Practice your shoulder rolls in BJJ

Practice your shoulder rolls in BJJ

It is so important to practice your shoulder rolls in BJJ. Every night, I yell out to my students during warmups to practice rolling forwards and backwards over BOTH shoulders. There is incredible value of variations of shoulder rolls for technical development in Jiu-Jitsu. Here is a fundamental truth that must become ingrained in your thinking about Jiu-Jitsu. For every move in Jiu-Jitsu there is a movement that underlies it and which makes it possible for you to perform it. If you can’t perform that underlying movement well, it is exceedingly unlikely that you will perform the move itself well. Of all the various body movements that help prepare you for Jiu-Jitsu performance, I put a particularly high value on the many variations of rolls here at Savarese BJJ (www.njbjj.com). Shoulder rolls, wrestling granby rolls, forward rolls etc etc. The movement and postures of rolling will greatly aid your development in guard retention, escapes, and eventually, inversion into lower body and upper body attacks. Futhermore, rolls will keep you safe when caught by a high amplitude takedowns. Nothing else does such a great job of making your body move in the manner associated with high level BJJ/MMA athletes. Time spent before and after class just playing around with shoulder roll variations from your back, butt, knees, all fours and standing is time very well spent. As your fluidity increases so will your Jiu-Jitsu performance.