The Art and Science of Kettlebell Training

Learn how to properly use this humble lump of iron and achieve a new level of strength and fitness.

Guest Author: Alex Goik

Chances are that if you train — or maybe even if you don’t — that you’ve come across an irregular shaped lump of iron being swung around by someone in the gym.

The lump of iron is called a Kettlebell and in my eyes, it’s one of the most critically misunderstood and under-utilized pieces of equipment in the modern strength and conditioning toolkit now available to us.

From the outside looking in Kettlebell training can appear cumbersome, awkward, and daunting to incorporate succesfully into a training regime.

Indeed this characterisation isn’t entirely wrong.

A degree of skill and an understanding of body mechanics is required to unlock the Kettlebell’s full potential. In order to become truly adept, the tool demands an investment of time and patience from its user.

But when you do become adept, the breadth and diversity of your training expands dramatically.

And with expansion of training protocol comes tangible benefits to your strength, conditioning, mobility and coordination among a host of other perks.

Boxes to Tick in the Pursuit of Peak Performance

Approaching athletic performance from a background in combat sports, I have always been cognizant of the need to satisfy four primary objectives.

Power, coordination, functionality and conditioning

How hard and fast you can hit, takedown, and submit is predicated on the metric of power. The general consensus within athletic performance circles is that power can best obtained through proper periodisation of heavy barbell training using compound movements (your bench press, deadlift and squat) followed by a focus on plyometric exercises (your medicine ball slams, depth jumps and explosive push-ups).

Coordination relates to maintaining balance and stability while performing athletic manuevers and the development of correct timing.

Functionality relates to how the strength and power developed through resistance training translates over to performance in your respective physical pursuit. This can be achieved through a combination of sport specific drills and non traditional exercies. If you’ve ever seen athletes perform tyre flips, swing around battle ropes, or push a loaded sled, these exercises are designed to mimic movements found within the designated sport and develop practical strength.

As explained by Coach Joel Jamieson, author of ‘Ultimate MMA Conditioning’, conditioning can be defined as your “maximum sustainable power output throughout the duration of the event”. Or Inother words, how long you can keep up a high level of power output before gassing out.

Striving to attain a good balance between all four of these objectives is an important goal for both combat sport athletes and athletes in general.

But these are also fantastic metrics that the average individual who just wants to get fit, add some muscle, or improve their mobility can use to gauge their overall fitness progress.

And Kettlebell training — if done correctly — ticks all four of these boxes.

The Benefits of Kettlebell Training

The true strength of the Kettlebell lies in its malleability.

It teaches you how to be stable and transition through movements while maintaining tension, promoting good posture and improving the integrity of your joints.

Using the correct weight, it develops both your strength and explosive power and encourages you to use correct body mechanics.

It develops coordination, flexibility and grip strength, (grip strength having been proven to be a “vital sign” of health and vitality in middle-aged and older adults.)

Through the incorporation of Kettlebell complexes or ‘flows’ that combine several exercises in one seamless movement pattern, using Kettlebells can drastically improve your cardiovascular fitness.

Finally, Kettlebell training teaches you to generate power in awkward and non-linear positions using your whole body as one integral unit. This is a vital component of a large number of atheltic endeavours, yet a factor that is often overlooked in traditional strength training.

Let’s now look to some specific Kettlebell exercises to ratify these claims.

1. The Russian Kettlebell Swing

The swing is the staple movement in Kettlebell training. Indeed Tim Ferris in his book ‘4 Hour Body’ refers to the Kettlebell swing as a ‘magic’ exercise.

Your hips, glutes and hamstrings are the power generators involved in virtually all forms of movement incorporating lifting, running and jumping. For many of us who live a sedentary life however, these muscles are left critically under-utilized and underdeveloped.

The Kettlebell swing is a ballistic movement and stimulates the whole of your posterior chain — the group of muscles on the back of your body including your glutes, hamstrings and spinal muscles. A swing is thrust forward by your loaded hips, rather than pushed into place.

The Kettlebell swing can therefore develop power, coordination and functionality depending on how you choose to implement the technique into your training regime.

The swing can also be approached as a recuperative exercise for those experiencing lower back pain. This is owed to the reversal of negative energy on the spine and the lower weight which is used in a swing in comparison to exercises such as the deadlift that are strenuous on the lower back if not performed correctly.

For a more complicated breakdown of the Kettlebell swing I reccomend viewing this clip.

2. The Turkish Get Up

The Turkish get up is a multidimensional and complex movement. I don’t recommend trying this exercise until you have mastered the correct technique without weight.

In saying this, performing a Kettlebell Turkish get up is arguably one of the best things that you can do to strengthen your body and encourage it to work as a cohesive unit.

The two greatest challenges of this movement are to your grip strength and overhead stability. Holding a weight overhead and progressing through various planes of motion is extremely taxing on your shoulder, hand and wrist. Performing each section of this movement correctly also requires a high degree of coordination, mobility and core engagement.

With the Turkish get up, you will quickly become aware of strength deficiencies and the stages of the movement that you feel weakest. The exercise is therefore a good barometer for gauging how well your body articulates itself as a unit, guiding you to focus on areas of your body that need improvement.

For those martial artists out there, I have found this exercise to be invaluable in improving my wrestling and jiujitsu, two pursuits that require you to generate power and maintain stability in multiple planes of motion.

For an analysis of three variations of the Turkish Get Up, I recommend viewing this clip performed by Kettlebell practitioner and competitor Mike Salemi.

3. Kettlebell Flows/Complexes

Eric Leija AKA ‘Primal Swoldier’ of Onnit Gym is at the forefront of Kettlebell experimentation and one of the pioneers of Kettlebell flowing. In fact, I have learned all of my Kettlebell flows and complexes from Eric through the great content he freely gives out on his instagram channel and his comprehensive Primal Kettlebell Course.

As explained by Eric, Kettlebell flows allow you to use “different exercises that work out every major muscle group for optimal gains.” The high intensity associated with Kettlebell complexes is therefore a great way to simultaenously develop your anaerobic capacity and improve overall cardiovascular health.

I recommend practising each of the fundamental kettlebell movements and mastering them separately before you try experimenting with Kettlebell flowing. These complexes are comprised of several movements that require skill and focus to execute so you need to be adequately prepared before attempting to put them all together.

Hopefully by this stage you are interested in becoming proficient with the Kettlebell yourself. Here are some things to keep in mind moving forward.

Start Light

The biggest mistake that people make when commencing Kettlebell training is to select too heavy a weight. Coming from a background in traditional strength training, it can be humbling to drop down the amount that you lift, however this is essential to ensure that you develop sound technique and optimal movement patterns. Starting out with an 8kg to 10kg for women and 12kg to 16kg Kettlebell for men is a sensible choice if you want to avoid unnecessary injury. Bear in mind that you are learning a skill — there is zero need to rush the process of acquisition.

Once you feel stable, strong, and comfortable with your starting weight, you can try moving up another bracket (Kettlebells typically increase by sets of 2kg). If you feel compromised, go back down to the previous weight until you feel confident. When scaling up the weight of your Kettlebell, another good practise is to lower the volume of training you are doing until your body adjusts. This is a solid way to ensure that you can handle a heavier weight — so long as you remain honest with yourself.

Start Simple

I explained the Turkish get up and Kettlebell flowing above to demonstrate the strength and conditioning perks associated with training with this particular implement. These are advanced movements however, and I strongly recommend you begin with mastering the swing and other compound movements before trying your hand at these.

I can recommend this book written by none other than the man considered to have started the Kettlebell revolution, Pavel Tsatsouline, to get you started.

Train with Purpose

When learning to use the Kettlebell you are learning a new skill. You therefore need to be thinking through each movement and paying close attention to how to correctly execute the exercise you are focusing on. You also need to get the right set of Kettlebells for you.

Cast-iron kettlebells are preferred by many because the bell (the sphereical bit of the kettlebell that holds most of the weight) is typically smaller and therefore easier manoeuvre. But I urge you to first experiment with different kettlebells before buying your own. You want the handle to be wide enough so that you can grip it firmly with both hands and ensure that there are no rough edges that could cut into your skin (particularly if you’re new to training and your hands aren’t yet conditioned).

Ultimately, you want to find a set that feels comfortable for you to use and that won’t end up in the back of your parents garage… Unless your parents’ garage is where you train.

Hope to see you out there swingin’.

Guest Author: Alex Goik

Alex Goik is a Media Analyst. He commonly writes for Mogul News and at Foreign Affairs Navigator where he strives to offer fresh perspectives on foreign affairs, tech and China (coupled with the odd analysis of human nature… and reminiscent pieces based on his time spent fighting in a cage).