There is a new video and article up on the site.
If you enjoy odd feats of strength you’ll definitely want to see this one.
Towing A Truck ‘Mighty Atom’ Style
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
The preparations are complete and the Kettlebell Domination Workshop is now live.
Go see for yourself what its all about.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
There is a lot more to getting strong then just hard work. I don’t want to downplay hard work though. Too many people think they are working hard when they are barely pushing themselves. Are you guilty of this? I have been in the past, for sure.
But today I want to talk about the technique side of strength. There has always been an emphasis on proper form in our society. Unfortunately, for some, their conception of proper form is skewed.
What does it mean to have proper form? Basically it boils down to two things.
1. Doing the exercise is a safe manner.
2. Doing the exercise in a productive manner.
Safety first. For obvious reasons this is important. Besides just keeping your health in mind, any injuries will take you away from future training time. If nothing else this should keep you doing things on the straight and narrow.
However, even if you do things properly there is still the risk of injury. Exercise is, by its nature, stressful. Some exercises are worse than others and some people are better suited for certain exercises over others. That is just how it is.
Besides strength training it is wise to balance your body with flexibility and mobility work so you can keep going in the long run. And find the exercises that give you the best results with the least damage.
You can do things safely but they must be done productively in order for you to get results. Can you stop every set just because you are not in a 100% biomechanically optimal position? No.
It is ok to splash some of the bathwater out, just don’t throw the baby out with it, if you catch my meaning.
With decent form you can be getting results from your training while staying healthy.
But technique goes beyond just the safe and the semi-productive. Often times a slight tweak in your form will allow you to surpass your previous bests with ease.
There is a reason coaching, in one form or another, is such a high-paid resource. A good coach can help you dramatically improve your form for safe and productive results.
You learn from those that know the technique (usually drilled in with years of experience and 1000’s of reps).
This Thursday I will be making a big announcement in these regards.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
P.S. Lots of new subscribers on board. If you haven’t read the articles on the site be sure to check them out at http://www.legendarystrength.com/articles.html
Since returning from LA I have been using my kettlebells in long timed sets. It is devastating work and let me tell you why.
In kettlebell competitions there are two main lifts. You must do the Jerk for 10 minutes straight. The other event is the Snatch for 10 minutes straight.
In case you don’t know what these moves are I will fill you in. If you have ever watched or done Olympic lifting then you will probably get it.
The Jerk is done with two kettlebells resting by your shoulders. Also known as the rack position. With an explosive leg movement you lift the bells upwards then drop down with a second leg dip and lock out the kettlebells overhead. Straighten your knees and you have 1 rep. The goal is as many reps as you can get without setting the kettlebell down.
The snatch is another explosive movement where the kettlebell is swung from between your legs to overhead. Again locked out overhead constitutes a single rep and the goal is as many as possible. You only use one kettlebell here and in competition a single hand switch is allowed. Usually this means five minutes with one hand then five with the other.
There is no magic in the 10 minute number. Five, six, or 20 minutes all work. Competitions are in ten minutes so it is commonly used.
In my eyes the greatest benefit of this training is mental toughness. When you have two kettlebells resting on you and you can feel the pain, where every rep burns, everything in you wants to put those bells down but the only thing stopping you is your decision to keep on going. You may be feeling like this at 6 minutes and still have 4 more to go, each more excruciating then the last.
The sad thing is that sometimes you will lose to this desire of comfort and set the bells down when you could have gone on. But more often than not you push through until the end.
Do you get this benefit from other kinds of training? Absolutely. But some more than others. High rep bodyweight exercises like Hindu squats or hill sprints are good examples. You can always push yourself a little faster, a little longer, or a little harder.
Low rep exercises don’t really build this. Sure you need the mind set to work hard and heavy, but there is a difference when your body is screaming at you to stop but you won’t let it.
The more uncomfortable you are, the more mental toughness you have the chance of building.
The next time you are training keep pushing until you can’t push anymore. Once you’re there reach down deep, use your will power, and keep going.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
One of my favorite ways to use a kettlebell is just to throw it around. A series of flips, catches, spins and whatnot will have you huffing and puffing in no time. Not to mention it hits just about every muscle and at odd angles. Don’t be surprised if you wake up the next day sore in places you didn’t know existed…
But to read more and see a video of this in action check out the articles on my main website. Go here.
As you know I was down in LA attending a seminar this weekend. What I did not tell you was that I got stuck there until Wednesday night. And not by choice. I was planning on leaving Monday.
Yep, my car broke down.
Pretty bad place and time. I was on the way to the second day of the event, when the thing just turned off and would not turn back on. Luckily, I was cruising at speed so I was able to pull into a parking lot.
A call to AAA and I was towed to a repair place. Two days later it is ready to go. I hop in and start driving back to my brothers place to pick up my stuff so I can head out of town finally.
At a stoplight and the same thing happens. Uh oh! There was lots of traffic around. I flipped on the hazard lights and try to get the car started.
It turned on…only to die again immediately.
A few more tries, and I decide I need to get out of the road. Problem is the car is three lanes away from a parking lot and it’s rush hour.
Mind you I am in LA so no one is running over to help me out.
I start pushing it backwards so I can get a good angle on the parking lot of a restaurant. After at least five minutes of waiting, standing outside of my car, someone waves at me saying I can go.
So I am steering the car with one hand and pushing it with the other. This isn’t the smallest car in the world either. But for me it was actually easy.
Why should you train for the best in strength and endurance? Well one reason is that you may need it. In fact your life might just depend on it.
I was not in a very dangerous position here, but you never know when you might be. No one got hurt here (except my wallet paying the repair guys).
But everything is okay because I made it back home late last night.
So the next time you train, maybe give a thought to the fact that the last rep you do could be the one that saves your life or the life of someone else. You never know.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
P.S. I couldn’t help but think I needed some chains so I could hook the car to my hair and pull it that way. But that is a story for another time.
I was pleasantly surprised that Steve Cotter was at the seminar. Got to talk to him and hear his side of the story. A lot of what he said made sense. No one can deny his incredible strength.The way he sees it the kettlebell is made for repetition lifting. There is a rich heritage in the kettlebell like that of a martial arts school. The analogy was that you can stick a bunch of flowers inside a car and call it a flower pot, but that does not mean that is what a car is for.
And if you want to get really high reps then you need to learn the right way to do so. Learn from the people who have done it such as Valery Federenko.
Teaching it any other way does not make sense and is limiting your potential. All the decisions he makes are based on this.
It makes sense to me but I say why limit the kettlebell to its traditional use. It can be used for standard weightlifting stuff in many cases and it performs admirably.
Another point was the difference of going after your end effect. Do you want to be tense or relaxed. Too many people are too tight and instead of getting them to tense up even more to train they should be learning how to relax.
It is the same difference between hard and soft styles of martial arts (karate vs. tai chi for example).
Do people need to have high levels of absolute strength? Or are they better served by having high levels of muscular endurance?
Obviously you are going to need to be able to tense up and relax. The better able you are to do this, the greater of an athlete you are. You need to train for both but how you approach it, from one end or the other, is up to you.
Again optimally you want a high degree of absolute strength and strength endurance. But here too you can approach it from on side or the other.
With the two kettlebell jerk are you going to do 5 sets of 5 trying to handle heavy weights. Or do you work with lighter bells and do one long set and push your numbers higher and higher, eventually working up in weight.
Both sides are valid ways to train, in my opinion, but does one give faster results or better results? That is what the whole debate is about.
In the end your training has to be something you like, scratch that, love to do. People sometimes ask me how I motivate myself to train. To me that is a silly question because I don’t need motivation to have fun.
There are so many different ways to attain the strength and health you want, why spend time on anything less than your favorites.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
I have practiced some GS (girevoy sport) techniques previously. Some of the basic stuff like corkscrewing your arm downward. Although my swings and snatches were rarely done with maximum tension, I now know that what I was doing was pretty far from the real techniques used in kettlebell lifting competitions.Previously, I talked about how I was approaching this whole event. You know, with an open mind and all. So that was not hard. A little more difficult was making my body do things differently then I had been doing all this time.
One of the main things is breathing naturally. Also called anatomical breathing. Basically when you are in a downswing your torso is collapsing so you will breath out. As you come back up you naturally breathe in.
This is fine when you are not under a heavy load. Breathing out as you descend in a squat with 500 pounds on your back would be a bad idea. Kettlebells are relatively light (assuming you use weights you are capable of) so this is not a problem.
The whole idea of bracing for a kettlebell swing (snatch or clean too) is not wrong but a different application. Breathing in one method is optimal for strength and the other for endurance.
So I had to consciously think to breathe out on the way down and round my back. There were many other points like this that I need to work on.
Why would you choose one way of doing things over the other?
Let’s talk about the whole philosophy of the AKC. Valery Federenko is frighteningly strong and enduring. He is a world champion at this stuff. Right there is proof that he knows what he is doing. Many of the techniques he taught us where things he taught himself or learned on the road to doing over 130 Jerks and over 90 Snatches with each hand using 32kg (70 lb.) kettlebells.
Kettlebells are made for these lifts. And high repetitions. These techniques are the optimal way to do that. If you want to reach the highest numbers in these lifts then you should use these techniques. Using kettlebells in other ways can be done. They can be used, and effectively, for bodybuilding or weightlifting, but that is not what they are made for.
Now if you are not competing with kettlebells, would you still want to use these techniques? There is no doubt that properly training in this manner or any other can be very beneficial for health and fitness.
So is training this way better than the Hard-Style method of training? Assuming that the only goal was health and fitness, so that we avoid the argument of different training for different reasons. Or perhaps just martial artists or athletes who want to be in the best shape for their sport. I don’t know for sure. The only thing I can say here is that it would be a fun thing to do a study on.
More coming soon.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
Tomorrow I will be attending the American Kettlebell Club Certification under World-Champion Girevik Valery Federenko. For those of you who do not know, Girevik is Russian for kettlebell lifter. If you don’t know much about kettlebells read my article What is a Kettlebell and Why Use One?I am not sure exactly what to expect.Previously I had been schooled in the Hard-Style of kettlebell training as popularized by Pavel and Dragondoor. In fact, when I first attended the RKC there was a guest teacher there and that was Valery. What he displayed was impressive.
For the first time I saw the differences between Hard-Style and Girevoy Sport lifting techniques. A talk by Brett Jones on that day about the two styles still stands out in my mind.
Not too long ago a rift occurred in the organization and part of it had to do with the supposed ‘real’ style of kettlebell lifting.
My goal with this is not to enliven the flames and hatred of some people who are so set in one style that they can’t see the benefits of another method. My philosophy is to learn from (and get good at) everything.
Personally I am not going to knock any style of training that works and makes you stronger and more fit. The way I see it now, is that both have there uses.
Will I be singing a different tune after these two days? I doubt it, but time will tell.
The big picture that this brings up is why do you train the way you do and what are you shooting for as your end result?
I will keep you updated on the happenings and see if I can get some video up of the event (at least some of us playing around with the bells).
My goal at this event is to increase my kettlebell lifting technique, broaden my horizons, become a better coach, and of course, have some fun.
I’d be writing more but the drive down to LA was long and now I’m tired. Stay tuned tomorrow for an update.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher
No I’m not talking about spending 4 hours in the gym that wear you down instead of building you up. That kind of stuff will be talked about some other time.
What I am talking about is a certain kind of strength training. The kind that leaves behind a pile of destroyed, mangled, ripped and shredded stuff.
In my last post I talked about the satisfaction that I and many others get from bending steel. One of the main causes of this is that you have something tangible and material afterwards. If you break a PR in the press or squat it is great, but unless you snapped some pictures or video then it is just in your mind and your sense of accomplishment.
Bend a new piece of iron or tear a deck of cards in half and you have the results left over. Not knocking any other lifts but these few give you something to look at, after the feat is done
I don’t hang on to everything but as a habit I keep my firsts and my records. I also have a few souvenirs from other people.
One of my favorites is a phonebook torn by John Wood at a seminar I attended. If you haven’t seen his sites then be sure to check them out. A good starting place is http://www.oldtimestrongman.com/blog/
The phonebook itself isn’t so impressive, but the manner in which he did it was. While in a wrestler’s bridge with someone standing on top of him he tore three phonebooks in succession. In this position he had to tear the books above his head, meaning without bracing. Truly a extraordinary stunt.
The first time I ever ‘performed’ I gave the remains of my feats to some young girls near the front of the stage. Twas a great feeling seeing them carry around the objects all night long.
My collection has just begun but you gotta start somewhere. If you haven’t, then what are you waiting for?
In case you’re wondering I do recycle the phonebook remains. Whether they actually can use them or not I do not know for sure.
Grow Powerfully,
Logan Christopher