• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

  • Fitness
  • Workouts
    • Best Shoulder Workouts
    • Best Chest Workouts
    • Best Leg Workouts
    • Best Leg Exercises
    • Best Biceps Exercises
    • Best Kettlebell Exercises
    • Best Back Workouts
    • Best HIIT Workouts
    • Best Triceps Exercises
    • Best Arm Workouts
  • Reviews
    • Supplements
      • Best Pre-Workout
      • Best BCAAs
      • Best Testosterone Boosters
      • Best Bodybuilding Supplements
      • Best Creatine
      • Best Supplements for Weight Loss
      • Best Multivitamins
      • Best Collagen Supplement
      • Best Probiotic
      • Best Non-Stim Pre-Workout
      • Best Greens Powder
      • Best Magnesium Supplements
    • Protein
      • Best Protein Powder
      • Best Whey Protein
      • Best Protein Powders for Muscle Gain
      • Best Tasting Protein Powder
      • Best Vegan Protein
      • Best Mass Gainer
      • Best Protein Shakes
      • Best Organic Protein Powder
      • Best Pea Protein Powder
      • Best Protein Bars
    • Strength Equipment
      • Best Home Gym Equipment
      • Best Squat Racks
      • Best Barbells
      • Best Weightlifting Belts
      • Best Weight Benches
      • Best Functional Trainers
      • Best Dumbbells
      • Best Adjustable Dumbbells
      • Best Kettlebells
      • Best Resistance Bands
      • Best Trap Bars
    • Cardio Equipment
      • Best Cardio Machines
      • Best Rowing Machines
      • Best Treadmills
      • Best Weighted Vests
      • Concept2 RowErg Review
      • Hydrow Wave Review
      • Best Jump Ropes
  • News
  • Exercise Guides
    • Legs
      • Back Squat
      • Bulgarian Split Squat
      • Goblet Squat
      • Zercher Squat
      • Standing Calf Raise
      • Hack Squat
    • Chest
      • Bench Press
      • Dumbbell Bench Press
      • Close-Grip Bench Press
      • Incline Bench Press
    • Shoulders
      • Overhead Dumbbell Press
      • Lateral Raise
    • Arms
      • Chin-Up
      • Weighted Pull-Up
      • Triceps Pushdown
    • Back
      • Deadlift
      • Trap Bar Deadlift
      • Lat Pulldown
      • Inverted Row
      • Bent-Over Barbell Row
      • Single-Arm Dumbbell Row
      • Pendlay Row
Fitness

Free Strength and Conditioning Workouts Designed for MMA and BJJ

We love our BJJ and MMA readership, and for that reason we've created a strength and conditioning program specifically designed for your needs and your sports.

Mindith Rahmat

Written by Mindith Rahmat Last updated on Oct 25, 2022

We know a lot of you reading this site are BJJ and MMA practitioners, looking to get stronger, faster, and healthier so you can compete at your sport. For that reason, we are launching our newest free workout program – the MMA & BJJ strength and conditioning program.

This program will be an entire year in length and it’s designed by seasoned martial arts trainer Doug Dupont. Doug has been a long-time jiu jitsu practitioner himself and has trained professional MMA fighters, as well. Here, in his own words, he explains the first training phase and what the next year will look like for those who choose to take on his training program:

Training for combat sports such as MMA, BJJ, judo, wrestling, kickboxing, and boxing requires a great breadth of attributes. Unlike a powerlifter or a marathon runner, focusing on strength or endurance alone won’t cut it. You need to develop it all.

This workout will be a full year long, separated into four twelve-week phases and a final four-week phase.

In the first phase we will begin by developing all around general physical preparedness (GPP). In this phase you might notice a lack of exercises specific to MMA or BJJ. This is because we are working on your general fitness. The strength or endurance you develop in this first phase will carry over into any physical activity you do in life, and will form the foundation of the future phases of the program. The conditioning you develop during this time will be maintained through the future phases of training.

The phases that come later will continue to build on one aspect of your GPP – the second phase will focus on cardio, the third on strength, and the fourth on flexibility and mobility. The final four-week phase will be a cutting phase, for use in preparing for a fight or competition in which you need to lose some weight.

Each phase is a three day per week program, but if you have the time I encourage you to add 30-minute light cardio sessions with your heart rate under 150 on as many as three of the other days, assuming you find you are still fresh, have energy, and are not overtrained.

To determine your overtraining status and your improving fitness, take your heart rate every morning. I strongly recommend a heart rate monitor, but if you do not have one, take your heart rate at your wrist, not your neck. Remember you need a clock or timer that measures seconds. Take the heart rate for a full minute every morning after you get up and go to the bathroom, but before you do anything else. Make sure you are sitting. Record the number every day, and if it is increases by more than five beats per minute you are probably overtraining or getting sick.

mma workouts, bjj workouts, mma conditionign, bjj conditioning, mma, bjjIf you find you are overtraining, then cut back on your workouts, starting first with the sprint portions of the cardio, and then with some of the strength training if need be, or take the day off altogether. Once you have recovered begin adding back exercises slowly to find your limit. You may find that your resting heart rate drops over the twelve weeks. This is good, and it’s a sign that your cardio is improving.

You will also note I do not use percentages of maximums, but rather what rep max you should be using for your weights. This is because I find this to be both more accurate, and simpler for most people to follow. As an example, if I write “3 x 5 with your 7-rep max,” this means you should do three sets of five repetitions with a weight that you could only lift seven times at most. However, you should be able to cleanly finish that seventh rep. If you have to seriously struggle and cheat a little to do that seventh rep, then it doesn’t count. Your 7-rep max is the weight where you could do seven very strict reps.

Note that this workout is very simple. For example, you might ask, “Only three sets of pressing for the first workout?” Yes. Do not do more than mentioned. Sometimes volume is low to allow you to adjust to the new program or to allow for strategic deconditioning. Also, combat athletes are among the most prone to overtraining, especially if they are training in their skilled disciplines three or more times per week. Given that scenario, this workout will be perfectly adequate for results.

For any exercise that says “for time” you should try to beat your previous time with each workout.

I don’t mark the rest periods in between sets or exercises. Rest as long as you need and approach each set as recovered as possible. Avoid failure. You should stop each set before you can’t lift any more, and rest longer if you need to so that you can follow along with the workout. The recommended starting weights assume familiarity with the exercises. If you are new to a program like this or are detrained, add a few reps to each rep max recommendation. For example, where it says “3 x 5 with your 8-rep max” instead, do 3 x 5 with your 10- or 11-rep max instead, as the work out will rapidly become too difficult to do with your 8-rep max.

mma workouts, bjj workouts, mma conditionign, bjj conditioning, mma, bjjYou will notice that this workout doesn’t change much from week to week. This is for good reason. Strength is a factor in both endurance and flexibility, and strength is developed, in part, by practice. The popular modern trends of highly variable workouts and “muscle confusion” are inefficient ways of exercising. As we move into different phases you will see new exercises, but for now stick to the workout as written.

If you are near the top of your weight class, you may need to increase the load so that you can get stronger without adding as much muscle. If this is a concern, please feel free to leave a message below with this or any other questions.

If time allows, a week or so before you begin day one, you should test the following:

  • Bench press and pullup or pulldown 8-rep maxes
  • Deadlift 10 -rep max
  • Overhead press and row 12-rep maxes

These are the weights you will be working with for the first phase of the program. Note that at the end of the first phase you will actually be doing more reps than your max at the start, so it may say something like “2 x 10 with your 10-rep max.” This is because by the end you should be stronger and fitter than when you started. In the following twelve-week phases we will re-evaluate your maxes.

Enjoy the workouts and let me know if you have any questions!

  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 1
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 2
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 3
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 4
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 5
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 6
  • Workout BJJ & MMA Cycle 7

Photos provided by David Brown Photography.

Mindith Rahmat

About Mindith Rahmat

Mindith is a born mover. She has spent her life exploring various athletic disciplines, starting with ballet and modern dance from an early age. She went on to become a E-RYT 500 certified yoga therapist and teacher and discovered CrossFit after the birth of her daughter.

Mindith coached CrossFit at a number of boxes near her home in Southern California, which lead to her involvement in Russian kettlebells and Olympic weightlifting. She has coached a wide variety of populations and cares deeply for women’s health, specializing in pregnancy and postpartum fitness. She is currently studying the principles of Natural Movement and Kettlebell Sport, and is working to complete an additional teacher training in the Taoist art of Yin Yoga with Master Paulie Zink.

Mindith founded Breaking Muscle in 2011. Over 5 million people a month have visited the site, hundreds of thousands of them follow Breaking Muscle on social media, nearly 2,000 coaches have written or appeared on its pages, and there are thousands of free, fully-formed training plans freely available. Breaking Muscle has won numerous awards in the industry and is recognized for pioneering new approaches to fitness and coaching techniques. In 2021, Breaking Muscle was acquired by Barbend. Mindith continues to devote time to her kids, pursue her doctorate in psychology, do research, and teach.

View All Articles

Related Posts

Fergus Crawley 5K Run Tips Photo
Fergus Crawley Shares 5 Tips For Running a Better 5K
Actor Chris Hemsworth in gym performing dumbbell row
Chris Hemsworth Diagrams a Killer Upper Body Workout Fit For an Action Star
Hugh Jackman Deadpool 3 Workouts Spring:Winter 2023
Hugh Jackman Returns to Wolverine Condition in Workouts for “Deadpool 3”
Method Man Incline Dumbbell Presses December 2022
Check Out Rapper Method Man Cruising Through 120-Pound Incline Dumbbell Presses for 10 Reps

Primary Sidebar

Latest Articles

New Year’s Fitness Sales (2025)

XWERKS Motion BCAA Review (2025): A Registered Dietitian’s Honest Thoughts

Assault Fitness AssaultBike Pro X Review (2025): Assault’s Best Bike Yet?

13 Best Exercise Bikes for Home Gyms (2025)

Transparent Labs BCAA Glutamine Review (2025): The Key to Post-Workout Recovery?

Latest Reviews

Element 26 Hybrid Leather Weightlifting Belt

Element 26 Hybrid Leather Weightlifting Belt Review (2025)

Omre NMN + Resveratrol, Lifeforce Peak NMN, and partiQlar NMN on a red background

Best NMN Supplement: Fountain of Youth in a Bottle? (2025)

The Titan Series Adjustable Bench on a red background

Titan Series Adjustable Bench Review (2025)

A photo of the NordicTrack Select-a-Weight Dumbbells on a red background

NordicTrack Adjustable Dumbbell Review (2025): Are These Value Dumbbells Worth It?

woman lifting barbell

Be the smartest person in your gym

The Breaking Muscle newsletter is everything you need to know about strength in a 3 minute read.

I WANT IN!

Breaking Muscle is the fitness world’s preeminent destination for timely, high-quality information on exercise, fitness, health, and nutrition. Our audience encompasses the entire spectrum of the fitness community: consumers, aficionados, fitness professionals, and business owners. We seek to inform, educate and advocate for this community.

  • Reviews
  • Healthy Eating
  • Workouts
  • Fitness
  • News

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS Feed

© 2025 · Breaking Muscle · Terms of Use · Privacy Policy · Affiliate Disclaimer · Accessibility · About