← Articles

BJJ Journal: What to Write After Class (Free Template)

By Scott, founder of JitsAI

★★★★★ 4.5 from 149 App Store ratings

Most BJJ journals die the same way: three long entries in the first week, then nothing. The problem is rarely discipline. The journal asks for too much and gives nothing back.

A useful BJJ journal is small. It follows one position for a week, notes who each round was against, and gets read again at the end of the week. Below: what to write after class, a template to copy, how to review it, and where to keep it.

Why keep a BJJ journal

Because you forget the details: which hand frames, where your knee goes, what the coach said when your partner posted. Those details are the technique, and they go first. Most grapplers who take our quiz say their game lives in their memory, and that has a cost.

Most people also have days between classes for them to fade. In our data on how each BJJ belt trains, from 3,316 adult members, 14% of white belts train five or more times a week, against 42% of black belts. If you train two or three times a week, the journal is what carries Tuesday’s detail into Thursday’s class.

A journal also does three things memory won’t:

• It keeps the misses. Memory holds on to the sweep that landed and drops the five that didn’t. A written record has both.
• It sharpens your questions. “Why doesn’t my half guard work?” is hard for a coach to answer. “What do I do when a heavier partner flattens me and takes the underhook?” gets a real answer.
• It shows change you can’t feel. After a rough class, a month of entries shows what has improved and what hasn’t. One bad night hides both.

What to write in a BJJ journal after class

Five things. Write these and nothing else, and you have a journal worth keeping.

1. Your focus. The one position you’re working on this week: side control escapes, closed guard sweeps, passing half guard. Keep the same one all week, so every class answers the same question: is it working yet?
2. What the coach showed. The technique and the one or two details that made it click. Not the whole sequence. If you only have time for one line, write the detail you’re most likely to forget.
3. Your live rounds. How many you did, and who each partner was by size (lighter, same, heavier) and experience (newer than you, about the same, more experienced). Size and experience matter more than names: a sweep that works on a lighter beginner and one that works on a heavier blue belt are different results.
4. What worked and what didn’t. Specific moments tied to your focus. “Framed early and got guard back” beats “rolled well”. “Flattened before I could frame” beats “got smashed”.
5. One question for your coach. Just one: the problem your rounds didn’t solve. Ask it before or after the next class, not in the middle of a drill.

A BJJ journal template you can copy

Paste it into a note on your phone and duplicate it after each class, or write it into the front of a notebook.

Date:

Focus:
(one position, same all week)

Coach showed:
(the move and the key detail)

Live rounds: how many?
For each round, note:
- size: lighter / same / heavier
- experience: newer / same / more
- did your focus work?
1.
2.
3.

What worked:

What didn't:

One question for my coach:

Here is a filled-in entry, so you can see how little it takes.

It’s short enough to write before you leave the gym, and at the end of the week it answers a real question.

How to review your BJJ journal each week

Writing is half the job. The other half is ten minutes at the end of the week, reading it back.

1. Count. How many rounds did you work your focus, and how many times did it work?
2. Sort the wins by partner. Draw a grid with size across the top and experience down the side. Put a mark in a box each time your focus worked against that kind of partner.
3. Read the grid. If every mark sits in the newer, lighter corner, the technique works on people who can’t stop it yet. That’s a start. The next test is the box beside it.
4. Hold it to a standard. One good round is a result, not proof. Call a technique yours when it lands at least three times, across at least two sessions, against the same kind of partner. One great night can be a tired partner or a lucky read, which is why a technique that worked once is not yet yours.
5. Decide. Keep the focus another week if you don’t have enough rounds yet. Test it one box harder if it’s holding. Change focus once it works where you need it. Then take the question that came up most to your coach.

Common BJJ journal mistakes

Writing everything down. A full transcript of class feels productive and never gets read again. In your first year nearly everything is new, so everything feels worth writing, and most white belts are in that first year: 74% of the white belts in our member data have trained for less than a year. Write the detail you’ll forget, not the whole move.

No focus. If every class is a new technique and every round is random, your journal is a list of unrelated nights. You can’t compare Tuesday with Thursday, because they were about different things. One position a week turns your entries into one experiment.

Never reviewing. A journal you never read back is a diary. The payoff comes at the end of the week, when the entries show a pattern no single class could. If you only keep one habit, keep the review and shorten the entries.

Paper, notes app or a BJJ journal app?

The best one is the one you’ll still open after a hard class six weeks from now. Here is the honest trade-off.

A paper notebook

Cheap, no battery, and writing by hand slows you down enough to think. You can sketch a position in seconds. The downsides: it isn’t in your pocket when a detail comes back to you later, you can’t search it, and the weekly count is all by hand. If you go paper, draw the grid inside the back cover.

A notes app on your phone

Free, always with you, and searchable: type “side control” and every entry comes up. For BJJ notes, keep one note per week and paste the template in after each class. The downside: nothing gets counted for you, and after a few months it’s one long scroll.

A dedicated BJJ journal app

The structure is built in, and a good one does the counting for you. The downsides: most cost money, you work inside someone else’s idea of what matters, and an app that asks for too much ends up like the notebook, full for a week and then empty. We learned that building our own: most people logged once or twice, then stopped. Pick one that asks for less, not more. We compare the main kinds of BJJ app, ours included, in our BJJ app comparison.

The digital version: JitsAI

JitsAI runs the same loop as this template, with the counting and the grid done for you.

You pick one Focus a week. There are 14 Foundation focus cards, plus intermediate and advanced libraries, or you can create your own. Prep lessons come from Henrique Rezende, a world champion, whose fundamentals course has 74 lessons.

After class, a quick check-in asks three things: whether you did focused rounds, how many, and for each round, who it was against by size and experience and whether it worked. That’s the rounds section of the template, without the writing.

The standard is built in too. Land your focus technique once and it’s a HIT. Three hits across two sessions against the same kind of partner earns PROVEN. Instead of a grid, you climb a nine-level ladder, Wood to Emperor, built on the same two questions: how big was your partner, and how experienced?

It doesn’t replace your coach. It tells you what to take into their class and what survived. If you like writing the coach’s details by hand, keep the notebook for that and let the app keep the count.

BJJ journal questions

What should I write in a BJJ journal?

Five things: your focus for the week, what the coach showed, your live rounds (how many, and each partner’s size and experience), what worked and what didn’t, and one question for your coach.

How long should a BJJ journal entry take?

A few minutes. If it regularly takes longer, you’re writing a transcript of the class. Cut it back to the five things in the template.

Is a notes app good enough for BJJ notes?

Yes. Paste the template into a note after each class and keep one note per week. You’ll do the weekly count by hand, which is the part a dedicated app can do for you.

What is the best BJJ journal app?

The one you’ll still use in two months. Look for one built around a single focus that records who each round was against and does the counting for you. JitsAI is ours. If you’d rather not pay, a notes app and the template above will do the job.