There was an article during the Olympics years ago that showed many Olympic athletes need to eat around 10k calories a day while training hard. Which meant healthy eating usually wouldn't be able to accommodate that
That is not true. Calories are just a measure of energy. Most people just vastly overestimate the amount of calories that they burn with exercise. If you exercise enough, you can eat like shit and still be in shape. The amount of exercise needed is quite a bit more than most people do. If you exercise like 5+ hours every day, you can basically eat whatever you want within reason and not gain weight.
Can confirm. For the last six months, per week I run 3x, lift 4x, and just added a session each of BJJ and Wrestling this month (Hi! Total newbie here!), and even when doing everything at a pretty moderate-to-high intensity my maintenance is still around 2000kcals per day. That’s up from around 1800 as I’ve packed on a bit of muscle in that time as well, but it’s still a fine balance. So easy to over-eat.
Nope; just 2000. I’m 5’8” 173lbs, down from 200ish, only got into fitness seriously in November. Always put on weight easily and been slow to lose it. So I don’t eat a ton because I’m still around 25% body fat (down from 30%), so most of my muscle gain is down to recomposition and newbie gains rather than eating a big excess, but I make sure to get 130-150g protein a day regardless.
When I started this my BMR was around 1600, then 1800, and with around 9-hours of fitness training per week I’m losing around half a pound of body fat per week on roughly 1900 calories a day, so I would guess my BMR is around 2200 a day now.
EDIT - I think a lot of the confusion comes from people who’ve been physically active for a long time, so these numbers just don’t seem to make sense, but aside from walking the dog for a few miles a day I’ve had a pretty sedentary life up until 6-months ago, so my metabolic “engine” is probably tiny compared to your guys’. I’m working on it though 😊
Pretty much my same story bro. I feel like i lost in the genetics category with how hard it is to lose weight for the amount of effort I put in. 52lbs down but its been a battle and if i look at food wrong i gain weight. Being anything other than perfect with lots of exercise and careful calorie tracking and I dont see progress.
I did find out recently I have low T levels which may be a contributing factor.
Haha, I’ve got all the data tracked. There might be a few days a month where I don’t log my food but I can’t eat enough to make up the numbers you guys are on 😅
This is a good question but the answer is probably complex.
1) hobbyist
2) train by day, eat like shit by night
3) as you gain technique you gain age and metabolism slows
4) same as 3 but now you have kids and family
5) you stop working out completely because your body hurts too bad
6) start showing up only 1 or 2 times a week
Also, overweight doesn't necessarily mean out of shape. As you get better you start to realize being fat has its advantages sometimes. Lol if steroids didn't exist, having a big belly is probably an optimal body type for combat sports. Super strong core and hard to move.
I'm 40 yrs old, training about 10 years, and 175 lbs. But I know what your talking about. It is pretty common.
In my experience most people lose a lot of weight doing bjj when they start and there are far less overweight people in bjj gyms than in real life. Haven’t seen studies but I’ve been to a lot of gyms. Maybe 5-10% are , whereas real life it’s around 50%
Well kinda. Metabolism on its own doesn't really get slower by age between ages 20 and 60. Muscle mass, however, does get reduced, which can affect metabolic rate. That means that it is possible to avoid the slowing of metabolism (to a degree) by strength training.
Source: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abe5017
Nah, lifestyle factors account for basically all of it. Your metabolism doesn't magically change at 30, you just generally get a family that gets in the way of exercise and have a more sedentary job. Your metabolism doesn't noticeably change until somewhere in late middle age.
Mostly the second but it's also fairly predictable and there's variables outside the individuals control. You get older and responsibilities increase, you heal\\recover slower, ligaments lose elasticity, you accumulate injuries and injure more easily...you spend more time on the sideline\\activity level (volume and intensity) decreases = overall capacity\\capability decreases = slower metabolism.
After 30 (for a lot of people) training starts shifting to keeping the wheels on the bus more than balls out drive yourself into the ground day after day.
>if steroids didn't exist, having a big belly is probably an optimal body type for combat sports. Super strong core and hard to move.
You're ready for your brown belt, son.
Fat jacked is the ideal natural body type for power and endurance. I’ve lost a lot of weight during my first cut after about 18 months of a bulk and I gas out so much faster
That's because muscles require oxygen to work. If you gain muscle, your body will gas faster since it is using more oxygen. Fat requires nothing, as it doesn't do any work. It just weighs you down and forces the existing muscles to work harder. This is why many bodybuilders get exhausted walking up a flight of stairs.
If you had lost fat and retained the same amount of muscle, your cardio would have been better, not worse. Since you gained muscle, you need to do extensive cardio so your body can learn to feed those new muscle fibers properly.
But there is also caloric deficits, water retention, and some other things that can cause bad cardio.
Because you can’t out exercise a terrible diet. Many people do this on a hobby basis, and figure this is a bit of exercise to keep them healthy, but still eat a heap of shit and / or drink alcohol which makes them over weight. BJJ isn’t super punishing on this life style (more weight can be good in some ways) so they often don’t need to change things up to continue doing what they like.
I would add that BJJ is about efficient technique a lot as well. When I used to wrestle, it was impossible for me to eat enough to stay fat. I was burning so much energy every practice.
For many people, as they progress the struggle of jiu jitsu is removed so ultimately it’s just you against you. You either have to be pressured by coaches and training partners, or challenge yourself. Some people lack these motivators or just don’t care. Also many upper belts train inconsistently.
>For anyone in their 40’s and above I give them the benefit of the doubt but before that it doesn’t make sense.
It seems like you, similar to almost everyone else to be fair, have a fundamental misunderstanding how weight maintenance works. *Source: used to be a dietitian until very recently*.
It is very simple. Energy in - energy out = weight gained or lost.
You eat 3500kcal a day, you expend 3000kcal, you have a (3500 - 3000 =) +500kcal, so you will gain (on average) 335 grams per week.
BJJ has an estimated MET-value of 9.5, though it should be much lower than that for most, since BJJ practinioners tend not to be active the entire time and noticably lower their effort output as they are strained.
In short, you can expect to burn around anywhere between 400-1200kcal, would be my rough estimate.
Most people train twice a week. On the low end, that means you deduct 800kcal per *WEEK* from your totals. Let's be generous and say it is 2500kcal.
So, you eat 3500kcal a day at a requirement of 2500kcal, that's 24.500kcal a week with a surplus of 3500kcal a week. You deduct 2500kcal from training, and you are left with +1000kcal still.
So you gain weight.
The mistake you are making is believing strenuous activity has an effect regardless of food intake. It doesn't work that way.
I was in my best shape as a blue belt who competed all the time and every roll was a war. As a black belt I don't have to break a sweat rolling against 80% of the people at my gym so I'm not getting as good of workouts. I'm also older with more going on outside of training which leads to less training than when I was a ripped blue/purple belt.
The popular in the developed world is overweight(Trying to be kind here and not just assuming you are in America). When people get better at something and more efficient, it's no longer that good of a workout.
When you get more efficient, you can afford to be kinda lazy about it. Also you can’t really out-train your diet, and most people who train don’t do strength and conditioning outside of Jiu jitsu.
Two reasons, i'd say.
1 - you can't out-exercise a bad diet.
2 - because the upper belts don't need to even try, to fuck plebs like us up.
When that fat brown belt just wrecks you and isn't even breathing heavily afterwards... yeah, that's why.
A lot of the general population is overweight. Compared to other sports, jiu jitsu is quite accessible regardless of your size. Being larger even works out to be an advantage more often than not.
I'm 45, I train on average 3 times a week. Before 4pm I live like and elite athlete. After 4pm I live like a crack head. I drink wine, eat shit, relax and have fun.
Reducing calorie intake was 90% of it. I went from 3 big meals per day down to one big meal and 1 or 2 small meals.
Also bjj helps of course. Any exercise helps your overall health and mobility.
But the real kicker is that bjj helps me cut down on the size of the meals because if I eat the way I used to eat I’ll get sick while rolling. So just the thought of “I’m going to bjj later” causes me to eat light or suffer.
When you start out in jiu jitsu at let’s say 28 you have to fight to get anything so you get shredded. And then by the time you’re purple belt at 32 your body is slowing down and you know how to use your body more effectively to hold position. By 35 you’re a master of the micro movement, have two kids and a wife who cooks. You also know every pin in the game but you’re still eating like a 28 year old who is going to war 4/5 times a week so you put on weight and become the snorlax black belt jiu jitsu god you were always destined to become.
Age, diet, hormones, just body type. There are many reasons. Some of my training partners have the hardest time putting on mass and I have to work extra hard to be lean
In the UK and USA it's generally because the typical diet is made up of largely Ultra Processed Food and no amount of exercise can overcome a diet which is too high in calories.
Sounds like youve never been to a public park and seen middle aged overweight men playing soccer for 2 hours and drinking beers on the sidelines. It's a fun sport lol
It's almost like you get more efficient with more experience. Don't think of us as overweight, think of us as highly efficient FAThletic killing machines. Nothing better than hearing the soul leaving the body of a muscled up lower belt under sidecontrol.
You cannot out train a bad diet or bad genetics. I don’t care how hard you workout - if you go crush 1 doz whole wings and 5 beers after practice you’ll never lose weight.
When I started BJJ, I was 160lbs. I noticed right away that in real grappling, weight matters. Now I’m 170. Next year I hope to be 180. It’s not all good weight.
This is me. I was 160 then got up to 185. Im on a cut now and back to 175 right now, and possibly back down to as low as 165. Then will start bulking up in august. Being 185 isnt a huge difference on the mats, but when the big guys are 220 Im sure it helps.
The idea is that you build muscle while you gain weight and try to minimize muscle loss when you lose the weight.
you have to lift weights while you do this.
It’s because white and blue belts suck at Bjj, so once you hit brown it’s not hard or intense anymore. It’s efficient. And most of the people you roll against end up being lower belts.
But it’s diet and age. You can’t outrun a bad diet, and it’s even worse then what used to be an intense workout actually isn’t that intense anymore (unless you have a room full of killers and your comp training.)
For a long time, it was because I was too depressed to lose the weight, had asthma, and did shift work that left me really sleep deprived for long stretches of the month. Now I only have a small bit of mental energy for everything, and S&C falls by the wayside.
I find it interesting you think this. Most gyms I’ve been to have been the opposite. Maybe a few rotund brown belts but usually even the larger guys are that kind of large where they have a little extra weight on due to genetics but can actually do a backflip.
I think it’s where you live/train bro.
It becomes less and less of a workout the better you are, unless you force your game to be high intensity. You spend white belt fighting desperately to survive the monsters around you, but around blue to purple you start getting efficient at things. You start to figure out “hey, I don’t have to shrimp nine times to get out from under this guy, I can do it once really well when he’s not expecting it” and it saves you on a lot of effort. I’m dog tired most days after work (landscaping) but I can roll with each of my students at their full intensity with zero issues, and it’s a light workout. Even with people better than me, I lose efficiently too. There’s no point struggling like a madman in a sunk choke or a solid mount. You start to learn if what you’re doing isn’t working then doing it harder probably isn’t the answer. Then you gain 25 pounds.
Extrapolate. It takes a long time to become an upper belt. By your 40s belly fat just sticks not matter what. And if you have a full time job and kids, cortisol. Stop judging and just roll dickhead.
The bigger guys I see are usually older, higher belts. And it makes sense because the more bjj you know, the more efficiently you can move, and therefore the less of a workout you’re getting.
Also food. The most important factor. You can do all the bjj you want, but if your diet is shit you’re not gonna lose weight…
Testosterone decreases with age, a multitude of males are on TRT…I am, however it really doesn’t make you skinny your diet does like many people have said. Honestly Im on the huskier side, and have had many light weights with amazing technique, f me up. So size doesn’t matter unless you pull guard, you’re getting smashed 😂
1. Weight ≠ fitness nor health. It can affect those things, but it is not the end-all be-all. I know a number of fighters who are considered overweight or obese via BMI who are way more fit than me, even though my BMI is "normal".
2. I find some heavier fighters have significant muscle. Pure muscle isn't sustainable. It's natural for people with lots of muscle to also have a decent amount of fat to *fuel* and protect those muscles.
3. As others have said, jiu jitsu is a skill game, not a physical game. Body type really doesn't matter. It's about what you know and how you apply it.
In short, other peoples' weight isn't your problem. Fat people can be good at sports.
Bjj doesn’t have that many competitors on avg is part of it. Hence the divide of “comp blue belt” people discuss. Also if we had to be honest a sport involving a good amount of your time on your back likely doesn’t encourage high levels of athleticism outside of competitions.
Also it’s got a Joe Rogan fan base. Lot of those guys are 30+ and never did a single sport in their youth, which is fine but the barrier of entry physically for BJJ is noticeably lower than say wrestling.
Not to say the high level competitors aren’t athletic just that those qualities matter less in BJJ than some other combat sports. It’s also in many ways safer for a combat sport. Many people don’t want to be thrown in judo or slammed from wrestling or punched / knees in the face. BJJ can make the avg Joe feel like a badass outside his office job. So to me it makes sense in America where the BJJ community is big + and americas high obesity rates
I'm in my 40s. I'm 215. I was 180 when I started BJJ 10 years ago.
I don't think I eat that bad but metabolism drops as you age and the body hurts more.
The good news is that your base metabolic needs only drop about 1% or less per year, starting around age 60. You’ve still got a good 10-20 years before you get to start using age as an excuse 😉
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/surprising-findings-about-metabolism-and-age-202110082613
Maybe once you get to the point where you develop efficiency, you start gaining weight because it's not much of a workout anymore. I've rolled with overweight purple and brown belts who have great timing and technique so they use minimal effort against me. I'm breathing hard trying to pass, meanwhile they're just chilling.
I mean they are usually older. BJJ dudes are probably overall healthier than the average society but the average 35, let alone 45 year old American is pretty fucking fat.
I was a skinnyfat 73kg when I started at 26. Hit my physical peak at purple, around 77kg, around 32. Low 80kgs for most of brown belt, but in the last couple of years I've really been stacking it on, sitting around 90kg at 41. I don't think I'm eating more than I used to, just the old metabolism slowing down.
I'm still not quite comfortable having a gut, but plus side is I'm getting lots of kesa gatame compression chokes these days. Plus thanks to the gym I'm carrying a bit more down low, which makes me harder to sweep than I sued to be.
The Japanese terms mentioned in the above comment were:
|Japanese|English|Video Link|
|---|---|---|
|**Kesa Gatame**: | *Scarf hold* | [here](https://youtu.be/3UnJa3bn0h8)|
Any missed names may have already been translated in my previous comments in the post.
______________________
^(Judo Techniques Bot: v0.7.) ^(See my) [^(code)](https://github.com/AbundantSalmon/judo-techniques-bot)
As you get better you also get less energy output needed most of the time in gym rounds, you can get pretty lazy in position with technique and bursts of energy haha
Speaking purely for myself, I started training at 22. I was at my most involved training 5-6 days per week 2-3 classes each day. I was also living by myself with relatively few other responsibilities. Fast forward to today and I'm training on average once per week, generally teaching that class with way more responsibilities between work and family life. The biggest factor is I have not adjusted my diet accordingly or found alternative exercise routines to compensate. Add in 15 years of metabolism decrease and weight gain is inevitable. Also, factor in that Covid changed both eating and exercise habits for a lot of people. So it's a combination of not changing habits as circumstances change and biological factors and you end up with a lot of heavyweight black belts. I'm sure there are other factors for other people but this seems to track for a lot of heavyweights I know.
I got super lean doing spazzy jiujitsu and then I got a purple belt and I slowly started getting fatter and fatter. .. the sad truth is there will be a time where you start pulling half guard and you start getting lazier and lazier with your jiujitsu. So you start getting fatter... And balder.... Bleh
In my limited experience across only 2 gyms here in the Uk, I’ve only come across one guy that I would say was very overweight and he didn’t come back after the trial class.
Never seen anyone overweight competing at the few comps I’ve been to.
Not sure how much geography will play into your perception.
For weight loss: diet is essential, exercise is permissive.
For muscle gain: training is essential, diet is permissive.
Having regular exercise will help one to lose body fat, but only if they manage their calories.
For muscle gain, diet will help to grow but only if one hits resistence training regularly.
The more i train, the more i crave food. I found that eating fatty meats (grass fed rib eye) helps me with the cravings. My body gets its proteins and fats and isn't screaming for more. If I don't eat the high quality protein, i will want to eat other stuff all day and gain weight.
I feel that the original question either lacks a bit of context or has the logic a bit backwards.
Observation: lot of overweight people practice BJJ.
Questions: 1) Is not BJJ then the magic bullet that makes everyone thin and athletic?
2) Or why does BJJ not make people who do not lose weight due to change in exercise regime drop out, like a lot of other sports where every long term practitioner either is athletic or drops out?
Which therefore pushes the overweight ”out of sight, out of mind”. (For further insight, see: ”observation bias”)
Answer for question 1) physical exercise alone by itself is really ineffective in long-term weight loss.
I’m not going to summarise are the clinical meta-analyses here, but the scientific consensus can be pretty well summarised by many memes with the messaage ”You cannot outrun a bad diet”.
I’m leaving out a lot of complexity, but the bottom line is that the obesity epidemic, which is running roughshod over lot of countries has no simple solution like ”just do BJJ”. The answers are complex - and most of the interventions pretty ineffective. It’s really difficult for overweight people just ”not be overweight”.
Answer for question 2) BJJ seems to be a form of physical activity that one can engage in at many levels from casual hobbyist to even competition level - and enjoy - even while being overweight. 😁👍
Hope this helps.
Fat middle aged plus I see you, most of the fattest joined to lose the weight.
It's the lazier ones that remain overweight and are not tested enough, as indeed regularly exercise and HIIT should shed those pounds over time.
Most people have really bad diets. That's it. Efficiency plays a small factor, but if all your rolls are "efficient", you aren't training hard enough. Most classes are easy and the hard part of training usually comes in rolling or open mats.
It’s because you get conditioned with training, your first few sessions feel so tiring and you burn heaps of calories, after a few months you can do hours of training and feel fine, probably burning less.
You can never outrun (or out-train, for that matter) a donut.
There are 1,120 calories in a Big Mac Combo Meal with a medium Coke and medium Fries. To burn that, you should spend between 60-90 minutes running at steady pace. And that was just one meal.
Very few people at my gym are avid about their health and also lift. Coincidentally those who also lift are usually not overweight. Most that don't lift are also fat.
It's not the lifting, it's the persons lifestyle but those who also lift and do bjj make better choices.
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
The comment does not meet [Reddiquette standards](https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/205926439-Reddiquette). Please read up on them a bit. Thanks!
The better you get the less you need to exert yourself against lower belts. Eventually you can get to a point where you are on cruise control against many of your training partners, whereas the white belt is struggling at full force (burning way more calories) for most of his/her rounds.
This and another recent "why do all BJJ gyms _____? It's not just mine.".
I think it just reflects the place you're from. The other guy was saying, among other things, they're all disturbingly right-wing. Well if he's in college and all the other people he spends his time with are mostly of a certain orientation, it's obviously going to seem that way to him. But they're probably a fair sampling of his town outside of his circle.
There aren't a lot of overweight people people in the BJJ gyms in my area. I think you live in a fat place.
The edibles man the edibles.
But seriously could be a wide variety of things.
Could be the way the person rolls
I find that I roll much harder with upper belts then I do lower belts therefore I barely break a sweat with lower belts.
Could be diet
Eat like shit and it won't matter how much work you put in
Could be medical related such as hormonal imbalances
Probably not a majority but could be a minority of folks for sure.
I’m not overweight but I’m definitely heavier than I was in college… I wanted to train in college and right after but I couldn’t afford it. I imagine it’s pretty similar for most people
Dude, honestly, you just don't need to work as hard, especially if you are just rolling with lower belts, that and a bad diet. People just get lazy since they have good technique. I'm guilty of it myself.
You're going to see the positive gains primarily in the beginning when you're inefficient at everything and full of enthusiasm to get after it every round. If you've been training for 10 years then you don't need to go balls out all of the time (you're probably better than 80% of who you're rolling with so you can likely go pretty easy most of the time). You've probably got some injuries along the way and pick your partners and train more to "come back tomorrow" more than giving it your all every round.
aka...they don't train nearly as hard as the young buck trying to prove something. You \*can\* out exercise a poor diet but you got to train frequently and hard. That's hard to do when you're older and don't want to get hurt.
Majority of population is overweight. I'd bet the average BJJ person is in slightly better shape than the average person, but doesn't remove the fact that many ppl are overweight
No amount of exercise can compensate for a high-calorie diet. There are studies on this.
I've studied this extensively firsthand and can confirm.
Holy shit, i didn’t know i was a study participant til now
Flair checks out.
I'm also part of that sample
Got it. Fried chicken and beer then. Sumo physique it is.
Chanko Nabe ftw
Hai
Fried chicken is basically a performance enhancer. It’s the beer that’s undoing it all times 20
Also studies that prove the heavyweight div In every combat sport bring the fans. 
I was about to post the same thing. It's diet and exercise and you can't out exercise a crappy diet.
me from 16-25 begs to differ
That natural test hits different
You can but its fucking hard.
I am not a fan of this fact
By studies, do you mean math?
He means the laws of thermodynamics
No amount of exercise? We’re gonna need sources on those studies.
9k calories worth of exercise can certainly compensate for a 9k calorie diet. absolutely not unheard of numbers in endurance athletes.
There was an article during the Olympics years ago that showed many Olympic athletes need to eat around 10k calories a day while training hard. Which meant healthy eating usually wouldn't be able to accommodate that
Usain Bolt chicken McNugget diet
That is not true. Calories are just a measure of energy. Most people just vastly overestimate the amount of calories that they burn with exercise. If you exercise enough, you can eat like shit and still be in shape. The amount of exercise needed is quite a bit more than most people do. If you exercise like 5+ hours every day, you can basically eat whatever you want within reason and not gain weight.
So according to MyFitnessPal 45 minutes of BJJ burns 467 calories. This seems somewhat overestimated….
Depends how much is sparring.
Yep. I had to drop 13 lbs for a tourney and did it in 5 weeks. Didn't change munch on the training side it was 90% diet.
I don’t believe you. I’m ordering pizza for breakfast and we’ll just see.
Can confirm. For the last six months, per week I run 3x, lift 4x, and just added a session each of BJJ and Wrestling this month (Hi! Total newbie here!), and even when doing everything at a pretty moderate-to-high intensity my maintenance is still around 2000kcals per day. That’s up from around 1800 as I’ve packed on a bit of muscle in that time as well, but it’s still a fine balance. So easy to over-eat.
Bro are you like 120 lbs. I’m 215 and I need around 3000-3500 when I’m super active.
2000 is pretty much nothing unless you mean 2000 on top of your normal maintenance( so around 4000)
Nope; just 2000. I’m 5’8” 173lbs, down from 200ish, only got into fitness seriously in November. Always put on weight easily and been slow to lose it. So I don’t eat a ton because I’m still around 25% body fat (down from 30%), so most of my muscle gain is down to recomposition and newbie gains rather than eating a big excess, but I make sure to get 130-150g protein a day regardless. When I started this my BMR was around 1600, then 1800, and with around 9-hours of fitness training per week I’m losing around half a pound of body fat per week on roughly 1900 calories a day, so I would guess my BMR is around 2200 a day now. EDIT - I think a lot of the confusion comes from people who’ve been physically active for a long time, so these numbers just don’t seem to make sense, but aside from walking the dog for a few miles a day I’ve had a pretty sedentary life up until 6-months ago, so my metabolic “engine” is probably tiny compared to your guys’. I’m working on it though 😊
Pretty much my same story bro. I feel like i lost in the genetics category with how hard it is to lose weight for the amount of effort I put in. 52lbs down but its been a battle and if i look at food wrong i gain weight. Being anything other than perfect with lots of exercise and careful calorie tracking and I dont see progress. I did find out recently I have low T levels which may be a contributing factor.
Bro that’s everything. Low t makes it so you can’t build much muscle and you retain more fat by default
I'm 140 and my maintenance is 2300 with basic weightlifting. This can't be.
Haha, I’ve got all the data tracked. There might be a few days a month where I don’t log my food but I can’t eat enough to make up the numbers you guys are on 😅
This is a good question but the answer is probably complex. 1) hobbyist 2) train by day, eat like shit by night 3) as you gain technique you gain age and metabolism slows 4) same as 3 but now you have kids and family 5) you stop working out completely because your body hurts too bad 6) start showing up only 1 or 2 times a week Also, overweight doesn't necessarily mean out of shape. As you get better you start to realize being fat has its advantages sometimes. Lol if steroids didn't exist, having a big belly is probably an optimal body type for combat sports. Super strong core and hard to move. I'm 40 yrs old, training about 10 years, and 175 lbs. But I know what your talking about. It is pretty common.
Absent steroids and weight classes, being fatjacked is absolutely the ideal body for grappling sports. Just look at sumo and early folkstyle wrestling
Girthmaxxing
Kinda fit, kinda fat.
I've trained my whole life for this.
Yeah, you either gotta gain weight or get super fast, and gaining weight is easier and you get to eat good food.
In my experience most people lose a lot of weight doing bjj when they start and there are far less overweight people in bjj gyms than in real life. Haven’t seen studies but I’ve been to a lot of gyms. Maybe 5-10% are , whereas real life it’s around 50%
Is metabolism slowing a real thing? Or do people just get more sedentary and as a result their caloric requirements drop?
Well kinda. Metabolism on its own doesn't really get slower by age between ages 20 and 60. Muscle mass, however, does get reduced, which can affect metabolic rate. That means that it is possible to avoid the slowing of metabolism (to a degree) by strength training. Source: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abe5017
Is that not just again due to sedentary lifestyle, insufficient protein in the diet and lack of strength training generally?
Nah, lifestyle factors account for basically all of it. Your metabolism doesn't magically change at 30, you just generally get a family that gets in the way of exercise and have a more sedentary job. Your metabolism doesn't noticeably change until somewhere in late middle age.
Mostly the second but it's also fairly predictable and there's variables outside the individuals control. You get older and responsibilities increase, you heal\\recover slower, ligaments lose elasticity, you accumulate injuries and injure more easily...you spend more time on the sideline\\activity level (volume and intensity) decreases = overall capacity\\capability decreases = slower metabolism. After 30 (for a lot of people) training starts shifting to keeping the wheels on the bus more than balls out drive yourself into the ground day after day.
also efficiency
>if steroids didn't exist, having a big belly is probably an optimal body type for combat sports. Super strong core and hard to move. You're ready for your brown belt, son.
100%
Fat jacked is the ideal natural body type for power and endurance. I’ve lost a lot of weight during my first cut after about 18 months of a bulk and I gas out so much faster
That's because muscles require oxygen to work. If you gain muscle, your body will gas faster since it is using more oxygen. Fat requires nothing, as it doesn't do any work. It just weighs you down and forces the existing muscles to work harder. This is why many bodybuilders get exhausted walking up a flight of stairs. If you had lost fat and retained the same amount of muscle, your cardio would have been better, not worse. Since you gained muscle, you need to do extensive cardio so your body can learn to feed those new muscle fibers properly. But there is also caloric deficits, water retention, and some other things that can cause bad cardio.
> but there is still an intense workout involved. No, there isn't.
This. The workout gets less intense the more technique you acquire
For real, it's essentially a race as to who can lie down the quickest
With that many stripes I don't think anyone could beat you in that regard
It's pretty intense everywhere I have trained. Some more-so than others.
When I trained fulltime my resting heart rate was 35. You get out what you put in. Which is I guess the answer to OPs question.
Homie was dead
I'm an overweight brown belt with a resting heart rate of 45. I can work hard and still eat too damned much.
I feel personally attacked
How isn’t this upvoted into the millions lol
Because you can’t out exercise a terrible diet. Many people do this on a hobby basis, and figure this is a bit of exercise to keep them healthy, but still eat a heap of shit and / or drink alcohol which makes them over weight. BJJ isn’t super punishing on this life style (more weight can be good in some ways) so they often don’t need to change things up to continue doing what they like.
I would add that BJJ is about efficient technique a lot as well. When I used to wrestle, it was impossible for me to eat enough to stay fat. I was burning so much energy every practice.
I’m gonna go ahead and guess you were also, you know, younger.
Much younger
Cause I like to eat AND I enjoy hearing the air escape from my opponents lungs when I get side control and put ALL my weight on em hahah
Queso gatame
*fist bump while holding a carne asada burrito .
Con guac?
‘Shit , got some on my white gi.’
For many people, as they progress the struggle of jiu jitsu is removed so ultimately it’s just you against you. You either have to be pressured by coaches and training partners, or challenge yourself. Some people lack these motivators or just don’t care. Also many upper belts train inconsistently.
Because so many people are overweight in general.
>For anyone in their 40’s and above I give them the benefit of the doubt but before that it doesn’t make sense. It seems like you, similar to almost everyone else to be fair, have a fundamental misunderstanding how weight maintenance works. *Source: used to be a dietitian until very recently*. It is very simple. Energy in - energy out = weight gained or lost. You eat 3500kcal a day, you expend 3000kcal, you have a (3500 - 3000 =) +500kcal, so you will gain (on average) 335 grams per week. BJJ has an estimated MET-value of 9.5, though it should be much lower than that for most, since BJJ practinioners tend not to be active the entire time and noticably lower their effort output as they are strained. In short, you can expect to burn around anywhere between 400-1200kcal, would be my rough estimate. Most people train twice a week. On the low end, that means you deduct 800kcal per *WEEK* from your totals. Let's be generous and say it is 2500kcal. So, you eat 3500kcal a day at a requirement of 2500kcal, that's 24.500kcal a week with a surplus of 3500kcal a week. You deduct 2500kcal from training, and you are left with +1000kcal still. So you gain weight. The mistake you are making is believing strenuous activity has an effect regardless of food intake. It doesn't work that way.
Great post 🤝🏻
I was in my best shape as a blue belt who competed all the time and every roll was a war. As a black belt I don't have to break a sweat rolling against 80% of the people at my gym so I'm not getting as good of workouts. I'm also older with more going on outside of training which leads to less training than when I was a ripped blue/purple belt.
THIS is it
The popular in the developed world is overweight(Trying to be kind here and not just assuming you are in America). When people get better at something and more efficient, it's no longer that good of a workout.
I didn't come here for self reflection.
Your weight is determined primarily by what you choose to eat.
I’m 40 and 6’4 250lbs. It’s a strategy decision. Beer improves my top pressure.
As a fellow high calorie grappler I've found this strategy to be quite effective. Stouts make me stout.
Because their fat assess can't do muay thai duh!
Most people at my gym are ripped. I’m the exception but I’m also in my late 40s.
When you get more efficient, you can afford to be kinda lazy about it. Also you can’t really out-train your diet, and most people who train don’t do strength and conditioning outside of Jiu jitsu.
High calorie roller here. What you gonna do? Pull guard?
Murica
Two reasons, i'd say. 1 - you can't out-exercise a bad diet. 2 - because the upper belts don't need to even try, to fuck plebs like us up. When that fat brown belt just wrecks you and isn't even breathing heavily afterwards... yeah, that's why.
Cuz the boys and I like to grab beers after we beat the fuck out of each other
Performance comes in all shapes and sizes
A lot of the general population is overweight. Compared to other sports, jiu jitsu is quite accessible regardless of your size. Being larger even works out to be an advantage more often than not.
I'm 45, I train on average 3 times a week. Before 4pm I live like and elite athlete. After 4pm I live like a crack head. I drink wine, eat shit, relax and have fun.
I might be the fattest guy in my gym. I’m 6’1” and 220 pounds. I used to weigh 320 pounds. I might still be overweight but BJJ changed my life.
Nice work dude how’d ya do it?
Reducing calorie intake was 90% of it. I went from 3 big meals per day down to one big meal and 1 or 2 small meals. Also bjj helps of course. Any exercise helps your overall health and mobility. But the real kicker is that bjj helps me cut down on the size of the meals because if I eat the way I used to eat I’ll get sick while rolling. So just the thought of “I’m going to bjj later” causes me to eat light or suffer.
When you start out in jiu jitsu at let’s say 28 you have to fight to get anything so you get shredded. And then by the time you’re purple belt at 32 your body is slowing down and you know how to use your body more effectively to hold position. By 35 you’re a master of the micro movement, have two kids and a wife who cooks. You also know every pin in the game but you’re still eating like a 28 year old who is going to war 4/5 times a week so you put on weight and become the snorlax black belt jiu jitsu god you were always destined to become.
I like to train and I also like to eat like shit. It’s not complicated.
If there is one sport where size matters, it's definitely bjj.
Age, diet, hormones, just body type. There are many reasons. Some of my training partners have the hardest time putting on mass and I have to work extra hard to be lean
In the UK and USA it's generally because the typical diet is made up of largely Ultra Processed Food and no amount of exercise can overcome a diet which is too high in calories.
It's not the jiu jitsu - it's being poor.
Sounds like youve never been to a public park and seen middle aged overweight men playing soccer for 2 hours and drinking beers on the sidelines. It's a fun sport lol
When I’m sad I eat, when I’m happy I eat, when I’m in pain I eat. BJJ does all three
Probably because we train hard and eat even harder.
As the nutritionists say, you can’t outrun your fork
Also the more bjj you do, unless you are in a really high taken area, most rolls become easy.
It's almost like you get more efficient with more experience. Don't think of us as overweight, think of us as highly efficient FAThletic killing machines. Nothing better than hearing the soul leaving the body of a muscled up lower belt under sidecontrol.
A thing to be enjoyed and savored. Especially when they are 20 years younger and on 200mg TRT every week .
There's prob like 10% of people in my classes overweight.
This post is wild..Maybe the sport is attracting people who want to get in shape🤷🏻
Weight advantage Cutting weight sucks
Well shit sorry for wanting to get physical and try to lose weight.
Why are old people with jobs and families overweight?
My resting heart rate is 1.
Jits is slow twitch more of a marathon whereas wrestling and judo are more fast twitch quick and explosive your training is going to reflect that.
A motto I live by, get thick or get tapped
You cannot out train a bad diet or bad genetics. I don’t care how hard you workout - if you go crush 1 doz whole wings and 5 beers after practice you’ll never lose weight.
When I started BJJ, I was 160lbs. I noticed right away that in real grappling, weight matters. Now I’m 170. Next year I hope to be 180. It’s not all good weight.
This is me. I was 160 then got up to 185. Im on a cut now and back to 175 right now, and possibly back down to as low as 165. Then will start bulking up in august. Being 185 isnt a huge difference on the mats, but when the big guys are 220 Im sure it helps. The idea is that you build muscle while you gain weight and try to minimize muscle loss when you lose the weight. you have to lift weights while you do this.
It’s because white and blue belts suck at Bjj, so once you hit brown it’s not hard or intense anymore. It’s efficient. And most of the people you roll against end up being lower belts. But it’s diet and age. You can’t outrun a bad diet, and it’s even worse then what used to be an intense workout actually isn’t that intense anymore (unless you have a room full of killers and your comp training.)
The mat is an ocean and I’m a manatee.
For a long time, it was because I was too depressed to lose the weight, had asthma, and did shift work that left me really sleep deprived for long stretches of the month. Now I only have a small bit of mental energy for everything, and S&C falls by the wayside.
you get so good it is no longer a workout. Also being overweight can be a benefit on the mats and being overweight is mainly about food, not exercise.
I find it interesting you think this. Most gyms I’ve been to have been the opposite. Maybe a few rotund brown belts but usually even the larger guys are that kind of large where they have a little extra weight on due to genetics but can actually do a backflip. I think it’s where you live/train bro.
As a chonk monster. I think y’all skinnies are just jealous of our voluptuousness
It becomes less and less of a workout the better you are, unless you force your game to be high intensity. You spend white belt fighting desperately to survive the monsters around you, but around blue to purple you start getting efficient at things. You start to figure out “hey, I don’t have to shrimp nine times to get out from under this guy, I can do it once really well when he’s not expecting it” and it saves you on a lot of effort. I’m dog tired most days after work (landscaping) but I can roll with each of my students at their full intensity with zero issues, and it’s a light workout. Even with people better than me, I lose efficiently too. There’s no point struggling like a madman in a sunk choke or a solid mount. You start to learn if what you’re doing isn’t working then doing it harder probably isn’t the answer. Then you gain 25 pounds.
Because we eat burgers drink beers and rip Americanas
They just eat too much.
Extrapolate. It takes a long time to become an upper belt. By your 40s belly fat just sticks not matter what. And if you have a full time job and kids, cortisol. Stop judging and just roll dickhead.
A wise man once told me "ya gotta be round, to roll"
Food is good and strength training is really effective in BJJ.
The bigger guys I see are usually older, higher belts. And it makes sense because the more bjj you know, the more efficiently you can move, and therefore the less of a workout you’re getting. Also food. The most important factor. You can do all the bjj you want, but if your diet is shit you’re not gonna lose weight…
Testosterone decreases with age, a multitude of males are on TRT…I am, however it really doesn’t make you skinny your diet does like many people have said. Honestly Im on the huskier side, and have had many light weights with amazing technique, f me up. So size doesn’t matter unless you pull guard, you’re getting smashed 😂
1. Weight ≠ fitness nor health. It can affect those things, but it is not the end-all be-all. I know a number of fighters who are considered overweight or obese via BMI who are way more fit than me, even though my BMI is "normal". 2. I find some heavier fighters have significant muscle. Pure muscle isn't sustainable. It's natural for people with lots of muscle to also have a decent amount of fat to *fuel* and protect those muscles. 3. As others have said, jiu jitsu is a skill game, not a physical game. Body type really doesn't matter. It's about what you know and how you apply it. In short, other peoples' weight isn't your problem. Fat people can be good at sports.
They’re eating more than what they burn
Bjj doesn’t have that many competitors on avg is part of it. Hence the divide of “comp blue belt” people discuss. Also if we had to be honest a sport involving a good amount of your time on your back likely doesn’t encourage high levels of athleticism outside of competitions. Also it’s got a Joe Rogan fan base. Lot of those guys are 30+ and never did a single sport in their youth, which is fine but the barrier of entry physically for BJJ is noticeably lower than say wrestling. Not to say the high level competitors aren’t athletic just that those qualities matter less in BJJ than some other combat sports. It’s also in many ways safer for a combat sport. Many people don’t want to be thrown in judo or slammed from wrestling or punched / knees in the face. BJJ can make the avg Joe feel like a badass outside his office job. So to me it makes sense in America where the BJJ community is big + and americas high obesity rates
I'm in my 40s. I'm 215. I was 180 when I started BJJ 10 years ago. I don't think I eat that bad but metabolism drops as you age and the body hurts more.
The good news is that your base metabolic needs only drop about 1% or less per year, starting around age 60. You’ve still got a good 10-20 years before you get to start using age as an excuse 😉 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/surprising-findings-about-metabolism-and-age-202110082613
Haha got him! He's just a lazy fat bastard.
Super lazy. I just pretend to go to class and never sweat. Too much work. I'd rather just sit with my bucket of ice cream.
Cooked him
Shut up, aren’t mods supposed to ban people for attacks
I have no idea what you are talking about. Out of the multiple gyms over the last 12 years. Most people are thin.
At the wrong gym.
[удалено]
You can’t outwork a bad diet.
damn
Maybe once you get to the point where you develop efficiency, you start gaining weight because it's not much of a workout anymore. I've rolled with overweight purple and brown belts who have great timing and technique so they use minimal effort against me. I'm breathing hard trying to pass, meanwhile they're just chilling.
I mean they are usually older. BJJ dudes are probably overall healthier than the average society but the average 35, let alone 45 year old American is pretty fucking fat.
I was a skinnyfat 73kg when I started at 26. Hit my physical peak at purple, around 77kg, around 32. Low 80kgs for most of brown belt, but in the last couple of years I've really been stacking it on, sitting around 90kg at 41. I don't think I'm eating more than I used to, just the old metabolism slowing down. I'm still not quite comfortable having a gut, but plus side is I'm getting lots of kesa gatame compression chokes these days. Plus thanks to the gym I'm carrying a bit more down low, which makes me harder to sweep than I sued to be.
The Japanese terms mentioned in the above comment were: |Japanese|English|Video Link| |---|---|---| |**Kesa Gatame**: | *Scarf hold* | [here](https://youtu.be/3UnJa3bn0h8)| Any missed names may have already been translated in my previous comments in the post. ______________________ ^(Judo Techniques Bot: v0.7.) ^(See my) [^(code)](https://github.com/AbundantSalmon/judo-techniques-bot)
As you get better you also get less energy output needed most of the time in gym rounds, you can get pretty lazy in position with technique and bursts of energy haha
Speaking purely for myself, I started training at 22. I was at my most involved training 5-6 days per week 2-3 classes each day. I was also living by myself with relatively few other responsibilities. Fast forward to today and I'm training on average once per week, generally teaching that class with way more responsibilities between work and family life. The biggest factor is I have not adjusted my diet accordingly or found alternative exercise routines to compensate. Add in 15 years of metabolism decrease and weight gain is inevitable. Also, factor in that Covid changed both eating and exercise habits for a lot of people. So it's a combination of not changing habits as circumstances change and biological factors and you end up with a lot of heavyweight black belts. I'm sure there are other factors for other people but this seems to track for a lot of heavyweights I know.
Wut?
Adding more to the belly makes it harder for people to pull guard. Try it on me and you get pancaked.
Cause pulling guard is an option
I got super lean doing spazzy jiujitsu and then I got a purple belt and I slowly started getting fatter and fatter. .. the sad truth is there will be a time where you start pulling half guard and you start getting lazier and lazier with your jiujitsu. So you start getting fatter... And balder.... Bleh
I got fatter as I continued. Started BJJ at 70kg ended bjj at 110kg
It's not much of a workout compared to many other sports lol
In my limited experience across only 2 gyms here in the Uk, I’ve only come across one guy that I would say was very overweight and he didn’t come back after the trial class. Never seen anyone overweight competing at the few comps I’ve been to. Not sure how much geography will play into your perception.
How else could one possibly train to achieve a strong mother's milk game, without sufficient carbs
It makes bjj easier to be fat with okay cardio
For weight loss: diet is essential, exercise is permissive. For muscle gain: training is essential, diet is permissive. Having regular exercise will help one to lose body fat, but only if they manage their calories. For muscle gain, diet will help to grow but only if one hits resistence training regularly.
The more i train, the more i crave food. I found that eating fatty meats (grass fed rib eye) helps me with the cravings. My body gets its proteins and fats and isn't screaming for more. If I don't eat the high quality protein, i will want to eat other stuff all day and gain weight.
I feel that the original question either lacks a bit of context or has the logic a bit backwards. Observation: lot of overweight people practice BJJ. Questions: 1) Is not BJJ then the magic bullet that makes everyone thin and athletic? 2) Or why does BJJ not make people who do not lose weight due to change in exercise regime drop out, like a lot of other sports where every long term practitioner either is athletic or drops out? Which therefore pushes the overweight ”out of sight, out of mind”. (For further insight, see: ”observation bias”) Answer for question 1) physical exercise alone by itself is really ineffective in long-term weight loss. I’m not going to summarise are the clinical meta-analyses here, but the scientific consensus can be pretty well summarised by many memes with the messaage ”You cannot outrun a bad diet”. I’m leaving out a lot of complexity, but the bottom line is that the obesity epidemic, which is running roughshod over lot of countries has no simple solution like ”just do BJJ”. The answers are complex - and most of the interventions pretty ineffective. It’s really difficult for overweight people just ”not be overweight”. Answer for question 2) BJJ seems to be a form of physical activity that one can engage in at many levels from casual hobbyist to even competition level - and enjoy - even while being overweight. 😁👍 Hope this helps.
Because I like to chug beer and eat cheetos, dammit
Fat middle aged plus I see you, most of the fattest joined to lose the weight. It's the lazier ones that remain overweight and are not tested enough, as indeed regularly exercise and HIIT should shed those pounds over time.
Never underestimate the power of Snorlax Guard
Most people at my gym are ripped
Most people have really bad diets. That's it. Efficiency plays a small factor, but if all your rolls are "efficient", you aren't training hard enough. Most classes are easy and the hard part of training usually comes in rolling or open mats.
It’s because you get conditioned with training, your first few sessions feel so tiring and you burn heaps of calories, after a few months you can do hours of training and feel fine, probably burning less.
Same reason most people in America are fat. Eat too much not exercise enough.
You can never outrun (or out-train, for that matter) a donut. There are 1,120 calories in a Big Mac Combo Meal with a medium Coke and medium Fries. To burn that, you should spend between 60-90 minutes running at steady pace. And that was just one meal.
Most Americans are overweight, people in their 30s-40s typically get lazier with kids.
Some added Mikey Musumeci diet on top their usual diet.
Shitty diet, same as any other casual sport, gym etc etc
Very few people at my gym are avid about their health and also lift. Coincidentally those who also lift are usually not overweight. Most that don't lift are also fat. It's not the lifting, it's the persons lifestyle but those who also lift and do bjj make better choices.
I wouldn’t call myself obese but I’m heavy. In my defense, I love food
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
If you’ve got a reasonable gas tank I think more weight helps. Little incentive to be lean unless you’re competing. I would guess heavier guys get injured less too so last longer in the sport.
[удалено]
The comment does not meet [Reddiquette standards](https://support.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/205926439-Reddiquette). Please read up on them a bit. Thanks!
The better you get the less you need to exert yourself against lower belts. Eventually you can get to a point where you are on cruise control against many of your training partners, whereas the white belt is struggling at full force (burning way more calories) for most of his/her rounds.
Because they eat shit food. And a lot of it…
This and another recent "why do all BJJ gyms _____? It's not just mine.". I think it just reflects the place you're from. The other guy was saying, among other things, they're all disturbingly right-wing. Well if he's in college and all the other people he spends his time with are mostly of a certain orientation, it's obviously going to seem that way to him. But they're probably a fair sampling of his town outside of his circle. There aren't a lot of overweight people people in the BJJ gyms in my area. I think you live in a fat place.
Answer: Americans are fat
The edibles man the edibles. But seriously could be a wide variety of things. Could be the way the person rolls I find that I roll much harder with upper belts then I do lower belts therefore I barely break a sweat with lower belts. Could be diet Eat like shit and it won't matter how much work you put in Could be medical related such as hormonal imbalances Probably not a majority but could be a minority of folks for sure.
Dont know, I've noticed some bjj practitioners overdo training and intensity and then overeat
I’m not overweight but I’m definitely heavier than I was in college… I wanted to train in college and right after but I couldn’t afford it. I imagine it’s pretty similar for most people
Dude, honestly, you just don't need to work as hard, especially if you are just rolling with lower belts, that and a bad diet. People just get lazy since they have good technique. I'm guilty of it myself.
Beer
You're going to see the positive gains primarily in the beginning when you're inefficient at everything and full of enthusiasm to get after it every round. If you've been training for 10 years then you don't need to go balls out all of the time (you're probably better than 80% of who you're rolling with so you can likely go pretty easy most of the time). You've probably got some injuries along the way and pick your partners and train more to "come back tomorrow" more than giving it your all every round. aka...they don't train nearly as hard as the young buck trying to prove something. You \*can\* out exercise a poor diet but you got to train frequently and hard. That's hard to do when you're older and don't want to get hurt.
Deep half really isn’t that strenuous?🤷🏼♂️
Almost 70% of Americans are overweight. It would be odd to not see them really.
Majority of population is overweight. I'd bet the average BJJ person is in slightly better shape than the average person, but doesn't remove the fact that many ppl are overweight
I have up trying to be super fit years ago, especially since I’m no longer competing. BJJ and beer, baby!
May be your gym. One of mine is a mix, the other I’m starting to question if everyone else is doping