Top 5 Strength Exercises for Jiu Jitsu

It blows my mind that there's still a debate about the necessity of strength training in Jiu Jitsu. The truth is crystal clear: aside from honing your techniques on the mat, strength training is the ultimate enhancer of your Jiu Jitsu performance. It goes beyond just bulking up or lifting heavy; it's about building a kind of strength that integrates seamlessly with your martial arts skills. More than that, it is THE single best defense against injuries. Every sweep, every guard pass, and every submission you perfect becomes more formidable when backed by a well-conditioned body developed through a thoughtful strength program.

In Jiu Jitsu, the ability to maneuver, control, and dominate doesn't solely stem from technical prowess. The balance of technique with physical strength, endurance, and flexibility makes a better grappler. It’s not just about brute force; it's about functional, applicable strength that enhances your technique, agility, and resilience on the mat. That's where the role of strength training becomes undeniable. This article isn't just a rundown of random exercises; it’s a carefully curated selection designed to boost the specific movements and demands of Jiu Jitsu. From enhancing your explosive power for dynamic takedowns to building a resilient core for better ground control, the right strength training exercises can elevate every aspect of your game.

These exercises are chosen to complement your skills, reduce your injury risk, and give you that extra edge every time you step on the mat. Get ready to transform your approach to training with these essential strength exercises for Jiu Jitsu.

1. Box Squat

2. Split Squat

3. Sumo Deadlift

4. Floor Press

5. Landmine Press

What do these exercises have in common?

When I started making this list, it got really long really fast. I need to develop a set of criteria in which I could apply to narrow it down without removing any exercise that I felt important for the Jiu Jitsu athlete to include in their program. So I asked myself “what is important to the Jiu Jitsu athlete and their performance on the mat”? When answering that question, that list also got pretty long, but a few things stood out. 

First, it's pretty obvious that no athlete wants to be injured. The very nature of our sport is violence, so injuries that occur on the mat are going to happen, but soft tissue injuries and nagging injuries that occur just from movement or repetition should try to be avoided at all cost. If your shoulder is banged up and your coach tells you to go into the gym and bench press, thats not exactly benefiting the athletes performance. We want to be able to consistently train around existing injuries that were sustained on the mat, while also preventing new injuries from occurring.

Secondly, I believe that no athlete wants to feel weak. Ever. You ever roll with someone and pass their guard and they say “man you're strong”? It's a weird backhanded comment in Jiu Jitsu that i’ve never fully understood. I do understand that technique is king and you shouldn't try to muscle your way through moves, but being a bit stronger than your opponent can be the difference between finishing a takedown or a sweep. I really do believe it’s that simple sometimes. 

With those points in mind, I came up with the following criteria and used it to pair down my list.

1. It must be able to be loaded heavily

2. It must directly attribute to the athletic requirements on the mat

3. It must have a relatively low amount of stress on the major joints

Why is this criteria important to you? Because no list is definitive. Nothing in Jiu Jitsu, strength training, or athletics in general is black and white. Its almost always gray. You can use these criteria to build your own list if you feel mine doesn't suit your needs or training style, but i’m pretty confident that every exercise in this list can work for every single Jiu Jitsu athlete looking to get a little bit stronger and gain a competitive edge on the mats.

Box Squat

The first movement on our list is the Box Squat, and its first for a reason. There are very few things in this world that will test you like a Max Effort or Dynamic Effort box squat session when training with the proper intensity. The box squat is a cornerstone exercise in many strength and conditioning programs for a wide range of athletes, including those in Jiu Jitsu. Understanding the mechanics of this exercise, its impact on key muscle groups, and its application in sports, will aid in our understanding as to WHY it's the top exercise on our list.

• Posterior Chain Development: Developing the posterior chain –  mainly the hips, glutes, and hamstrings – is a must if you want to have more powerful takedowns and guard passing. The Box Squat's unique mechanics involve pushing the hips back and down, engaging the hip flexors and strengthening the hip extensors, while sitting back onto the box activates the glutes more than regular squats. This results in not only increased strength but also a stable and powerful base crucial for control and balance in grappling. The controlled descent and pause on the box eliminates the stretch-shortening cycle, which is the muscle's pre-stretch that typically aids in subsequent contraction, thereby requiring greater starting strength and explosive power, a crucial adaptation for movements like takedowns and quick transitions during rolls.
  

• Enhanced Takedown and Sprawls: The box squat directly improves takedown and sprawl mechanics by strengthening the hips and lower body, essential for forceful takedown execution and quick, effective sprawls. The exercise enhances explosive hip extension and muscular strength, crucial for rapidly countering takedown attempts, making it a key element for both offensive and defensive ground maneuvers.
  

• Reduced Knee Stress: The box squat in Jiu Jitsu training uniquely balances the development of maximal strength and power with reduced knee stress, focusing on overloading the posterior chain while sparing the knees from excessive strain. This approach allows athletes to safely build crucial power for mat performance, making it an ideal exercise for enhancing strength and preserving knee health in the demanding world of Jiu Jitsu.
  

Split Squat

Being a Jiu Jitsu athlete requires you to be dynamic and to master the art of leverage, balance, and strength. An exercise that I believe aids in developing all of these areas is the Split squat. More than just a lower body workout, this move is a game-changer for grapplers, offering a host of benefits tailored to the unique demands of the sport. It directly translates to improved mat performance, offering athletes enhanced single-leg strength for better takedowns, sweeps, and ground control. 

Want to take better shots? Train the Split Squat.

Want to have a stronger open guard? Train the Split Squat.

• More Powerful Shots: In my experience there is no better exercise than the Split Squat for developing powerful takedowns, specifically double legs. I find that the harder and heavier I train them, the more powerful and more successful my double and single legs become. Being able to generate force off the lead leg, while simultaneously maintaining balance and extension of the trailing leg has a direct carry over into your standing game. I find that it allows me to shoot from further and drive through my opponent with much more ease than when I leave them out of my training programs.
  

• Stronger Open Guard: When playing open guard, you want to control the distance between you and your opponent. This requires you to be unilaterally strong. Developing unilateral strength via the split squat directly correlates to this ability to manage distance with your legs. Whether its controlling your opponents hips or shoulders from open guard, the split squat will aid you in controlling the distance between your opponent leading to a higher success rate on both sweeps and submissions.
  

• Unilateral training benefits: At its core, the Split Squat is a testament to unilateral strength and stability, focusing intensively on each leg. This is especially important in Jiu Jitsu, where single-leg strength can mean the difference between a successful sweep and being controlled by an opponent. The exercise's ability to improve balance and coordination directly translates to enhanced body control on the mat, allowing for more fluid and precise movements during combat.
  

Sumo Deadlift

The first exercise on my list was the Box Squat which in my opinion is the king of lower body movements for Jiu Jitsu. Well, if the Box Squat is King then the Sumo Deadlift is his second in command. The Sumo Deadlift is a rare combination of strength, mobility, and muscle recruitment that not many exercises can claim. The wide stance aids with takedowns and sprawls in a very similar manner that the Box Squat does while also requiring a good deal of hip mobility to execute it properly. It also requires a great deal of grip strength and teaches the athlete to learn how to maximally engage just about every muscle in their body in order to train it at higher intensities. 

The Sumo Deadlift and the Box Squat have a lot of overlap and directly compliment one another. The subtle differences between the two allow you to train them both at a high intensity but have enough variation between the two where you do not accommodate either one and can continuously train them. 

You may ask yourself, “Why the sumo deadlift over the conventional or trap bar deadlift?”. And my answer would be that the sumo deadlift allows you to keep a more upright posture than the conventional deadlift, attributing to less spinal flexion, and is overall less taxing on the back than the conventional deadlift. When it comes to sumo versus trap bar it comes down to the added hip mobility gained from the sumo deadlift and how that applies directly to Jiu Jitsu. Does the sumo deadlift take more technique and coaching than the trap bar? Yes, absolutely. But if trained properly I believe it to be more optimal for Jiu Jitsu athletes. That being said, I still love both the conventional and trap bar deadlift and they have a place in just about every program. 

• Greater Hip Mobility and Strength: The wide stance of Sumo requires the athlete to have a higher level of hip mobility that directly correlates to Jiu Jitsu performance. With the focus on the glutes, hips, and abductors, I find that when I train Sumo more frequently there is a direct carry over into my open guard performance. Specifically collar and sleeve.
  

• Increased Grip Strength: The primary goal of Sumo (or any deadlift) is not to train your grip, it is to train the lower body and get brutally strong. That being said, training the deadlift will also give you the added benefit of grip training that is required to excel on the mats.
  

• Full body muscle engagement: Training the deadlift at a higher intensity requires the athlete to learn how to fully engage and recruit every muscle fiber that they can. This is a learned skill for sure and something that powerlifters could teach Jiu Jitsu athletes a lot about. Being able to maximally engage and recruit muscle fibers has a ton of benefits to performance in all athletics including Jiu Jitsu.
  

• Improved Starting Strength: In Jiu Jitsu you will often find yourself in a fairly still position looking for grips and leverage then a second later have to perform a brutally violent and powerful movement in order to take advantage of those leverages before losing them. This starting strength can be trained using the deadlift as you lift the weight from a dead stop and have to quickly perform each rep.
  

• Better Sprawls and Takedowns: As I stated earlier, the Box Squat and the Sumo Deadlift have a ton of overlap, this is one of those areas. With the wide stance and emphasis on the glutes, hips, and hamstrings the benefits that will be rewarded to your standing game cannot be overlooked. When training Sumo and the Box Squat you will find out very quickly that they directly carry over to both your takedowns and takedown defense. 

Floor Press

Next up on the list is the Floor press. That's right, NOT the bench press. While I love the conventional bench press, and I program it often, I find that the floor press provides more benefits and less draw back than the standard bench press for Jiu Jitsu athletes. With the reduced range of motion, removal of all leg drive, and focus on starting strength with your elbows on the floor, I believe the floor press to be more optimal than the conventional bench press. 

Does the floor press have a reduced range of motion? Yes.

Should you train a full range of motion? Also yes. 

While both of those statements are true, the goal of this exercise is not to train and build strength in the full range of the shoulder. The goal of this exercise (and frankly all the exercises on this list) is to get brutally strong while also preventing injury and reducing stress on the joints that are already taxed from the sport of Jiu Jitsu.

• Reduced Shoulder Stress: Shoulders are very often the culprit of injuries in Jiu Jitsu. What the floor press allows us to do is train the upper body at a high intensity while also reducing the strain placed on the shoulder joint. A typical bench press puts the shoulder joint into increased extension which, with the added strain of hard grappling rounds, can further lead to impingement of the joint. The floor press allows us to train the upper body heavy, while avoiding this added risk of injury, putting less mileage on your shoulders and allowing you to prevent injury on the mat.
  

• Improved Escapes: While pinned on the mat, a great deal of both technique and strength is required to get your frames back, regard, and escape your opponents pin. The floor press is the perfect exercise for improving the strength for these scenarios. It is specific enough, in that we are actually lying on our back to perform the exercise, and requires a mechanically similar movement pattern that is used to create space and recover your guard from a bottom pin position. This specificity, with the added ability to train heavy at a high intensity, makes the floor press an excellent option for strength training in Jiu Jitsu.
  

• Stronger Frames: Similar to the point I just made about improving your ability to create space and escape from a bottom pin position, the floor press also builds an incredibly strong base for your frames once you do begin to recover guard. When you add paused reps, and isometrics to the floor press your ability to create a keep frames on bottom becomes much, much easier.
  

• Better Isometric Strength: And to tack onto the last two points, the ability to keep your frames is directly associated to your isometric strength. We’ve all been on bottom with someone bigger trying to smash us. They apply pressure and try to cook you. The only thing saving you is your frames…. See where i’m going? When trained with pauses, the isometrics of the floor press can make the difference between holding your frame long enough to reguard, or get flattened out and have your guard passed. 

Moral of the story - if you weight 150lbs and can floor press 250lbs then you will be significantly harder to pin and have a much higher success rate at getting and keeping your frames in order to reguard and begin attacking.

Landmine Press

Last, but certainly not least, on our list is the landmine press. Why not just an overhead press, or a kettlebell overhead press? Its simple, the landmine press has a fairly unique movement arc which differentiates it from other overhead pressing movements and, in my opinion, makes it a superior pressing option. This arc, different from the strictly vertical movement of traditional presses, brings a range of advantages tailored to the needs of a Jiu Jitsu athlete.

• Functional strength from every position: The landmine press simulates the angular and diagonal strength required in Jiu Jitsu. The pressing motion isn’t just vertical but also involves a horizontal component, closely mimicking the pushing angles often encountered in Jiu Jitsu during hand fighting or while creating space from the guard. This functional movement pattern ensures that the strength gained is directly transferable to the mat.
  

• Reduced Shoulder Stress (Again?): You seeing a pattern here? Unlike traditional overhead presses, the landmine press allows for a more natural scapular movement, which can be particularly beneficial for athletes with shoulder issues. The arc movement provides a safer range of motion for the shoulders, reducing the risk of impingement or excessive strain.
  

• Versatility: The landmine press can be done from a wide range of positions. Standing, kneeling, mixed stance, the list goes one. This versatility allows the athlete to reduce repetitive strain while at the same time working on hypertrophy, power, or strength (whichever their program calls for at the time).