The Right tool for the job.

Let me preface this post by saying I thank God each and EVERY morning that I wake up without the horrific pain I have had for many years, especially the last two. Having something, like the ability to lift weight, do cool movements and tricks or have muscle pale in serious comparison to the basics of life; like spending five minutes trying to figure out how to get out of bed or put your shoes on without a hot,searing spike of pain stabbing you.

Little stuff like that. And when you can't walk how much you can squat or snatch becomes completely irrelevant very quickly.

BUT, as soon as that pain goes aways it's way too easy to forget that it was there. And that it can come back at any time for seemingly no reason.

So as my lost abilities remake their appearance and my ability to train again, harder, longer and do more things progresses I have to remember not to be greedy or take any of it too serious. The most important abilities are those that get us through life strongly and without pain. That's the real food of life. Everything else is icing on a cake that we don't need to survive. It's just fun.

I have specifically been digging my ability to do two hand swings again and especially my two clubbell work. So when I saw Mike Mahler do two KB swings outside his legs I immediately thought I might be able to do them too, given how strong and natural my two clubbell swings.

feel.

Mike even put up a video on Facebook for me to watch. Very cool.

The REAL danger with these is that it is very, very, very easy to hit your knees with the kettlebell and my knees are bad enough without smashing a fast moving cannonball into them but I seem to have good leverage for this movement with the clubs so I thought I would start light, give it a try and go from there.

I survived them but figured out right away they aren't for me and that if I want to swing something outside my legs the Clubbells are the right tool for the job. There is just way too little margin for error here and I don't have any more joints to sacrifice to the training gods. But it was a fun experiment nonetheless.

Here's today's workout

6:30- 7:00 am stretchout.

main emphasis today was on straddle stretching in three positions

1) one the floor basic straddle stretch

2) standing straddle working wider as well as head to floor

3) standing straddle stretch working to side splits( a few galaxies to go here but this is a brand new move and I LOVE it already! This is an adductor strengthener as well as a serious quad contraction for me.

This will stay in the mix.

8 am

Two clubbell rockits

2/ 10 lbs x 20 x2

2/ 15 lb x 15 x 2

2/ 20 lbs x 10 x 2

two clubbell swings

2/10's x 20x 2 sets

2/ 15's x 15

2/ 20's x10 x 2

These all felt great and were the perfect warmup! NO back, knee or other issues. very happy with this and felt seriously strong in all the movements.Love the quad and glute work these give.

Two KB outside the leg swings

2/12kg x15

2/14 kg x15

2/16 kgx10

2/20kgx15 x 2

here's some video of the last set

OK, now onto something safer,lol. I really got some serious leg work with the rockits so I thought I would apply the same work to one of my favorite RKC/HKC swing prep drills :the low hover/pendulum swing. I've been wanting to work this up in weight and see how it felt and today, with my training partner Nick out of town, it seemed like a good time to experiment and play.

Low hover/pendulum swings

20 kg x 15

24 kg x 12

28kg x 10

32 kg x 10

these worked great! I could have done more but with all the new stuff I was trying today I didn't want to push it (more than I already have,lol). One nice thing is with this smaller ROM I can handle more reps more easily. Nice.

These seem like a wider stance, more stable rockit.

It's also great to hear Tracy in the background saying "ok, 100",lol. Tracy's work capacity is insane. They did 1000 swings today in 3o minutes! Now that's Hardstyle.

here's the 28 kg set

Hike pass two hand swing drill

20kg x10 singles

24 kg x10 singles

28 kg x10 singles

32 kg x5 singles x 3 sets

WOW, this is my new favorite two hand swing exercise and suits my strengths for change. It's pure starting strength, speed strength and the power squat/ good morning position.Plus I get to reset every time and this makes it feel much safer on my back.

It's also one HELL of a lat exercise and I have to make sure to stretch them out after each workout.

This one is in Tracy and my new DVD on Mastering the Hardstyle Kettlebell Swing so I can't go into any more details until it comes out but people,especially guys, are going to love this. You can go heavy and still get the endurance.But in a totally different way.

It's like the box squat of kettlebell swings! Just remember, I said it here first, lol.

One arm shield cast

10 lbs x10/10, 15 lb x10/10, 20 lbs x 8/8

one arm arm cast

10 lb x10/10, 15 lb x10/10, 20 lbs x8/8

I don't think I'm going to do one arm cast work for awhile. This always seems to worry my elbows and the two I don't any elbow issues.It's also so very strong for me that I tend to end up pushing it and I don't need the temptation. Two hand casts and swipes are great.

Two Hand Shield cast ladder

15 lbs x10/10

25 lb x5/5

x6/6

x7/7

x8/8

20 minute stretchout.

My hammies were getting seriously toasty so I spent the time opening them back up. Very glad I did. This seems to be the key to my progressions of late, balancing the workload and intensity with an equal amount of stretching and mobility work.