#371 Should YOU Compete in Jiu Jitsu?

Have you ever been in the jiu-jitsu competition limbo? That point where you're saying, yeah, I think I'm going to compete in a couple months. I think I'm going to do that tournament. I may register for it. I may start training hard for that tournament. And sometimes you actually do register and show up and compete, but most of the time, it's just talk. And you have to ask yourself, wait, was it actually a good call to compete? Was it actually a good call to not compete? And then on top of that, the other question that nobody talks about when it comes to competition is what tournament fits you best? Cuz to assume that one tournament is better than a different tournament is crazy. There are pros and cons to all of these different jiu-jitsu and submission grappling organizations that are coming out right now. And so we want to talk about that. We want to talk about really approaching competition with intention. Should you be focused on being a black belt adult world champion or should you be focused on having fun? Should you be focused on seeing if you can change who you are as a person? Another thing that we are going to look at is why do people actually compete? Is it just ego? Is it for money? Is it just for clout? Is it to tell people that you got to do something like that? We will answer all of these questions and so many more on today's episode of the I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show. I am your host, Josh McKinney. Let's hit that intro. I suck at Jiu-Jitsu. I suck at Jiu-Jitsu. Let's go. So, I thought the perfect place to start is why do people compete? And it's different for everybody that you ask. And you'll always hear people like, oh, why do you compete? And I'll get offended comments in this one. Why do you compete? Oh, I compete for my family. You compete for your family? Really? So your family wants you leaving them alone for a three-day weekend while you go spend a bunch of your family's hard-earned money traveling to a competition only to get first rounded and blame the referee. Really? You compete for your family? No, that's not true. No one, no one's wife who is home with the kids says, man, I am happy that my husband is not here with us and he's hanging out with his friends in pajamas rolling around on the ground with other people. Unless you're sending a check home, or you're coming home with a check, it ain't for her. It ain't for your kids. It is for you. Other one I hear all the time, coaches will say, I compete for my students. And there is something to motivating your students. There is something to seeing your coach be willing to put it all on the line that makes it feel way less pressure for you to put it all on the line. And so I see the reasoning behind that. But the problem is, most of the coaches that say that, if you gave their students a choice, like, hey, would you rather have your coach never around and competing all the time and when he's there, he's here to train for himself? Or would you rather have your coach focused on you? Well, a lot of people who pay good money for jiu-jitsu say, I would rather have my gym focused, I would rather my coach focus on me and not himself and his competition accolades. And of course, there is some, there are some students that prefer that they have a coach that competes, that would only go and learn from a coach that competes. But the big point that I'm trying to make here is that competition, when you boil it down, when you boil it all the way down, it's generally a pretty selfish act, right? There is, you know, there there are going to be times in any sport where somebody uses their platform for something that isn't selfish, right? And they win to this point and then they they use their platform for something selfless. But most of the time, most of the time in our individual sport of jiu-jitsu, it is selfish. We reference this a couple weeks ago. Um, one of my students won Master Worlds. It was the second time winning and for the second year in a row, we had all, I don't think we all got, I think I I went one and one that year, but I think we all lost relatively early. Nobody placed. We're going home without hardware, but we had our ringer at the end of the week, like Master 37, um, Nick comes in and, uh, he's a purple belt at the time, and he just absolutely runs through the division. Just runs through the division. And at a point in the mat, like at the point he gets done, he walks off the mat and it was totally for the vibes. It was totally for the crew. Like, he couldn't have cared less about competing. He doesn't like to compete. We basically are like, hey, but we're all going to hang out in Vegas. And he'll like, you know what? I'll do that. I suppose I'll compete. And that was the attitude. And he wins and he walks off and he comes up to us and he goes, I really hope that that was entertaining for you guys because that's the only reason I did it. And the truth was, it was so entertaining. You know, at Master 79 that this guy was at, he's fighting, you know, people that are on their deathbed and he's, you know, helping them, helping them complete the transition to heaven, if you will. And it's a huge, it's a ton of fun for me and the boys. It was so much fun to coach. It was such a fun group experience for the people that were there. And honestly, for the students that I had that were home, getting to watch one of their training partners compete at their age and at their belt and win at the highest level that they could, it's motivating. Like, oh, well, I I don't feel as bad that that guy passes my guard now because he passed all those guys' guard, right? So, when we go to the selfless part, the the camaraderie part of competition, most of the time, just like your belt promotion, it doesn't matter to the outside world. We want it to. We want it to be important to the outside world. But the truth is, it just matters to the homies. And that's cool. That's how it should be. This is why we do this. And we always want competition to be so much more than it is. This life or death experience, this movie, you know, where you're at the very conclusion of the movie. But that's, that's really not what competition is. When you boil it down, we are playing, when it comes to competition, we are playing a sport with our friends. And I'm not saying that that is the art of jiu-jitsu. But when it comes to competing, we are competing in a sport. We're competing in a specific rule set. It's actually not about finding out who's better at jiu-jitsu. If you were trying to find out who's better at jiu-jitsu, in all honesty, you would go just have like 10 rounds with the person at the gym and you would just keep doing round after round and you would very quickly discover who's better in general at jiu-jitsu. You go to a competition, sometimes all you discover is who's better at setting up their ankle pick and then doing nothing for the next nine minutes. Sometimes it's who's better at getting to that one submission that they've drilled a million times, they've played a million times. But does that mean that the person is better? Who knows? That's not what we're here for. We are not here to find out who's better at jiu-jitsu. We are here to see on the agreed upon time, on the agreed upon day, in the agreed upon rule set, who can win, who can perform better than their opponent. And this is the problem that so many people have in jiu-jitsu. They think that competition is about who's better at jiu-jitsu. We we don't even have a definition for what jiu-jitsu even is. And so you're going to tell me that the IBJJF or the ADCC is the pinnacle of this person is the best. Actually, one of those is the pinnacle of that person being the best. But we'll look at the debate of IBJJF versus ADCC, um, and then of course, bash some local tournaments too in a second. But for right now, we're just looking at why. Well, I think the biggest why for most people is it forces you to grow. You cannot lie to yourself about competition. You can, but you look stupid. You can go and say, oh, it was the ref's fault, it was the rule set's fault, it was any of these things' fault. But you just look stupid. It doesn't change anything. The only thing that matters in a sport is winning or losing, right? That is the conclusion of the game is do you win or do you lose? And getting that pressure from competition, you actually commit. You actually don't beat around the bush and this is my biggest thing is Yo, we only have one day left for our pre-order of I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu rash guards and shorts. So if you have ever seen me out in public, seen me on the show, seen me at a tournament asking for hot takes and said, wow, that is a cool rash guard. I wish I could let people know that I suck at jiu-jitsu too. Now is your chance. Go to inpostwill.com and click I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu. There's also a link in the description. You will be able to order all of our coolest short sleeve I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show rash guards and let the world know, one, of course, that you love the I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show, but two, most importantly, you can let the world know that you too suck at jiu-jitsu. Let's get back to the episode. Just commit. Just commit to the competition. You don't have to tell people that you're doing it. It's the opposite of what most people do. It is more important to train for and do the competition than it is to tell people that you are doing the competition. Yet, most people's jiu-jitsu anxiety, their competition anxiety, plays through in this way of they're like, well, in order to get some of the clout now, I better tell everybody that I'm going to go compete. I better let everybody know that I'm going to go compete. And I don't I I if that's how you live your life, that's cool. But I don't like it. I don't think it works and most of the people that have that mindset and are always talking about the next competition are the least consistent competitors. They are always telling you a year from now, I'm getting ready for this. And like, okay, well, if you were getting ready for that in a year, you should probably compete four or five more times between now and then because you are trying to play the sport. You're trying to be able to perform on command right when the second matters. It's not about being good in general. It's not about being well-rounded. Yes, those things can help you, but that's not what it's about. It's about figuring out the rule set, figuring out how you win that. And the best way to do that is with real reps. And I know you're going, well, I can't afford to compete every weekend. I can't afford to compete once a month. Well, then that's where the idea of having a performance day matters, right? We talk about this on the podcast all the time. So, first competition hack, random competition hack I'm throwing in for you guys in this, because obviously competitors are going to be the ones listening to this. If you're trying to become a better competitor, choose one day a week to have a performance day. Just one. Just one. Just one. Okay? Do you understand what I'm saying? You choose one day a week to have a performance day. The thought is, this is the day that I compete. Just like when you go to a real competition, the goal is not progression once you're there. The goal is not progression. The goal is performance. It's performing on command at the best you can. And the best way to get good at it is to practice it. And performance days, days where you come in and it's not about learning, it's not about drilling, it's not about getting better. It is simply about winning. You do rounds from the feet. Try ideally with people that are close to your size and skill. That would be the best scenario, right? People who you can beat but can also beat you. And then you compete against them. You keep score, whatever rule set you're training for, you wear what you're supposed to wear for that rule set, and then you grapple them. And then you wait a few minutes. I really like on performance days actually taking more rest in between rounds because that's more realistic for a competition. Competition isn't like slow-paced like we do most of the time when we're training jiu-jitsu, where it's like, you know, 40% speed the whole time. Competition generally has these waves of 100% speed. Full speed ahead, let's go really hard. And it can be really frustrating and it can be really shocking if you've never experienced it. Now, if you choose a performance day, you get to experience it once a week. The problem most people have is then they go, this performance day is great. Maybe I'll do two. Maybe I'll do three. If every day is a performance, no day is a performance. We are taking those other days and we're only focused on getting better at jiu-jitsu on those other days. Whether that means our cardio, whether that means a specific position, right? But our performance day is a good guide to tell us what we should be getting better at. And so this whole thought on performance day, we get way deeper on it in the free ebook that I wrote called The Competitor's Journey. It's just basically how to maximize performance day. But we built it into three different training camps for getting ready for competition. And basically, boxes that you should be checking consistently from like the seven-week out point all the way to the lead up of the actual competition. And I think that this, the ideas on that are just so helpful. But I just wanted to go off on that bit of a tangent, um, when it comes to, uh, when it comes to performing. But just just take a step back. I didn't get to finish this thought of with competition is like the why. Why do we do this? It's so we can grow because we're putting ourselves in this feeling of a life and death situation and we're also putting social pressure on ourselves. We're saying, we're signing up for the tournament and my coach is going to be there. My friends are going to be there that compete. And that like camaraderie that comes with working together to win this, right? Win or lose, that camaraderie is such an awesome experience. It's actually the experience that I think that most of us care about most in jiu-jitsu. There are other ways to experience camaraderie. You go to a seminar with your friends. You go to class with your friends. But to me, the community aspect of jiu-jitsu is why we love it. So, growing up, I would, you know, me and my dad would walk the park or, you know, just walk around our neighborhood. And I honestly couldn't tell you how many times we would get stopped in the street where someone would scream from across the, you know, across the way, yo, Mac. And they were talking to my dad. Uh, that was apparently what they called him was Mac, you know, because that's cool. And then they would always look at me and be like, oh, little Mac. They all knew naturally that that had to be the the conclusion of the nickname was me being little Mac. But anyway, um, they would come up, haven't seen you in forever. And then they would look at me and they would tell a story. So my dad was a professional slow-pitch softball player in like the late 80s, early 90s. And keep in mind, this sport doesn't even exist anymore. But when these guys would come up, it was as if they were seeing a local celebrity when they would come up to my dad. And then they would tell some story about how, hey, little Mac, one day, you we were on the baseball field on Seventh Street and your dad was just crushing the ball and he was batting righty. And he's crushing the ball, he's hitting home runs every play. They're getting frustrated and some of the outfielders start to say, well, why don't you switch hit? Why don't you switch hit? And then you don't you may not know this, but your daddy Mac, he's actually left-handed. And then he would switch it to left hand and hit the ball twice as far. He would, you know, all the stories were houses that were roofs that he hit that were, you know, three miles past, uh, uh, the the where the home run started. You know, they're just the craziest stories. But here is the point of that. There's two. The first point is all of those guys approach it and approach my dad and approached me and talked about that stuff as if it was the greatest time in their life. And something that I really believe to be true, uh, it's just a saying that I heard, is that you don't know the best time in your life, the greatest time in your life while you're in it. The other example that I give of this is a lot of people's jiu-jitsu competition career is about 18 months. You know, maybe maybe to three years. A lot of people will compete for a period and then be done and be like, okay, I'm kind of, they never even really say to themselves that they're retired. But you just kind of fall out of the habit, you stop competing. You get the experience that you wanted from jiu-jitsu competition. And for a lot of guys, that is the experience is these 18-month, three-year, you know, if you're lucky, you compete for four or five years. For me, I've competed in jiu-jitsu for 18 years. I am so lucky to have gotten to do that. In that time, I've had maybe six different groups of really committed competitors that were with me. Now it's like my students, of course, right? And those are the groups that I have. But like, before that, it was, you know, just guys at my gym. I was just a, you know, a white, blue, purple belt just like you guys. And there were a few guys that would we would all get ready together and we would compete. And for me, I had always wanted to be a competitor, right? It was like something I always loved to do. Uh, I always wanted to win big tournaments and just really get to compete against the best guys. That was the most fun that I would ever have is when I knew I had a legitimate guy in my division. It was win or lose. It was like, people consider him the best guy in my division. And I just want to know. I just want to see if I can beat him or not. And that's always kind of been my thought, but I've been like that for 18 years. Now, all of these times of these couple year spans where someone would compete with me. And this would be my teammate, they'd be training full-time, we'd be working really hard together. And then a lot of times they would fall off at a point. Life would get in the way, they would have a kid, they would get married, they would date a girl and she was a terrible person and, you know, she would pull him away from jiu-jitsu. And all kinds of different reasons that people would stop competing, stop training. But then I'd see those guys in the same way that we would see people at the park when I was a kid. See those guys now. Talk to him for a second and every one of them, every one of them says, man, I wish I could go back. I wish I was, you know, living in that moment that we were together. We were competing together. I wish I was there. And I think that so many people, they have an experience, they live in the moment and in then the moment ends. And then they go, man, I wish I would have enjoyed it more. I wish I would have taken more in. I wish I would have, one, I wish I could keep doing it. But it's just not how the world works. It's not how life works. Things end. When it ends, when jiu-jitsu ends for you, do you want to have regret because you said, I did want to be a competitor. I did want to push myself. But I was just afraid. I was afraid of injury. I was afraid of losing. I was afraid of just all of these things, all of these parts of jiu-jitsu competition that are scary. Um, but I think most of us, the real reason that we don't compete when we want to. Some people actually just don't have that in them. They don't have the desire to compete. And if you are that person, I don't think you should. I don't think if it doesn't, if it doesn't, if the sport doesn't move you to go compete, I don't think you should. If it does, though, if you have that desire, that little thought that pops into your head that says, I should compete. And then you you, you know, tell the logical thing. You say, no, no, um, injuries. No, I can't, um, time commitment. No, I can't. There's too guys are going to be too good. Um, there's all these reasons that people will tell themselves they cannot compete. The problem for me, though, is you boil it down, most of the reason is they're afraid of disappointing their friends, they're afraid of disappointing their coach. That's really why people they the the anxiety of what if I lose is too much. But honestly, this just started this thought with why compete? Because the anxiety of competition is so high. The realness is so high. The life or death experience that you get to experience for at a local tournament, $75 is crazy. It is crazy. It is it's it is life-changing when you have these experiences. And competitors will agree with me. People that have competed for a long time will literally agree in the same way that people have just done jiu-jitsu as a hobby for a long time. You will agree that if I didn't do this, I'd probably be a totally different person. This has changed me so much. Um, this has affected me so much. There's just something about the the the calendar. When you put an actual tournament on a calendar, and this is the other hack that I will leave you with. I gave you the performance day hack. Here is the other hack. If you want to be a better competitor, if you want to be a good competitor, if you want to have a chance at winning, if you want to have the biggest benefit, sign up for the tournament. Sign up and do it. Take that decision-making out. Say, no, I have decided to compete. Now, all my decision-making can be focused on how do I prepare myself best to compete? Well, obviously, at first, with starts with signing up for the competitor's journey. Um, there is no doubt about that. But now, let's get into which competitions actually matter. Yo, if you are enjoying today's episode, I have a free gift for you that is going to change the way that you look at jiu-jitsu competition and most importantly, preparation for jiu-jitsu competition. There's always this mindset that people have that they feel as though they're going to rise to the level of competition that they face, but the truth is not that. The truth is you will fall to the level of your training. And so, if that is the case, how could we train to be great competitors? Especially when we have work, we have family, we have two days a week that we get to train jiu-jitsu. Is it possible to be a competitor? Yes, it is. With my new instructional, The Competitor's Journey. This is an ebook where I take you through step-by-step how I look at preparing somebody over a seven-week training camp for their first jiu-jitsu competition, for their second jiu-jitsu competition, even for their 100th jiu-jitsu competition. The principles in this free ebook are game-changing. And so if you like this episode, you will love The Competitor's Journey. You can click the link in the description or you can go to simplifyingjiujitsu.com to get your free copy and learn the secret methods that the highest level competitors use to stay healthy, to stay in shape, and to stay ready to compete. Let's get back to the episode. Um, so like now we know why we would compete. But is there, is there a better place to, you know, is there a better basket to put my eggs? Or should I, you know, should I just compete in anything? Are all tournaments equal? Should I start with local tournaments and then move up to IBJJF or move up to ADCC? Should I focus on Gi? Should I focus on No-Gi? These are all very valuable questions. And obviously, there is, um, it's going to be different depending on who you are. I would say the first thing in this thought is let's look at the IBJJF and ADCC. These are the two biggest tournament series by far, right? And there's other organizations, there's other super fight shows, there's all kinds of other stuff. But if you want to just register to compete and then go compete and you say, well, what has the most clout with it, which is going to have the most the toughest competition? It will be an IBJJF or an ADCC. And here is the thing, though. There are so many more pros and cons to these things that are that are huge. And so, what I thought we would do is I would just go through my pros and cons list of IBJJF, go through my pros and cons list of ADCC, and then we'll chat about those things, okay? So first, I think the biggest thing with IBJJF is how organized it is. There is, um, also, I have competed and I have coached in both of these organizations. And so, um, I have both perspectives that I will be able to give you. Um, so, the organization and the consistency of IBJJF is unmatched. It's not close. If anyone complains about the IBJJF's is unorganized or something like that, go to FloGrappling, look up their name. I guarantee you that their last loss was a points loss that they didn't understand the rule set. I guarantee it. Yeah, that's the only, when people complain about anything in the IBJJF, anything at all, it is simply because they lost their last match in the IBJJF, okay? And so, they can make it whatever, but it's just that they lost, right? Um, then it's like the ability to have matches. Let's say you're 140-pound Master 4 black belt. It's like, do you want to go do a local tournament? Do you want to go do an ADCC with, you know, 30-plus year old as your age group? Probably not. You probably want something more specific. And so, um, the uh, the ability to actually have divisions where you're going to go against somebody your skill, your age, and your belt, or your weight is huge. But on top of that, um, you can know who is in your division way, way, way before. And so you are able to kind of register and kind of do things that way. Um, and then I think the biggest thing for a lot of people is that there is Gi and there is No-Gi to the IBJJF. Um, you know, and you have and then since they've adjusted the No-Gi adult black belt rules and brown belt rules, I think that the, honestly, I know people will be mad about this, but I think that's the most fun No-Gi rule set to watch is the IBJJF's 10-minute round with heel hooks, with all submissions legal again. Um, or with all submissions legal, I think that's the most fun to watch. Why? Because with points, you know who's winning. It's so nice to know who's winning the match as a spectator, right? And not just go, well, I wonder what the ref's opinion is about this. I wonder what the judge's opinion is about this, right? Um, and so, those are the the pros. And I'm not going to bash any of these tournament series because I understand, you don't understand. I competed 18 years ago. We would compete literally in barns at carnivals, okay? And we drove five hours to get there. And that was normal. That was jiu-jitsu competition. So, if you don't like the IBJJF and you skip IBJJF St. Louis and you live 30 minutes away because you're mad about whatever, honestly, I hate you and I want to fight you to the death. Okay? It's very important that you understand that. Um, that is, and I'm not even saying that I like the IBJJF. It's just what other options are there? You this whole idea that you're going to complain and nitpick at every rule set and nitpick at every organization. It's like, brother, well, where else are you going to compete? And generally, the people that do all that nitpicking aren't very good. You don't see the highest level guys go, oh, I won't compete IBJJF because of this or because of that. Maybe they have a story and they were screwed over, right? And it's specific. But most likely, they came up through the IBJJF. It's just in general, where the best competition is by far. And you can say, oh, well, it's not the best No-Gi competition. Here's the thing. All those other No-Gi organizations are split now. Contracts are getting exclusive, there are going to be other big organizations. No one ever, no one ever doubts that the hardest Gi division, the hardest thing to win in the Gi is the adult worlds. It's not even a debate. The second hardest is either Brasileiros or Pans. Not even a debate. All IBJJF, right? So if you want to get good in the Gi, if you want to win big stuff in the Gi, probably go IBJJF. There's no, there's literally no other option. Now, here is the problem with that from a like trying to be a high-level competitor, uh, is is this, is like you go IBJJF. And you lose, even if you're an amazing competitor. You lose to some rando Brazilian who is tough as nails. He is here on a visa. He assumes he's getting deported soon. He is fighting for his life. You lose to that guy, nobody cares. You beat him, nobody cares. There are only a few big names in the IBJJF that, you know, are Brazilian names. And that's like, that's a thing when you look, it's all Brazilian guys. So in America, you just see so much less polarization because, you know, we as Americans are racist and we're like, oh, they're all, you know, all these Brazilians are the same, you know, they're all Mexican, you know, and that's they all have 15 names. How am I supposed to know the difference between them, right? And so I think it makes this battle for people who want to be great jiu-jitsu athletes where they almost now younger guys are going, I'm just have to do No-Gi. Like, the level of clout is not very high in the Gi IBJJF. But then the level of skill is actually exponentially higher than in No-Gi. And again, people can be mad about that. Drop it in the comments. Give me call 951 hot take. Um, and yeah, and if you hate the IBJJF or you hate ADCC, call 951 hot take or drop a comment. Um, but like I said, I'm going to try my best to just not bash either of these organizations because what other options are there, boys? If you want to compete in the Gi and you aren't getting phone calls to fight Gi super fights all the time, most likely, you're doing the IBJJF. If you want to compete in No-Gi and you're not getting phone calls for No-Gi super fights all the time and you want to be good and you want to gain some clout, most likely, you're competing in ADCC. So now, let's look at the biggest con of IBJJF is it's so expensive. I can't deny that. I can't argue. And obviously, the organization's huge. It they employ a lot of people, they run amazing tournaments. They'll have three or four, I always hate it when you see somebody will post a picture at an ADCC and be like, yeah, there's a thousand people at this ADCC and you look in Columbus, Ohio, IBJJF only has 600 people. ADCC is taking over. I'm like, brother, IBJJF has three other tournaments around the globe right now happening today. It's not even close. These guys are an organization. You can just do the IBJJF circuit and just run that, try to be the best at your weight, your age, and your belt, you know, and score points at all these tournaments. But you better be freaking rich, brother. You better be loaded. You got 50 bucks for your yearly registration fee. And I swear to you, it's like two something. Let's just look it up while we're while we're hanging out together, just me and you. Um, it is, let's say that I was going to register for the, oh, I can't register for Santa Cruz open because event is at full capacity because it's IBJJF, it's popping. Ooh, what if we went to Geneva? Register now. What's our, oh, remember, got a weird sign-in. It's a little bit odd on the IBJJF. Oh, no, I'm inactive. I have not paid for my registration. Holy smokes. It's $167 for one division. It's $284 for two divisions. Honestly, it would be cheaper for me to get to Switzerland than to register. Okay, I get it. Listen. Cons. Too expensive. Too freaking expensive, bro. That is absolutely the con. Um, yeah. And, you know, you can get Brazilian at IBJJF. Um, and I'm not going to tell you, I love the IBJJF. I love I love the IBJJF. Big fan. Big fan. But I will say, there have been times that I've talked about cheating scandals that I would do, cheating methods that I would do, um, and on the podcast. And then I would come to a tournament a couple months later in IBJJF and there would be, uh, uh, new rules for me specifically, it felt like. And so I think that there's some IBJJF people listen to the podcast. Shout out to you guys. Report to your bosses that Josh only said kind things. Give him advantages. Give him advantages, right? But I think that that's the other con is a lot of people feel like that there are politics in the jiu-jitsu space that are really prevalent in the IBJJF. And this is true. Um, there is documented evidence of refs being willing to fix matches in the IBJJF. Um, or at least screenshots of messages. As much as screenshots of messages are evidence of anything, you know, that happened. Who knows if it still happens now, but who knows if it happens at ADCC, right? Who knows what happens at any tournament series? This is the tough thing about any sport is you have to then build all of these specific rules for all of the situations. IBJJF has done the best job of that. No doubt their rule set makes the most is the most defined. ADCC, there's probably a little more up for interpretation, which still like even though there's definition, you can still get screwed over in IBJJF. But let's look at the thing about ADCC pros. The pros about ADCC. So, I'm going to let you in on a little secret that big cotton does not want you to know. Don't even get me started on big polyester. But right now, we are in the middle of a secret war. It is between hemp and cotton. One of them shrinks, isn't durable, and holds bacteria. The other is hemp. And the beauty of hemp, not just is how durable it is to make a Gi out of, to make a backpack out of, to make a fanny pack out of. The beauty of hemp is that it is anti-microbial, meaning that things are not growing and living inside of your Gi. And that is a beautiful thing to know because you can know that with your nose. Your Gi doesn't stink. You are not the stinky guy. And our friends at Datsusara are the company for hemp jiu-jitsu. They have Gis that are made of hemp. They have some of my favorite bags. They have some of my favorite fanny packs. Again, all made of hemp. They don't hold odor. They are super durable. They look really cool. You get all kinds of compliments on them. And if you use promo code I SUCK at DSgear.com when you check out, you get 10% off of your purchase because they love the I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show just like you do. And so be sure to check them out at DSgear.com. The pros about ADCC. Um, I think that there is nowadays, I think you get way more clout winning a beginner's ADCC division than winning a blue belt IBJJF. In my opinion. But people see the the brand name and there's still a really good amount of clout. Is that leaving? I heard the simple man guys talk about that. Is trials wasn't as big as it's been. West Coast trials especially wasn't as big as it's been. Um, does that mean ADCC is on the down? I don't think so. This is a weird thing that, uh, if you have if you weren't around jiu-jitsu in 2015, you may not know this. But actually, nobody cared about ADCC back then. Didn't matter. It wasn't until Gordon's run that ADCC started to matter, right? And then it became this thing of like, oh, no, now we all agree ADCC is the Olympics of jiu-jitsu and it's the best guys. Brother, look at the lists of competitors from 2013. It's not as strong. It's not as there are, you know, there are Olympic wrestlers in the submission grappling event, right? There are UFC fighters in the submission grappling event. It was a different thing. It has morphed into this new thing, this new brand. Who knows if it's going to stay like that, right? And that's I think more of the question is like, did was it just great branding? Was it just that was it just amazing branding and Gordon going all in on ADCC that made ADCC what we consider the most prestigious thing in the universe? I don't know, but it still seems to be that way. People care about these ADCC tournaments so much more when it comes to Instagram, when it comes to social media. So if you were if it's only about clout for you, do ADCC over IBJJF. I don't even think it's a doubt, right? If it's about money, either one, you just have to win at the highest level and beat the best guys. That's the only way that you're going to generate money besides building a brand, having funny posts on social media, having, you know, all of these other things that can give you a brand. But the problem is, you still have to beat good guys. You know, you can talk your way into a match, but if you just get thrashed by somebody who's tough, you're probably not talking your way into a second match. So, other ADCC things, um, that I think is huge is one, if you're a No-Gi guy. If you're all No-Gi, I could see, you know, there's reason to do IBJJF No-Gi. Um, but more the reason is to fight tough guys. In my opinion. I don't think that, you know, No-Gi Worlds clout in IBJJF is nothing compared to winning ADCC. Um, they are not even close to the same thing. And so, um, no doubt that you get more out of that. But, um, yeah, I just think that it's a different rule set, it's a different sport. You're going to see more people specializing in the rules that make ADCC make sense, right? In the strategies that make ADCC make the most sense. It's just like any other sport. We will always game the system as competitors. That's our job, right? And then they'll be adjustments and stuff like that. Um, now, I would say that the other thing that I look at, or now let's look at some cons of ADCC, because like the main pros are just so much clout for winning in ADCC, anything, even an ADCC open. Um, even at a low level, people are going to be excited, people are going to be, you know, you wear your cool I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu rash guard because you love the show, of course. Um, on sale right now, I think for the next like day. Um, I think until tomorrow, uh, we have I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show rash guards and shorts on sale right now. But, of course, you're wearing that when you go to ADCC. It's cool that you're allowed to wear whatever you want. Here's the problem is like, they don't care what you wear. It's weird, you know, and I as an IBJJF guy, I'm like, bro, check this guy's check this guy's shorts, you know, is this guy greased up right now? Um, yeah, No-Gi check, weird. Um, but I love that you can wear whatever you want. It's just so much more freedom and it does, you go to an ADCC, it does feel more like an open mat. You go to a IBJJF, it does it feels more like, um, like a high school or collegiate sport, right? It feels like we have this mat time. I know when I'm going three days out. I know, you know, what mat I'm going to be on. That is like when I go to cons of ADCC, the biggest con that I have is the, uh, system of bracketing and whatnot. And I understand that they can't they don't build brackets until everyone has weighed in, right? Um, because I'm sure you get guys that register and don't compete, right? Um, so I get that. But I just did, um, West Coast trials. The fact that like, you register on Smoothcomp. You then don't know what time you're competing unless you had checked ADCC's Instagram page where they made one post about this is the showtime for each weight category. And then on top of that, you didn't know your actual mat match time until like 12 minutes out, you know, or 15 minutes out or whatever. Either way, that's craziness. The fact that like, IBJJF has it so locked in that I know on Wednesday who I'm competing against, what weight I need to make, and what time we're going and it will be adjusted as the day goes on. That to me is the most beautiful thing. Like that's what I love about IBJJF is that professionalism. And that was the con for ADCC was like, eventually on Smoothcomp, they they never posted any of the brackets or any of the matches. But eventually on Smoothcomp, they posted a link for you to go to FloSports to then get the brackets. I know that this is like, feels like I'm just complaining about something silly. But as a competitor, it's just nice to know when you compete, right? Just like it's nice to know the the score of the match. It's just nice to know what time you compete because then you can plan your whole day around it instead of just go, okay, well, we're going to wait at the venue all day. We're going to wake up early to see if we have to be at the tournament at 8:00 or be at the tournament at 12:00. And, you know, so those are kind of my that was really honestly, though. That was my only negative for ADCC was it could have been more organized in that sense. It could have been more organized for the competitor, um, to be aware of mat time and stuff like that. Um, also, side note, if people, um, first side note, uh, I lost at West Coast trials in case you guys were wondering. Wasn't good. Don't need to even talk about it. Not enough time on the mat to even talk to you guys about it. But, uh, here is, uh, the other thing to think about when it comes to, uh, when it comes to competition in general, but specifically when it comes to ADCC is since it's about the experience, sometimes like the most fun part of the experience for a lot of hobbyists especially, is that you get to run into big name competitors. And obviously, I was at trials. I've only ever been, I've never been to an ADCC open, but still when I look at the ADCC opens versus the IBJJF opens and you see who's getting pictures of that they're there. ADCC also has way more clout in the audience too. And so if that's what you're after, if you're looking to, you know, try to have a conversation with Gordon Ryan. Um, and like, you're going to do that at an ADCC, way more likely than an IBJJF. Uh, and so I think that there is, there's definitely reasons for both of those. But here's the other part is that there's local tournaments too. And here is the thing about local tournaments. We call about we call them local tournaments, but sometimes you still travel to them. It's just basically, you call it a local tournament, anything under IBJJF or ADCC, right? If you're doing a Fuji, if you're doing a Naga, if you're doing an Ego, if you're doing a, uh, uh, grappling industries, if you're doing a submission challenge, if you're doing whatever other, um, tournament series there are. And I know there's a lot of different tournament series now. But no matter which one you're doing, um, you kind of look at it as, okay, the highest level is going to be in the Gi, IBJJF, in No-Gi, probably ADCC or IBJJF, right? And so, but those are, those are the peak. It's going to be the toughest competition you fight. It's going to be the most expensive, but it's going to be the toughest competition. You could have just as good or a better experience for $75 doing a local tournament, for $80 doing a local tournament, you know, for $100 doing two divisions, right? And so this is kind of how you look at it is, who this is where so many people struggle is they want to be an IBJJF guy, they want to be an ADCC guy. But they don't compete in the small shows. Small stuff is what gets you ready for the big stuff. This is how all competitors have always been. All competitors do it this way. Maybe you can find me one outlier that just competes once a year and then wins that. But I guarantee you will find that outlier had periods of their life where they would compete at everything. You can always tell who is going to be a really, really good competitor in the blue and purple belt division by who's just competing the most. Because those guys that are competing a lot, they're getting reps against the best guys. They're learning the rules of the sport, right? And that is to me, that is the, that is like what you get out of of competing a lot is you start to learn to actually be a competitor and not just a jiu-jitsu guy trying to compete, right? You are this thing that when you show up to the tournament, you have a routine, you have a mindset, you have things that you think, ways that you warm up, specific strategies that you're going to use. That is to me, if you're trying to win the biggest things, that's the secret is you have to develop that skill. The best way to develop that skill is to compete, is to get reps of competition. And so few people understand that a rep at Fuji against local people is probably going to be very similar than a rep at IBJJF against local people. Yeah, it changes when you start to travel a little more. But you could travel to local tournaments too. And again, you get more bang for your buck in that situation, right? And so, um, when you think about it, and this is like how I always sell it to my students, is like, I guarantee you, this tournament that's coming up, you will have a $100 or more experience from it, right? You're just paying 100 bucks for it. You will, you know, in the same way that you go to a restaurant and you pay $100 for a meal and you're like, yeah, the meal, I mean, never do you think this bite was worth $100. I mean, maybe, I don't know. Maybe you're wealthier than me and you've eaten a lot more $100 meals than I did. But every time, my first bite, I go, oh, I could eat this at Texas Roadhouse and it would be equal, right? Or better. But when you start to, uh, when you start to kind of think about not again, think about it in terms of reps. Like, I'm going to show up, I'm going to get one rep of competition. I'm going to get two reps of competition. I'm going to keep winning, I'm going to get four reps of competition. You think about it as like a rep each time. It starts to make competition so much easier because, well, I've done this before. I've done this before. Even you put me in a different environment, right? And I get to, you know, even though I'm getting good at it, I get to have this experience that is worth something great, right? This pressure that's put on me and then I get to try to perform and I get to have this experience. And I can always guarantee you, after that experience, even when you go lose first round, everybody says, yeah, that was a $100 experience or more, right? That experience you couldn't pay for. Now you go to a restaurant that has the same exact food, same exact serves you the same Texas Roadhouse food, but the service and the atmosphere and the environment are all immaculate, just so high level. A lot of times you'll go, yeah, it was a $100 experience, right? It's not the food that makes it a $100 experience. Sometimes it does, but most of the time, it is everything all at once happening. And that is this jiu-jitsu competition. As much as we make performance days feel like competition, they are not. They are not a competition. And it's one of those things that when you have that mindset that, oh, well, I compete in the gym, so it's the same thing. It's like, yeah, but do you? Is that reality? Because here's the difference. You didn't agree with the person in your gym, hey, we're going to both try to show up at our best and win once. That pressure, it changes everything. And so now that we know the difference between IBJJF, ADCC, and local competition. And honestly, the big reveal here is just, you should compete. You should compete. If you have the desire, you should compete. You should register for one of these and just freaking do it. You may lose, but you also understand that the real secret of competition is actually being committed to do another one after. Because then you lose and then you can go, okay, well, I didn't really train as hard as I could have. I missed certain days. I didn't train the specific things that I should have been training. I should I haven't trained my guard retention and I got my guard passed. And I think that it's so easy to to to have that experience and then go right to the next one and go, oh, well, I'm a competitor now and you get the ball rolling. But it only works if you stop with the I'll sign up next time. Uh, you know, I'm just not sure if I want to do this one. I've been working a lot lately. I've been, bro, you want to do this one. Anytime a student comes up and says, uh, you know, I think I should compete. What do you think? I want to compete. What do you think? I always say, yeah, register right now. Like get on your phone right this second and register. And then we can just focus on getting there. We can just focus on getting better for the competition. And we can stop with this wishy-washy, maybe I'll compete, maybe I won't. So many people do this and so many people it it ruins, honestly, it ruins the hobby of jiu-jitsu for them because now they have this pressure of like, I wanted to be a competitor and, you know, I'm not and, you know, is this even worth it? I promise you, if that desire is in your heart, face your fear. And I'm going to give you some hacks for the people that are still listening that what if what if things are just not right for me? You know, what if should I still make myself compete? I think that this is kind of how I looked at, um, trials. I told you guys I wasn't going to do it. I tell you about it, but I'm going to tell you about it. Um, so I talked to my wife at the beginning of the year and like, hey, I know that it again, that competing is selfish. It's so fun for me. It's what I, you know, if I was a single guy, that's what I would be doing. You know, if I didn't have a wife and a child, I would probably just be competing. And I don't really get to commit that time anymore. I don't have enough time to consistently do it. And so how I look at it is, okay, well, I will pick at the beginning of the year. Maybe there's only two tournaments that I'm going to get to do this year. I want to have those scheduled. I want to know when they are. I want to be ready to train for those hard, um, and get the most out of competing. You know, and, uh, that was, that was my whole thought process with West Coast trials. I'd never done the rule set before. Hadn't done a lot of No-Gi in a long time as a competitor. Um, you know, I think I've done one No-Gi match since brown belt. Uh, maybe two. Uh, but, uh, yeah, it's just, you know, not something that, you know, it's like, okay, this is going to get me out of my comfort zone so much. It's going to get me to train ways that I haven't trained before. Try to think about things that I haven't thought about. And then I lose first round. And I'm like, man, that's frustrating. And you get this choice. Like I always tell you, you get a choice after competing. You can make an excuse and say, oh, you know, I don't even do a lot of No-Gi, you know, this didn't really matter to me. And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. No, dude, screw that. It mattered. I wanted to win. I don't compete unless I want to win. I trained hard for it and I lost. Guess what? No one cares. Let's move on and get better for the next one. And I mean, within minutes, I can feel that after this competition, I can feel that that mindset creeping back of like, you hate losing so much. It just boils your blood. You hate this feeling, don't you, Josh? Let's make some changes and not feel this way anymore. That is why I compete. I heard Chael Sonnen once say that a he said fighter, which, you know, I do jiu-jitsu. So let's say competitor. But a competitor is always at his best when he's in camp. That's when he's the most disciplined. That's when his thoughts are right. That's when his schedule is right. That's when he's at his best. And I got to feel that competing and it was like, oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, I remember, you know, I remember being disciplined. I remember hard work. I don't enjoy these things right now. They are not fun for me right now. But these things change who you are. I know this because, like I said, I've had these waves of competing so much. And at the end of them, you are never, you are never who you started out as. These competitions, they change your whole worldview. It's just like this life or death situation that you go into. It's stressful, it's intense. You go like, what's the point? The point is that. The point is the pressure. The pressure changes you. It makes you hopefully a better person, but it makes you a different person, right? And I think that that is that's the real value as an individual. Is jiu-jitsu competition changes you. Maybe you're a competitor and you go, well, nobody at my gym competes. I can't even just pick a tournament that everyone's going to. Well, maybe you got to be a leader too. Maybe you got to convince some people. Or, and this is the hack, maybe you do what, uh, my student and I, Jeff, did, which was, hey, nobody needs to know we're competing at this one. Let's just go, uh, let's train, let's get ready. And then let's just go compete. No pressure on us. If we lose, who cares? You know, if we win, awesome. But that mindset takes a lot of pressure off competitors. So if you're really struggling with the idea of competing and you really want to compete, choose a local competition in a city like three or four hours away. And then go do that one. Register for it and go do that one. Maybe with like one training partner that you really trust. You guys don't have to put pressure on yourself. You don't have to tell people about it. And that's like, that is, you know, we started with this, is so many people want to tell people that they're a competitor, but they don't want to go do the things that competitors do. You know, one, they don't want to show up and compete. It's always like, this isn't the right time. This isn't the right rule set. This isn't the right, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. None of it matters. You show up and you compete. And you compete at your best. And you try your best. And if you win, awesome. Probably should try to figure out what you could have done better. But if you lose, now we have a clear formula of losing. We should try to fix that. And this is what competition does to you. I think that it is the it it's understanding that even if there was money involved, that's not why you do it. Even if there was clout involved, that is not why you do it. You don't do it to get a gold medal. Just like the belt, you don't do it to get your blue belt. You do it to become that thing. You train and train hard for competition, show up for competition, win or lose, you get to be a competitor. That's the beauty. Is you get to change who you are and become something totally new because you pushed yourself. Because you were willing to say, I don't, I'm not going to, I'm not going to make this about, you know, hey, everybody, I'm getting ready. We're 32 days out. We're 28 days out. We're 21 days out. No. This is internal. I know we're 21 days out. I'm training hard. And then honestly, it's so much cooler for people to go, hey, what are you training for? You're obviously training for something because, you know, you're it's it's we can see it. You're in better shape. You're showing up. You're more consistent. You're training harder. You're getting ready for something. That is the person you tell. Yeah, dude, I'm getting ready for I'm getting ready for Worlds. I'm getting ready for trials. I'm getting ready for whatever, right? But when you're posting about it on Facebook, and you're telling everybody on Instagram, a lot of times you're just putting all kinds of extra pressure on yourself. And a lot of people will then say, oh, you know, I had a sore throat, um, the morning of, so I just decided to not compete. You know, like I got some sand in my eye three days before the competition. And so, yeah, no competition for me. I'm just going to get ready for the next one, you know, six months out from the next one. And that is the method that most people have. If you just stop doing that, you will be better at jiu-jitsu. You will be a better competitor. If you said, oh, tournament that I can afford, that I have the time to do, I want to do, sign up and do it. And that is all I have for you guys today. I hope you guys enjoyed today's episode. And, uh, most importantly, honestly, if you guys need help with competition, I know I don't really, this is more of an encouraging you to compete. But if you need more specific advice on competition, I have three or four different I Suck at Jiu-Jitsu Show episodes on jiu-jitsu competition. I think the place I would start is called the 10 Commandments of jiu-jitsu competition. I think that's the simplest place to start. But there are so many different things that we talk about when it comes to mindset, when it comes to breath work, when it comes to other tools that you can lose to perform at your best. And of course, if you like that idea of being able to perform at your best on command and you don't want to have to search through a bunch of episodes and you just want a specific system for doing that, then you should absolutely check out Champions Day present. This is my course that is on simplifyingjiujitsu.com and BJJ Fanatics. And you can basically sign up for this course and over about three hours, I will teach you how the best competitors warm up, how they prepare for competition, and the way that they think. And then you'll be able to use those methods specifically for yourself. You'll be able to say, oh, well, now I can be a great competitor because I know how to think. I know how to perform on command. And so if that interests you, be sure to search The Competitor's Journey on BJJ Fanatics or at simplifyingjiujitsu.com. And that is all I have for you. Hopefully, you guys liked today's episode and hopefully today's episode helps you guys suck just a little bit less at jiu-jitsu. Have a great day, guys.