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Kettlebell Swings the best all round exercise?

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Opiaswing

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After lots of fun with Kettlebells and weight training I have grown tired and bored.

I still love my swings and am planning a routine involving regular heavy (40kg-80kg) swings to maintain my cardio and post chain strength, but am dedicating the bulk of my time to yoga and mobility/stretching work.

I have read a lot about swings being the best all rounder; with this in mind are heavy swings enough to have general full body strength and exosivness?
 
are heavy swings enough to have general full body strength and exosivness?

As much as I'd like to offer my opinion, the only person who can really answer this question is you.

(Offers opinion anyway) If you want to take some time to work on mobility and health while maintaining your strength, the swing is a solid choice; it won't work everything but it will do plenty to keep you from becoming weak.
 
Swings are vegetables. I dont want to pick only one food group but if I had to for the rest of my life, it would be vegetables. And with a more well rounded diet, i still better have a healthy dose of veggies. Such are swings to me. Not the only thing to do but really do treat you well.
 
After lots of fun with Kettlebells and weight training I have grown tired and bored.

I still love my swings and am planning a routine involving regular heavy (40kg-80kg) swings to maintain my cardio and post chain strength, but am dedicating the bulk of my time to yoga and mobility/stretching work.

I have read a lot about swings being the best all rounder; with this in mind are heavy swings enough to have general full body strength and exosivness?

Why not just ‘do a Pavel’ and add a press to the swing so you got a ‘big’ pull & a press which will hit most of the body (PTTP, ETK, S&S) as a minimalist strength maintenance program whilst you explore yoga for a while?

Dave.
 
My vote would go for heavy sandbag getups where you start with cleaning it to shoulder, get down, get up, drop the bag, then on to the next rep.

Nothing boring about cleaning a 100lb bag 10-20 times. You may rest during the getups.
 
I also consider what most people need that the swing can give: hinge & pull strength & power, posterior development, core stability, grip & shoulder strength, energy system capacity etc... I think the posterior work alone would fix a lot of problems for a lot of people.
 
Swings apparently have a unique WTH effect similar to squats in that they add a hypertrophy hormonal spike to other exercises done between the swings.

I believe I have experienced some of it alternating pushups and swings via Q+D 015 type workouts

 
Swings apparently have a unique WTH effect similar to squats in that they add a hypertrophy hormonal spike to other exercises done between the swings.

I believe I have experienced some of it alternating pushups and swings via Q+D 015 type workouts


Fascinating article that provokes some really interesting discussion in the comments. Followed up the search recommendation in one comment to find this:
- a sobering read for this snatchoholic...
 
I like squat, with barbell.
Kettlebell swing and back squat/front squat is my vote for minimalist training
 
I like squat, with barbell.
Kettlebell swing and back squat/front squat is my vote for minimalist training
I get where you're coming from. I love the way paused BB front squats hit the anterior core and, therefore, complement the kb-swing's posterior chain emphasis - all more so if you add in the contrasting stretch in the muscles and tendons of fingers-hands-wrists-forearms.

"Some Russian sports scientists, such as Prof. Victor Selouyanov, advocate sandwiching sets of full-body exercises like squats between sets of upper-body muscle building exercises to benefit from this [hormonal] spike. Kettlebell swings appear to have the same effect."

I wonder whether sandwiching swings with squats would double this hormonal spike...?
 
I get where you're coming from. I love the way paused BB front squats hit the anterior core and, therefore, complement the kb-swing's posterior chain emphasis - all more so if you add in the contrasting stretch in the muscles and tendons of fingers-hands-wrists-forearms.

"Some Russian sports scientists, such as Prof. Victor Selouyanov, advocate sandwiching sets of full-body exercises like squats between sets of upper-body muscle building exercises to benefit from this [hormonal] spike. Kettlebell swings appear to have the same effect."

I wonder whether sandwiching swings with squats would double this hormonal spike...?

I'm also interested in how much we need to do of the swing or the squat. Having to do a thorough warm up takes a lot of time.
 
After lots of fun with Kettlebells and weight training I have grown tired and bored.

I still love my swings and am planning a routine involving regular heavy (40kg-80kg) swings to maintain my cardio and post chain strength, but am dedicating the bulk of my time to yoga and mobility/stretching work.

I have read a lot about swings being the best all rounder; with this in mind are heavy swings enough to have general full body strength and exosivness?

Short, sharp Q&D sessions are great energizers and may well be a good way out of your tired and bored doldrums; instead of heavy swings, targeting power with lighter bells should put some wind in your sails...

Also, Q&D will allow you to prioritize yoga and mobility etc. while still building explosive strength.
 
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I get where you're coming from. I love the way paused BB front squats hit the anterior core and, therefore, complement the kb-swing's posterior chain emphasis - all more so if you add in the contrasting stretch in the muscles and tendons of fingers-hands-wrists-forearms.
Nice. I only thought about some kettlebell swing at the end of squat season to get some work for hamstring and for the glute, and also to feel some relax. 3 sets of 5 with moderate weight is enough for me.
I'm also interested in how much we need to do of the swing or the squat. Having to do a thorough warm up takes a lot of time.
I believe light weight, done in explosive manner would work. With squat some jump squat, holding the kettlebell seems resonable for me.
I wonder whether sandwiching swings with squats would double this hormonal spike...?
It depend on the type of hormone you want to spike. If you want to increase cortisol, heavy sets of 10 squat superset with sets of 10 swing would work...
 
After lots of fun with Kettlebells and weight training I have grown tired and bored.

I still love my swings and am planning a routine involving regular heavy (40kg-80kg) swings to maintain my cardio and post chain strength, but am dedicating the bulk of my time to yoga and mobility/stretching work.

I have read a lot about swings being the best all rounder; with this in mind are heavy swings enough to have general full body strength and exosivness?
I can’t say I will not be using any other lifts, but I’m sure the older I will get, the more it dominant it will be in my training. Whenever I have just few minutes, a quick session of pure swings makes my day. When I was starting with KBs, it was more a thing I knew I should be doing, with time i appreciate them more and more.
 
Hello,

Swings are usually a very good and versatile option for almost everything.

Very heavy swings will help for DL. Fairly light for power (roughly 20% of bdw). Somewhere in the middle for conditioning.

Varying the weight from day to day to reap all the benefits sounds appealing to me, assuming we do not chase a specific goal.

Kind regards,

Pet'
 
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