Gi or no-gi: which should I learn?

A gi is the heavy cotton jacket and pants you see in every jiu-jitsu photo. No-gi is shorts and a rash guard. Same art, same positions. What changes is what you can hold on to.

In the gi you grab collars, sleeves, pant legs. That gives you control that does not exist anywhere else in fighting, and it slows the whole thing down. Gi players tend to be patient and precise. Nothing wrong with that.

In no-gi you have nothing. You control somebody with your hips, your head, an underhook, a grip on the wrist. Sweat takes care of everything else. It is faster, and it looks a lot more like what happens when two people in jeans end up on a sidewalk.

I teach no-gi. It has been this gym’s specialty since the Hostility MMA days, and it is what runs straight into MMA, wrestling and self-defense. If you train gi later, none of this is wasted. The positions are identical. You just pick up extra handles.

So: want it useful fast, and want it to sit next to striking? Start no-gi. Love the traditional side of the art? Train gi somewhere and you are still welcome here.

Rank runs across both, which surprises people. One ladder, white through black, and it does not reset because you took the jacket off. See belts in no-gi.

Kit is the other real difference. No-gi is cheaper and lighter: shorts with no zips or pockets, and a rash guard or a fitted shirt. Rash guard or a t-shirt covers what matters there, and most of it is about not leaving skin on the mat.

One warning either way. Grappling gear goes ripe fast, and a gi is worse than a rash guard because it takes a day to dry. Keeping your gear from stinking is not a joke answer. Skin stops more people training than injuries do.

Start with what no-gi actually is, then look at everything you can train.