I haven’t written much about this yet, but I’ve been using kettlebells quite a bit these days. My husband went above and beyond this year on my Christmas present: a whole set of kettlebells!
Kettlebells are awesome. They are a great way to build strength AND work on your cardio. We primarily follow a Kettlebell dvd set (Skogg system- I’ll do another post on that). Every now and then though, we make up our own workouts.
My husband actually made up this workout. Just a side note, I love that my husband and I finally found something we enjoy doing together. We do some sort of kettlebell workout almost every day. Usually they are short-20-30 minutes.
At this point, we are both kind of working on increasing the weight we’re using. We are keeping our workouts basically the same, but switching up the weight. Build z muscles!
Here is a workout we recently did:
So, we did single arm swings. If you wanted to try double arms you could absolutely do that too. I think single arms may be more challenging but it’s nice to let one arm rest while working the other (although you feel this mostly in your Glutes).
(sorry for the blurry photo- these are action shots baby!)
One thing to keep in mind about swings: they are not squats. You’re sort of hinging forward at the waist, then thrusting forward with your hips. The momentum should be what swings the bell up. You do not use your arms to bring the bell up-it gains momentum and sort of swings on its’ own. Does that make sense? I’ll have to do a video to show you in real time.
Turkish get ups are hard (at least for me). I’m still sort of practicing them hence only 5 reps on each side. I like to do a few with no weight then add just a couple pounds (literally only 3). I actually did some again today and used an 8 pound weight. Moving up in the world!
Here is a link to a video showing Turkish Get Ups. I barely feel comfortable doing them myself so I definitely don’t feel comfortable explaining how to perform one. There are lots of steps involved too so I watch along with videos the first few times I try them. I would recommend either doing that or have someone show you who knows what they’re doing!
Have you used kettlebells? What’s your favorite exercise?
I like to do KB windmills because it always stretches out my tight hip flexors
I got a kettle bell on clearance, its a 20 pounder, I would love heavier but I am not willing to pay for more. I love my kettle bell though, I use it quite a bit. I agree Turkish getups are hard!