I once flew in through the mountains in a helicopter with my friend Kevin at the controls. He was not only a commercial pilot but also fellow whitewater paddler. We had commandeered a helicopter for 'a maintenance flight', but the real reason we were airborne was to scout a remote river in northern British Columbia, almost at the Yukon border. The idea was to fly over the river and down its … [Read more...]
12 BJJ Black Belts Give Their Best Tips for Starting BJJ {Video and Podcast}
Today you're going to get 12 BJJ black belts give their best tips, strategies and advice for people just starting out in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. White belts looking for help getting started and organising their training will really benefit from watching this. Although there are a few themes the fascinating thing is how diverse the advice is. There is no one path, no one BJJ tip to rule them all, … [Read more...]
Wrist Locks – Attacking The Most Under-Attacked Joint
Jiu-jitsu and submission grappling offer techniques to attack almost every major joint in the body including the elbow, shoulder, neck, knees, feet, and ankles. These should be your bread and butter submissions because they have a long, proven track record of effectiveness. I think a bit of variety is a good thing, however, so let’s talk about a not-so-common attack: wrist locks! The … [Read more...]
Big News for All Grapplearts BJJ Apps
Really important message for you today. First, here's the short form version. If you've ever bought an BJJ app from me - any of them - then please go and update your apps right away. The Apple app store, and probably the Android app store too, are soon going to be changing their policies. This means that you'll need to update your apps to make sure that you can keep on getting access to the … [Read more...]
The Strenuous Life Podcast: New Episode with Extreme Kiteboarder Jack Rieder
I really enjoyed talking with kiteboarder and extreme athlete Jack Rieder (in part because I'm dying to try kiteboarding myself). It's episode 107 of The Strenuous Life Podcast with Stephan Kesting. You can listen to the audio below or subscribe to the podcast and then download the episode in iTunes, Google Play, Soundcloud, or Stitcher. Even though Jack doesn't do martial arts (yet!) he … [Read more...]
Christmas Office Party Jiu-Jitsu
Tis the season, and there's a very good chance that you'll be going to one or more Christmas parties in the next few weeks. I hope those parties stay friendly, but you can never be too careful. Let's just say that things can go sideways QUICKLY! A little bit too much rum in the eggnog... The wrong person under the mistletoe... Accidentally giving your girlfriend an oversized piece of … [Read more...]
Podcast Episode 102: Ken Johnson on What He Learned in 34 Years of Firefighting
In this episode of The Strenuous Life Podcast I sat down with Ken Johnson, retired Battalion Chief of Training, to talk shop. We covered, Managing emergency scenes, Staying calm under pressure, Training for boxing and making sure that you're always in shape, Recent breakthroughs in firefighting tactics, How to do your best in difficult situations, The critical importance of … [Read more...]
Older Grappler Training Q & A
In this episode of The Strenuous Life Podcast I answer lots of questions by older grapplers about continuing to train and make good progress when you're in your 40's, 50's and beyond. Can you still train hard as you get older? How often should you train? How can you recover faster? Should you also do weight training as an older athlete And more! The questions came from an … [Read more...]
Cults, Comets and Critical Thinking!
I've just released a new podcast episode (episode 093) just out that starts with martial arts training and ends up talking about mass suicides and alien spaceships trailing comets... At it's core it's a rant about the importance of testability, falsifiability, and critical thinking. You can listen to this episode (number 093) on my Strenuous Life Podcast which is available on iTunes, Google … [Read more...]
Jiu-Jitsu for the Zombie Apocalypse
As we get closer and closer to Halloween it's important to shift your priorities from training jiu-jitsu to surviving the impending zombie apocalypse. (After all, it's tough to train jiu-jitsu when you're dead. Or undead, as the case may be.) That's why you've got to check out the most important video I've ever put onto Youtube: Jiu-Jitsu for the Zombie Apocalypse. A lot of people will … [Read more...]
Are You Just Not Getting Any Better? Here are 3 Steps to Bust Your Training Plateau
When you're training hard, hitting a training plateau can be incredibly frustrating. But first of all, let's hit on an important distinction. A training 'slump' and a training 'plateau' are two different things... I go into detail about the differences between slumps and plateaus in this article here, but basically a slump is a relatively short-lived event, one to four weeks long, in … [Read more...]
McGregor vs Mayweather: Don’t Waste Your Money
Unless you've been living under a rock you know that Conor McGregor, the reigning light-heavyweight UFC champion, is going to be fighting one of the all time best boxers Floyd Mayweather on August 26th.\ I know people are excited about this, because I get asked about it every single day... McGregor is younger, bigger, cockier, is a southpaw and has proven knockout power. But is he going … [Read more...]
Don’t Be Afraid of Admitting that You Don’t Know Everything
This is rant was brewing inside me for a long time, and I'm sure it'll upset some people and ruffle some feathers. Oh well, can't make an omlette without breaking a few eggs, so I'll get over it... I did the rant in video form, and the full name of that video is "Don't Bullshit Your Students About Knowing Everything!" which pretty much sums it up! The humility to admit that you don’t know … [Read more...]
Upcoming Facebook Live Q&A
Grapplearts Facebook Live Broadcasts NEXT TOPIC: Q&A (probably) What is Facebook Live? Facebook live is when you get live streaming video on Facebook. It usually shows up on your feed if you're on at just the right time, but it also shows up on the page that's broadcasting the video. In this case it'll be on the Grapplearts Facebook page. What will we cover? Different broadcasts will … [Read more...]
A Musician’s Perspective on Studying Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
By Jeff Marder I’ve been a musician for as long as I can remember, and have been playing professionally for over thirty years. My primary focus is playing keyboards, conducting, and doing electronic music design for Broadway productions, although along the way I’ve also played a lot of jazz, classical, and spent three years in Las Vegas playing keyboards on a Cirque du Soleil … [Read more...]
Grappling Styles of the Pacific
by Jeff Meszaros Our around-the-world trip is nearly at an end. First, we took a spin through Asia. Then we hit the grappling styles of Europe. Then we did a tour of the various U.K. wrestling systems. After that, we headed south for a look at Africa and South America, and then back north up through North America, where we left off with trying hockey in Canada. (Sure, you could make the … [Read more...]
Blood, Sweat and… Sparta!!!
This may sound a bit weird coming from a guy who runs a grappling site, but I want you to ask yourself a question: why on earth are you spending hours and hours rolling around on the ground with men wearing spandex and/or pajamas? Really… I mean it’s not the easiest of activities. And it’s sweaty and sometimes it’s even painful… Obviously there are self defense benefits to training, but if … [Read more...]
Every Martial Art Consists of These 3 Things…
I'm primarily known as a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt, but the reality is that I've trained in a lot of other martial arts too. These other martial arts include Combat Submission Wrestling, Kajukenbo Karate, Boxing, Wing Chun, Judo, Muay Thai, Hung Gar, Pekiti Tirsia Kali, Hsing I, Northern Shaolin, Maphalindo Silat, Capoeira, Tai Chi, Western Fencing, Freestyle Wrestling, Jun Fan/JKD, … [Read more...]
‘Twas the Day and the Night Before Christmas…
So about a year ago a semi-annual tradition got started... The way it works is that every 6 months the toughest woman I know and I do a one day, 30 mile hike through the mountains with a TON of elevation gain and loss. It's up and up and up and then down and down and down... We call it the 'Deathmarch' and it's a ton of fun. Here's a video I put together using photos and snapchat videos … [Read more...]
What To Do When Your Mind Goes Blank While Sparring or Competing
Lots of grapplers run into the problem of their mind going blank when they're sparring or competing. In a class setting they might be able to bang out repetitions of techniques, demonstrate combos, and flow with the go like nobody's business, but as soon as they hit the mats to actually roll, well, all of a sudden they have absolutely no idea about what they should be doing. This … [Read more...]