Academies and the way they train

Now I have visited a few schools here and there in both Judo and BJJ. For me I think it is exciting training in different schools at the same time. You get to see how different people are doing, how they are doing in terms of their training regimen and find out news about what is happening in the club.

Currently I visit 3 clubs regularly. My base club at the moment is a BJJ academy, where I try to train 4 times a week (monday, wednesday, friday and saturday), although saturday is just sparring really which is also good in a way since you get to really relax and just practice the moves you have learnt during that week. The other club I visit normally once a week is a judo club (either Tuesday or Thursday) where I practice throws from standing. It is for beginners and they focus very thoroughly on a single throw which is then used as a base around which several exercises are performed. I value standing technique a lot even though I feel my progression in this area is far slower then ground fighting.

The other club that I sometimes visit at the expense of bjj is a traditional Kodokan-style (rather than sport) judo club where there is a lot of sparring. I used to train there regularly and the teacher is nice to work with. The reason why I kind of left is that we do not practice enough technique and a lot of the techniques which we do practice are the same, so it does not feel like I am growing in terms of my abilities and knowledge. This club only has 2 training sessions a week, so many of the members there are very casual and therefore it only makes sense for me to carry on practicing there in combination with some training elsewhere.

It seems like a lot but of course with work and sometimes injuries I miss training sessions!!

Training sessions themselves also differ quite widely and in particular the warmups. Some are really focused on spending a tremendous amounts on warming up. Running around the map and performing, sometimes a little strange exercises such as for example moving on knees across the mat which feels like something out of Aikido with little application in real sport-like grappling. (Well at least I have never seen anybody move on his knees in a judo or bjj match) On the other hand for general coordination I accept that it adds certain benefit. I just feel that long warmups are often done at the expense of practicing techniques. I think formal warmups with the teacher should be a short affair while students should warmup when they arrive to the dojo/academy prior to the start of the class.

Anyway these are some of my thoughts on the subject. Certainly interested in much opinion on the subject.