Words of Wisdom from Cobrinha

Here's something from Cobrinha's e-mail newsletter about drilling that makes the case pretty plainly.

A lot of people have been asking me how they can still keep up with the full time athletes when they have other priorities. For some people it is job, a family, or anything else that takes your time away from the mat.

One thing that will dramatically improve your jiu jitsu is drilling.
Here is a short story from my life: When I was a blue and purple belt, I had a full time job, I was teaching capoeira, I had a girlfriend and I was training jiu jitsu. I found time to train every day and I was finding a partner to drill with before and after class in order to catch up because I wasn't able to train full time like most of the kids were doing. I saw the other people were impriving and i needed to find a way to keep up. If I had 30 minutes, 20 minutes whatever. iIt helped. By the end of the year if you add up the minutes of the drilling I did, it is a lot of hours total.

If you train three times a week you have to make time for drilling each week. You should drill either before or after class for at least 20 minutes.

Let's calculate this together. There are 365 days a year which makes 52 weeks. You should drill 3 times a week. Let's say you can only get in 20 minutes for each class you are able to attend, so 1 hour a week. Adding it up:

52 weeks x 1 hour each week= 52 hours a year. That's a lot!