Kettlebell Simple & Sinister: Revised and Updated (2nd Edition)

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Ronen Katz, a StrongFirst instructor and 6th Dan in Kyokushin karate, told me a parable. A villager asked a wise man how to find water. "Dig down 10 meters," was the answer. A few days later the villager returned complaining that he had done as told and found no water. The wise man came over to take a look: the villager had dug 10 holes, each 1 meter deep. This requires a lot of practice to get conditioned for that 2:1 ratio he mentions and it will vary depending on conditioning levels. When you want serious gains and workouts that give you strength, you should go to an expert. That’s what Pavel Tsatsouline can give you in his book Kettlebell Simple and Sinister. He’s the real tough deal. Starting weights - he recommended 16kg for an "average strength" man and 8kg for a woman. Presumably this is to be used for both exercises although anyone can tell you that getups are harder than swings at any given weight.

your wording makes me think that you, “swing until your HR reaches 142”, and this occurs at rep 7 or 8. Is this accurate? As opposed to, “you perform 7 or 8 reps… THEN, the subsequent spike in HR reaches 142”. Which did you mean? (This is important.)Karl, great transformation you are on. My practice seems to resemble yours. I let my hr drop below 100bpm. Half an hour ago I finished my session 47k for swings (4sets 2handed, 6s 1handed) 50k with the get ups. The swing and get up session took 43,10min 122avg/147max. And now, even the weights were heavy I feel recharged (it was not always so), because I left something in the tank. Time will show me if it works. Therefore I "only" have to be consistent By now I have some points of reference for myself and I am my own competition in this regard. I haven’t even mentioned my physique because it was never a objective of mine to make a change there, but that too has improved significantly. I haven’t dropped or put on any weight, but I am considerably more muscular, and I’ve dropped a lot of fat. I've been thinking about this for a long while, and was both surprised and relieved to find this subreddit and read the wiki. I'd been wanting to make this post somewhere, and felt like posting to the StrongFirst forums(where I am somewhat active), would not be met with open-arms, same with the various kettlebell subreddits, so I'm posting this here.

The book drills down deep and sets a better, stronger foundation not only for kettlebell training, but for the principles of strength. Swing workout - 12 minutes, sets of swings with "active rest" between sets (such as jogging, pushups, planks, etc). The number of reps and sets is not specified in the book and is left to the individual. Collectively, these ideas constitute "hard-style" training, a remarkably cohesive and adaptable approach that "reverse engineers what strong people do naturally," as powerlifter and strength coach Louie Simmons has said of Tsatsouline. All of his work emphasizes simple programming, maximal tension, and "practicing" difficult movements rather than "working out." Getups - Do one rep on each side without a break. That's one set. Do five sets total, resting in between each set. So a total of 10 getups (5 each side). Take as long as you need. That was when I discovered one of my favorite programs of all time, “ Simple and Sinister.” As the name suggests, it’s very simple. YOU control how sinister it is. All you need is a kettlebell and enough space to do a Turkish Get-Up and some swings.Internet research led me to kettlebells by Easter 2014 and 'Enter the Kettlebell' - I still think this is the clearest description of remedial exercises for learning the swing. StrongFirst Master Instructor Doug Nepodal has been strength coaching Brazilian jiu-jitsu three-time world champion Fabio Leopoldo for five years. The bulk of the training is two exercises: the kettlebell swing and the kettlebell get-up—the "Kettlebell: Simple & Sinister" regimen. It’s important to know that since the book Enter the Kettlebell was written, kettlebell training has much evolved. Mastery is doing a daily workout with 10x10 one hand swings in 5 minutes, 1 minute rest, then 5 sets of perfect getups in 10 minutes.

Swings and get-ups are great, and I felt great on the programs I did, and if you go from drinking too much and eating like shit with no activity, it's better than nothing. But it's far from a complete approach if you want to make some serious strength and physical gains and transform yourself to a much stronger person.Step loading is an adult training progression. It weeds out impatient juveniles unable to stay on task". Kettlebells are one of the most rugged, hardcore exercise tools out there. It’s a big piece of iron with a handle. Grab this cannonball-shaped weight, and you know it means business. Second, there's a tendency to use too much force on each swing, or to treat each swing as a maximal effort. However, you don't need to act like Spinal Tap and "turn it up to 11" - the most technically proficient swings occur at a lower percentage of effort. Instead of giving each swing 100% effort, think about using 70-80% and embrace the float of the bell. This is going to improve your conditioning as you're not constantly emptying the tank, and you'll continue to reap the benefits without being so gassed. I've been on GSLP for about 9 weeks, and it really feels like I've made more of the progress I wanted to make in these 9 weeks than my years training with kettlebells. Now, I know that that's not actually true, and I think I primed myself to realize gains from barbell training by working with kettlebells before hand, but given that the kettlebell progress I made was so minimal and hard to actually see the effects of, I'm much happier so far with my progress working with barbells.