Stop us if you’ve heard this before: you signed up for KFit or Guavapass, or you went to your local gym or cycling studio or whatever have you because they are the current in thing at the moment (you see all your friends sweating in either boxing rings or CrossFit boxes), and also, you wanted to get in shape or be a little more active. Sometimes, you’re gonna like what you stumbled into, but there will also be times where you find that for whatever reason, what you signed up for isn’t really for you. That’s normal, and it shouldn’t discourage you in the quest to stay fit.

Now the following suggestion may finally work for you, or it could be another item on a list of failures. Hawaiian UFC fighter Max Holloway was here over the weekend to help promote the upcoming UFC Fight Night Manila event next month, and Scout asked him what he really thinks is the best thing to get into for people looking to sweat—and a little direction in their lives, if they need it.

His answer: Brazilian jiu-jitsu. With a gi, to be specific (it can be done without a gi).

“A jiu-jitsu class is great, actually. I would say more jiu-jitsu than kickboxing,” says the tough-talking Holloway, who never really intended to be an MMA fighter until he learned kickboxing for self-defense and his coach told him he was good at it.

“…guys come in and lose 50 pounds doing gi jiu-jitsu, changing their life, changing their eating habits, changing the way they live, changing the way they look at life.”

“[When] I was kickboxing, I thought I was the man,” said the very confident Hawaiian. “I was walking around with my chest lifted high, thinking, ‘Yeah, try and test me, I would whoop that ass,’ you know, but jiu-jitsu is a way of life. Using a gi, you’re sweating a lot, and I see so much stories [of people coming] through to Hawaii at our gym, you know, guys come in and lose 50 pounds doing gi jiu-jitsu, changing their life, changing their eating habits, changing the way they live, changing the way they look at life.”

There you have it, friends. When you next get the chance and you’re looking for something to better yourself, give grappling a shot—it may make you The Transformed One among your group of friends. And if getting fit still isn’t enough to convince you to try it, here’s the coldest of parting shots:

“It’s a way of life, it shows you how to be humble, be great—knowing that you can kill someone and not even punch them.”

Photo by Ralph Freso