I achieved Simple on Sunday the 31st of October 2021. The journey to this point has been absolutely amazing and one of the most meaningful and rewarding learning curves that I have ever been on.
Background: I am 45, 193 cm tall, weigh 92 kg and I live close to Cape Town in South Africa. In terms of fitness, I have mostly been involved in aerobic sports (swimming, cycling and running) and my prior experience in strength training was basically non-existent.
At the start of 2019, I was out of shape and 30 kg overweight after 4 years of working full-time and studying part-time - a period during which I never managed to maintain a consistent training programme. I started on a quest to get my diet sorted out and to find a training approach that would provide overall strength and resilience – as I identified this as crucially missing from the aerobic training that I did in the past. Part of my criteria was that the programme should require minimal investment and I should be able to do it from home, since I felt this would increase the chances of sticking to it.
I initially started on a popular HIIT based body weight training programme. This worked well for a few months – but I soon reached a point where there was no noticeable improvement anymore. I was also frustrated with the programme, because it changed exercises every two weeks and I never felt that I had the chance to master any of the movements (which I also believe contributed to my stalled progress).
I came across Simple & Sinister after searching for minimal training programmes. I bought the book on Kindle and was sold to the philosophy behind S&S and to the utility of kettlebells after the first few chapters. My next challenge was to find proper kettlebells in South Africa during the COVID19 hard lockdown that started in April 2020. By a stroke of luck, I came across Kettlebells for Africa which imports and distributes authentic RKC kettlebells to South Africa and are located about a 30 min drive from where I stay. I ordered a 16kg and 24 kg online to start with. Seeing that we were still in lockdown, I thought that it would take while for the kettlebells to be delivered. The two kettlebells arrived at my doorstep 2 days later, hand delivered by Shaun Cairns, SFG Master Instructor, and owner of Kettlebells for Africa. This made my day and eventually my year!
I started on Simple & Sinister on 1 July 2020 using the 16kg and slowly incorporating the 24kg – as by the programming described in the book. I veered from the program twice in the first few months – either going up in bell size quicker or adding additional elements to the program. Both of these ill-informed decisions led to minor injuries or tweaks that required me to take a few days of before continuing. I therefore decided to just stick to the programme as it is written and to be patient and enjoy the process. I did the full S&S programme, with warm-up, swings, get-ups and stretches for either 5 or 6 days a week throughout.
I lost three months twice - firstly, after having COVID19 at the end of 2020, which required about a month of no training and then 2 months to get back where I was. Secondly, I had a sinus surgery in June 2021, which again required about 3 months to get back to where I was before the surgery. So, the whole journey took about 17 months (to get from 16kg to 24kg to 32kg) instead of 10 – but every step was worth it. There were many lessons about my own physical strengths and weaknesses, about patience and about perseverance, that not only applied to training but also directly transferred to my personal and work life.
Achieving Simple has truly been a transformative experience that has improved many aspects of my life, including:
General improvements:
Needless to say, I am much stronger now than at the start of the programme. However, I am also significantly stronger than I have ever been at any previous point in my life. This is not just strength measured in terms of the S&S programme - but in terms of everyday functioning. Everything just feels better. My posture has improved, I am moving better, stronger and more confidently; I am sleeping better and even my asthma has almost completely cleared up. My body composition has also changed dramatically – Pavel’s descriptions of “fighter’s physique” captures it best.
What The Hell Effects:
I am not a professional athlete. My motivation for doing S&S was to improve my overall physical ability and to build a foundation that will allow me participate in the outdoor activities that I enjoy without feeling restrained by my physical condition. Aside from S&S, I would usual do a hike in one of the nearby mountains once a week. It has been amazing to see how my overall hiking ability and endurance has skyrocketed over the past few months – I can literally maintain a solid hiking pace for hours without getting tired. Also, although I have not trained for this – I can now do several sets of 3-5 pullups, which I could not do at the start of the programme.
A note on tweaks and sprains:
I had no serious injuries while doing S&S, but did have a few minor shoulder, back and hamstring tweaks. In all cases, I could deal with this by either just taking a day or two of – or just adding an extra day of two-hand swings to recover. I usually added some additional stretching as well for a week or two to aid recovery. I incorporated a foam roller recently which helped quite a bit, in combination with stretching, for minor tweaks.
I did encounter an odd situation when moving up to the 32kg bell, since I could not find a grip position in the TGU that does not bruise my upper left arm. The right arm is not a problem, only left. I tried to just push through this, but he bruising accumulated over time to the point where it affected my wrist posture in the TGU and I started getting some inflammation at the inside of my elbow (golfer’s elbow) as consequence. The solution was to use a tennis style sweatband on my left wrist, which eased the pressure of the kettlebell on my left arm enough to continue without bruising or hinderances. The golfer’s elbow subsequently also quickly disappeared. I hope to ditch the sweatband in the future once this arm has toughened up a bit.
Literally all the tweaks/sprains were caused by moments where I lost focus during the swings or the TGUs. I am therefore trying to be present throughout these exercises and to keep my eye on the bell at all times. I have started using a heart rate monitor a few months ago, which has become a useful tool in this regard. Elevated heart rate or slow heart rate recovery allows me to pick up if I am a little more exhausted than I perceive – and therefore more at risk of losing focus during the exercises. When I pick this up on the HRM, I take extra time to recover between exercises, to focus and move consciously through the swings and get-ups to avoid unnecessary mistakes and, consequently, injuries.
My goals for the immediate future are to continue with S&S to reach timed simple and to bring my goblet squats up to 32 kg. I have already acquired a 40 kg and would like to continue onwards to own this bell in S&S during the courses of 2022. I might alternate S&S with Rite of Passage. Anyway, I am not yet sure, but whatever happens – I am sure it will be great.
My biggest challenge at the moment is to not change the topic of all conversations to something revolving around kettlebells. ?
Thank you, Pavel! Thank you StrongFirst! This has been life-changing and absolutely awesome!