Dan Manasoiu has recently challenged the necessity of traditional warm-up routines in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
The elite grappler, who trains under John Danaher, argues that conventional BJJ warm-ups – such as shrimping, forward rolls, and jogging across the mats – are largely unnecessary.
Or, at the very least, unnecessary after a student’s initial weeks of training:
Why would I spend so much time shrimping, doing front rolls, back rolls on the mat, if it’s not my first week of Jiu-Jitsu?
That time could be so much better spent drilling takedowns, starting in a movement.
Manasoiu believes that warm-ups should be directly tied to technical training, rather than generic movement drills:
Do you really need to do sprints across the mat, forward rolls, backwards rolls, shrimps, reverse shrimps, to start working on passing somebody’s guard or doing an Armbar?
Of course not.
Instead of traditional warm-ups, Manasoiu proposes that technique work should serve as a warm-up – allowing practitioners to immediately focus on practical skills before transitioning into live rolling:
Your technique is your warm-up, and then live rolling is live rolling.
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Do you agree with Big Dan? Let us know.
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