Today\'s Kettlebell Training

This is a very quick post to go over what we covered today with the Kettlebells. I’m a big fan of these for building strength. Not just in the muscles but also the tendons. They also help in developing co-ordination, stability and balance etc. These days they are also relatively inexpensive – unfortunately I had to get my first set custom made by a Blacksmith! – I’m not kidding. They were originally used by Russian “Strong Men” and wrestlers. I was introduced to them in the 90’s when I was a competitive Judoka (Judo player), cross-training in Sambo – a form of Russian Wrestling, which is a little more brutal and a little less subtle than the Japanese system. The Kettlebells share this lack of subtlety but are brutally effective at what they do.

It’s worth remembering what our goal is: not to bulk up or put on muscle but to develop functional strength i.e. the type of strength that is useful in getting a particular job of work done, be that throwing a punch or kick or lifting up an irregular object such as a bag of groceries. Functional strength is the strength that is needed for us to function in our daily lives. If Krav Maga is part of our daily life then we need to learn how to develop the strength necessary to make the techniques we practice work.

This Functional approach to training means we have to select compound as opposed to isolation exercises. A compound exercise is one which involves several muscle groups. When we throw a punch or lift something from the ground we are using our legs, hips, back, shoulders as well as our arms. This means we need to train all these muscles together rather than isolate each one and train it individually.

For example, when you throw a punch, the largest muscle groups work first: you push up from the floor using your legs, then engage the hips, pull back using the larger back muscles and then employ the shoulder followed by the triceps to extend the arm and punch. I like to compare this to the way that a multi-stage rocket works: the biggest boosters fire first, then the next largest, followed by the smallest. A punch should fire in the same way. This is why we chose the exercises we did. All employed the use of the legs, buttocks and back followed by the shoulders and then the arms. When we look later at the way we should structure our workouts this is the logic we will follow: biggest muscle groups to smallest.

The lifts we practiced were: the swing, the clean and press (two handed) and the one handed clean and press. All of these employed the calf muscles, the quads, hamstrings and glutes/buttocks along with the hips, lower and upper back, shoulders and triceps (back of the arms). The abdominals and core muscles were also used to stabilize the body as the exercise was performed. We were pretty much training the whole body to work as one unit, with each muscle group “learning” how to transition/flow work and effort between them.

This is what many people don’t realize about strength training. It’s not about simply building muscle but about educating muscles how to work/fire and combine together to do a piece of work. An Olympic Lifter wants to get stronger without simply putting on muscle that may move them up to the next weigh category – this means they are concerned with getting the most work out of their body as they can i.e. they are all about efficiency.

We studied three different types of training: straight sets, circuit training and “laddering”. If you use straight sets you choose one exercise, train it for a number of repetitions and for a number of sets. A circuit sees you take a number of exercises, train one set of each moving between them. A ladder is a great way to get a lot of work done, when you are not able to train many repetitions in a set e.g. if your maximum number of reps for a pull-ups is 8, rather than try and push out 8, in a ladder you would start with 1 repetition, then do 2, then do 3 etc by the time you do 8 reps, you will have actually done 36 reps (8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1).

This is maybe the best piece of advice I was ever given regarding strength training, “A muscle cannot recover until it returns to its natural length.” When you train, you shorten your muscles i.e. you contract them. Where you make your gains in strength training is after the workout, when your muscles start to recover. However you have to wait for them to return to their natural length. The quickest way to do this is to stretch. Although there is no scientific evidence or studies to suggest that stretching before a workout has any benefits there is a lot to say that stretching after a workout is extremely beneficial, whether it is weight training or Krav Maga etc.

 After a workout you need to consume both protein and calcium. Protein will help your muscles to recover and gain strength whilst calcium will help your nervous system to recover – both get “exhausted” from training. You can give your muscles time to recover and fail to do the same for your nervous system and still feel fatigued and unable to train. You should also take vitamin C, as your immune system will become depleted as well.

As a final thought, don’t think you’ve got away with it because you don’t hurt tomorrow (Sunday), Monday is the teller. DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) will hit you the day after (Monday). Keep stretching, taking your protein – especially before you go to bed, calcium and Vitamin C and I look forward to training everyone on Monday.