"Eighty percent of success is showing up."
— Woody Allen.
38 year old man. I discovered kettlebells in 2014. I don't remember how I found out about them, but I liked the simple, primal idea of them. Ball of iron/steel, with a handle. Pick it up, throw it around. Simple.
My wife bought me a 16kg bell in November that year. I learned how to two hand swing it. Got sick with pneumonia in both lungs and wound up in the hospital for a week in March 2015. Diagnosed with a rare disease/disorder Eosinophilia. It is a disorder that produces too many eosinophils, a type of white blood cell. Too many of them can cause problems in your lungs and other places. I developed asthma because of this. Not a good time.
A month or so out of the hospital, I came back to exercise and the kettlebell. I discovered Pavel and his Simple and Sinister program. Very appealing program for a neophyte. As he says in the book, all of the thinking has been done for you. Follow the program on a near daily basis.
Starting out was a chore, especially the Get-Ups. I could not TGU a 16kg bell. I was a month out of the hospital and probably the weakest I have been in my adult life. I had to buy a 12kg bell, just to get the bell overhead. The idea of moving a 32 kg bell off the ground and over my head seemed absurd, insane. Impossible.
But, the thing is, I kept showing up to practice. Working nights, getting home at 4:30 in the morning, I would hustle my two kettlebells out of a closet, do the practice before wife woke up at 5 am and take her to work at 6. I liked S&S. Kettlebells were fun! Some days they would kick my butt, but I enjoyed it. I would be swinging a kettlebell in the dark silent morning, building a quiet foundation of strength, day by day.
I progressed to the 24kg in August of 2015, and suddenly that 32kg did not seem so crazy. I would miss days here and there, but I would keep coming back. Put aside the practice time and focus, and your body will know what to do.
I bought the dreaded 32kg for Christmas 2015, except I was not dreading it anymore. It was an exciting day when it arrived! Worked with it for a few months, with a hiatus for moving in 2016, and accomplished Simple standard in September 2016. Roughly a year and a half. It might have been done sooner, but we all have our own pace.
Results? When my wife says she likes hugging me because my torso is so thick. That's virtually all kettlebell work. When I did a day of moving furniture up and down stairs, on and off a truck and waking up the next day soreness-free. That's real world, FUNCTIONAL strength. When you see a picture of yourself taken two years before your kettlebell journey, and are amazed at how skinny you were. Nobody will mistake me for Dan John, but I am so much more all around SOLID than I was before.
My asthma and disease are still with me, but well-managed. The 40kg kettlebell is in my future, and I still do S&S, as well as snatches and goblet squats. This kettlebell journey has been a blessing and a challenge. Just show up and do your best. The weight will come in time. Until then, every practice is its own success.
