I've been training for about 9 months now and I always come away from class with some sort of bruising or ache and pain but it's not this I'm concerned about, it's the other injuries, the other 4 during that time; I've very nearly broken my ankle, had quite a bad groin strain, badly sprained my thumb and badly sprained my foot last Thursday which resulted in a trip to A&E. The academy where I train is very safety conscious, I want to get that out there, and the instructor is very vigilant on keeping space between people when sparring and paring people up appropriately. This is not the problem and there aren't that many other guys there getting injured. I don't know if it's me being unlucky or what. I've been training once a week during this 9 months and that has been a bit on and off at times due to these injuries but I've been making progress. I thought I was starting to finally be able to control the situation a little more as my experience grows a bit but then the sprained thumb and foot have both happened in the last couple of weeks and have both been painful, especially the foot. I've read quite a bit lately about people stopping BJJ training due to injuries and ending up with wrecked knees and other joints. I've got to be honest I wasn't too bothered about all these stories before as I know a few injuries are a part of any sort of regular training but this last injury has made me really consider packing it in as it's affected my business, my home life responsibilities and other hobbies these last few days and almost ruined a holiday that I've got planned in the next few weeks. I roll light and mostly play a defensive game as my attacking isn't that strong yet so it's not like I go all guns blazing when sparring. I tend to flow into different positions instead of fighting them and holding off. All of these injuries have been freak accidents where my partner and I have just ended up in some weird position or posted awkwardly with my hand (the thumb injury). I'm fairly strong and pretty well conditioned so I'm not exactly a really weak person physically. I know BJJ is a contact sport and this will happen but is there anything else that I can do to reduce this risk? Does injury rate taper off as experience grows? Is it worth it haha!? Ok only I can answer the last one.
Freak injures are mostly the result of lack of knowledge, over posting instead of accepting a sweep for example, they do happen, but drop to virtually zero once you have a year or two on the mats, and are training intelligently. To reduce posting injures, 1) keep all fingers and thumbs together like a flipper. 2) only post wide so that you don't wristlock yourself 3) don't lock your elbow, so you don't armbar yourself 4) keep your shoulder in neutral so you don't rip your shoulder. And accept sweeps sometimes instead of over posting, if your going 50% but you post 100% they'll sweep you 100%, or you'll get overconfident in your posting abilities. Both of which leads to Injuries.
The near-ankle was me poorly executing a drop seo nagi during drilling. I bought my partner down onto my leg as it was on the mat. This was only after a couple of classes so my body positioning was very poor. The groin strain was random and I'm not too sure. I cycle a lot so legs are normally pretty tight I guess. Again, this was at the start of my training and only about 5 weeks in. The thumb injury: I was sparring nogi and got taken down. For some reason my thumb was isolated and got pushed backwards when I hit the mat. I normally fall pretty well but this happened really quickly. I carried on the class and I caught it a second time during the next round of sparring. I should have sat out after the first time but thought it was ok. The damage was already done in hindsight. This was my first class after a 5 week break from training over Christmas. Then the foot was last Thursday. Specific CG sparring so I was trying to pass his guard and he was trying to sweep me. He's got strength, size and skill on me so I was trying quite hard to stop the sweeps. I had posted with my right hand a few times and had a wide base with my legs, we somehow moved quickly in the opposite direction so I ended up going over to the left and backwards with his weight on top of me. My foot bent as we went over it (toes towards heal away from me) and I felt a twinge in my knee from what must have been a bit of a rotation. A loud pop in my foot and I felt sick. My partner said my foot bent a lot and judging by the swelling etc., it must have done. The problem was it was momentum and weight that caused it and it happened so quickly that neither of us could have stopped it. We were moving in an odd direction and my leg was in an awkward position and it's opened my eyes to how easily this can happen and that's my main concern.
I would recommend supplementing your BJJ with yoga or pilates. BJJ can lead to a variety of injuries caused by bad posture or lack of mobility. Like DP says, when rolling, keep it playful. Tap quickly and tap often. Most people are a lot more tense during rolling than they actually realise, especially at white.
If they've got size, strength and skill on you, you trying 100% to not get swept, will force them to sweep you harder and faster then you can safely cope with. Theirs two people responsible for Injuries, you and your partner, and you can only 100% control yourself.
If it was normal sparring then I probably would have been more inclined to just go with the sweep and then go from there but I think because it was specific sparring/training I was trying harder to hold it off. Perhaps this is where my error was in this instance. It's hard to gauge how much I should work against an opposing force/opponent's will -vs- going with the flow. Perhaps this is lack of experience on my part. I still find it worrying, however, how this happened so quickly without me being able to get a grasp on it and do something about it. It's this that is starting to play on my mind a bit. I suppose it's made me realise just how easily a really bad injury could happen and how easily that can affect my business etc., if I'm not careful.
I find the majority of beginner injury are from not tapping appropriately, and not thinking about feet and knees etc when getting swept. What closed guard sweep allows you to have both feet posted wide? Or was it open guard by that point? It sounds like a hip bump to elevater sweep and you'd left your feet wide, but I could very well be wrong. If your self employed, you can either roll safer, or get injury/medical insurance, or ideally both.
His guard had opened up and I was still on my knees. I think we both kind of moved to my left and then his weight came towards me and back. I went over back/side-wards with his weight on me and my left leg was caught underneath. In all honesty I'm not too sure at this point as it happened really quickly but there were experienced guys watching so I could ask them for a bit more info. As for insurance, yep got that sorted already!
I'd also recommend slow rolling if you can find a good partner. Slow rolling is the number one thing that has improved my bjj.
really cool video on how to slow roll, here. [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlUXO40uhP0"]How to learn slowrolling in BJJ - YouTube[/ame]
So is the general opinion that a lot of [these] injuries can be prevented rather than this being the norm? I really hope I am doing something wrong that I can fix, at least then I can begin solving the problem. I have read quite a bit about people stopping training due to the high injury rate and was beginning to think that it might just be the way it is.
In my experience BJJ is paradoxically both highly injurious and highly curative. Injuries do happen you can mitigate against them to an extent but ultimately it's a contact sport. I got my neck crushed up a few months back from a quickly applied crank and it was wrecked for days... Nothing I could do about that.
White belts injure themselves loads, a good gym takes it easy on them and encourages them to go at a pace that means they won't injure themselves too badly. Your gym sounds like it already does this, so really its all down to you to train appropriately, and not hurt yourself.
I have trained at several gyms. Got badly hurt at the first gym as I was not relaxed while rolling. 2nd place helped improve my mentality by teaching me to slow roll and reinforcing that tapping was learning, and tapping early and often can be a good thing. I've kept that attitude since and apart from a black eye from an accidental knee in spider guard, I've had no injuries to speak of over the last few years. So to answer the OP's question, yes, in my experience injuries are avoidable. most of us are doing BJJ as a fun hobby. It requires some focus and discipline, but don't take it too seriously. Check out my sig. I think of that every time I get on the mat. And ironically, you'd struggle to find a more successful gym than the one John Kavanagh runs and they are big on slow rolling/looking after you partners and yourself. Also I noticed the OP's age. I'm not too far off that age myself. Check out the Boyd a Belt system and adjust accordingly http://youtu.be/FGk_urw1_hA
There are other academies around the area but I believe that Si is the most experienced BJJ instructor and from what I've seen so far I can vouch for that (in my limited experience). Classes are ran very well and he pairs us up very well and it's rare that I spar with someone out of my weight class really. We were specific sparring where the whole class rotates through 5 guys down. It's not the first time I've done this either but I think I was probably a bit more keen on Thursday to pass the guy's guard as it's an area that I want to improve on. I'm also mindful that my focus was perhaps on not hurting my already injured thumb and thus perhaps a bit distracted to other possibilities of injury...
Guard passing lineouts always bring out the worst in people, don't be disheartened, I tore my ACL before I realised that about myself. PS your in a good school.
