Kettlebell Your First 1h or 2h Swing or Snatch - Better Than The Second?

[Steve Freides]

How you find the first swing or snatch, the one that starts with the bell on the ground, as compared to the second and the rest, where the bell is already "in flight?" I am finding it interesting that:

• My first 1h swing doesn't feel as powerful as the second.
• 
  
• My first 2h swing feels about the same as the second.
• 
  
• My first snatch feels _better_ than the second (and I don't use a pre-swing).

You? And I'm interested in speculation as to why this might be.

Thanks in advance for your replies.

-S-

 

[Anna C]

Mine feels the same. First 1H swing, 2H swing, or snatch feels the same as the ones that follow.

 

[Blake Nelson]

Hmmm. That is an interesting question. I'll swing a little tomorrow and see what I observe.
My first inkling @Steve Freides is that your situation has something to do with set-up. I wonder if you would find the same thing if you went heavier than normal on you 1HS or lighter than normal on your 2HS.

 

[Oscar]

My 2nd rep is better than the first in all exercises. Maybe a bit less so in 2HS.

My second set is also usually better, but I train with almost zero warm up.

 

[Steve Freides]

I'll submit my theory for my own experience.

I tend to 1h swing pretty heavy for me, usually a 32 kg. Here, I don't think my hike can supply the kind of momentum that the bell coming back at me after a swing can.

I'm stronger at 2h swings. Here, I get a solid hike back and off I go, not much difference.

For snatches, the weights are the lightest, my hike works well, and I haven't found my ideal turn-around after each rep, so that first rep feels perfectly well loaded but the rest of the reps find me not storing the energy and reusing it, and there is something of the quality of a hang snatch in them - not altogether, but more than I'd like.

-S-

 

[Steve W.]

In my experience, the first rep, hiked off the floor, is always the worst rep of the set and pretty much HAS to be that way.

One group of faults we see all the time in people's swings is hinging too early, dropping the bell too low, and having bad timing out of the hole because the hips moved back way before the bell. Well, hiking the bell off the floor pretty much ensures that the hinge is too early and ahead of the bell (because you start with the hips back and the bell out in front), and that the bell is too low (because it starts on the floor).

IMO, hiking the bell off the floor is a necessary evil to start a set. There isn't a better way to initiate the first rep, but it's something you need to adjust FROM, not something to replicate on subsequent reps.

 

[Papa Georgio]

In my experience, the first rep, hiked off the floor, is always the worst rep of the set and pretty much HAS to be that way.

One group of faults we see all the time in people's swings is hinging too early, dropping the bell too low, and having bad timing out of the hole because the hips moved back way before the bell. Well, hiking the bell off the floor pretty much ensures that the hinge is too early and ahead of the bell (because you start with the hips back and the bell out in front), and that the bell is too low (because it starts on the floor).

IMO, hiking the bell off the floor is a necessary evil to start a set. There isn't a better way to initiate the first rep, but it's something you need to adjust FROM, not something to replicate on subsequent reps.

I had once made that argument to my instructor. I was promptly prescribed 10 X 10 of 1-arm dead-start swings. Lessons learned was:
* 100 1-arm dead-start swings aren't a joke
* momentum will always help the second swing, but it's no excuse to be easy on the first one (at least in front of other people)
* know when to keep your mouth shut

 

[Kenny Croxdale]

How you find the first swing or snatch, the one that starts with the bell on the ground, as compared to the second and the rest, where the bell is already "in flight?" I am finding it interesting that:

• My first 1h swing doesn't feel as powerful as the second.
• 
  
• My first 2h swing feels about the same as the second.
• 
  
• My first snatch feels _better_ than the second (and I don't use a pre-swing).

You? And I'm interested in speculation as to why this might be.

Power Movements

Research show that in most Power Movements, the second repetition produces the most Power Output. The second repetition in a Speed/Power Squat is usually the one the generates the more force; providing each rep was performed in the same way.

There are various theory's why this is but no one know exactly why.

Dr Daniel Baker

Baker is one of the leading researchers on Velocity/Power Training.

in the video demonstration below, Baker found that the second and third rep in Jump Squats (Speed Training, which differs from Power Training) were preformed with the quickest velocity.

 

[Steve W.]

I had once made that argument to my instructor. I was promptly prescribed 10 X 10 of 1-arm dead-start swings. Lessons learned was:
* 100 1-arm dead-start swings aren't a joke
* momentum will always help the second swing, but it's no excuse to be easy on the first one (at least in front of other people)

My comment was not about momentum. It was about the timing of a KB ballistic drill hiked from the floor being different from the timing of subsequent reps in a set.

This may go against SFG conventional wisdom, but I am NOT a fan of dead stop swings.

The first rep of a set, where you are initiating the swing from the ground, forces you to swing the KB too low between the knees. Dropping the KB too low is a big problem that a lot of people have in ALL their reps, related to hinging too early, and is often hard to fix. Reps from the floor force you to hinge too early -- you start from a full hinge, but the KB is way out in front of you on the floor. On a regular rep, you don't hit the full hinge position until the KB is at the end of the back swing. So the first rep puts your hip action way ahead of the bell movement and has very different timing from subsequent reps. The first rep of a set is always the worst for this reason (in my experience and observation). I think it is misguided to practice doing MORE reps like this.

One thing I frequently notice is that people often have a great hinge position in their set up, but then lose it when doing their actual swings, so dead swings can take advantage of this. But I think the problems it enforces with bell path, position and timing outweigh this. I also avoid "hover swings" as a teaching progression for the same reason.

Apparently a lot of people find the dead swing useful (and I can't argue with that experience), but I am honestly not one of them.

 

[Anna C]

Reps from the floor force you to hinge too early -- you start from a full hinge, but the KB is way out in front of you on the floor.

The timing and arrival there is different, I agree. But the first hinge can be loaded just as the others. I screen captured my first and second hinge in the video below, and they look identical to me. The swing is also identical.

My example, back when I was doing tons of 1H 32kg swings with @Al Ciampa's original A+A swing protocols:

 

[Tim Randolph]

For my N=1 sample of just me, my second swing is consistently better than my first. This is especially true if my hike mechanics are subpar.

My understanding from a reference that Pavel made in S&S and @Pavel Macek Solid article is that a properly executed swing with a quick turn around has a plyometric aspect that allows for more power generation. But you only get that with the second swing onwards because the hike doesn’t deliver as much momentum to reverse. My apologies if I have misunderstood. It’s not something I have really dug into.

 

[elitmalp]

Mine feels the same.



Sarkari Result Pnr Status 192.168.1.1

 

[Blake Nelson]

I'll submit my theory for my own experience.

I tend to 1h swing pretty heavy for me, usually a 32 kg. Here, I don't think my hike can supply the kind of momentum that the bell coming back at me after a swing can.

I'm stronger at 2h swings. Here, I get a solid hike back and off I go, not much difference.

For snatches, the weights are the lightest, my hike works well, and I haven't found my ideal turn-around after each rep, so that first rep feels perfectly well loaded but the rest of the reps find me not storing the energy and reusing it, and there is something of the quality of a hang snatch in them - not altogether, but more than I'd like.

-S-

That seems right to me.

 

[Mannc]

To all of the above I just want to add a thought (If I'm wrong here that's totally fine, it's meant to be food for thought)

I guess another factor that might play a role here is the activation pattern of the muscles in the hike vs. the bell coming back in the one arm swing.

Disclaimer: I'm talking about the last portion of the hike!

For me the anti-rotational component feels a lot different.
Instead of "playing chicken" with the bell like in the second rep, I have to pull the bell back into my brace and work against myself more so I have to work harder to stay square and thus it feels like the pressure in my core shifts to one side a little in contrast to the second rep where it seems a lot more evenly pressured and the hip extension feels a lot more quick and I have to steer less.

My grip is by far my weakest link so anti-rotation and hip extension are never an issue for me (baseball player).
Some time back I used straps for very heavy one arm swings (which I consider very dangerous now) in order to improve my sprinting and the above was even more prominent.

I guess the anti-rotational-component of the upper body in the hike resembles more of a one arm front lever (I can't do a one arm one, but shifting the focus to one arm in the two arm one is still possible), whereas in the swing itself it's more of a one arm deadlift type of force vector, which doesn't try to pull my hips out of alignment as much as the former.
So after the hike I have to shift the activation pattern to that of the swing.

And of course we practice far less dead-start swings than normal swings, so we might have 10 times the repetitions in a continuous manner and it simply feels more familiar and thus "strong" regardless of if it really is.