Prepare & Move: 27-Min Pre-Training Flow for BJJ

As we come down, shoulders are coming forwards. Maybe fold a little further forwards. Let's go back up. Last one, super low.

Good, now we'll just do some little circles. So keep your hands on your knees, start off tiny little circles here. See how the back is. Think about as you lean over to the right, your left shoulder's coming up.

As you go back, sitting up. As you go over to the left, right shoulder up. Just moving everything, getting that, as I said, just movement, just getting some movement in your back. Checking in with everything.

Let's go the other direction now. Keep moving. Even if you're sitting around all day or all evening, just put on a class like this when you know you've got a little bit of time to just move, even if you can't make your gypsy tonight, it's just nice to get something in. Good.

So we moved the back a little bit. Maybe the shoulders are feeling a little bit tight. Maybe you've been training hard recently. So let's just roll the belt out.

Don't worry about folding it in half and knotting it today. Just take it nice and wide, wider than you think you should today. And we'll just sit, sitting up straight. Come up and back with the belt.

Just open the chest. And I'm particularly tight at about this point. So each time I get there, I'm just going to go a little slower. So up and back.

Think about moving the whole of the shoulders as well. So as I come up, I'm going to start shrugging my shoulders up towards my ears, coming forward so I can see my shoulders in the corners of my eyes. Back up and behind. As you start to open, maybe get that grip a little closer.

Maybe not. We're just moving. It doesn't need to be more than you want today. And next time you're up, so you're at that midpoint, just turn your chest to the left.

Come back, turn your chest to the right. Just super light from left to right. Come back to breathing through the nose. Nice and calm.

Just think you're almost breathing like you're still sat, not doing much. That's what we want today. This time, next time you go over to the right, really think about opening the chest over to the right. Maybe look behind you a little bit.

Super slowly back over to the left. Maybe look behind you again. Bring that belt down. Just drop it to the side.

And now we'll come to all fours. And when we get here, check in with the wrists, check in with the knees. Just do some light circles. Maybe a bit more pressure in the fingertips in the mat, like you're trying to grip the mat.

Change direction. Just moving around. Okay, tuck your toes now in the mat. And all I'm going to do is, at the moment my shoulders are over my wrist, I'm just going to push back so my knees come off the mat, then come back forwards.

Push back and forwards. Just do a few of them. It doesn't matter, even if your knees, if you're going back to this, that's fine, but just a few of them. See how the ankles are, see how the knees are.

And now finally spread your fingers and your hands out a little more. This time we'll just push up into our first down dog. Really bent knees here though today. Almost think about getting your belly onto your quads and then pushing those hips up towards the ceiling.

Two breaths here. How do your shoulders feel? How does your chest feel? How does your neck feel?

Are you letting your head dangle or are you keeping tension in the neck and looking up at the screen? One more breath here. And then super slow, start dropping that right heel, bending the left knee, start lifting that right heel, bending the right knee, dropping the left heel. And now dropping the right heel, just switch.

But if you think of the speed you should do this, half that speed, just go even slower. Again, this is a mid-class, we're not doing like crazy cardio workout. This is just enough to move and get a bit of a stretch. And I find the slower I move here, the more I open out, the more I relax.

Remind yourself of those deep breaths through the nose as well. Good. Let's come down to our knees again and we'll do what we were doing a second ago just before down dog again. So just pushing back, lifting the knees.

See how that feels. Come back down to all fours, come forwards. Two more of them. Pushing back.

Last one. We push back and then lift into dog one more time. Maybe drop the heels a bit more in dog this time. Maybe straighten the legs a tiny bit more.

And now just start to bend the knees even more. Super slow, super little steps up towards the hands so that we get to a forward fold. And I'm bending my knees more and more on the way. I'm not thinking that I need these super straight legs and this super perfect forward fold.

When you get to whatever feels like a fold for you, just let everything hang down. And again, rest your belly on your quads and breathe. Good. Two more breaths here.

Really letting that head hang. Last inhale. Last exhale. And now we're going to rewind.

So just walk back to down dog. So maybe bend your knees a little more, a bit more weight in your hands. Baby steps back into down dog. And don't rush because when we get here we'll take two or three deep breaths, checking in how that down dog's feeling now.

Just breathing. And last inhale wherever you are. Last exhale. And then hands this time.

So hands to feet. Again, baby steps. Walking the hands to the feet. Super small steps.

And as you start to get closer, instead of coming to a fold, we're slowly dropping our hips into a squat. And my heels aren't on the floor. Your heels might not be. That is fine.

And then in this squat, just move from side to side. Check in with the knees, the hips, whatever else you need to check in with. Yeah shrug the shoulders back a bit. Sit the heels back a bit.

See if they can get a bit heavier towards the floor. Maybe not. I'm going to step my feet a little wider. And that usually helps me get my heels to the ground.

And then maybe take some weight off your hands and just try and sit in a squat for a couple of breaths. You can have your hands on the floor still. That's fine. Maybe your hips are up here.

And this is what a squat is for you today. Doesn't matter. It's really all about you. Okay.

And then wherever you are, we're coming up from that squat with our hips and dropping our head into a forward fold, letting the head hang. Again, nice and bent knees. Take an inhale wherever you are in this forward fold. Then on the exhale, sit yourself back down into a squat.

You might need to rearrange your feet for that. That's fine. Take an inhale here. Then the exhale.

Lift into a forward fold. Inhale here. Exhale squat. Inhale in the squat.

Exhale. Lift the hips. And let's do this three or four times with our own breath in our own time. Just sitting down.

You can have as much or as little weight in your hands on the floor. Just flowing between movements. And last one is the one you're on. Just finishing a squat.

And now I'm going to start to creep my hands forwards, back into that down dog position. Pointing my hips up towards the ceiling. Keeping my knees a little bent. Heavier heels if you can.

And just check in. See how that feels. And then we're going to do the same thing. We're going to do the same thing with our hands.

We're going to do the same thing with our hips. We're going to do the same thing with our knees. We're going to do the same thing with our hips. We're going to keep our hips straight.

And then we're going to bring in the right knee. Bring in the right elbow. And then we're going to step the right foot outside the right little finger. So let's come forward to the plank and do that.

So bending the right knee. Bringing that towards your right elbow. And then stepping out. If on the way you do this, that's how you get there.

That's fine. Let's drop that back knee now. And if you need to shorten your lunge, feel free. Okay.

Flatten out that back foot. And just think about heavy hips here. Lifting the chest forwards and the shoulders back. And then we're going to do that.

Heavy hips here. Lifting the chest forwards and the shoulders back. Really opening out those hips. And just think about heavy hips down to the mat.

Maybe go from side to side. And then we'll step back. So tuck those back toes. Step back to down dog.

Lifting the hips. Another left foot this time. So come forward to the plank. Bend the left knee.

Step forward however far forward you can. And then walk that foot. That's fine. Come into that lunge.

Drop the back knee. Flatten out and feel that stretch on the hips here. Okay. Let's come back to down dog.

Lifting those hips. Good. Now from here, this time, I'm keeping my right foot on the floor. I'm going to bend my left knee.

But I'm going to turn on my right foot so my toes turn out to the right. And my left foot is going to kick through. As my weight comes off my right foot, I'm going to sit down on my left hip. So just like a sit through, now I'm going to rewind.

So back. Now I'm going to do the same with the other foot. So my weight stays on my left foot but it turns out and my right foot kicks under as my left hand comes up to my hip. Sit.

And back. Super smooth. Keep breathing through the nose. Just moving again.

Not crazy. Not intense. We're moving with control. Out.

Back up. And out. Back up. This time, as the right foot kicks through, I want you to sit down and think about leaning towards that right foot.

If, in order for you to do that, this left knee comes down and you bend the right knee, do that. Okay. What I'm thinking about doing is hinging at the hips until I feel quite tight there and then everything's coming down and we're leaning forwards towards that right foot. You'll either feel it in your lower back and your hamstrings or both.

Just go for it. One more inhale here. Maybe sit up a tiny bit. On the exhale, fold a little more.

Really good. Let's come out of that now. So if your right knee's down, bring that up. Right hand down.

Now we're coming up, back into down dog and then kick your left foot through to the right. So you're going to end up in the same position. Drop the right knee. Bend the left if you want.

Then think about hinging and folding towards that foot and breathing when you get there. Super important. If you're doing anything and you're straining and your breath is, you know, you're really pulling into something, you're not going to get anything out of it. You need to just find a flow, find the movement and then just relax into it and you're going to be able to fold or stretch so much more and you're going to learn to be comfortable in these uncomfortable positions.

One more inhale, maybe up a tiny bit. Exhale a little further, maybe, maybe not. Lovely. Okay.

Now instead of coming back to down dog, let's lay on our backs with our hips pointing up. Okay. And now we'll just do some light bridges. So what we're doing with bridge is just lifting our hips up.

I've got my heels as close to my hips as possible. I'm just going to lift up. Then when I think I'm high enough, tense my glutes a little more, get them even higher so you can really feel that stretch on the front of the hips. Then drop your hips, knees over to the left, back up, over to the right.

Then lift the hips. Lower down, knees over to the right, back up, over to the left. Let's bridge up again. Lift, drop.

This time knees over to the left and I can feel stretch on the front of my right hip when I do this. I'm just tensing my glutes, just squeezing into that a tiny bit to bring that stretch on. Two more breaths. Let's go up and over to the right.

Again, invite that stretch on by tensing your glutes on the left hand side, sending your hips over. Good. Knees up, lift the hips, lower the hips. This time we go right first, opening out to the right with the hips or the glutes.

Up and over to the left. Feel that stretch. Again, if your knees are up here and you can feel enough of a stretch, you don't have to force your knees to the floor. Just do whatever works for you.

Keep doing what works for you and you'll keep improving just like Jiu Jitsu. There's no point learning that crazy in-depth technique if you've just started. You've just got to work at your own pace and you're going to get there eventually. We all will.

Let's bring the knees up again. Now my hands just going above my shoulders here. I'm going to lift my hips and then I'm going to think about coming to the top of my head. I might not get there, but I'm going to think about that.

A bit of weight in my hands. I'm going to lift my hips a bit more by tensing my glutes, then come to the top of my head. If you can't get there, stay where you were before. Just a few breaths.

Wherever you get to, just breathe in. Lifting those hips. Last inhale. Exhale.

Maybe pushing your hands a bit. Tuck your chin to your chest and then super slowly, one vertebra at a time. I'm starting with the top of my back and I'm just going to imagine I'm rolling my spine down to the mat here. The last thing to touch the mat should be my lower back here.

Super slow. That last bit is always the hardest. As that comes down, just relax. We'll do that one more time.

This time I want you to imagine you're peeling your back off the mat. If you want to go to the top of your head again, feel free. If not, don't do it. When you're ready, let's go.

I'm tilting my hips up. I'm peeling that lowest point of my back off the mat. Then everything else is coming up as I bridge, tensing my glutes. Lift, lift, lift.

When we get to the chest on the chin, you can put your hands above or stay here or even get to halfway. That's fine. All I'm doing is lightly pushing with my hands, bridging up to the top of my head. Just breathing here.

Lift those hips. One more inhale. On the exhale, lift a tiny bit. Tuck your chin and we're rolling our back down to the floor.

Really good. At the moment, you should have a nice and flat back on the mat. Now just lift your feet off the mat. Grab the front of your knees and don't pull them in so much that your lower back comes off the mat.

If grabbing your knees makes that happen because you're feeling tight, just grab around your hamstrings at one point and think about that flat back in the mat. If your chin's pointing up to the ceiling, just tuck your chin. Imagine your spine and your neck are nice and straight. I'll never be perfectly straight, but just imagine it.

Wherever you are, if you're back here and you're feeling tight, just think about bringing your knees a little closer to your chest. The sweet spot for me here is if I start pulling and my hips start to come up, I ease off so that my hips come back down and my back is nice and flat. Then I think about pulling my knees in towards my chest here. Again, if you're over this way, that's fine.

Just as soon as those hips start to come up, drop them down and feel that stretch from there. It's just really nice to think about compressing the hips instead of this, which is just all over back or all back. It's just nice to think about this movement. It's a little different.

You're just tilting at the hips. Okay, drop the feet to the floor now and let the knees open out here. If you're here and that's a stretch, that's a stretch. That's fine.

Or just let those knees open out a little more until you feel a nice stretch. Don't push with the hands. Just rest the hands on the inner thighs. Any tension here, maybe you're still lifting your shoulders up because your chest is tight.

Just relax down into your mat here. Any point where you feel like you're tensing and picking something up, just relax it. Literally think of all the areas of the body and anywhere that's holding tension. Just relax that.

Slow your breath down. Keep breathing through your nose. Just lighten that breath. Taking a slow inhale, slow exhale.

Imagine someone's right next to you and they're trying to listen to your breath and you're trying to slow that down so much they can't even hear it. Same with the exhale. Keep going with that. Super slow inhale.

Super slow exhale. Then just start to come back to your natural breath. Maybe feel your belly is almost helping you breathe, lifting up towards the ceiling and dropping down as you exhale. Maybe using that diaphragm a tiny bit more as you're breathing.

Just be aware of that for a few breaths. I'm taking an inhale. My belly is lifting up slightly. I'm taking an exhale.

As all the air comes out of me, that comes down. Just notice that for two more breaths. Let's slowly come out of where we are. Your knees are probably a bit more open than you kind of realised they'd get to when we started at this point.

Just help your knees come up with your hands. Bring them up. Breathe your knees from side to side. Just checking in.

A little almost twist from side to side as we windshield wipe the knees. Then in your own time, seat yourselves up. Then whatever it is you're going to do, maybe you're going to train, chill out all evening, maybe you've just finished training and you're going to bed or whatever. Thanks for watching.

Make sure you do this video more often. As I said, this is kind of a mid-range class. It's not too crazy. It's not too light.

You know where to fit it into your day now. I really hope you enjoyed it. If you did, leave me a comment. Jump in the Yoga4BJJ community tab on the app or the website as well.

We're trying to build some engagement there. Share your favourite classes. Share your opinions or questions. I will see you all in the next video.

Thanks for watching guys.