It’s not easy being a BJJ instructor. And it’s especially not easy when you want to put in the extra work, which will make it possible for your students to become the best that they can be.
To all of the instructors that are like this: kudos to you! But we understand that it can be confusing so as to what to do sometimes. So, here are two pointers from John Danaher himself… Whatever you do, make sure to balance out the sense of direction and the amount of details in your students’ training.
Here’s the advice, in Danaher’s own words:
The main thing that has aided my coaching has been an ability to work towards a satisfactory reconciliation between two conflicting demands that all coaches have to try to satisfy.
The first is the need to give students an overall sense of DIRECTION in their training, which means that they always know what they should be moving towards in a match situation – this concerns their strategy and tactics. The other is the need for the small details that make their performance effective – this concerns knowledge and skill development.
He went on to explain why the “marriage” between direction and details is so important:
Details without direction lead to paralysis and direction without details is ineffective. Only the successful marriage of the two makes for good Jiu-Jitsu.
As for a specific skill – it is simply the use of trial and error to constantly look for better ways of doing the same things all Jiu-Jitsu players must do in order to be successful on the mats.
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Make sure to read the rest of our interview with John Danaher on the following link.
