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Kettlebell Intro / Request for Critique

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TedM

Level 6 Valued Member
Hello all-
Hope to be dropping in for a long time to come.

Total newbie to this and to weights in general. 62 yr old male; my activities have been swimming (20 min. kilometer and out..) and almost daily walking in the hills near our home, in Jerusalem. No injuries that impede mobility; my knees have been sore of late, but that's probably due to new orthotics.

Came to hear of Pavel and S&S when my pool closed down. I was looking for a low impact, simple, strength and flexibility replacement program. My son sent me a link to the interview with Pavel and Joe Rogan and I was instantly sold.

I finally got my copy of S&S and am working to follow it. I'm focusing on form and that's why I'm writing.

As of now, 1 1/2 weeks into it, I'm doing 3 sets of the warmup circuit (I don't use a kettlebell to go down/up for the goblet squats. I take it off the floor and do a few kinda curls each time I go down, but I don't feel ready to take it up and down yet.) I have one 16 kg as of now.
AFter the circuits, I'm doing just deadweight sets and really trying to make sure my form is correct on the deadweights. Then I'll progress.

I'm here to ask for some feedback on my form. @Steve Freides suggested sending in a vid, and so, here it is, attached.

Thanks in advance for any and all feedback!!
 
I can't see the video. If I remember correctly, this forum doesn't actually allow posting videos - you need to use an external utility, like YouTube or Dailymotion.
 
@TedM and I started chatting in email after he contacted us via our website for assistance in finding an instructor to work with. I suggested he post here - welcome to the StrongFirst forum, @TedM. Working with an instructor is still, and always will be, the best choice, but with current technology, a video posted here and feedback from our members is a fine and functional second choice.

-S-
 
TedM said:
hmmm. ok. let's try this:
Click to expand...

That looks basically solid. A really good start, and it's very good that you're getting your deadlift grooved to establish a good hinge. A lot of people neglect to do this and rush into ballistic swings before really having the hinge pattern grooved.

The biggest issues I see are:
--Just lacking a bit of confidence and feel for the positions. You're still searching for the groove, which is to be expected and part of the learning process.
--You sit back into the hinge and then have to fold forward more at the hips (as opposed to sitting back) to reach the floor. You're searching for the floor. This is partly a matter of matching the timing of sitting back and folding forward so your shoulders, hips, and knees start and finish together, and it may partly be a matter of hamstring flexibility.
--Don't rush the ascent. It doesn't have to be super slow, but slow it down a little and make it smooth.

A few things I would recommend:

Practice the "touch the wall drill":
--Stand facing away from a wall with your heels a foot or so from the wall.
--Sit back into your hinge and touch your butt to the wall.
--Move a little further away from the wall and repeat.
As you move away from the wall, if you sink your hips straight down (squat) you won't reach back to the wall. If keep your legs too straight, you also won't reach back to the wall. This may facilitate a slightly deeper hinge.

Work on your hamstring flexibility:
Try out the "elephant walk" stretch. Here's a good tutorial:

Better hamstring flexibility may enable you to reach a deeper hinge position

Do sets of 20 for the DL. You can use one bell or two, and one or two arms on one bell, but do sets of 20. I found that the second 10 in a 20 rep set is where my brain and body really start to feel things and figure things out, but you have to do the first 10 to get there.

Focus on your timing. The tendency is to start lowering the bells by sitting back as far as possible and THEN continue to fold forward and bend the knees to reach the floor. So it ends up being a two-part movement. See if you can adjust your timing so that your hips, knees, shoulders, and the bell all start and finish together. This tends to happen naturally on the positive part of the movement, so see if you can reverse engineer the timing of the positive and apply it to lowering the bell. You want to be able to smoothly lower into your deep hinge and not have to reach for the floor.

Focus on your rooting. Keep your weight evenly balanced over your whole foot and try to maintain that same weight distribution throughout the range of motion. I visualize the soles of my feet extending straight down into the ground, as if I were wearing tall flat platform shoes that are sunk below the surface of the ground. In the actual ballistic swing, just focusing on maintaining even balance over the whole foot throughout the whole movement can often automatically fix a lot of timing problems.

Get a feel for the endpoints of the lift (the zipped up standing plank and the deep hinge) and use those as targets in your swing. When I was recovering from a shoulder surgery (rotator cuff repair after injuring it playing basketball), I did a LOT of KB deadlifts because I could do them long before I could do ballistics, and I developed a new appreciation for them. I found that they were actually very valuable in helping refine my hinge pattern, even after deadlifting and doing KB ballistics for decades, and had a lot of carry over to my KB ballistics when I returned to them. By grooving the pattern at slow speed, I could naturally and smoothly transition from plank to hinge and back at ballistic speed, with everything starting and finishing together.
 
Thank you all for your feedback. @Steve W. That was a lot to write out and I'm digesting as I train. @Steve Freides - much appreciation for feedback and suggesting to post (I would have been way too intimidated...)

This is a very exciting process for me. Discovering how to "bounce" on my hamstrings while keeping shins vertical has been a real "aha".

Starting mindful swings today.
 
TedM said:
@Steve W. That was a lot to write out and I'm digesting as I train.
Click to expand...
TedM said:
Starting mindful swings today.
Click to expand...
Just don't overthink it when you do ballistic swings. You can't think your way through a ballistic lift. Part of the value of the DL is that you can think your way through it to establish the pattern, so you have a feel for it before trying it at ballistic speed.

For the actual swing, just focus on one cue or intention at a time for a given set. Watching yourself on video can help you see where you need to adjust and what you might focus on next set or next session.

While you're getting comfortable with the swing, don't worry about a following a structured program. Just mess around and practice. Try out different cues and technique variations (a lot of variation will just occur naturally since your technique won't be consistent) and look for those reps that feel especially good. Then try to reverse engineer what you did and replicate replicate it. Then try to replicate it consistently. Just by messing around and focusing on technique, you can rack up a substantial volume without even realizing it.

Here's a good video by @Pavel Macek explaining the coordination between the arms and the hips in the swing. I realize it's one more thing to think about when I just told you not to overthink it. However, it's very applicable when going from practicing the DL to the ballistic swing because the DL grooves your hip hinge position, but not the bell path of the swing or the movement of the arms along with it.

 
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Steve W. said:
You can't think your way through a ballistic lift.
Click to expand...
That is a huge understatement; things move fast down there. But, when that kb starts to come up, it feels like an out-of-body experience: just watching it fly up and float.
 
Two things to work on there:

1) The bell only needs to be a foot length in front of you at the start—having it closer will prevent you from overextending and tighten up your first hike.

2) Timing—wait till the arms reconnect to the ribs before hinging out of the standing plank at the top. You are hinging too early.
 
i second @Brett Jones and raise you ...

the grunting .
KEEP THE GRUNTING IN.
grunt with the exertion to maximize it.
don't try to be quiet.
it's also indicative of you having a good breathing match for the movement. very good to have.

when you get this pop and float going, the grunt helps me with snapping into the plank at the top. like a good karate kiyai .

and like @Brett Jones notes, work on the 4 part timing of the kettlebell swing that @Steve W. posted earlier.
wait as long as you can to hinge into the backswing.
 
+1 to all above. If you look at your last rep of the set you are the closest there. Couple of cues that always help me are…
Playing chicken with your crotch, wait till the last second that the bell will slam into it, then hinge.
This leads into my second cue of putting the bell into the pocket. Imagine there is a string or rope tied around your knees. The bell has to fit between that and your crotch.
Keep up the strong work!
 
LarryB said:
Playing chicken with your crotch, wait till the last second that the bell will slam into it, then hinge.
Click to expand...
I like this imagery. I try to imagine that I'm rolling away from an incoming punch, just hinging before the BallBuster moment. I try, but still having problems with my timing...rather: I'm still working on my timing :)
 
Ok for discussion sake let's say the recent vid is your 100% effort..

I'd like you to dial down the power and effort to 70% tops

Focus on timing both on the way up and down..

It's also fine to swing a bit lower (chest level vs shoulder level)

Let's see how your swings will look..

I've noticed that at times too much power too soon means you have a low level of control..

Try those tweaks first and we shall go from there
 
I second everyone's comments on the most significant issue being the early hinging. The simplest way I know to address that is (on the downswing) to just focus on keeping the bell high in the triangle between the crotch and the knees. The "playing chicken" cue addresses this, but keeping the bell high addresses the same issue and gives you direct feedback on whether you're doing it successfully.

The only way to keep the bell high is to delay the hinge/hold the standing plank until the arms come down against your torso. So from one end, you might think of holding the plank, or you might use a more figurative cue like "attack the zipper." But the sign that you're successfully applying those cues is whether you're dropping the bell too low.

I hesitate to throw in too many suggestions at once, but the other issue I see is not fully extending the hips into the standing plank. Coming out of the backswing, just think about standing tall, head to ceiling. Not swinging the bell, just standing tall. Aside from holding onto the bell, the arms are just passively along for the ride.

In fact, probably the cue I use with myself most often is "arms down" when I initiate the upswing. It might seem a little counterintuitive to think "arms down" when you want the bell to go up, but it helps ensure that I'm applying full power to the bell from my hips, through my torso, to my shoulders, and then down my arms to the bell. Once I actively try to pull the bell up with my arms, that connection with the hips is lost. "Arms down" helps me keep that connection as long as possible. Any time the bell in a KB ballistic isn't flying up the way I'd like, thinking "arms down" usually gets the next rep back on track.

I also agree with the suggestions to keep the bell a little closer in your setup and to dialing back the power as you work on the timing (as you get the timing better, the power will go up without an increase in conscious effort).
 
TedM said:
Amazing feedback!! Thank you very much!!
Click to expand...
Ted, welcome to the strength training world. Stick with this and, in a year, you are not going to be very pleased with what a different human you have become. Keep practicing, not straining, and it will all click into place over the weeks and months. Good job and good luck!
 
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