Ask any coach and they’ll tell you: injuries climb in winter. It’s not bad luck or soft students — it’s physiology. Once you understand what the cold actually does to a muscle, the fix (and why the usual “quick jog and roll” doesn’t cut it) becomes obvious.
What cold actually does to a muscle
Muscle and tendon behave differently at different temperatures. When tissue is cold it’s more viscous and less elastic — stiffer, slower to stretch, and quicker to tear when you load it fast. Blood flow to the area is lower, nerve signals fire a touch slower, and the synovial fluid that lubricates your joints is thicker and less slippery. So the exact same explosive scramble or deep shrimp that feels effortless in a warm summer class is landing on tissue that simply isn’t ready for it. That’s why the first hard movement on a cold morning is so often the one that tweaks something.
A warm-up that actually prepares you
“Warming up” isn’t five minutes of half-hearted jogging. A good one follows a simple order — raise, mobilise, then potentiate:
- Raise (3–5 min). Light continuous movement until you’re genuinely warm and lightly sweating. In winter this takes longer than you think — don’t rush it.
- Mobilise (3–4 min). Move the joints you’re about to use through their full range: hip circles, shrimping and bridging on the mat, neck and shoulder rolls, wrist and finger mobility.
- Potentiate (2–3 min). A handful of progressively sharper movements — sprawls, sit-outs, a few hard grips — to switch the nervous system on before you drill or roll.
Ten honest minutes and you walk onto the mat warm, mobile and switched on — instead of using your first two rounds as the warm-up (which is exactly when people get hurt).
Why “push through it” backfires in the cold
Winter stacks the odds against you: colder tissue, a rushed warm-up, and the accumulated fatigue of a season where you’re sleeping worse and half the gym is fighting a cold. That’s the injury trifecta. Managing your training load — and treating recovery as part of training, not an afterthought — matters more in July than at any other time of year.
Look after the joint that’s already grumbling
If a knee or elbow is stiff before class, a little heat beforehand helps it move; if it’s swollen and hot after a hard session, cold settles it down. Knowing which to reach for is worth getting right — we broke it down in the ice-or-heat guide.
Warm up properly, keep showing up, and you’ll come out of winter sharper than everyone who didn’t. — Liga Combat
Heat before, ice after
The Re-Gen Hot & Cold Recovery Sleeve warms up cranky joints before training and ices the swelling after — one sleeve for knee, elbow, calf or forearm.
Shop the Re-Gen Sleeve →What the evidence says
By Lukie Ali, BJJ Brown Belt · Liga Combat · Last updated 14 July 2026
There’s real physiology behind “cold muscles get injured”: below core temperature, a muscle needs less energy to tear. That’s why a proper warm-up — active movement that raises tissue temperature and blood flow — matters most in winter.
“The energy required to induce muscle failure was significantly lower at muscle temperatures of 17°C to 32°C compared with muscle at core temperature.”— Scott et al., Bone & Joint Research, 2016
Warming up works: a meta-analysis of 15 trials (21,576 participants) found structured warm-up programmes cut injury rates by about a third — “injury rate ratio… 0.64… (36% reduction)” (Ding et al., 2022). That study is in youth athletes, so treat it as “warm-ups reduce injuries,” not a product claim.
And most BJJ injuries happen in training, not competition — one study found 91% of practitioners injured, “primarily sprains and strains” (Petrisor et al., Sports Health 2019); another found 85.7% injured (McDonald et al., 2017). Sprains and strains are exactly the soft-tissue injuries most sensitive to muscle temperature. Use an active RAMP-style warm-up (Raise, Activate, Mobilise, Potentiate); a hot/cold sleeve helps retain and deliver heat in the cold, but it complements the warm-up — it doesn’t replace it.
Sources & further reading
- Scott EEF, et al. Increased risk of muscle tears below physiological temperature ranges. Bone Joint Res 2016.
- Ding L, et al. Effectiveness of Warm-Up Programs to Prevent Sports Injuries: meta-analysis. IJERPH 2022.
- Petrisor BA, et al. Injury in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Training. Sports Health 2019;11(5):432–439.
- McDonald AR, et al. Prevalence of Injuries during Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Training. Sports 2017.
This guide is general information for training recovery, not medical advice. For a serious or persistent injury, see a doctor or physiotherapist.