Best Workout in Ages!!!

I find that you can never really predict how a workout is going to go until you get into the thick of it. Sometimes I will start a workout with nothing but the best of intentions, with plans to swing the world on its axis and blast out a gahjillion calories, but end up struggling after ten minutes and finishing early. Other times I might start off tired and weary, thinking that there’s not much chance of pushing the envelope on that particular day, but then it all comes together when the iron starts moving around and I end up with a really satisfying workout. Today was definitely one of the latter workouts, and by some margin!

I took at trip to the gym this (Sunday) morning for my workout. As I arrived at the reception I cast my eye over to the open area near the free weights/kettlebells where I like to work out and saw that it was pleasingly devoid of gym-users – I like a quiet gym. When I emerged from the locker-room, however, people must have been teleported in because there was just no room left for me! Argh! maybe I was going to be stuck on some boring CV machine for a while until some space cleared. But no! I’d forgotten about the studio! A quick check with the guys behind the reception to confirm there were no classes planned for a few hours and I’d grabbed myself a huge workout area, all to myself! I grabbed a few kettlebells, a BOSU, a Fitball, a 20kg powerbag, a Reebok step/bench and a mat and I was “good to go!”.

Working on the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid!) I thought I’d go with squats and swings.

• 20x20kg alternating one-hand kettlebell swings
• 20x20kg powerbag squats
• 20x20kg two-hand kettlebell swings
• 20x20kg powerbag wide-stance squats
• 20x20kg one-hand kettlebell swings (10L10R)
• 20x20kg powerbag narrow-stance squats
• 20x20kg two-hand kettlebell swings
• 20x20kg powerbag squats
• 20x20kg one-hand kettlebell swings (10L10R)20x20kg powerbag wide-stance squats

All of the above with 20s rest between exercises.

The other great advantage of working in a studio that is really intended for group fitness classes is the preponderance of mirrors, which are great for checking form and technique; I worked hard on my squats to ensure that my knees remained behind my toes at all times and that  my thighs got to at least parallel  with the floor for each and every rep.

I then went for a some old-school plyometric stuff on the Reebok step, doing a couple of minutes each of running steps and then some astride centre jumps on and off. Jeez, that nearly killed me! I used to do that stuff every Friday at our martial arts fitness session with Mike from http://www.logicfitness.com, but that was a few years ago and it was a real eyeopener to me to see just how hard it was to get back into that type of “intense-burst” exercise. Felt good though. Hard. But good.

After that I was back to kettlebells for some GS-style snatches, with particular emphasis on trying to get a comfortable, relaxed position at lockout and slowing down the reps from the RKC-style pace of perhaps 20 per minute, to maybe even less than half of that. The mirrors on two walls allowed me to see my form from both front and side and whilst I was not overly unhappy with how the lockout *looked*, even from the side, I didn’t honestly feel that I was gaining much back from relaxed position, and really does feel like it is my lack of mobility/ROM in my shoulders which prevents it. Perhaps I should be a little more rigouous in my use of TheRotater, perhaps I should have a month of shoulder stretching exercises and see whether that produces any kind of improvement? Worth considering, I suppose.

So, then in the spirit of resurrecting exercises that I haven’t done in some time, I laid myself out on the floor for some … Turkish Get-Ups!!! It’s been tricky to do this exercise with my hand/wrist problems, but today I actually found that if I took my thumb out of use and just relied on my fingers and hand to push myself off the floor, it was more do-able. I confined myself to only using the 12kg kettlebell. That’s a “light” weight for someone of my size and overall strength for this exercise, but it’s definitley a weak-spot for me, so I figured there’s no point in being stupid and macho about it and just used the 12kg. I alternated between left and right sides, no appreciable resting, just enough time between get-ups to “reset” myself and kept it going for 10 minutes. Really enjoyed them, which is a first 🙂 Also managed to actually do a single 12kg bottom up TGU on each side as well, which was very pleasing – I am actually looking forward to trying to extend that. A great video of that particular exercise, albeit with the 16kg is from Mark Cheng.

I’m pretty sure I could get to 16kg, but I’m not sure I’ll make it look as good and tight as Mark does!

Anyway, on to the next set of exercises. I figured that I should really take advantage of having the whole of the studio to myself, especially since it gave me a chance to throw some powerbags around … so that’s what I did! Down the length of the studio is about, I dunno 30m or so, so I started at one end and launched the 20kg powerbag with my right arm, three throws to get from one end to the other, then left arm back again. My only restriction was that the bag had to be launched from above shoulder height. After doing that for half-adozen up-and-downs I was loving it! Totally weird kind of exercise, strong and explosive and exhausting, but not like anything else. I thne mixed it up with a few rounds of two handed throws from above my head, those really killed, and then some throws/swings from waist height, working on getting some rotation into the torso to send the bag flying. All great stuff!

Back to the kettlebells again. Grabbed a pair of 16kg bells. Racked them and walked around the room, dropped them into a suitcase position and walked around the room again. Rack. Walk. Suitcase. Walk. Rack. Walk. Suitcase. You get the idea … then I mixed it up some more. Single 16kg kettlebell, rack it into a bottom up clean and rack, and walk around the room with it. Switch arms and repeat. A few more reps of that and I was really starting to fade. Then I got out some more benches and set up a little two-step pyramid enabling me to walk up steps and over the other side, kind of like this:  _¬T¬_ I then cleaned the two 16kg kettlebells to a bottom up rack position and then rolled over the steps, back and forth a few times, concentratinmg on maintaining that bottom up rack position stable. Quite a stiff trial in actual fact. I then finished off the bottom up work with a 20-rep see-saw press cycle.

To finish off the whole session, I then simply used the BOSU, Fitball and mat to enjoy a good stretch and completely finished off with a sauna. Absolutely Pooped!

I really feel like I will pay dearly for this workout tomorrow, or the day after, with some major-league DOMS, but it’s gotta be worth it after an epic workout like that! 🙂

Bottom Up Clean & Press with Double 24kg Kettlebells Video

February Snatch Target Hit! New Target is 5 Reps of See-Saw BUP Presses with 2x20kg Kettlebells

Today I managed to hit my current target for kettlebell snatches. I completed 100x20kg snatches in 290s. Happy with that.

I had the idea of making March’s target something around the lines of bottoms-up presses and have settled on the target of 5 reps (10 presses) “see-saw” bottoms-up presses with double 20kg kettlebells. I can currently do this with 16kg kettlebells and I can do a single double BUP press with 2x20kg kettlebells, so this sounds like an achievable if tough target to hit by the end of March.

There’s a big difference between single, or double, presses and the “see-saw” press, as it involves the transfer of effort from one side of the body to the other, and then back again. This should hopefully be a good test of my dynamic core strength as opposed to the static core strength utilised  more in the non-seesaw presses.

Friday Night Kettlebell Snatch Workout – a modicum of success.

Went to the Fitness Farts gym this evening for a bit of a workout, as I’d been stuck in front of the computer for most of the day (as I am now, somewhat ironically!). I really need to try to get back into some cardio – long kettlebell swing sets are exhausting and very beneficial, but if I am ever going to run a marathon I cannot just forget about running. So, tonight I jogged out 30 minutes on the treadmill for an easy 5km. I felt like I was getting into the groove by the end of it, but let’s not go nuts, eh, 3o minutes is enough for now.

Besides, the current challenge is 100x20kg snatches in 6 minutes by end of February. That took a good step forward tonight as after the run I wound myself up for a snatch test and managed to bang out a 100 snatches in the not completely dreadful time of 6min 45s. A long way off my previous best of a year or so ago, but markedly better than a week ago when I couldn’t even manage 50 regardless of the time! I did rest a couple of  times in that test, but I can feel my snatch technique gradually smoothing out and improving – I’m remembering to just pull the my shoulder back a little as the kettlebell rises, just before I “punch-through” and that seems to be improving the rhythm and efficiency of the snatch. When I finished the 100, I actually felt confident that I can see better numbers very soon. To be honest I think working with the 24kg, and heavier, kettlebells earlier this week has helped enormously – the 20kg always feels much lighter after working the heavier bells and psychologically that works for me.

After the snatch test, I cooled down a bit with some gentle swing/clean/high pull/snatch complexes, just a few, alternating each side , and then my mind turned to my grip strength. I worked on a few BUP cleans to get the blood flowing again and then I tried a new exercise today, which was basically to flat pinch grip the kettlebell and lift it. This is what I mean, albeit with my paperweight kettlebell:

I found I could manage this with the 12kg comfortably. I guess it’s just like a plate pinch really, but there’s actually less to get hold of as the handle is rounded.

Heartened by this I went back to the dumbbells for a better choice of weights. My exercise of choice here is to balance the dumbbell on its end on the floor (so that the bar/handle is perpendicular to the floor) and then spread my hand over the circular end which is facing the ceiling. It kinda looks like this (I am no artist!) :

… and then you just lift it off the floor and put it back down again. Increasing the weight is doubly trying as it not only gets heavier (obviously!) but the diameter of the end of the dumbbell also increases meaning you have to spread your hand wider ans well.  2-3 months ago I was lucky if I could lift 14kg on my good left hand, and 10kg on my recovering right hand. Today I managed to pull 18kg off the floor relatively comfortable with both hands, several times. That’s a great result for me!

Just done some more research on this, and I think real grip aficionados do this type of exercise with a “blob”. Looks just like the end of a dumbell to me!

Wednesday Workout – a mixed bag!

Sorted out the trainer tyre for my old Dawes 10-speed and stuck it on my turbo-trainer:

Blatted out 20 minutes on that, then inside for kettlebells.

Followed a 15 seconds on/15 seconds off protocol and did 10 rounds of 24kg swings, 10 rounds of 24kg snatches, and 10 rounds of 24 kg cleans&presses. After that I did a half a dozen pull-ups – first time since my wrist surgery – and they seemed ok. Hard, cos I’m a heavy MF’er at the moment, but OK.

I then did some work with the heavier kettlebells and revisited the Bottoms-Up Press. I tried putting some more emphasis into crushing the handle and I think it shows in the stability of the kettlebell in this clip. First time I have managed three reps on the press with the 24kg.

I then tried it with the 28kg and got some success on a single rep. Managed to repeat it too. Definite improvement there:

Tried to get there on my left side as well, but it was just not happening for me on the left. It just didn’t feel right in my stance as much as anything else – I may need to video that fail again just to see if I can work out where I am going wrong with the left side, as I am sure the strength is there, just not the action.

28kg Bottoms Up Clean

Feeling pretty rock solid in the cleaned position now, just need to start into pressing the damn thing upwards with a bit of confidence.

Bottoms Up Clean & Press with Double 20kg Kettlebells

Clean needs to be a little smoother and more stable, and the lockout on the press could be better, but this was at the end of my workout, so I’m going to cut myself some slack for now.

Bottoms Up Clean & Press 24kg Kettlebell