Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu

Height and strength are definitely an advantage, but there are a lot of guys who are shorter and lighter than you.

Work on defence, especially framing and half guard. You need good defence before you can work on attacks, and it can take a while to get that right.

Thanks for sharing that! I like how you broke it down to defense and attack. It makes the learning process of BJJ more comprehensible!

Hi guys!
I’ve just returned tô practice bjj but i confess it’s been really difficult because of my lack of height and specially strength. How do you deal with it? Dont you feel that bjj techniques dont contemplate ppl like me?!

Jiu Jitsu offers a variety of techniques. At the beginning, the most important thing for you will be to learn defenses and sweeps. In the medium term, it will also be good to train explosive movement, so you are able to surprise an opponent when submitting.

At the gym where I train, the lighter guys are the ones who usually train more hip mobility, the closed guard from below (white belt) and the half guard (blue belt).

For any beginner, jiu jitsu can be a bit frustrating in the first year and a half. You get beaten up a lot. The learning curve is long. However, if jiu jitsu interests you, don't get discouraged. There is light at the end of the tunnel!

BJJ techniques are specifically designed for your situation— using leverage and positioning to offset power differences.

If there are attributes it’s hard to live without in BJJ, they are speed, agility, and body awareness, but good practitioners can help you around whatever you’re missing

You can also do strength training (weights but not too heavy; body weight exercises, etc.) to become stronger.

With all due respect, it’s easy to say that when you are a bigger guy.

It’s an online forum, it’s easy for everyone to say everything.

But I also say this as a trained big guy who has been beat by better trained smaller guys, who has encountered a few of these small light guys who compete in the open weight classes (open to beasts bigger than me and ALSO better trained.)

And I say this as someone with two attribute DISADVANTAGES: I am neither fast nor flexible and always had to roll with people who are far faster than I am, and whose flexibility offered them possible moves I could not pull off.

You can’t fix most of your attributes (exceptions include conditioning and to an extent flexibility). But you can train harder, smarter, with more experienced people, etc.

Yes, they can - thanks for your reply and I hope my replies do not come across in the wrong way. It is just something I come across quite a lot: BJJ was designed for smaller guys, you just need to train harder/smarter, smaller guys have advantages with some techniques. But this is at the higher level - a level I can only respect people who get there, and one which most do not get anywhere near (injuries, physical limitations, other commitments or situations that limit how much you can train). At this level even more, weight really matters - it hurts a lot when a heavier guy lands on top of you, it is frustrating when pinned down you cannot escape, or when grappling you cannot even move them. That is the reality for me and maybe quite a lot of people on here (would be good to know - especially how the original guy who posted is getting on).

Exactly! I already had 2 injuries at my bjj journey: broken finger and biceps lesion. All because Im always the smaller and weaker guy! Def, you need tô be way advanced to take adiantage of flexibility, because when you are a white belt, this only helps you tô be smashed! I have to work out to get stronger and train bjj which, rn, i think Im not able to do… and I think it happens at all martial arts. Unfortunatly i had tô stop bjj again because Im injuried 🤷🏻‍♂️

Aperta os ovos do seu oponente.