adolfo Vieira was a brown belt. He had a huge jumper which had Mary and baby Jesus, sweet baby Jesus, 10-pound baby Jesus, hugeesus, huge, huge thing. Big white hoodie, I think, cut off sleeves so it could go over his, and it's fucking hot. We're in tojuca tennis club, right, it's. It's, uh, it's summer, it's june, july. We're in fucking rio, right, oh my god.
Speaker 1:
And he just stayed warm the whole time. Like the guy didn't cool down, he never stopped sweating. Yeah, right, like, he just kept his gear on and he would put the jumper over the top. I don't know how efficient that is, but I, I saw that and I'm like, well, I guess he's not got heaps of matches, right, like it's black belt, heavyweight or whatever. He's probably got three or four matches. He just needs to stay in that zone and just get it done. Yeah, yeah, if it works for you, right, like.
Speaker 1:
And also, too, if you're, if you're acclimatized to that kind of heat, then maybe it's not so, whereas for us you'd be like, oh my god, I'm fucking cooking over here. We're just gonna keep you warm. Yeah, the, yeah, like, if you're in, like you know northern hemisphere, like up in, like northern europe or some shit, or you're in fucking hong kong or wherever you might be, yeah, like somewhere cold, then keeping warm is paramount. Sorry, oh sorry, I thought you were talking about hot. Oh, no, my bad, sorry, yeah, um, keeping warm is super important. So, yeah, like a big hoodie that can go on over your gi. Um, maybe even there's a beanie there.
Speaker 1:
Shoes and socks not slides, because slides, your feet are going to get cold. You're walking around on cold floor like shoes and socks. I put them on like thermal stuff, man, like even maybe something over your gi pants, because those things you know, yeah, um, because, like, yeah, physically cooling down in a cold environment will just nullify all of that. Yeah, and look, I usually try and bring a change of rashy, because you know, when you get the cold sweat on a rashy and it can feel like if your body might be warm, we're rashy under the ghee. I do usually. Yeah, right, yeah, as a as a general rule, that's part of the kind of staying warm.
Speaker 1:
Not that you have to, right, like most competitions, you don't have to. Yeah, you're going to compete. You need your routine. Obviously everybody is different, but the three components get the body limber, get the body warm in a specific way. Do not recommend star jumps and then get the body limber, get the body warm in a specific way. Do not recommend star jumps and then also get the nervous system excited, whatever that looks like. You've got to have that G up element. Yeah with it. Yeah, fuck, yeah, send us your comp results. Get out there. Thank you.