10K Swings Post-Mortem

Completely unrelated, but I was up in Seattle for the Super Bowl, though less for the Super Bowl and more because my favorite bar is closing, so they were holding a special event.  Moon Temple, you will be missed!  The really cool part about the trip, though, was the vibe.  Everywhere I went, you could feel all the goodwill from the fans, it was awesome.  So to the 12, I say, thank you for sharing such positive energy.  On the (very tiny) downside, since I was travelling that Monday and sick most of the following week (funny how I get better just in time to go drink myself stupid), I had to break from my scheduled post, the second in the Mapping Your Space series.  Instead, I started putting this together, my long overdue post-mortem of Dan John's 10,000 Swing Kettlebell Workout.

    This post got a little long, so feel free to jump to any specific section if there's a particular observation you're just dying to get to right away:

• Overview
• What I Didn't Like
• What I Liked
• Things To Consider
• Through My Lens

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Overview
    I mentioned in one of my last posts before the new year (10,000 Kettlebell Swings In The Air).  I won't rehash the entire post, but to recap (not so) briefly, most years, I try and do a cut between Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day to help me finish the year out strong and slingshot me into the new year (and give me an excuse to skip Christmas/Holiday parties), which I call "Turkey-To-Tree", or T2T.  For 2013, I chose to do The 10,000 Kettlebell Swing Workout for a few different reasons:

    First, there's the absolute simplicity of the program.  I had planned a pretty hard cut for 2013, so I wanted something that wouldn't require a ton of mental commitment, something I've learned from past experience.  Also, given the fact that T2T period is also pre-CES crazytime, the simpler, the better.  That in mind, having to only do a single movement seemed like a pretty sure bet, and I figured the structure of the clusters wouldn't require too much concentration, even in my mentally-impaired-by-low-caloric-intake state.

...I mean, how hard can one thing be?

    Second, there's no disputing that kettlebell work is great for fat loss.  When you consider everything that goes into a proper kettlebell swing, which, having done this program, I can confidently say I can do now, it's basically your core, glutes, hamstrings, shoulders, grip, pretty much all points extreme and in-between getting hit like a...whatever the unholy spawn of a raging bull and runaway freight train would hit like, pretty much knocking the fat off of you.  I've done tons of different fat loss programs, and when it comes to bang-for-buck, I really gotta give it to the kettlebell swing, yes, even over the thruster, burpee, and any sort of tabata.  Your results may vary a bit on that depending on how experienced you are with kettlebells, but I really doubt they'll vary that much, seriously (if fat loss is your goal).

The kettlebell swing in creepy, disturbing, cartoon form.

    Third, I wanted to do kettlebell work specifically because I've been paying quite a bit to mobility since I injured my knee last August.  My posterior chain lost quite a bit of strength and stability while I was rehabbing my knee, and as I've mentioned wanting to do some powerlifting meets this year, I needed a way to address these concerns while also losing (massive amounts of) fat.  Yep, I figured I'm would try to proverbially "ride the two (or in this case three or four) horses with one ass."  Look, I get why internet says it's not a good idea and all that, but I'm not the run-of-the-mill trainee looking for a quick fix (more on that in a future post).

    Finally, I wanted to see if I could just do it!  I'd been planning my content schedule and all my activities therein for a bit leading up to the launch this year, but I have a bad habit of letting work and life derail stuff.  I'll be honest, T2T 2013 wasn't just about finishing and starting strong, it was about Crushing Demons, and one of those demons was the aforementioned letting life and work derail.  Training is part of my life, so I figured if I could stick with this, it's a step towards re-integrating and re-framing training in the context of life.  I know that sounds a little feel-goody-new-agey-hippy-dippy, but hey, it's honest.  So that all said, let's talk some specifics.

...coming to get you, Demons...

What I Didn't Like
    Full disclosure first, I am both a huge Dan John and kettlebell fanboy.  That said, there's nothing about this program I didn't like.  While there are a couple of points that could be potential stumbling blocks, I'm going to put them down as Things To Consider more than dislikes; they really aren't negatives so much as things to keep in mind before you start or in the event that you're programming this for someone else.  However, if I were absolutely pressed, I would say I have some issues with the T-Nation article, but you wouldn't really know of its "shortcomings" if you weren't an obsessive researcher like me, and this is another Thing To Consider I'll address below.  But first, let's talk about what I liked.

What I Did Like
    What I liked best about the program can be summed up in two points: Simplicity and Time.  Like most kettlebell workouts, this one is simple enough that you can pretty much do it wherever there's a kettlebell, but the way the template is presented allows for enough customization to keep "simple" from being "boring".  Coach Dan suggests a few different strength movements to use with the program, but I'd think you could substitute any good full body pushing and pulling movements, or carefully measured intensity/sprint work, which really gives you the opportunity to program either for general activity or tailored towards a specific goal.  Imagine doing TRX rounds, rope jumping, or bag work in between sets, or any sort of movement patterns that are relevant to your pursuits, and you start to see that the possibilities for this program are endless.

Make the tools fit the work

Things To Consider
    Now the moment you've all been waiting for, the things I sorta didn't like, but not really didn't like, but feel like they're worth mentioning so you'll be aware and hopefully make productive decisions if and when you encounter them.  Some of these are probably just conjecture based on my experience, so take most of the following points with a grain of your favorite savory food additive:

• As I mentioned above, the T-Nation article leaves out a few very important points.  Lucky for us, Coach Dan included them in a post on his forum, and I highly recommend you read it.  It's probably safe to say that your progress won't suffer significantly if you don't read the article, but I will go so far as to opine that you'll develop better overall technique and progress faster if you follow the tenets in the post, and c'mon...it's Dan John, the dude knows what he's talking about, so you can't go wrong - Two Things That Didn't Make The T-Nation Article
• Since you're pretty much doing the same movement 10,000 times, you'll adapt very quickly, so be honest with yourself.  Start heavier than you think you should, or be ready to move up in weight.  It gets pretty easy to get to a point where you can just sorta coast through, but I would suggest instead to go heavier and keep pushing your time as hard as you can, in fact, I would challenge you to cut your starting time by at least 30% by the end of the program.  That's actually the one thing I could've done better, keeping my intensity level up.  Next run, sub-24 minutes or bust...
• Corollary to the above point, do not ignore or marginalize the following piece of advice: "This is a stand-alone program. If you feel you're able to do a second workout in the same day, then you are 'underbelled' – you're either not going heavy enough or not training with maximal effort."  I mention this because I've seen a lot of folks on various forums and workout sites using the clusters set as a supplemental workout to their "main" training, and I'll admit that even I was still hitting the mats, albeit on a severely reduced schedule, so no fight cardio days, no kickboxing or sparring class, just technique classes (Kaju, Silat, Systema, etc).  But that was all I did, there was no trying to hit my big three in the afternoon or alongside (which honestly, would be insanity).  In retrospect, even doing two cluster set sessions a day, which I did a few times to stay on schedule, is also cheating.  I know, I get it, it's a simple program and you'll be tempted to muck with it, or your ego will tell you that it's so simple, of course you'll have overhead for another workout, you're a member of that "trained population" the studies love to cite.  I say, in the words of Marsellus Wallace, "Fuck Pride", resist that temptation, check your ego, and go all out.  Use a 28kg bell if a 24kg is too easy, or heck, step up to the 32 or 48.  Do whatever you need to do to ensure that the program is challenging enough that you can do it at least 90% as presented.  I'm buying both a 28kg bell and a 32kg bell in prep for my next one, doing what I have to do to go as hard as I should be.  I invite and challenge you to do the same.

"...and I'm telling YOU, Marsellus, Fuck Pride and do the program right! So, we cool?"
"Yeah, we cool."

Through My Lens
    So I hope that I've come across as having an overwhelmingly positive opinion of this program, if not, guess I really need to work on my delivery, because, yes, I like and absolutely recommend this program.  I've already planned on doing a second run, with some tweaks based on my first go-around, and I've gotta say I'm pretty excited about it.  Having a reference for what kind of times I should be hitting, as well as what levels of physical exertion I should be reaching should make my second run even more beneficial than my first, provided I can figure out my calories so I'm not passing out tired and eventually stunting my fat loss, which, sadly, happened (although 18 lbs lost isn't that bad).  To summarize the rest of my thoughts:

• The 10/15/25/50 cluster with a lighter bell makes a great general warmup; I'm using a 16kg for 2 or 3 sets to warmup for my heavier kettlebell work.
• I'm pretty much convinced that the two-arm kettlebell swing is one of the most underused movements in training.  If you're like me and need to work on your mobility, you're doing yourself a huge disservice by not including kettlebell swings in your mobility programming.
• This is a great program to introduce someone to kettlebell work.  I'm a firm believer that the swing is the first movement someone should learn, and the structure of this program, along with Coach Dan's notes on technique, makes it near impossible for someone to learn to swing improperly.

    Even if you're not a huge kettlebell fan, give this program a shot.  As I mentioned above, I'll be using it again as both another cut and to springboard me into a six month kettlebell training cycle, wherein I'll be prepping for StrongFirst Kettlebell Instructor Level 1 Certification in November.  Wish me luck, and if you have any more questions related to programming for this program, Email Me or post a comment below and I promise I'll get back to you.

...next step down the new path.

Shake The Ground

Ok, I've officially failed at staying on my content schedule not two weeks into it.  I'm late posting this week, the original post I had scheduled for this week is barely even started, and the replacement post I wrote for that post is ALMOST done but still needs some serious editing, so I guess we're falling back to (a hastily concocted) Plan C: Shake and "Juice" Recipes!  I'll admit that I'm the last person to be posting recipes since I don't really cook anymore, but I figured maybe some hard information as opposed to my usual load of anecdote and observation might be a welcome change.  That and how hard can it be to screw up shake recipes?  Of course, I make no promises to the effectiveness of these recipes for you, I just know they work for me.  But they are pretty tasty (again, my opinion).

...Burroughs had his own ideas about what should go in shakes, I'm sure.

    The astute among you are probably wondering why Juice is presented in quotes above.  I'm glad you asked!  See, when most people think of juice, I get the impression that their idea is basically the combined humours of various members of the vegetable kingdom.  This is both valid and correct, however, here in Landbear Territory, juice basically means pulp.  Pulp means fiber, and for someone that eats meat like I do, fiber is good.  With that in mind, I have to take a moment and plug my shakemaker of choice, the Ninja Mega Kitchen System.  Now, I know this thing has gotten some bad press from some juicing sites, and rightly so if your idea of juice is purely liquid, but for me it's great because I don't have to have two devices, one for juice and one for blended shakes.  So if you like your juice with some punch, grab one of these.  Really, my only complaint would have to be the choice of names, I mean, the way this thing goes to town on just about everything that make the bad decision to wander to close to its six blades designed only for the massacre of foodstuffs, I think "Berserker" would've been a much better historical warrior for this thing's namesake.  Seriously, that's my only complaint, so onto the recipes...

...it's basically a whirling tornado of food evisceration.

I Drink This In The Morning

• 2 small cucumbers
• handful or so of kale (a handful is about 3/4 of a wet cup, I don't pack it in, I just grab a handful...or so)
• handful or so of spinach
• handful or so of lettuce (greenleaf or romaine, iceberg is somewhat nutrient devoid)
• handful or so broccoli florets
• maybe two handfuls of frozen berries (or 1/3 of a package of Trader Joe's frozen berry medley)
• 1 fuji apple
• 2 stalks celery
• 6-8 "baby" carrots (I know, they're not really baby carrots, just peeled and cut down normal carrots)
• 5 or 6 cherry tomatoes
• 16-20 oz chilled green tea
• Water to top off (or sugarfree beverage, I use Crystal Lite)
• (Optional) 1 scoop protein powder (something fruit, vanilla, or plain flavored, I use Isopure)
• (Optional) 1 or 2 servings of your greens powder of choice (I use Biotest Superfood)
• (Optional) 4 packets of stevia, Splenda, or other low/no-cal sweetener

Sometimes I Drink This At Night

• 16oz almond juice (or some other nut juice, I refuse to call it milk, sorry)
• 2 scoops chocolate-ish protein (I use one scoop of Sun Warrior and one scoop of Isopure)
• 1/2 cup yogurt (I use Pavel's Original Russian, it's the only full-fat stuff I can find around here)
• 4 packets splenda, stevia, or some other natural sweetener
• 1 tbsp PB2 chocolate
• 4 tbsp peanut butter (PB Co White and Dark Chocolate are awesome)
• sugar free chocolate syrup
• 5 ice cubes

    No clue about macros, calories, other than I think the first one has a ton of fiber and no fat, and the second one should have more fat and protein than carbs.  May not be the best choice if you're trying to keep calories down, but if I've learned anything in the last few months, it's that I've been keeping my calories too far down, so I'm trying to focus more on keeping my macros in check and not worrying so much about total calories, given the volume and types of training I'm doing.  Enjoy!

I've Come From Where I've Been

So I really haven't been blogging much the last...well, forever, and I realized the main reason is that I wasn't writing in my own voice.  For some reason I felt like I had to sanitize, organize, and basically go through all this process that made writing hard and not fun.  Not that process is bad, just that mine was so scattershot and focused on the wrong things that it became the epitome of process that just gets in the way.  So, I'm going be better about blogging this year (that's the most of a resolution you get out of me), this time with a new process, approach, and an actual schedule.  I'm not a professional writer, so when my writing voice can be the same as or near my thinking and speaking voice, I tend to write more, and have more fun doing it.  Corollary to that, I'm going to try and not post too many NSFW images (no porn or anything) or get too vulgar, because really I don't swear that much in real life, just when I get excited...and I guess "NSFW" depends on where you work.

...probably the most NSFW thing I'll post, boo if your co-workers can't take a joke.

    To give a bit more context before I jump in, one of the main things I learned in the last few months is that I have an unnatural love of training, to the point where it feels like a second job (but it's that proverbial "DWYLLWYD" type job).  This realization and acceptance was a big part of me getting on track and focused, which I credit for the huge upswell in positivity in my life as of recent, and it's been a marked change (people say I smile more).  As a result, it's going to seem like some of these blogs are super random and have nothing to do with training, technology, or any of the topics I originally set out to pontificate on in this blog.  In the interest of organization (a little), I'm starting another blog for stuff that's obviously not training related in any way, personal philosophy type stuff, random observations, art and creative process, etc.  If I start out on something and it obviously belongs there, it'll make it's way there (and you'll never know the difference;))

The blog is called "Finding My Mexico", if that phrase means anything to you (hint: it should)

    OK! Onto the meat of this post.  I've noticed a trend over the last couple years, this idea that, without fail, "Man, Last Year Sucked."  Seriously, take a moment, browse your social feeds from around NYE/NYD, and verify this for yourself.  In retrospect, it was the same last year, and I imagine if I were to scrape feeds from all the years I've been on social networks, it'd be the same (hmm, visualization project?).  Now, I don't mean to brag when I say this, but when I look at last year and going forward, I'm pretty happy!  Sure, I didn't do everything I wanted to do, had some false starts, some changes of direction, and some running through molasses, but I feel like I came out of it all with some good direction, and most of all, a destination I think is reachable.  I'm terming the process Mapping My Space (which I guess is a nod to work, so i'm not leaving it completely behind), and I'd like to share some thoughts on that over the next couple posts.  Granted, I can't give you a step-by-step that's going to work 100% for you, but maybe the Cliff's notes will give you some ideas. 

    I'll be honest, the real motivator for me was me was in a nutshell thinking: I need to Fix My Shit, which is something I think we all need to do to some extent.  Now, I don't want to come across as some tough love peddler, because that's really not what it's about.  I realize that some people, probably quite a few people, went through very real situations that they had little-to-no control over, and I'm not trying to make light of that at all, in fact, my heart goes out to quite a few folks as I know people have lost loved ones, had horrible accidents, business mishaps, relationship problems, from ugly breakups(definitely feel you on that one) to divorces (involving children, alimony, petulant ex-es, etc) and the like, so I understand some things do require a bit more than just a simple flip of the switch.  In fact, let me indulge myself a bit (further) and whine...uh, I mean elaborate to give a bit of context (although "break up" is a slight misnomer): I went through what to me was a pretty jarring personal incident literally the week of Christmas, made all the worse because it really did come out of nowhere, you know, it was one of those situations that you feel like, ok, I've finally got a handle on this, I can get a little comfortable, and then Crack!  Right on the button (down goes Frazier, DOWN GOES FRAZIER!!).

You never see the one that gets you. Probably why girls make such good fighters.
Ok, no more negativity directed at women ever again. Moving on.

    From my perspective, it was definitely bad enough that I could've just said, "Fuck it, 2013 is a wash," (though, in retro, it now seems so small and far behind, even just a month later, that it's laughable to think I could've gone down that road, in all seriousness, not being petty) and let me be clear, the outcome was shitty, i mean, i lost someone out of it.  That's never good, but choices had to be made, action had to be taken, and the best course was just walk away.  I'm not saying it's easy and over, it's still a thought and I'm sure i'll be dealing with it for the next few months, but the fact that I have a plan for how to transition my energy keeps me comfortable with saying "that's just how it's going to go," and letting the plan flow.  I know i've sorta skirted around my weird relationships in other blog posts, I'm not going go into detail about them, but I also promise that I'm not going to ever mention relationships again, even in passing.  Over, said, done, keep breathing, keep moving.  So let's pull back out a bit now and start setting the stage for the actual process...

...or hallucinogenics, because this MIGHT require a bit of a shift in thinking on your part.

    Here's the thing, I'm actually not opposed to people declaring that it's a new year, new me, or that this year is the year that they're going to become a badass at whatever their chosen focus is, and fuck all the folks who love to meme that shit, you're all kinda dicks.  Personally, I think it's fuckin great, it hypes me up too!  I get excited to see that people are passionate and I get even more excited to see people succeed and become that new them or hit the levels of awesomeness they're after.  It actually amazes me a little that more people aren't supportive of that pursuit, although I guess it could be chalked up to ego, something about how we view even the slightest bit of emotional investment as tantamount to full commitment, and so we take it as a personal slight when we encourage someone to get after it and then they don't live up to our expectations...of what they were going to do for themselves.  Put like that, it seems even weirder that people instead tend to have this sort of attitude (with friends like that...):

...honestly, this meme pisses me off more than most of the others combined.

    The problems set in after the initial New Year excitement wears off and we're left wondering...Ok, where do I go from here, or even worse, everything just sort of fades out and we continue to trudge on along a similar path unless something major like a move, new job, or unfortunate tragedy jars us onto a new path. That's exciting (in a good or bad way) for a bit, but eventually we tend to drift back to the same courses of action from our previous state, right up until, oh, say about the 31st of a December of a given year, whereupon, we look back and decide, "Man, Last Year Sucked," made all the sadder because this year was the year we really decided to do it and make some changes, you know, do things differently, become a personal badass, be the new me, and all that such positive affirmation (despite whatever snarky memems internet decides to foist on us).  So where did it all go wrong??  We came seeking awesomeness!  I'm going to hypothesize a bit based on my own experience and say that often it boils down to a few points, including, but not limited to:

• Lack of focus, because of
• Too short- or too far-sightendess, which lends itself to
• Unqualified expectations, leading to
• Lack of perceived progress, all of which stems from
• An unclear plan, due to
• Lack of personal honesty (my words applied to myself, not commenting on you)

    As I said, including, but not limited to, so I don't mean this to be a definitive list or a call out, nor am I saying this is what's going on with you.  Again, this is based on my experience and observation, thus, these are the things I noticed in my own process.  But let's be honest, I'm sure none of these sound out of the ordinary at all, and if you take a moment and think about it, you may even be able to identify some of these as your own sticking points, I mean, I read this list myself and it does sounds like Self-Help 101, which is probably just a commentary on what a textbook case I am.  I promise, this is as generic self-helpy as this is going to get, my intention going forward is not to give you a blanket process for solving the problem, instead, I'd like to take a look at how I solved (am solving/addressing) these issues through my own lens, including my training focus, well, especially my training focus, in the hopes of you being able to replace training with your own personal equivalent focus and move forward from there.  In the next Wednesday's post, I'll talk about how this all started with me and how I addressed the first couple of these posts, so stay tuned.  Serious as a heart attack when I say I'm going to get back to blogging this year.  This is going to be one (of many) awesome year(s) for me, you should do the same...

...because 9 out of 10 fence-jumping Corgis already think you're awesome.

My Thoughts On The Desolation Of Smaug

Fun thought experiment for my Martial Artist/Fighter Friends:

    I was watching The Hobbit 2 yesterday (which I enjoyed, yep, I said it), and I got to thinking, if the races of Middle Earth had their own martial arts, which I figure they probably do, what would the be/be based in?  Here's what I came up with (this is just a few of the races represented in the movies, i'm not going to even try to hit up all 25+ including variants):

---

Dwarves: Definitely Sambo.  Those stout dwarven builds I think would give them quite a bit of leverage to work with and they're at just the right height to apply all those great sambo leg techniques.

Hobbits: Silat for sure.  Perfect height to strike upward into those soft, unprotected spots, very compact builds, great for moving around the body, and let's be honest, with feet like that, they can foot and ankle trap all damn day and not GAF.  Also, hobbits just seem perfectly suited to the karambit.

Elves: Kalaripayattu, given their penchant for flowing, continuous motion and longer range work.  Actually, I'd love to see one or more of the elves bust out a flexible sword in the next hobbit movie (or any movie involving elves)

Humans: Some combination of different classical western boxing styles, I'm thinking british and irish, with that Mexican boxer ferocity.

Orcs: Kajukenbo, but not just any Kajukenbo, we're talking Master Brother Abe Pilau Style.  Lots of super heavy upper body work, forearm strikes, and every hit breaks something.

Seth's Birthday Training Extravaganza!

    I know I'm totally late to this party but Arrow? Great show, i mean, GREAT FREAKIN SHOW.  It's exactly what I want a comic book TV show to be (minus Thea, god I hope she dies horribly, what an annoying, unnecessary character).  I do wish that Kelly Hu's character would quit with the karambits.  It's not just a cool looking knife, there's real technique that goes with it.  Ah well, I know, that's a total martial arts nerd/fanboyish thing, sue me.  And honestly, I'm totally ok with Kelly Hu getting tons of screen time, though truth be told, the world needs to see more Rinko Kikuchi, mmmm...Not sure what it is, but in the last couple months I've become really attracted to Asian women.  You know, in the last couple of months, my whole concept of what I find attractive in women has changed...well, changed is not an accurate term, let's say broadened?  Coincidentally, my definition of relationships has broadened quite a bit too, well, let's not say broadened, let's say I'm giving myself permission to be ok with the concepts of relationships I've had for a while and felt guilty about because..well, yeah.  Really, it's just that I'm all about options, but that's a post for another day and blog entirely.  Also...there are a lot of really in shape, hot dudes in Arrow, and the writers find a lot of excuses to show them shirtless.  Tasty.


Really? You WOULDN'T? Not even a little? ...
    Anyway, I've decided my birthday week 2014 is going to be a whirlwind tour of training, friends, sex, drugs, and rock and roll.  Well, i mean if you replace drugs with craft beer and whiskey, rock and roll with industrial, and sex with...more training (tho if someone wants to give me a..."special birthday present", I'm open).  I will say if there's one thing I'm definitely ok with it, it's the idea that spending money on training and tools is something I'm not going to feel guilty about at all.  I've held for a long time that spending money on experiences outweighs spending money on things by a factor of...some very large number, but it's still a good idea to get the most bang for your buck.  Go airline miles, hotel points, and couch surfing!  So here we go...

• Martin Wheeler Systema Seminar at Shugyo Center - First steps on my Systema journey, I've always really been interested in the concepts behind Systema but have just recently experienced good instruction.  The last time I took a Systema workshop was about 10 yrs ago and given perspective, the instruction wasn't great.  On a side note, the seminar is taking place in a city where a dear friend of mine lived and passed a little while ago.  Will be good to exchange energy, me thinks.
• Mateo Kajukenbo - I went to a Kaju seminar in Portland, OR last month and got to train with one of Prof. Mateo's Sigungs.  Gotta say I was really impressed, so I'm hoping to be able to drop in on these guys.  From what I understand, they're changing locations, so hopefully they'll have one nailed down by January.
• Worden Defense System/NSI - Been talking about Datu Worden since the Portland seminar too, can't say enough good things about working with him.  More than anyone I think he's really got the pulse of MPMA.  Can't find a class schedule for him, so might have to make some calls, but since I'm planning on attending Water and Steel 2014 anyway, may not be a big loss if nothing happens.
• Kajukenbo-Ge Shou Dao - Another side effect of the Portland Kaju Seminar was that I got to see different groups from the Pacific Northwest (which was my main impetus for going to the seminar) and I was totally blown away.  Didn't get a chance to work with Prof. Davies, but I've gotten to work and speak with his Grandmaster, GM Jerry Scott, and he's a good man with lots of useful information.
• Whittle Kajukenbo - A little on the fence about this one just because Spokane is like a 4 hour drive, but damn, Grandmaster Whittle was good and his students were awesome.  Good Kaju guys and just good people in general.  They have a Saturday morning class, but given what I'll be doing Friday night, I doubt I'll be getting up at 5AM Saturday morning.  This one's probably worth its own trip anyway, as GM Whittle also teaches Royal Hawaiian Lua, wouldn't mind having the time to take a few classes with him.
• Systema WA - Highly recommended Systema instructor in Washington who's new to the area from what I understand, so why not drop in?  Seattle...you're making it harder and harder for me to stay away.
• Capoeira Malês - Should set things right with Mestre probably so I can really get back to playing proper.  Been away from home too long.
• ...and of course there will be some sort of weight training, I imagine I'll just hit up the 24 Hour Fitness at Northgate like I usually do just because they have tons of gear and heavy kettlebells, which doesn't suck.  At all.

OPEN INVITATION!!!

    Once I get the specifics of which classes I'll be taking when, I'll be posting the full schedule here, so if anyone wants to join for any of this stuff, hit me up and we'll throw down.  Slightly ego-centric, I know, yes, I'm sure people are lining up to come train with me, but whatever, it's out there.  It'll be a good time either way.  Also, when did I get so old??


Evolve . Survive . Live

10,000 Kettlebell Swings In The Air

    Once again I'm approaching that time of the year where my thoughts turn to what sort of crazy sprint I'm going to do for what I call the "Turkey-to-Tree" period.  As you can probably imagine, it's that month between Thanksgiving and Christmas where holiday parties abound, complete with tons of horrible for you food and drink all laid out in the spirit of festive giving and sharing.  Now, I have no problem with festive giving and sharing, but I decided a while back that I didn't really want to follow the pattern of bloating, err, sorry, bulking up over the holiday hibernation period and taking the following quarter to shed the accompanying...well let's just call it what it is, fat, for the beach season.  So I (try) to do what I call a Turkey-to-Tree sprint every year, or T2T (catchy, eh?).

    I started doing Turkey-to-Tree sprints a while ago, but didn't do one last year for a few reasons (bad relationship, busy at work, etc), nor the year before for a few reasons (bad relationship, moving, changing jobs, etc), so I'm pretty committed to doing one this year, and since there are no relationships whatsoever anywhere near me, other than those of my dear friends up in Seattle, who I'm very much looking forward to spending a long and incredibly inebriated birthday weekend with in a few months, what better time to re-visit an old ritual that's always done me some good? I really like the T2T for a few reasons:

• It springboards me into the next year really well.  I want to get back to being big and strong like I was a few years ago when I started seriously powerlifting, and I've made good progress in the past coming off of a good, high-intensity, moderate-to-low calorie resistance program.
• It's the end of the year, why not just go out in a balls-to-the-wall, all-in, sprint to the finish?  I love the holidays and everything we associate with them (well except, Black Friday, that's just some BS), but no need to shut down.  In fact, I say take advantage of the empty gyms and empty offices and go hard and heavy.  Cross the end of the year finish line at a dead sprint and keep going into the new year.



• It's a great way to burn away all the BS that may or may not have happened during the year.  If you had a fabulous year and are riding high, awesome!  Keep it up, crank hard, and finish up knowing you set one more challenge in front of yourself and killed it!  But maybe you didn't have a GREAT year.  Maybe there were some things that you just want to slough off and in the process refocus.  Take a month, go hard, crank those endorphins up the best way possible and get yourself right.

CAUTION: WHINING AHEAD, SKIP THIS SECTION IF YOU DON'T WANT TO HEAR ME COMPLAIN

    Look, I know a relationship, according to conventional wisdom, is the worst reason to stop training.  No!  They say, you should train through it!  Use training to get right!

    That's all well and good but you know, sometimes things just add up.  I'm not saying this as a woe is me sorta thing, i'm just setting some context.  It wasn't just the "relationship", it was alot of the things surrounding it as well.  It had me questioning my self worth, my interaction with other people, even my value to my company, everything.  Basically, it played on every insecurity I have about myself and put me in the lowest spot I've ever been personally, and because of some of the specifics, I wasn't able to really talk to anyone about it, and the other party was pretty much unwilling to try and talk, resolve, come to closure, anything.

    So, I need to do something different (and yes, I know, I need to man up.  I'm working on that as well).  I need to do something that gets me focused, gets me breathing, gets me moving, gets the rest of this fat off, and just gets me reset.  I know it's all in my head, because outside of that one thing, everything else has been pretty solid.  Work's gone...ok, my other training, Kajukenbo, Silat, grappling, even lifting, have all been spot on, even with the knee and shoulder problems.  Sometimes things just get too big and out of control because you didn't stomp em down and walk away when you should've.  So, anyway...(and for those of you who have some idea what I'm talking about, this is the last I'm going to say on it.  Sorry if I've been a dick or treated you less than well.  I can't promise it's going to get better soon, but I'm working on it.  That's what I got for now, hang out and deal with my BS (which I will attempt to minimize for social grace), or check back in 6 months.)

WHINING OVER

Enter Dan John's 10,000 Swing Kettlebell Workout

    It's funny, because you all probably know my take on extreme volume/intensity/etc programs that are poorly thought out or just done for the sake of being difficult.  Well, I've been a Dan John fan for quite a while, and if there's one thing I've learned about his work, he doesn't just do random things.  Everything that makes it to the public from Dan John comes from testing, observation, and of course, Dan's quite considerable amount of experience.  So when I saw this, it seemed like the perfect way to end the year.  5 weeks, 20 workouts, 10,000 Kettlebell Swings.  Me being me, of course, I also saw this as a chance to do that other thing that I love doing so much, which is plan around/design programs.  I've spent a little bit of time planning (obsessing over) a nutrition and supplementation plan to go along with this, and it's funny, i was mucking about in my spreadsheet today, tweaking some final numbers and it almost literally just appeared.  Total serendipitous moment, it was like the clouds just parted and revealed my nutrition supplementation plan...sounds silly, I know, you had to have been there.  Nutrition and supplementation isn't something Dan touched on in the article, but he does make a few statements that bear some thinking on (from me):

• "Every person who has completed this 20 workout plan has increased lean muscle mass while dropping body fat."
• "Everyone got leaner, dropping a waist size or two, in 20 workouts."
• "Every coach or athlete made visual muscular improvements in their physiques, adding lean body mass."
• "Abs were more visible..."

    These statements give me pause, not because I don't believe them, but because after years of training, I have a good understanding of how my metabolism works, and I know that if I want to make significant changes, I can't just hop on a really hard program and look markedly different in five weeks.  I have to consider all facets, and I have to hit a bit of an extreme with those other facets too.  I'm not going to sugarcoat it, at the end of the day, part of my drive is I want to look good enough to hook up when I go back to Seattle for my b-day (not that that's on the agenda, but a little positive female attention would do some good for my self-esteem).  I also set a goal of being back around 12-15% BF by the end of the year, and given where I am now, that's doable, but not without some diligence.  Last, while I respect Dan John quite a bit, I also respect my own experience enough to know that, with some tweaks to nutrition and recovery, I can hit this program pretty hard and still hit the dojo as well.  I have another goal of wearing my green belt when I hit Vegas next year for the KSDI Tournament, so no skipping Kaju unless absolutely necessary.  Kickboxing may or may not be necessary for conditioning, we'll give it a test and see what the effect ends up being.

    So that's the preview, I'll talk more about the specifics of my plan at the end of the 5 weeks, what worked, what didn't, and what all I used specifically. November 25th is D-Day, time to do it up.

Kneehab!

First off, a tiny bit of butt-cover. I am not now, never have, and never will claim to be anything close to a person who can give anyone any useful advice about rehab, PT, any of that stuff.  The most I'll tell anyone for the record is "Buy a foam roller (or PVC, if you're like me and effeduproyal) and a lacrosse ball, and here's a bunch of youtube vids that'll show you what to do with 'em".  If you happen to sprain, strain, or tear something, the best advice is get it checked out ASAP.  This is something I did NOT do, not because I'm "hardcore", not because I was broke, not for any good reason, I just didn't know better.  I definitely should've at least gotten an evaluation from some reputable medical professional so if nothing else, I would've had a baseline for how injured I was.

    I AM going to go on record and say that when it does happen (and it WILL happen), you need to take advice on recovery from someone who understands where you're coming from, which for the practicing Devlifter means: Not your regular GP guy.  Find a good sports therapist, competition trainer, someone who has experience dealing with people who train outside the realm of the general populace, because otherwise you just run the risk of getting some yahoo who's going to tell you to go get surgery and you'll never have full use of whatever you injured again.  In some cases, that may be true, but me, I'd rather hear it from someone who can really look at everything in proper context.  I dunno, on some level, I feel really bad writing this because it just reeks of me giving people misinformation, so let's also butt-cover this by saying, this is just MY experience and it's kinda worked for ME.  You really need to figure out what's going to work for you and don't be quite as negligent as i was.  However, if you insist on being ridiculous, like me (don't do that, seriously, don't ever be like me), here are some things that MIGHT POSSIBLY point you somewhere in the vicinity of where you want to go.

Until we can heal like this, it helps to have a plan

    Long story short, about 3 weeks ago in kickboxing class, I landed a flying knee wrong and jacked up my support leg.  See, it's even a lame story, I wish I could be all, "Yeah man, i threw that flying knee and he blocked with his elbow and tore my sh** up," but no...it was pretty much all my fault.  The best (worst) part was I didn't even do it during a drill, I was just practicing the technique BEFORE we started drilling...which meant I didn't really even get a chance to drill the movement.  That's embarrasing man, that's like walking out on the floor to do your forms or something, tripping in front of the judges, and hurting yourself bad enough that you can't compete.  Anyway, whining aside, it was bad enough that I figured I probably shouldn't stay for the second class, but not bad enough that I couldn't finish the class I was in, and definitely not bad enough that I couldn't put some weight on it.  For those reasons I figured it was minor enough that I could take care of it myself and be ok as long as I didn't do anything stupid.  A few weeks of ice, stretching, and foam rolling, and I'd be alright.

    Problem: I hate icing. Actually, I hate anything that makes me feel slow or movement impeded, which is why I don't get drunk very often anymore and one of the main reasons I stopped doing...erm, other things that may be legal now.  I've done the whole RICE thing in the past, and I wasn't really looking forward to doing it again, but you know, as I've gotten older and gained something like the ability to look a bit further down the road and realize what's actually important, I'm ok doing what has to be done to get where I want to go.  BUT I STILL HATE ICING.  Thankfully, I've somehow managed to find myself in the company of many people who are much more intelligent about many things than I am.  Take for instance, my good friend Brad Clark of Rigging Dojo fame, who happened to drop the following knowledge bombs on me just as I was about to embark down that treacherous path:

    Wait so, I could NOT do the thing I hate (even though it's burned into the gospel of recovery) and still recover?  Well, alllllright.  It's funny, because Erica, she of Stuff I Make My Husband fame, had mentioned Mobility|WOD to me a while back and the do have some crazy knowledge bombs.  I definitely recommend checking out the following videos, and while they are a bit preachy and marketing-y (I think one of the guys is trying to sell people some machine or implement), there's a decent bit of underlying knowledge here that may change your view on things.  Again, I don't have any sort of certification for therapy, so no one get all butt hurt because you've been recommending RICE to everyone and now they have an alternate viewpoint (heaven forbid).  Just write it off by saying what I just said, i.e. I have no credentials, just personal experience.

• Mobility|WOD: People, We’ve Got to Stop Icing. We Were Wrong, Sooo Wrong.
• Mobility|WOD: Community Video – Peoples, We’ve Got to Stop Icing. A Year Later…

    I think the universe sorta wanted me to go down this path anyway, as T Nation posted another great article that basically amounts to Compression Wrapping 101, along with some more awesome videos that you should absolutely add to your recovery arsenal.  This came out about a week and a half after I started down the recovery path so I didn't make as much use of it as I'd like to, but I'm definitely starting to think about ways to use it as a supplement to foam rolling for general well being.

• TNATION: Two Minute Injury Fix

    To make matters even better (but wait, theeerrrre's more!!), I found this other article on EliteFTS that kinda sums up this whole blog post much more succinctly and informatively than...this blog post.

• EliteFTS: How To Be Superman With Your Knees

    Coach Scott Abel talks alot about biofeedback and being able to read your own body, and that's probably been the most useful tool in this whole process for me.  If I go back to the day I injured myself and think about how I was feeling, yeah, my legs were SUPER tight, I mean it really was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back, or in this case, the load that sprained the knee, I mean my legs were uncomfortably tight, and not just because of my Kaju pants.  Knowing that, I pieced together a recovery program that addresses everything based on what I remember feeling:

• First, I started just WALKING again, and this was a super eye-opening thing for me because the first couple days I did it, it felt awkward.  Imagine that, walking feeling weird!  That right there should tell you that there's a basic mobility issue.
• I've gotten back to taking mobility and flexibility seriously.  I'm performing hour long mobility/flexibility sessions every morning, upper body some days, lower body other days, but both with the goal of just being able to move around again.  I want the kind of mobility I had when I was doing Capoeira, and you know, we used to stretch and do basic movement exercises for about an hour before we started drilling techniques.  This has actually been huge, not just for the gains I'm already feeling, but just because doing it in the morning makes me feel GREAT for the day.
• Had to make some little tweaks to my lifting program, but I don't feel like it's been anything crazy detrimental.  The most "extreme" change I've made is moving squatting to the end of the week so I've got a full weeks worth of mobility work stacked up before I go in.  I've dropped my numbers back too, for example, this week my working max was 235, which at a normal tear I probably would've hit for 10-12, but I kept it at 5, just to be safe.  It's a marathon, not a sprint, and even though I do want to do some meets next year, keeping the legs right for Kajukenbo is priority.
• Lastly, NO MORE SKIPPING PVC ROLLING EVER.  Sure, I'm doing it every morning, but I'm also doing it before every lifting session now, even if it's just 10 or 20 passes over the IT band and adds.  When I take a step back and think about it, I'm putting some serious demands on my legs!  Kickboxing, Silat, squatting, deadlifting, that's alot to ask without giving some TLC back.  So, I'm sorry legs, thanks for reminding me I was being a jerk, it won't happen again (if only I could fix my relationships that easily...another story)

    To wrap it up, look, I'm not going to say don't ever ice again, that's up to you and whoever you're working with.  What I am saying is that this time, I didn't ice and I've recovered faster than I did from smaller injuries that I have iced.  I'm not going to run out and hurt myself again just to see if I can quantify things a bit better, but yeah, I think i'm pretty sold on mobility, flexibility, and compression.  I'll post up the specifics of my mobility splits here in a bit, I'm still fine tuning.  I hope these resources end up being helpful, if for no other reason than they make you think about stuff.  Train Hard So Real Life Is Easy.

Seriously, this is how icing my joints makes me feel...