June 1, 2025 • 17 mins
On today's QNA episode, we get a call from one of our longtime members of the community Ben with the infamous batman voice. He shares his struggles with his recent health scare and how he plans to go about it. We also get a question about a controversial topic: cutting weight. Is it necessary? Or is it a tradition that needs to die. Find out all in this ep.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
A good martial artist does not become tense but ready
.
Essentially, at this point thefight is over.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
So you pretty much flow with the goal.
Who is worthy to be trustedwith the secret to limitless
power?
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm ready.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to the Q&A episode.
We've got a couple of questionsfrom you guys.
If you want to leave us one, goto the website
bulletproofforbjjcom, hit thepodcast tab and record us a
voicemail.
You can ask us a question Aboutanything Gym politics, strength
mobility, jiu-jitsu cultureWhatever the fuck you want.
Here is the first question,anonymous, of course.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Hey fellas, this has been Hannah Will, back from the
dead, coming to Eat your brainsanyway.
Uh, I just suffered fromcardiac arrest, came back to
life thanks to my girlfriend anda bunch of medical
professionals, and shortly afterthat I was implanted with a
(01:21):
pacemaker and a defibrillator.
I was just wondering if you knewanybody that it happened to and
what happened with theirjiu-jitsu and their fitness life
, how they got back into it.
So any advice you could provideor any perspective you could
(01:43):
provide from somebody you knowwho's gone through the same
thing, I'd really appreciate it.
In any case, as always, Iappreciate the Bulletproof for
Jiu-Jitsu program.
It's been a positive influenceon my life and I wanted to
(02:05):
continue to be so.
And while I can't be, uh,lifting things and being a
hancher, I'm still gonna, I'mstill gonna be making myself as
mobile as possible until I canget back to it.
Anyway, thanks, fellas, peace,my guy fuck a ben hanwell man
I'm sorry to hear that, bro.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
It's so dramatic.
That's huge.
It's been in the Been in theside chat.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Yeah right.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
It's pretty Devastating, considering he's a.
He's a man monument and hecan't.
The uncertainty around what hecan and can't do has been, I
guess, more resolved now I won'tgo into it Super deeply, but I
has been, I guess, more resolvednow.
I won't go into it super deeply, but I do know someone
specifically who has a pacemaker, who I used to train with Nick
Barker, who runs GrapplingIndustries, australia now
(02:55):
instead of Ben Hodgkinson.
Oh yeah, he still trains, hestill rolls, probably not super
hard rolls, I think, because hehad it, he put it, had it put in
like eight years ago or nineyears ago.
Now he might be a littlelaissez faire from time to time.
He might just be like, yeah,just roll, you know, like
classic jujitsu guy, but he, hetrains like he.
(03:17):
I think the fear when, when uhBen first mentioned this, was
I'm done, jujitsu is over.
Now, like fuck, I'm fuckedright, because the doctor's like
don't lift weights, don't dothis, don't do that, like it's,
there's a lot of fear because,like I mean, I have questions.
Did you go to the other side?
Did you see the light?
(03:37):
like yeah bro, that's crazyexperience to literally yeah, go
, go, go, go go and come back.
But what I'd say is take heart,it's not the end.
It's not the end.
You can do jujitsu with apacemaker or a regulator of
(03:58):
sorts, depending I don't knowthe exact nature of yours and
you can come back and you willeventually be doing weights and
doing some other things too.
So I don't think it's the endof the henchness.
So in the meantime, obviouslydo what the doctor and the
surgeons say, but based off whatI know from nick and how he
lives his life, you'll be ableto be a healthy, fit, strong man
(04:19):
soon enough.
Yeah, for context, for other,for listeners, ben ben's been a
long time bullet proffer, yes,big contributor on our community
group like ask great questions.
He's fucking man's got a voicefor radio and he's got a voice
for movie intro he's come in,he's hit us on the q a a few
times.
He's always asked good qualitystuff.
Um, yeah, I've known a coupleof people.
(04:41):
I know one guy, big dadd, whoused to train here oh Not a well
, I don't know but he had openheart surgery.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
He had some shit going on.
They opened him up, had somepretty fucking heavy-duty stuff
done and, you know, he had likea couple of like a year or two
where it was like low-intensitytraining only.
But I'm pretty sure that he'sat a point where he can now get
back into whatever he wants.
Wow, my original coach, dan,who graded me to Brown belt he
had a pacemaker put in oh, wow,yeah, I think that coincided
(05:12):
with him closing the gym and umand I'm not sure how it affected
him, cause I sort of lost touchwith him at that point but um,
yeah, at a point you're probablygoing to be able to just go
(05:32):
back to whatever, because thereality is is like like here's
an example I have.
I got a friend who used to trainwith us who came to our gym
when he'd broken his back.
He broke his back at atrampoline park.
Oh, jesus, broke his spineRight.
Oh my God, it was in a fullbody cast, like yep and, and was
in a full body cast for likethree months.
It was really bad.
(05:52):
He came to our gym maybe sixmonths after that and was like
hey, man, I'm a mess, but I wantto do something.
The doctor told me I wouldnever be able to lift anything
heavier than a case of beeragain, wow.
And you're like wow, that'sfucked.
And you're like I can see howthat makes sense.
Like you broke your back, it'skind of whatever.
(06:14):
And you're like I can see howthat makes sense.
Like you broke your back.
It's kind of whatever.
They've screwed the shit backtogether.
But yeah, you can never go toohard.
Motherfucker was deadlifting 160kilos for reps after three
years training with us right andfull capacity surfing.
Whatever he wants to do, he cando it.
Like probably has forgottenabout that injury, right, and
that's kind of the thing is thatthey give you those
recommendations which must beconservative and are based on
(06:35):
the average person, yeah, butthere's always more bandwidth.
There is, and it and it becomesapparent once you get past this
acute time of the injury whereit's like no, you can actually
get back into shit.
And I don't know, maybe, maybe,yeah, maybe there is a
limitation that you can't gofucking balls to the wall at the
(06:56):
comp prep class for adcc.
Sure, but you can still dojiu-jitsu man you can and I
actually think this is the firststep in terms of you becoming a
cyborg.
I think it's perfect.
I think you have an unfairadvantage.
You've got something in youthat limits your ability for
your heart rate to go high.
I think you'll be able to gohard and be recovered quicker
because you've got something inyou that limits your ability for
(07:17):
your heart rate to go high.
I think you'll be able to gohard and be recovered quicker
because you've got mechanicalenhancement.
So I would actually look at itlike actually, what happens next
?
Like maybe this is going tobecome a trend in jujitsu that
elite athletes are getting in.
I want what he's got.
Yeah, he's got the heartregulator so he never gets tired
.
His heart rate never goes over80 beats per minute.
Imagine, no, look.
(07:38):
Shout out to Mr Ben Hanawal.
We wish you well, mate, and Iknow that you are on the
comeback, so you'll be good,mate.
I have great faith that you'llbe back to where you want to be.
There is a silver lining inevery injury.
There's a silver lining inevery injury.
This is true.
I had this conversation with amember of the gym this morning.
It's always fucking sucksbecause of all the things you
can't do, but that only servesto narrow your focus on the
(07:59):
things that you can do.
Can do, and that's a chance toget really fucking good at those
things.
Something else, yeah, big love,man.
You know what I love whensomeone shares a secret with me
and that secret is helpful.
And the secret that I'm goingto share with you today is the
new flavor from Sodi.
I'm talking about mandarin.
I didn't think there wasfresher flavors, but I'm telling
(08:22):
you that mandarin, it hitdifferent.
Not only does it give me sodium, potassium, magnesium to keep
my muscles pumping, it gives methe chef's kiss of freshness.
I cannot recommend it enough.
Now, if you want to getyourself some new flavors they
also have kiwi you need to go tosodicomau and use the code
(08:45):
BULLETPROOF15 to get 15% off getfresh and get that flavor, jake
.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Hey, jake, here, 4Stri stripe, white belt.
Uh, enjoy the podcast.
Just wanted to ask you, um,just done a couple of
competitions and where I live wehave two main organizations,
the uh.
The one does weigh in eitherthe day before or in the morning
.
The other competition doesweigh-ins in the um just before
your fight.
(09:19):
Uh, I was.
I'd love to hear some tips onwhat you recommend doing
different between these two kindof competitions and how you
find it it that's one thanksjake legend.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, I yes all right so two different comms way in
the night before or the morningof, and then the other one is
way in right before you step onfor your first match.
Now this comes back to whatwhat I would say is, depending
on your natural weight, whereyou sit.
What I have found is for mostpeople they either kind of bang
(09:55):
in the middle or they're closeto an upper category or a lower
category, whatever it might be.
And so in that way, if you likethe competition format where
you have to weigh in on the day,which is an IBJJF approach, you
want to sit as close to thenatural weight, like you want
your natural weight as close tothe upper end of your weight
(10:18):
category as it can be, yeah,whereas that day before comp,
whatever that, whatever thatformat is, that is one where
maybe you know you mightconsider there could be some
athletic advantages in gettingyour weight down, maybe in a way
that's like, maybe not supersustainable, but whether you're
in a sauna or you're, you'redoing water loading or whatever
(10:39):
you're doing to cut that weightand then feed up the night
before and then come inmonstrous the next day because
if you don't, some othermotherfucker will come in
looking like glace and t-bow bro.
Good, because I've had thatbefore where I didn't cut for a
judo comp and I a big, a big guy, did.
(11:01):
I like a 105 guy cut to 90, oh,wow, and yeah, and oh my god,
oh jesus, huge motherfuckers.
Right, and it was just.
That wasn't a federated comp.
They just said, oh we, it wasfor convenience, they did the
way in the day before.
Typically they do on the day,right, but, mate, that was big
trouble.
So that's my advice that if youlike a particular style of comp
(11:24):
that you would want to come insomewhere near the top of your
weight category, it is anadvantage.
That's what I say.
Yeah, I think that's fair.
I um, I got a slightly differenttake on it, jake, which is
going off my personal experience, whereby I had a coach back
when I used to compete a lot,which was like white to purple
belt and he would always betalking about the weight thing
(11:48):
and oh, where's your weight at?
And oh, you want to drop down,and always kind of like that was
part of competing was likewhere's your weight going to be
and how are we leveraging this?
And I just found for me it wasan extra stress at that in those
early days that I just didn'tneed and I would.
I remember showing up to a lotof comps being like half starved
(12:12):
because I was right on the edgeand you're nervous and it's
comp day, and like you don'tneed, like you know, going in
like part, like with only alittle bit of food and a little
bit of water, is like it's shit,right, because bad prep, yeah,
and it's like on top of all theother shit you're worried about.
And you know, to be honest, itnever, it never made that, I
don't think, at the, at thedivisions, at the standard jits
(12:34):
I was doing, it never made thatmuch of a difference, sure.
And so if you, as a four-stripewhite belt, I'm like probably
doesn't matter, man, like Iwould just go with what feels
comfortable, and to that point,I would choose the division that
you naturally sit at so thatyou can comfortably eat and
drink and be hydrated andwell-rested coming into the comp
, and then if you've got to goagainst some cunt, that's a bit
bigger.
So what you True, you know.
(12:54):
That said, though you mightalso be like no, no, no, I want
to fucking take every advantageI can get.
And you know those people areout there and if you do come
from a culture like we know,with wrestling or judo and stuff
, where like cutting is a partof the competition, that's
something worth considering.
I remember my coach back thendoing shit like like we did an
(13:16):
episode today where we'retalking about coaches getting
injured, right Sure, and we'resaying how what the coach does
influences what the students doDefinitely yeah.
And I remember going to theAsian championships and we
weighed in.
I think I was a blue belt, hewas a brown belt.
We weighed in sometime themorning of it's not before your
first fight, but it's a coupleof hours before or it could be a
(13:39):
couple, it could be six, youknow, depending on where your
match is that day.
But him having to go and likerun laps with a fucking plastic
bag on or whatever around theoutside of the Budokan in Tokyo
to like, sweat out some weight.
And I'm like you're dehydratingyourself before your first match
and and you're like I just gotto win this first match and I
(14:03):
can't remember he might have,but it's just so fucking stupid.
It makes no logical sense inthat way.
I mean, look for Taekwondo,weight cutting was definitely a
part of it, but what they didwith black belts is you had to
weigh in in the morning and thenthe black belts weren't on
until the end of the day, so youkind of had the whole day to
Hydrate.
Yeah, get ready.
But if you're a white belt, youweighed in and then you
(14:25):
competed.
But at internationalcompetition weigh in was day
before.
So everybody was at the sauna Ifthere was one sauna in that
little German town or in thehotel, every motherfucker was
there and it was romanticizedLike, oh, how much weight can I
cut?
And then eat and drink and thencome in the next day behemoth.
That was a big part of theculture for Taekwondo, actually
(14:50):
for at least internationalcompetition.
So it was quite interesting tome to, yeah, like similar to
what you're saying, joe, justcome in feeling good, fed, happy
, and then just fucking put allyour energy on the line.
I.
I definitely feel that untilyou've done a fair bit of
competing and look, you may bevery experienced even as a
four-stripe white belt that, um,feeling good and being full of
(15:12):
energy will have a more positiveimpact on your jiu-jitsu than
just uh, you know having aslight weight advantage yes yeah
, but being a fucking ball ofnerves, yeah, that's it, because
that that happens to youregardless.
yeah, so better to just likelimit the amount of fucking
anxious energy to just the factthat you're about to compete.
(15:33):
There was a guy I knew just adisaster story on weight cutting
um who was fucking with theseuh di diuretics and he would
just swore by him.
You know, he got these uhdiuretic pills, he got them off
his brother and he, he just likeit was like the pretty strong
shit.
He's like, trust me, man, speedpills or some shit, oh no, you
(15:53):
just like up kilos, except thelike, I think, for whatever
because of his diet.
It kind of didn't work.
Like he'd used it a fair bit,he was kind of relying on it,
but the day it was before thepan packs, he just he'd taken a
pill the night before and I saidI didn't hit.
So he took another one thatmorning and then like, and then
just before warm-up he was likerunning to the bathroom and had
(16:17):
a disaster before he could getto the toilet and so he only
brought one gi Shat himself.
He couldn't even competebecause he shat the gi the worst
.
Oh God, poor sucker.
So, man, like there can be alot of disasters when you're
playing with your weight and,yeah, ultimately you want to
focus on the skill you know.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Yeah, there it is.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
There it is, folks.
Hey, good questions today.
Big love to Ben.
I fucking wish you all the beston that, bro.
We're always here for you, herefor you.
Thank you for the questions.
If you want to leave us aquestion for a future episode,
go to the websitebulletproofforbjjcom.
No-transcript.
A good martial artist does not become tense but ready
.
Essentially, at this point thefight is over.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
So you pretty much flow with the goal.
Who is worthy to be trustedwith the secret to limitless
power?
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm ready.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome to the Q&A episode.
We've got a couple of questionsfrom you guys.
If you want to leave us one, goto the website
bulletproofforbjjcom, hit thepodcast tab and record us a
voicemail.
You can ask us a question Aboutanything Gym politics, strength
mobility, jiu-jitsu cultureWhatever the fuck you want.
Here is the first question,anonymous, of course.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Hey fellas, this has been Hannah Will, back from the
dead, coming to Eat your brainsanyway.
Uh, I just suffered fromcardiac arrest, came back to
life thanks to my girlfriend anda bunch of medical
professionals, and shortly afterthat I was implanted with a
(01:21):
pacemaker and a defibrillator.
I was just wondering if you knewanybody that it happened to and
what happened with theirjiu-jitsu and their fitness life
, how they got back into it.
So any advice you could provideor any perspective you could
(01:43):
provide from somebody you knowwho's gone through the same
thing, I'd really appreciate it.
In any case, as always, Iappreciate the Bulletproof for
Jiu-Jitsu program.
It's been a positive influenceon my life and I wanted to
(02:05):
continue to be so.
And while I can't be, uh,lifting things and being a
hancher, I'm still gonna, I'mstill gonna be making myself as
mobile as possible until I canget back to it.
Anyway, thanks, fellas, peace,my guy fuck a ben hanwell man
I'm sorry to hear that, bro.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
It's so dramatic.
That's huge.
It's been in the Been in theside chat.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
Yeah right.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
It's pretty Devastating, considering he's a.
He's a man monument and hecan't.
The uncertainty around what hecan and can't do has been, I
guess, more resolved now I won'tgo into it Super deeply, but I
has been, I guess, more resolvednow.
I won't go into it super deeply, but I do know someone
specifically who has a pacemaker, who I used to train with Nick
Barker, who runs GrapplingIndustries, australia now
(02:55):
instead of Ben Hodgkinson.
Oh yeah, he still trains, hestill rolls, probably not super
hard rolls, I think, because hehad it, he put it, had it put in
like eight years ago or nineyears ago.
Now he might be a littlelaissez faire from time to time.
He might just be like, yeah,just roll, you know, like
classic jujitsu guy, but he, hetrains like he.
(03:17):
I think the fear when, when uhBen first mentioned this, was
I'm done, jujitsu is over.
Now, like fuck, I'm fuckedright, because the doctor's like
don't lift weights, don't dothis, don't do that, like it's,
there's a lot of fear because,like I mean, I have questions.
Did you go to the other side?
Did you see the light?
(03:37):
like yeah bro, that's crazyexperience to literally yeah, go
, go, go, go go and come back.
But what I'd say is take heart,it's not the end.
It's not the end.
You can do jujitsu with apacemaker or a regulator of
(03:58):
sorts, depending I don't knowthe exact nature of yours and
you can come back and you willeventually be doing weights and
doing some other things too.
So I don't think it's the endof the henchness.
So in the meantime, obviouslydo what the doctor and the
surgeons say, but based off whatI know from nick and how he
lives his life, you'll be ableto be a healthy, fit, strong man
(04:19):
soon enough.
Yeah, for context, for other,for listeners, ben ben's been a
long time bullet proffer, yes,big contributor on our community
group like ask great questions.
He's fucking man's got a voicefor radio and he's got a voice
for movie intro he's come in,he's hit us on the q a a few
times.
He's always asked good qualitystuff.
Um, yeah, I've known a coupleof people.
(04:41):
I know one guy, big dadd, whoused to train here oh Not a well
, I don't know but he had openheart surgery.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Right.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
He had some shit going on.
They opened him up, had somepretty fucking heavy-duty stuff
done and, you know, he had likea couple of like a year or two
where it was like low-intensitytraining only.
But I'm pretty sure that he'sat a point where he can now get
back into whatever he wants.
Wow, my original coach, dan,who graded me to Brown belt he
had a pacemaker put in oh, wow,yeah, I think that coincided
(05:12):
with him closing the gym and umand I'm not sure how it affected
him, cause I sort of lost touchwith him at that point but um,
yeah, at a point you're probablygoing to be able to just go
(05:32):
back to whatever, because thereality is is like like here's
an example I have.
I got a friend who used to trainwith us who came to our gym
when he'd broken his back.
He broke his back at atrampoline park.
Oh, jesus, broke his spineRight.
Oh my God, it was in a fullbody cast, like yep and, and was
in a full body cast for likethree months.
It was really bad.
(05:52):
He came to our gym maybe sixmonths after that and was like
hey, man, I'm a mess, but I wantto do something.
The doctor told me I wouldnever be able to lift anything
heavier than a case of beeragain, wow.
And you're like wow, that'sfucked.
And you're like I can see howthat makes sense.
Like you broke your back, it'skind of whatever.
(06:14):
And you're like I can see howthat makes sense.
Like you broke your back.
It's kind of whatever.
They've screwed the shit backtogether.
But yeah, you can never go toohard.
Motherfucker was deadlifting 160kilos for reps after three
years training with us right andfull capacity surfing.
Whatever he wants to do, he cando it.
Like probably has forgottenabout that injury, right, and
that's kind of the thing is thatthey give you those
recommendations which must beconservative and are based on
(06:35):
the average person, yeah, butthere's always more bandwidth.
There is, and it and it becomesapparent once you get past this
acute time of the injury whereit's like no, you can actually
get back into shit.
And I don't know, maybe, maybe,yeah, maybe there is a
limitation that you can't gofucking balls to the wall at the
(06:56):
comp prep class for adcc.
Sure, but you can still dojiu-jitsu man you can and I
actually think this is the firststep in terms of you becoming a
cyborg.
I think it's perfect.
I think you have an unfairadvantage.
You've got something in youthat limits your ability for
your heart rate to go high.
I think you'll be able to gohard and be recovered quicker
because you've got something inyou that limits your ability for
(07:17):
your heart rate to go high.
I think you'll be able to gohard and be recovered quicker
because you've got mechanicalenhancement.
So I would actually look at itlike actually, what happens next
?
Like maybe this is going tobecome a trend in jujitsu that
elite athletes are getting in.
I want what he's got.
Yeah, he's got the heartregulator so he never gets tired
.
His heart rate never goes over80 beats per minute.
Imagine, no, look.
(07:38):
Shout out to Mr Ben Hanawal.
We wish you well, mate, and Iknow that you are on the
comeback, so you'll be good,mate.
I have great faith that you'llbe back to where you want to be.
There is a silver lining inevery injury.
There's a silver lining inevery injury.
This is true.
I had this conversation with amember of the gym this morning.
It's always fucking sucksbecause of all the things you
can't do, but that only servesto narrow your focus on the
(07:59):
things that you can do.
Can do, and that's a chance toget really fucking good at those
things.
Something else, yeah, big love,man.
You know what I love whensomeone shares a secret with me
and that secret is helpful.
And the secret that I'm goingto share with you today is the
new flavor from Sodi.
I'm talking about mandarin.
I didn't think there wasfresher flavors, but I'm telling
(08:22):
you that mandarin, it hitdifferent.
Not only does it give me sodium, potassium, magnesium to keep
my muscles pumping, it gives methe chef's kiss of freshness.
I cannot recommend it enough.
Now, if you want to getyourself some new flavors they
also have kiwi you need to go tosodicomau and use the code
(08:45):
BULLETPROOF15 to get 15% off getfresh and get that flavor, jake
.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
Hey, jake, here, 4Stri stripe, white belt.
Uh, enjoy the podcast.
Just wanted to ask you, um,just done a couple of
competitions and where I live wehave two main organizations,
the uh.
The one does weigh in eitherthe day before or in the morning
.
The other competition doesweigh-ins in the um just before
your fight.
(09:19):
Uh, I was.
I'd love to hear some tips onwhat you recommend doing
different between these two kindof competitions and how you
find it it that's one thanksjake legend.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, I yes all right so two different comms way in
the night before or the morningof, and then the other one is
way in right before you step onfor your first match.
Now this comes back to whatwhat I would say is, depending
on your natural weight, whereyou sit.
What I have found is for mostpeople they either kind of bang
(09:55):
in the middle or they're closeto an upper category or a lower
category, whatever it might be.
And so in that way, if you likethe competition format where
you have to weigh in on the day,which is an IBJJF approach, you
want to sit as close to thenatural weight, like you want
your natural weight as close tothe upper end of your weight
(10:18):
category as it can be, yeah,whereas that day before comp,
whatever that, whatever thatformat is, that is one where
maybe you know you mightconsider there could be some
athletic advantages in gettingyour weight down, maybe in a way
that's like, maybe not supersustainable, but whether you're
in a sauna or you're, you'redoing water loading or whatever
(10:39):
you're doing to cut that weightand then feed up the night
before and then come inmonstrous the next day because
if you don't, some othermotherfucker will come in
looking like glace and t-bow bro.
Good, because I've had thatbefore where I didn't cut for a
judo comp and I a big, a big guy, did.
(11:01):
I like a 105 guy cut to 90, oh,wow, and yeah, and oh my god,
oh jesus, huge motherfuckers.
Right, and it was just.
That wasn't a federated comp.
They just said, oh we, it wasfor convenience, they did the
way in the day before.
Typically they do on the day,right, but, mate, that was big
trouble.
So that's my advice that if youlike a particular style of comp
(11:24):
that you would want to come insomewhere near the top of your
weight category, it is anadvantage.
That's what I say.
Yeah, I think that's fair.
I um, I got a slightly differenttake on it, jake, which is
going off my personal experience, whereby I had a coach back
when I used to compete a lot,which was like white to purple
belt and he would always betalking about the weight thing
(11:48):
and oh, where's your weight at?
And oh, you want to drop down,and always kind of like that was
part of competing was likewhere's your weight going to be
and how are we leveraging this?
And I just found for me it wasan extra stress at that in those
early days that I just didn'tneed and I would.
I remember showing up to a lotof comps being like half starved
(12:12):
because I was right on the edgeand you're nervous and it's
comp day, and like you don'tneed, like you know, going in
like part, like with only alittle bit of food and a little
bit of water, is like it's shit,right, because bad prep, yeah,
and it's like on top of all theother shit you're worried about.
And you know, to be honest, itnever, it never made that, I
don't think, at the, at thedivisions, at the standard jits
(12:34):
I was doing, it never made thatmuch of a difference, sure.
And so if you, as a four-stripewhite belt, I'm like probably
doesn't matter, man, like Iwould just go with what feels
comfortable, and to that point,I would choose the division that
you naturally sit at so thatyou can comfortably eat and
drink and be hydrated andwell-rested coming into the comp
, and then if you've got to goagainst some cunt, that's a bit
bigger.
So what you True, you know.
(12:54):
That said, though you mightalso be like no, no, no, I want
to fucking take every advantageI can get.
And you know those people areout there and if you do come
from a culture like we know,with wrestling or judo and stuff
, where like cutting is a partof the competition, that's
something worth considering.
I remember my coach back thendoing shit like like we did an
(13:16):
episode today where we'retalking about coaches getting
injured, right Sure, and we'resaying how what the coach does
influences what the students doDefinitely yeah.
And I remember going to theAsian championships and we
weighed in.
I think I was a blue belt, hewas a brown belt.
We weighed in sometime themorning of it's not before your
first fight, but it's a coupleof hours before or it could be a
(13:39):
couple, it could be six, youknow, depending on where your
match is that day.
But him having to go and likerun laps with a fucking plastic
bag on or whatever around theoutside of the Budokan in Tokyo
to like, sweat out some weight.
And I'm like you're dehydratingyourself before your first match
and and you're like I just gotto win this first match and I
(14:03):
can't remember he might have,but it's just so fucking stupid.
It makes no logical sense inthat way.
I mean, look for Taekwondo,weight cutting was definitely a
part of it, but what they didwith black belts is you had to
weigh in in the morning and thenthe black belts weren't on
until the end of the day, so youkind of had the whole day to
Hydrate.
Yeah, get ready.
But if you're a white belt, youweighed in and then you
(14:25):
competed.
But at internationalcompetition weigh in was day
before.
So everybody was at the sauna Ifthere was one sauna in that
little German town or in thehotel, every motherfucker was
there and it was romanticizedLike, oh, how much weight can I
cut?
And then eat and drink and thencome in the next day behemoth.
That was a big part of theculture for Taekwondo, actually
(14:50):
for at least internationalcompetition.
So it was quite interesting tome to, yeah, like similar to
what you're saying, joe, justcome in feeling good, fed, happy
, and then just fucking put allyour energy on the line.
I.
I definitely feel that untilyou've done a fair bit of
competing and look, you may bevery experienced even as a
four-stripe white belt that, um,feeling good and being full of
(15:12):
energy will have a more positiveimpact on your jiu-jitsu than
just uh, you know having aslight weight advantage yes yeah
, but being a fucking ball ofnerves, yeah, that's it, because
that that happens to youregardless.
yeah, so better to just likelimit the amount of fucking
anxious energy to just the factthat you're about to compete.
(15:33):
There was a guy I knew just adisaster story on weight cutting
um who was fucking with theseuh di diuretics and he would
just swore by him.
You know, he got these uhdiuretic pills, he got them off
his brother and he, he just likeit was like the pretty strong
shit.
He's like, trust me, man, speedpills or some shit, oh no, you
(15:53):
just like up kilos, except thelike, I think, for whatever
because of his diet.
It kind of didn't work.
Like he'd used it a fair bit,he was kind of relying on it,
but the day it was before thepan packs, he just he'd taken a
pill the night before and I saidI didn't hit.
So he took another one thatmorning and then like, and then
just before warm-up he was likerunning to the bathroom and had
(16:17):
a disaster before he could getto the toilet and so he only
brought one gi Shat himself.
He couldn't even competebecause he shat the gi the worst
.
Oh God, poor sucker.
So, man, like there can be alot of disasters when you're
playing with your weight and,yeah, ultimately you want to
focus on the skill you know.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Yeah, there it is.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
There it is, folks.
Hey, good questions today.
Big love to Ben.
I fucking wish you all the beston that, bro.
We're always here for you, herefor you.
Thank you for the questions.
If you want to leave us aquestion for a future episode,
go to the websitebulletproofforbjjcom.
No-transcript.
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