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Kettlebell Get Ups have stalled, how do I proceed?

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Get up with 48kg beast, left side

Get up with 48kg beast, right side

Here is a get up on each side from yesterday morning’s practice with the beast.
Nice work! The a beast get-up is one of my long terms goals as well.

I am not an expert by any means but I noticed a few things that I have been corrected on personally by an SFG that helped me out a lot.

Your bent leg is splay out a bit which I suspect is not providing you maximum force production as it is outside of your hip.

On your reverse lunge your stance appears to be pretty narrow. I think at one point it almost looks like your feet are directly in line. When you position your knee outwards your front foot is almost in the centre of your shin. Looks like a T shape as opposed to an L shape which I think is robbing you of some of your strength.

Lastly it was shared with my that making a tight fist with your other hand can help with maintaining tension.

If you are 80kg, the beast should be roughly 60% of your BW so I am confident you should be able to manage it.

Here is an example of a 40kg get-up at around 60kg BW which is a close ratio to your scenario.




Hope some of this was helpful.
 
Others will be able to say it better, but what i see is that your non bell holding knee and hand should be paralell when they are in contact with the ground (and in hinged/half kneeling). Your hand is going behind your knee. I always practiced running my hand down my leg and then go out from there when i had issues with it. Now it’s just second nature. Otherwise looks great to me!
 
Get up with 48kg beast, left side

Get up with 48kg beast, right side

Here is a get up on each side from yesterday morning’s practice with the beast.

Those look great, @acutaiar12 ! Really nice work.

@jtsang has some great suggestions on some movement tweaks.

The one thing that jumps out to me is that you could have more tension. @jtsang videos are a great example of that feed-forward tension, amplifying your body's stability and strength by creating and using tension in each position and transition. All of the StrongFirst courses and certs focus heavily on this so it's often missed by people who have not trained with an SFG or been coached in person.

I suspect that this might even be more evident with the 36kg, since you are strong enough for the 48kg, you are probably not really focusing on creating that tension and leverage with the 36kg that would help you get the most out of the movement.

It seems a bit counterintuitive (like, why would I want to make it harder than it is already?) but trust me that it pays off. Crank up the tension regularly in training, so you know how to use max. Then, judiciously and skillfully dial it back to exactly what is needed. That is Pavel's concept of dominata, as I understand it. It applies to all hardstyle kettlebell training, both ballistics and grinds.

It's a difficult concept to put into words, but let me know if you feel like it's something you can do when you focus on it. If not, I'll try to explain better...
 
Nice work! The a beast get-up is one of my long terms goals as well.

I am not an expert by any means but I noticed a few things that I have been corrected on personally by an SFG that helped me out a lot.

Your bent leg is splay out a bit which I suspect is not providing you maximum force production as it is outside of your hip.

On your reverse lunge your stance appears to be pretty narrow. I think at one point it almost looks like your feet are directly in line. When you position your knee outwards your front foot is almost in the centre of your shin. Looks like a T shape as opposed to an L shape which I think is robbing you of some of your strength.

Lastly it was shared with my that making a tight fist with your other hand can help with maintaining tension.

If you are 80kg, the beast should be roughly 60% of your BW so I am confident you should be able to manage it.

Here is an example of a 40kg get-up at around 60kg BW which is a close ratio to your scenario.




Hope some of this was helpful.

Thanks for the reply! Everything you said makes sense to me, and I’ll start working on it.
Those look great, @acutaiar12 ! Really nice work.

@jtsang has some great suggestions on some movement tweaks.

The one thing that jumps out to me is that you could have more tension. @jtsang videos are a great example of that feed-forward tension, amplifying your body's stability and strength by creating and using tension in each position and transition. All of the StrongFirst courses and certs focus heavily on this so it's often missed by people who have not trained with an SFG or been coached in person.

I suspect that this might even be more evident with the 36kg, since you are strong enough for the 48kg, you are probably not really focusing on creating that tension and leverage with the 36kg that would help you get the most out of the movement.

It seems a bit counterintuitive (like, why would I want to make it harder than it is already?) but trust me that it pays off. Crank up the tension regularly in training, so you know how to use max. Then, judiciously and skillfully dial it back to exactly what is needed. That is Pavel's concept of dominata, as I understand it. It applies to all hardstyle kettlebell training, both ballistics and grinds.

It's a difficult concept to put into words, but let me know if you feel like it's something you can do when you focus on it. If not, I'll try to explain better...
Yes @Anna C It does make sense. I came into kettlebell training already from a powerlifting background, and for some reason my get up numbers shot up a lot quicker than my swings. I focused so much on how to get my swings up that I may have gotten lazy with the tension on my get ups.

My next practice is on Monday, I will give it a shot. It makes sense to me know, but I will let you know if I have a grasp on it after actually practicing it. Thank you!
 
I was just wondering if you built up your general strength with another movement, one where you are further to the left on the "accommodation" scale. I imagine that with the TGU, you are closer to your biological potential. With the press, I assume you are not.

Take 1 step backwards to eventually take 2 steps forward. Maybe folks here can support or shoot this idea down. I'm not certain about it.

Regards,

Eric
 
Some thoughts:

• Your getup @48kg looks strong. The notes others have provided are great, so follow those. But good work!

• Could be time to get on a new program. Improving the press *might* help, so a PlanStrong/BuiltStrong press plan could be a good idea.

• if you stay on S&S, consider waving the load. For a 4-Day per week example: 10/16/14/20 getups on respective days.

• Try some specialized variety: TGU, Bridge Floor Press, TGU To Elbow, Boomerang Getup (to elbow and back down, to hand and back down, to low sweep and back down, etc)

Keep up the great work!
 
The one thing that jumps out to me is that you could have more tension.
First of all hats off to you @acutaiar12 . You got the weight overhead and back down again. Not me. Respect. You are strong.

here are a couple tips I've picked up about tension from my betters.

Ball up your free hand into a fist and use that tension to square your frame while upright. Feel the connection of stabilization all the way through your legs and feet to the ground.

And when getting off the ground look in the direction you're going, then allow you head to follow and turn. Then send your sternum in that direction.

And aim to hinge the body up from the ground like a rigid trap door with 1 side attached to the floor. Rely on feeling the pressure under your foot to press the body from the ground. Experiment with foot placement to take advantage of leverage.

A rigid body is easier to move and manage than a limp one.

These points will be easier for you to practice, focus on, and perfect under a lighter load, or a balanced shoe. Maybe a couple warmup reps might be in order. Maybe they are things that you can start to add in your heaviest practice. But as @Anna C notes there may be opportunities for more tension in these reps. Heavy get ups (and presses for me) do have a way of tricking me into thinking I'm already Expressing a great deal of tension. But the video on my phone usually says otherwise. I have more wobbles in there than I thought, or wanted.

I hope this is helpful.
 
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Another vote for 2-5 continuous reps with 36kg per set. But if you can do a 2min get up with 36, you can probably already do several in a row too. So these may not get you a ton.
Other things that helped me when starting with the 48.
Floor presses, the ability to floor press the 48 even just 2-3 times made repeat get ups much less stressful. Multiple reps per set of half get ups with the 48. I think it's been said, but you also may need more distinct/larger waving of the load with get ups.
 
I was just wondering if you built up your general strength with another movement, one where you are further to the left on the "accommodation" scale. I imagine that with the TGU, you are closer to your biological potential. With the press, I assume you are not.

Take 1 step backwards to eventually take 2 steps forward. Maybe folks here can support or shoot this idea down. I'm not certain about it.

Regards,

Eric
I have considered this, but I’d like to keep my training specific to the get up for the time being. I’ve considered adding a press at the top with the 36kg, maybe the floor with the 48kg.
 
Some thoughts:

• Your getup @48kg looks strong. The notes others have provided are great, so follow those. But good work!

• Could be time to get on a new program. Improving the press *might* help, so a PlanStrong/BuiltStrong press plan could be a good idea.

• if you stay on S&S, consider waving the load. For a 4-Day per week example: 10/16/14/20 getups on respective days.

• Try some specialized variety: TGU, Bridge Floor Press, TGU To Elbow, Boomerang Getup (to elbow and back down, to hand and back down, to low sweep and back down, etc)

Keep up the great work!
Thank you for the kind words!

I have thought about waving the load, but I’d like to wait until I own timeless Sinister before considering doing so. I’d like to keep it simple as I’m in the phase of increasing the weight.

Adding in that floor press sounds like a good idea. I starting doing half get ups every 3rd session about 1 month ago and I believe they have helped. I’ve thought about maybe adding a press at the top with the 36kg as well. I’m not sure how much that helps though besides looking cool.
 
First of all hats off to you @acutaiar12 . You got the weight overhead and back down again. Not me. Respect. You are strong.

here are a couple tips I've picked up about tension from my betters.

Ball up your free hand into a fist and use that tension to square your frame while upright. Feel the connection of stabilization all the way through your legs and feet to the ground.

And when going on the ground look in the direction you're going, then allow you head to follow. Then send your sternum in that direction.

And aim to hinge the body up from the ground like a rigid trap door with 1 side attached to the floor. Rely on feeling the pressure under your foot to press the body from the ground. Experiment with foot placement to take advantage of leverage.

A rigid body is easier to move and manage than a limp one.

These points will be easier for you to practice, focus on, and perfect under a lighter load, or a balanced shoe. Maybe a couple warmup reps might be in order. Maybe they are things that you can start to add in your heaviest practice. But as @Anna C notes there may be opportunities for more tension in these reps. Heavy get ups (and presses for me) do have a way of tricking me into thinking I'm already Expressing a great deal of tension. But the video on my phone usually says otherwise. I have more wobbles in there than I thought, or wanted.

I hope this is helpful.
This is very helpful. One of my main focuses for my next practice will be increasing the overall tension throughout.
 
You Are very Strong and I have only dine get-ups with easier weights than you. So this is just built om theiry and what makes sense to me. Maybe it has already been mentioned too.

1) Try doing top-down tgu where you start from the top and go down to the floor. And then setting the vell down. Maybe you can get more reps that way. (With the 48)

2) doing tgu with 36 super slow.

3) doing partial reps with 48.

4) saving up money for a 40 kilo.

5) be proud of how far you have come. And you Are only 21.

6) read the log of Pavel Macek. A true master of patience. He has worked for a very long time on achieving the Sinister.
 
Other things you can work on
1. Consecutive rep getups
2. Longer pauses at various stages of the getup
 
ABA62784-1261-461C-92E1-647008E48DA3.pngReading Kenneth jays perfecting the press and there’s is a whole section on tgu stuff. Also references another book just for the tgu by this man.
 
My plane was about to take off when i sent last one. Hadn’t actually read the chapter in detail yet. It very much focusses on tension and not leaking any during transition, especially in the lat.
 
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