Many people spend hours on the mat, hours watching instructionals, hours in the gym and often they are left looking for an edge. Nothing replaces mat time, but proper conditioning and strength building are components of any athlete’s over all game and often the difference between winning and losing.

Of course running and weight lifting can help you develop sufficient cardio and strength to excel in grappling. What do you do when you are bored with those options, don’t have a gym near by, or believe (as I do) that running is harder on the body than an armlock and weight lifting is inefficient? You turn to non-traditional yet functional alternative training methods.

Below are several cheap, simple, and FUNCTIONAL exercises that will leave you exhausted while building relevant strength. There is AMPLE example and explanation on how to do the exercises that I demonstrate, so I (after demonstrating the exercise) take you through it’s BJJ/Grappling counterpart. Enjoy the exercises, and Happy Grappling! Click “read more” to see the vids. Continue reading →