Just came off a two-week international business trip. I tried to eat less on some days and work out when I could (treadmills, dumbells, nothing major), I only gained 1-2lbs which was much less than expected. Got back on Friday and gained another lb or two over the weekend.
Yesterday was back on KBs — did easy day according to ROP, 5 ladders of 1-2 with the 24kg kettlebell.
Today I didn’t have a lot of time and for variety day did the “Furnace” workout from David Whitley. Wow. That’s a smoker!
Today is technically a variety day, so I did this workout I read about somewhere.
Sets of two-handed swings alternating with Hindu squats. Start with 50 swings, then 10 squats. Take a one-minute break.
Then do 40 swings, and 20 squats
Then 30 swings, 30 squats
See the pattern? 20 swings, 40 squats
Finally, 10 swings and 50 squats.
It takes 12-15 minutes, but it’s a smoker!
Clif and I have been working on some combo stuff, which is what we are focusing on August.
Our friend, Steve Maxwell, was one of the inspirations for that, and here is a great video of him teaching some guys a bunch of wicked exercises in a circuit. Many of these are incorporated into our own plan. Looks like it’s time to get some rings and clubs!
We made another change to the August plan, making Friday a variety day instead of just a lighter version of Monday and Thursday.
I did not invent this workout, but read it somewhere:
30sec-ladder @24kg:
30sec two handed swing
30sec rest
30sec deadlift + 30sec two handed swing
30sec rest
30sec front squat + 30sec deadlift + 30sec two handed swing
30sec rest
30sec clean&press (weaker arm) + 30sec clean&press (stronger arm) + 30sec front squat + 30sec deadlift + 30sec two handed swing
30sec rest
30sec snatch (weaker arm) + 30sec snatch (stronger arm) + 30sec clean&press (weaker arm) + 30sec clean&press (stronger arm) + 30sec front squat + 30sec deadlift + 30sec two handed swing
1min rest and start again
We thought by going through that just once, it would be a nice, kind of light, variety day. Well, it turns out it was no such thing!
(I shouldn’t write this yet, because Clif does his workouts at night and so he won’t do this one until tonight. I’m not sure it would be fair to warn him.)
Anyway, it started out really easy. I wasn’t really breathing hard until round three, when I added the front squat. Those three were like walking up a slight incline, but rounds 4 and 5 were like scaling the mountain! I struggled to do 30 seconds of clean and press with each arm, and actually had to switch more frequently. Snatches too, on the last round. Man, those were really hard and I would not say I would consider my form at all perfect.
To make up for some failures in the last two rounds using the 24kg kettlebell, I repeated the final round using the 16kg kettlebell, which made it a little easier, but was still fairly challenging.
Total time was about 15 minutes and it was pretty tough!
There are different lists available on what people consider the basic human functional movements. If we consider those to be pushing, pulling, squat and deadlift, this workout does it all with only two exercises.
Perform 5×5 getups, then do 50 swings
Rest 1 minute
Perform 4×4 getups, then do 40 swings
Rest 1 minute
Perform 3×3 getups, then do 30 swings
Rest 1 minute
Perform 2×2 getups, then do 20 swings
Rest 1 minute
Perform 1×1 getups, then do 10 swings
Puke.
You could also reverse one of those exercises. After 5×5 getups, do 10 swings. Work your way down on getups, but up on swings. Or vice versa.
