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Kettlebell Do you do any sports alongside Kettlebells?

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Opiaswing

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i am thinking about starting Judo to make use of my strength and conditioning from kettlebells.

I currently just train to be strong and fit and for fun, but am quite strong now and can clean 68kg kettlebell and swing it daily but would like to put use to my strength.

Do any of you train for a sport? Does Kb help with injury prevention? And have u noticed a lot of progression in your sport since training Kb?
 
i am thinking about starting Judo to make use of my strength and conditioning from kettlebells.

I currently just train to be strong and fit and for fun, but am quite strong now and can clean 68kg kettlebell and swing it daily but would like to put use to my strength.

Do any of you train for a sport? Does Kb help with injury prevention? And have u noticed a lot of progression in your sport since training Kb?
Talk to @Kozushi about Judo applications....
 
Train goalkeepers having played myself. Swing and TGU are excellent in developing strength and power that can be used in goalkeeping. I have trained in Krav Maga for 5 years and BJJ for whole. Both use Kettlebells extensively. KB snatch replicates the sensation that sparring can generate. I'm not sure if it's D J or Pavel who said that it's as close as you can get to fighting without throwing a punch.
Luke Donald pro golfer uses KB and can swing an TGU a 32kg...
Even Rocky Balboa uses them:)
 
Do any of you train for a sport? Does Kb help with injury prevention? And have u noticed a lot of progression in your sport since training Kb?

I play beach volleyball for may years and started bouldering 10 months ago. I've noticed alot of progression as a balanced, functional and robust human since adopting SF/FMS/OS principles just over two years ago.

Have not missed a single day of training/playing/climbing due to injury or discomfort for the last 23 months. I am much better at diagnosing when to back off before I am forced to.
 
Just started training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu about a month and half ago. Heavy snatches seem to have translated well. Not just with conditioning, but having strength in my back, hips, grip and biceps has proven to be a big advantage. When first started, I got asked by quite a few people if I used to wrestle, despite me having almost no experience in any kind of grappling whatsoever, so I take that as a good sign. @Opiaswing your first order of business will likely be to learn how to dial back how much you rely on your strength. It's tempting to use strength as crutch so you don't have to learn the techniques as well, but it's much more satisfying to develop the skills, and then be able to execute them powerfully when you want to.
 
i am thinking about starting Judo to make use of my strength and conditioning from kettlebells.

I currently just train to be strong and fit and for fun, but am quite strong now and can clean 68kg kettlebell and swing it daily but would like to put use to my strength.

Do any of you train for a sport? Does Kb help with injury prevention? And have u noticed a lot of progression in your sport since training Kb?
Yes to all your questions! Get out there and start judo! It's extremely interesting! The moves are terrifically intricate and will keep you intellectually engaged forever, let alone the fun application of our kettlebell strength!
 
Great idea, combat sports are tons of fun. They do come with a higher injury risk, which does have the potential to derail your KB training.

Just a quick aside - make sure you pick your time and place to use your physical attributes when learning a combat sport.

You will learn quicker and develop better technique if you pull back on the strength/power/speed when rolling - especially with smaller/unfit folks. Your training partners will really appreciate it as well.

There’s a term in BJJ called a spaz, which is normally given to an unskilled beginner, with lots of physicality and little restraint. Unsurprisingly, rolling with a spaz is often how injuries occur. I’m not suggesting this might be you, but keep it in mind :).

Signing up for a competition after a few months of training will give you a very appropriate forum to really apply your strength and conditioning.
 
MTB, trail running, off road triathlon. KB swings and the DL allowed me to “get” the hip hinge, and two clinics with a MTB skills coach helped me translate that hip snap to cleaning trail obstacles on the bike. Loaded carries have been very helpful in helping muscle my bike around.
 
I’m going to go against the current here...

I’ve been a martial artist and moderately successful competitor all my life (started at six years old and now I’m forty six) and I’ve also spent quite a long time hiking and running mountain trails. I’ve been doing some form of resistance training since I was sixteen: bodybuilding at first, then Starting Strength, I’ve even given Crossfit a fair try and then I decided Easy Strength, KBs and some calisthenics were all I really needed.

And this is what I found, regarding strength training (I’m not trying to generalize, I’m just talking about MY experience, which may or may not be shared with any other person):

- Being strong helps... to a degree, but it’s waaaaaaaaaay more important to improve my specific martial skills. I try to spend at least 80% of the time I train doing martial arts.

- Being combat-conditioned is way more important than being strong. Being able to pull 500 lbs. but gassing out after one round is kind of useless. The other way around (not being able to deadlift a broomstick, but being able to spar quite hard for one hour) is manageable.

- Being strong enough is a real concept. And easily achievable. I would say that, being able to do ten chins, ten dips, ten front squats and ten Romanian deadlifts with 100% of your bodyweight is WAY more than enough. Strength standards don’t really apply here; fighting is a rather different game.

- No amount of snatches, swings or circuits can replicate the sort of conditioning you need to fight. Sparring, sparring, sparring and then more sparring is all you REALLY need (because it improves your skills, conditioning and, to a lesser degree, your strength at the same time in the way is needed).

- Strength training is a GREAT injury prevention tool (provided you do it to improve your game on the mat, instead of pursuing strength-oriented goals).

- Slow steady cardio is a fantastic recovery tool which, aditionally, creates interesting adaptations which can easily be translated to the mat.

- Walking (I’m talking about taking a stroll, not doing it for cardio), Yoga, Original Strength are great recovery tools.

- All the above applies to both grappling and striking arts. And, I suppose, to any other skill oriented activity too (climbing, skiing, basketball, etc...).

- I would bet 98% of this forum’s members could easily push, pull, squat and deadlift WAY more than Manny Pacquiao. And those same members could probably do way more swings, cleans and snatches than him. Then, you step into a ring, not with PacMan, but with any amateur competitor and reality hits back (quite literally).
 
Does powerlifting count for the topic?

In my case, I started strength training later in my yet short life with kettlebells, then picked up the barbell - multiple times - and now I'm powerlifting.

I think my kettlebell training and the skills taught by Pavel served me well for my current sport. I had a good understanding and perception of how my body moves and how to move it. The tension skills and such, the basic ideas for programming, staying fresh etc. have been great.

It's hard to say how much ahead of myself without kettlebells I was when it came to pure strength in the three lifts. I'm pretty big by nature but the lifts I did when I started out weren't anything special.

So I think in essence from my kettlebell training I learned how to train well and safe and the development has been nice.
 
I can say that before I found kettlebells and S&S my BJJ cardio was garbage, no matter how much rolling I did. After a month or so of S&S my rolling cardio was much improved and the KB training didn't get in the way of my BJJ, it just made it better. When I started to program hop and not maintain my swings my rolling cardio dropped and the aches and pains of old returned. Not only did my cardio improve but the ability to be explosive, rest and then be explosive again on command again improved greatly.
 
I’m going to go against the current here...

I’ve been a martial artist and moderately successful competitor all my life (started at six years old and now I’m forty six) and I’ve also spent quite a long time hiking and running mountain trails. I’ve been doing some form of resistance training since I was sixteen: bodybuilding at first, then Starting Strength, I’ve even given Crossfit a fair try and then I decided Easy Strength, KBs and some calisthenics were all I really needed.

And this is what I found, regarding strength training (I’m not trying to generalize, I’m just talking about MY experience, which may or may not be shared with any other person):

- Being strong helps... to a degree, but it’s waaaaaaaaaay more important to improve my specific martial skills. I try to spend at least 80% of the time I train doing martial arts.

- Being combat-conditioned is way more important than being strong. Being able to pull 500 lbs. but gassing out after one round is kind of useless. The other way around (not being able to deadlift a broomstick, but being able to spar quite hard for one hour) is manageable.

- Being strong enough is a real concept. And easily achievable. I would say that, being able to do ten chins, ten dips, ten front squats and ten Romanian deadlifts with 100% of your bodyweight is WAY more than enough. Strength standards don’t really apply here; fighting is a rather different game.

- No amount of snatches, swings or circuits can replicate the sort of conditioning you need to fight. Sparring, sparring, sparring and then more sparring is all you REALLY need (because it improves your skills, conditioning and, to a lesser degree, your strength at the same time in the way is needed).

- Strength training is a GREAT injury prevention tool (provided you do it to improve your game on the mat, instead of pursuing strength-oriented goals).

- Slow steady cardio is a fantastic recovery tool which, aditionally, creates interesting adaptations which can easily be translated to the mat.

- Walking (I’m talking about taking a stroll, not doing it for cardio), Yoga, Original Strength are great recovery tools.

- All the above applies to both grappling and striking arts. And, I suppose, to any other skill oriented activity too (climbing, skiing, basketball, etc...).

- I would bet 98% of this forum’s members could easily push, pull, squat and deadlift WAY more than Manny Pacquiao. And those same members could probably do way more swings, cleans and snatches than him. Then, you step into a ring, not with PacMan, but with any amateur competitor and reality hits back (quite literally).
From my experience this is true for most skill based enterprises.
Looking at one of my crafts... climbing... if you don't have the skill base and sport specific conditioning dialed in you could die if things go south. No amount of lifting will guard against this.

That being said, an intelligent strength programme such as S&S certainly helps fill in the gaps...
 
A lot of folks here into MA. Me, not so much. Some TKD when I was a kid, some tai chi as an adult. I prefer to run around in the woods all day or play in the ocean. The comments from others regarding the importance of skill training vs strength training are spot on. The experience one has will depend on when one begins or implements strength training vs sport practice. If one starts sport practice first, develops skill and technique, then adds strength training later will have a different experience than someone who does the reverse. For me, I let my strength fall way behind as I did all Maffetone training. When I discovered how to blend Easy Strength style training with aerobic endurance it made a big difference. I could clean obstacles with less effort and stay aerobic longer. When I took some skills clinics, the coach helped show me how to translate that strength into more efficient movement on the bike.

But in the OP's case, going from a background of great strength to a beginner learning new skills, I'm not sure what the effect would be.
 
I train students who MMA, play tennis, golf, karate just about anything really. I have no evidence but from their reports they perceive I help them in the sport. I know they get stronger, higher level conditioning, more mobile and flexible and also able t stabilize themselves and balance better. I was almost retired when I started lifting kettlebells so in my sport it helped some not sure how much I did not compete long after that. I think for Judo it will be perfect match.
 
I still play Cricket, but used to also play rugby, football and golf until injuries, work and family life took over.
 
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