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S&S+, Judo, Kendo, Historical & Modern Fencing, Walking.

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Okay, so my judo and BJJ is restarted in earnest. It's too much fun now that I'm too strong for everyone.
 
The swings with the 32 and the TGUs with the 40 are working out very well. I don't feel broken after my workouts any more, and I feel stronger than before. I would not have made this change had it not been for the excellent advice given here. It's clear to me that after spending several weeks 1h swinging the 32 that I'll be strong enough to 1h swing the 40 in a reasonable amount of time (not 30-45 minutes as it was taking me before!) Once I've arrived at comfort doing both exercises with the 40 it will only be a matter of time before I'll be able to move up to the 48 and I'll be a BEAST. I can do TGUs with the 48 already but I feel a bit wobbly still, so I'll move up when I'm ready.
 
Now that I'm solidly back into judo and also BJJ now too, I can confidently say that you MUST have a strength building programme to accompany you on your martial arts journey. If not, it's like you're building a gun without any ammunition.

So far, I've noticed that the only holes left in my strength are the hamstrings (for BJJ grapevining drills) and thoracic upper spinal area (for judo fighting). These are the only parts of me I've had some issues with over the past bunch of fight workouts, because of the unique demands of the sports I'm doing.
 
I'm starting to think that someone without any weights could go far with one arm pushups, squats (preferably pistols) and chin ups (eventually aiming for one arm.)

I have a feeling that it would be fine to keep doing one arm pushups even after you can do one arm one leg pushups, and regular chinups even after you can do one arm ones, etc.
 
Swings with the 32 and getups with the 40 - not hard at all but the right kind of strain and stress to keep me strong and well! I still want to progress, particularly with the swings. All in due time though, all in due time.
 
Kozushi said:
Beginnings:

I stopped judo (and some other martial arts) late 2015 since I have a big family to care for and a demanding career. I had to find a way to stay fit, strong, healthy, ready for physical labour (chopping down trees or thick bushes, trekking to work through deep snow, portaging canoes, etc), and ready to fight if necessary (including bears and dogs if needed), to replace judo. I had bought quite a number of different dumbbells and even a few kettlebells over the years, and I have a chinup bar and a home made dipping station. I was in a hurry to find out how to stay in fighting trim with the equipment I had at home or could purchase for my home. I decided to focus on kettlebells because they most resemble carrying real things around. I had no idea what I was doing so I did workouts with over 30 different kinds of exercises in them, daily. I got sore and bored with this fast and cut out a lot of them, leaving about 15 or so exercises (I forget exactly how many now). I wanted to find out how to cut the whole thing down to as few as possible but had no idea what to do. I also forget how, but I came across Pavel Tsatsouline's name as the father of the kettlebell in North America (I'm a proud North American (specifically Canadian, but I feel kinship with all of the Americas)) and looked at what books he had on Amazon. The current "go-to" book seemed to be "Simple and Sinister" so I bought it and was utterly shocked to find that it had only two major movements, the swing and the Turkish get up. Anyhow, I started his programme in January or February of 2016, and eventually went back to judo one last time in June before the club closed due to the sensei moving away. Hilariously, I found myself having improved more at judo in those 6 months of no judo and only kettlebells than I had ever improved before in my life. I was doing things in judo I had only seen in videos previously. I was very happy about this and I decided to learn more from Strongfirst through these forums and by buying several other Pavel books.

I hope by starting this training blog thread that I can get some help and advice from others here.
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It was an error to quit judo. I am back at judo, and kendo and I will never quit again. That was stupid.
 
Actually, I'll add to this. One reason I quit was I was physically too weak. I think I needed the year off to "go find myself" and meditate on what was wrong, and I found out that I lacked strength, which problem has been remedied with Pavel books and this site. I'm still learning though. S&S is my staple but I've now come to add chinups and one arm pushups into my daily exercise. Now I'm actually good at judo and my kendo is getting better all the time. While I may have stagnated a bit in my S&S progress, who cares (?) because I am making a lot of progress in martial arts.
 
This morning with the 40kg kettlebell:

3X5 goblet squats
2X10 2 hand swings
4X5 1 hand swings
1X10 2 hand swings
10X5 1 hand swings
2X10 2 hand swings
5X2 Turkish getups
 
I think some bodyweight stuff will help me get to Sinister. Why? Because I can load more weight onto myself with bodyweight moves safely than I currently can with kettlebells. Chinups load 50kg per arm. One arm pushups load 70kg per arm and activate anti-twist muscles similar to the swings and getups. Pistols load 100 kg onto each leg separately! Given that Sinister requires manipulating a 48kg weight, training with 50kg and 70kg and 100kg weights can't hurt!
 
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Kozushi said:
I think some bodyweight stuff will help me get to Sinister. Why? Because I can load more weight onto myself with bodyweight moves safely than I currently can with kettlebells. Chinups load 50kg per arm. One arm pushups load 70kg per arm and activate anti-twist muscles similar to the swings and getups. Pistols load 100 kg onto each leg separately! Given that Sinister requires manipulating a 48kg weight, training with 50kg and 70kg and 100kg weights can't hurt!
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I agree that heavier weights help one manipulate lighter weights more easily. But why do you stop at 50kg, 70kg and 100kg? You know, there are ways to put even more weight on your pull, press and squat.
 
Antti said:
I agree that heavier weights help one manipulate lighter weights more easily. But why do you stop at 50kg, 70kg and 100kg? You know, there are ways to put even more weight on your pull, press and squat.
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I agree 100% with you, but it comes down to equipment. Also, higher reps of something can get your absolute strength up a fair bit. The ROP programme proves this brilliantly, for instance. I saw a guy who was training with just a 32 all of a sudden clean and press a 48 out of nowhere! If I can do 20 chinups in one set or say, 10 one arm pushups in a set, I'm pretty darn strong!

But yes, at some point, if indeed I get handy with the bodyweight-only exercises, I'm going to get fidgety and want to start putting weights on my back or hang them between my legs! Luckily with pistols I can hold a heavy kettlebell if I want to to add to that one.
 
Kozushi said:
I agree 100% with you, but it comes down to equipment. Also, higher reps of something can get your absolute strength up a fair bit. The ROP programme proves this brilliantly, for instance. I saw a guy who was training with just a 32 all of a sudden clean and press a 48 out of nowhere! If I can do 20 chinups in one set or say, 10 one arm pushups in a set, I'm pretty darn strong!

But yes, at some point, if indeed I get handy with the bodyweight-only exercises, I'm going to get fidgety and want to start putting weights on my back or hang them between my legs! Luckily with pistols I can hold a heavy kettlebell if I want to to add to that one.
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Yes, I have felt this high-rep advantage myself. I bought both a 32kg and a 40kg kettlebell at once. Before them I had mostly worked with a 24kg, and often with a 28kg as well. I could press the 40kg right away with both arms.

I do understand that it is perfectly possible for a person to meet all his goals with bodyweight only. The reason I train with kettlebells or barbells is because I love working with them, not that they make me better at a certain task or make me healthier. But if you're looking for more strength per se, or looking forward to working with more weight, well, nothing beats more weight.

It is all of course a matter of preferences. Do you live in such a remote location, that you do not have a gym within a tolerable distance? Or are they horribly expensive over there?
 
Antti said:
Yes, I have felt this high-rep advantage myself. I bought both a 32kg and a 40kg kettlebell at once. Before them I had mostly worked with a 24kg, and often with a 28kg as well. I could press the 40kg right away with both arms.

I do understand that it is perfectly possible for a person to meet all his goals with bodyweight only. The reason I train with kettlebells or barbells is because I love working with them, not that they make me better at a certain task or make me healthier. But if you're looking for more strength per se, or looking forward to working with more weight, well, nothing beats more weight.

It is all of course a matter of preferences. Do you live in such a remote location, that you do not have a gym within a tolerable distance? Or are they horribly expensive over there?
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I've never gone to a gym and won't. Driving there is a waste of my time when I have all I need at home. I've got all kinds of kettlebells and also bodyweight exercises to do. I have both a chinup bar and parallel bars. My goals include Sinister.
 
I'm working around some soreness in my right shoulder socket which is either from judo or from trying to do one arm chinups. It'll get better fast.
 
Came back from an hour and a half judo session last night, with my right shoulder still being pretty sore, and then did S&S:
40kg
  • 3X5 goblet squats
  • 10X10 1 handed swings (yup, I'm getting pretty handy with the 40kg 1h swings now, yep! The advice I got worked!)
  • 1X2 TUGs
My arms were so sore, so I moved down to the 32kg for the rest of the TGUs:
32kg
  • 4X2

Callisthenics just doesn't replace this stuff! I'll keep using some callisthenics moves to add nuances to my strength, important nuances, but wrestling with my heavy kettlebells demands much more attention, alertness, and they challenge your balance, which are all important things for real life and for fighting. It's your kettlebell in your hand today, your opponent in your hand tomorrow.
 
The Kavadlo brothers' new book "Get Strong" is very interesting. I want to pass their week 4 phase 4 (final) test and to therefore know I've "got strong" according to their system. I think with my S&S at the 40kg level, my one arm pushups, and my judo (etc) with me, I can get there pretty quickly. I did try their highest level workout out and found the volume was too high for me, which actually surprised me a lot! I really thought the sets of 25 legs elevated normal pushups would be easy for a guy who can do sets of 5 one arm pushups, but, NOPE! This is teaching me something important about volume versus weight. I'm better at some of the lower body moves than I expected, like for instance the archer squats and the candlestick bridges. Musing upon these I think it's because they somehow resemble parts of S&S.

I'm not going through a crisis of "what's better" this time like I did between ROP and S&S a year ago, which I eventually realized the answer to for myself, but rather what is happening is that I am becoming more and more fit and strong from S&S. I am finding I have more and more gas left in the tank, so to speak, and I can work on mastering other things ALSO. (I don't see the point of quitting S&S. I don't understand why anyone would! That's just mediocrity crying out for a victim right there!) I know guys who do physical labour all day, so I'm sure I can work in a few callisthenics sessions in per week also. The Kavadlo system has you doing your workouts every third(!) day, so that's not a problem!!! Even if I end up sticking with their phase 4 week 1 routine, which has much lower volumes, I'm definitely getting something out of it. We'll see what happens!
 
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