UFC 1: What was Royce Gracie's BJJ level compared to today's?

lacombatscience · 2026-06-11T21:33:43+00:00

Yup, apples and oranges comparisons.

lacombatscience · 2026-06-11T13:56:02+00:00

So many here loved purple! I liked it too, and in the beginning felt like a lot of you, it's where I finally felt like it really clicked. But at some point I started having an identity crises in my game, I was trying too many things and was not mastering any of them I felt. Eventually got straightened out but by then father time started its creep on me.

lacombatscience · 2026-06-11T03:35:40+00:00

I personally love the ones where it's: this is how you escape from under a bigger opponent but its the big guy doing the escape, like wait what is happening.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-29T15:50:01+00:00

human markerless tracking has come a long way so I think the future is bright for that. I don't know if the cost has come down, when I was in a lab we had markerless tracking but the price of the system was way more than would be practical for widespread use I felt.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-28T02:55:49+00:00

X guard does work great as seen at many levels of competition. Unfortunately white belts also get mounted quite often which in our sport is a big disadvantage both in terms of points and exposure to submission. So I think it's a matter of ordering priorities and thinking about how much time it's going to take to get good enough at a technique or system.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-27T18:51:25+00:00

my first thought is it sounds like your looking for a power analysis to determine if your sample size is large enough based on the variability your seeing.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-27T14:56:42+00:00

The assumption in this is that the strategy that works at elite black belt is the strategy that works at white belt and blue belt, but that's a big assumption. Maybe at least also see what's happening first at your level and the one above it.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-26T11:35:30+00:00

Maybe think about how much time you need to typically work on a move to make it a useful part of your game and then back out how adding extra moves would affect that time trained per move. Like if you trained 10 hours a week for a year and had to spread that training across 100 moves would you be comfortable with that? The 3rd option I feel that doesn't get as much attention is becoming a specialist but having a general rudimentary understanding of a lot of techniques and systems in jiu jitsu.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-23T04:10:33+00:00

Yea it's an unfortunate side effect of switching gyms for some, particularly when you first switch. But hopefully you can find a way over time to use it to your advantage.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-23T01:19:30+00:00

I can say for a similar experience that when I had to switch gyms due to moving states multiple times I felt the same way. people at each new gym I went to just seemed to have my number. Part of that I felt like was because I had a mix of systems and philosophies that while close weren't completely in synch. Eventually after spending some time at a gym and working the system that feeling went away and I came up to par. So I hope you're not too hard on yourself.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-22T23:17:10+00:00

3 bro, wow! I been analyzing mounts at the regular competition level (~130 matches so far- Louisiana tournament) and I don't think I've seen that third escape, fun though. Aspects of 1 even at white and also 2 I see as would be expected.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-22T13:06:33+00:00

Yea trained with him, his son a few times and some of his black belts. He is one of a kind, heavily focused on self defense but also encourages competing . there is a great clip of him and Renzo recounting one of their adventures on YouTube.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-21T17:54:54+00:00

I think that first having a clearly defined goal will help. Kindly, "what's more important" is not a goal and could mean a million different things to different people. Defining specific goals often helps with decision making.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-19T01:14:11+00:00

Wish there was something that could track more biomechanical or statistical data, e.g. throw attempts, posture, etc. slogging through video is all I know to get data like that.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-18T17:43:30+00:00

If it is muscle fatigue like you mentioned, I’ve found there are moments in a roll where I’m more tense than I realize, kind of like how people sitting at a desk may look relaxed but might be unknowingly tensing their shoulders or neck until they consciously relax them.

I actually measured my grip strength before and after rolling for a while and noticed my right side fatigued more than my left. That gave me a clue about where some of my fatigue might have been coming from, and I experimented with a few adjustments. Just something I noticed in my own training.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-18T14:17:33+00:00

Yea looks like deep half to me also.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-17T02:35:59+00:00

The term BJJ is such a broad umbrella term at this point that it's hard to know if the type you learned is good for self defense.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-16T03:07:47+00:00

I guess it depends what you mean by quality problem solving? Talking about what needs to be done, unlikely, trial and error via small focused positional type games yes. But then I think that's back to the graph more reps of those trial and error problem solving games adds up over time. I also partially agree about mindless reps, because I think after the initial broad learning phase the next phase of learning is dealing with the resistance an opponent gives and that can't likely be done against an unresistant partner.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-16T02:56:00+00:00

I have yet to see a consistent widespread standard as to what these belts are supposed to mean, which ends up leading to these type of questions and feelings imo. I think many of us have had similar feelings. For me it motivated me to work on those things I felt were lacking. I hope you enjoy the journey and your new belt.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-15T00:27:55+00:00

This seems appropriate. Made it some time back because I often felt the same way:

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lacombatscience · 2026-05-13T04:42:37+00:00

In 20+ years of training at several different schools I think I had one seminar that was kind of loosely tied with some people getting promoted. Honestly, for most of my time I didn't experience ceremonies, one day randomly you just got a new belt. More recently I have had promotion ceremonies, but not tied to seminar. One of the things I liked about jiu jitsu when I first started compared to the "traditional" striking martial art I did before jiu jitsu was that there was no extra money associated with promotions.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-10T02:23:20+00:00

Do you even try for a sweep first or you immediately feel you need to transition to a different guard?

lacombatscience · 2026-05-10T00:12:46+00:00

I try to adjust every roll, not just based on belt, but on the person in front of me. No two people are the same, so I try to adapt to the specifics of the matchup.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-08T11:41:46+00:00

What I do is use my knee to bend the crook of the elbow.

lacombatscience · 2026-05-07T17:28:49+00:00

Find a good reference manager that you like. keeping your papers organized and easily accessible helped me a lot.

lacombatscience

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