Today was a daddy daycare day and I needed to go to the grocery store. Kroger is 1.7 miles away from us, so I decided to take Avi for a walk in the Bob Revolution.

Guessing total distance was four miles including walking around Kroger.

Why include this? I see it as low-level activity for one. For another, I’m trying to implement a sort of LeanGains-inspired strategy, which is daily fasts broken in early afternoon, say 2 pm, and begun nightly no later than 10pm. Furthermore, on weight-lifting days, I eat more than on low-intensity days. Thus, yesterday I didn’t break my fast until maybe 6 or 6:30 when I had a couple glasses of Kombucha Tea. Dinner was grilled chicken over field greens, mandarin oranges, blueberries, strawberries, feta, and a citrus-y zesty Italian dressing. Had some bourbon after and that was it. I’d guess total caloric load last night was no more than 700 calories.

It was kinda strange b/c I noticed some appetite suppression after dinner, which is unusual. I often feel or want to eat something else after dinner, but I didn’t have that urge last night.

I did wake up around 4am, which is something that only seems to happen when I’ve been restricting calories a good bit, so that was surprising.

We’ll see how this goes – weight right now is 174ish by the way.

Just did the C8B300 in 18:32. Marks the first time I’ve done this workout in over two months! The last time I did it was on February 19, when I did it in 16:30.

It was rough, which means that I really needed to do it.

Note: was about 19 hours fasted.

I have finished the 30 day 10,000 35 lb. kettlebell swing challenge!

At long last (after a month), I have completed the challenged and done 10,000 35 lb. (one “pood") kettlebell swings in thirty days! Based on the records below, I spread these swings out over 24 days, averaging in at approximately 417 swings a day. Clearly, at the end things got a little lumpy thanks for some busy weekends and a weekend away (at a wedding in Cali).

I am glad to be done with this challenge. Kettlebell swings are an intense form of exercise, and at a minute and a half for 55 swings, that totals up to about four and a half hours of straight kettlebell swings spread out over a month. Sure, if you’re working out three times a week for 45 minutes, you’re putting in nearly 10 hours of workout time a month, but you also are taking brief rests in between sets at the gym, and kettlebell swinging is more intense than regular cardiovascular exercise. Alls I’m sayin’ is that 4.5 hours of kettlebell swings is intense!

And it’s also monotonous. This is why I wouldn’t do this challenge again. Swings just get boring, like work, and exercise should be fun and challenging, not just challenging. Other drawbacks to this challenge is that it puts your hamstrings in a generally achy state most all the time—not enough to be super annoying, but enough to be irritating. I think the high repetitions is also not so good for knees and lower back. Yes, if you’re swinging properly, you’re not blowing out your knees or your back, but when you’re doing such high reps, you start using stabilizing muscles and putting strain on joints that normally are left alone. One final negative is that interjecting so many swings throughout your day demotivated me to doing any additional weight-lifting. That’s a big “negative” to a program like this.

On the plus side, it seems that the daily, dispersed swinging time had some benefits as far as body recomposition. However, it’s at the margin (Read: it’s hard to tell). I wish I had done a before and after vertical leap, but I didn’t. All this swing work helped me really get a feel for the hip-snap action that makes a swing most powerful, so chalk up that for another benefit.

All said, though, I wouldn’t do it again. Did I mention I was glad it’s over?

Original Write-up and Records/Notes

The idea for this 30-day kettlebell swing challenge emerged from a combination of wanting to do 1,000 swings in one workout session (I did 500) and some twitter from @sandysommer (Charm City Kettlebells) about a 10k swing challenge. I seem to recall that challenge involving doing something like 200 swings a day.

Well, my 10K swing challenge is intended to be completed in 30 days. That means I have to do 333 swings per day, every day, for 30 days. I’m using my 35 lb. kettlebell, and the intention is for this not to replace other workouts. In other words, I’d like to additionally continue doing weight training and other exercise in concert with this challenge. Also, the total can be broken up however makes the most sense. Currently, I’m breaking it down into three rounds of two sets each. The rounds are spread throughout my day, which makes for a nice five minute break between working, blogging, etc. Default method is double-arm. “SA” is noted where alternating single-arm swings (Sets of 11 per arm, typically). “SAA” is noted where single-arm swings are performed with a flip/pass at thea peak of every swing. A set of 55 takes me a minute and a half (exactly) to complete.

I started the challenge on 3/16/09. Check back here to see my progress:

3/16: 333 (3x[56,55])
3/17: 333 (3x[56,55])
3/18: 333 (2x[56,55]SA, 1x111)
3/19: 333 ([56,55], 1x111, [56,55])
3/20: 333 ([56x3 w/1:30 rest between sets], [55x3 w/1:30 rest between sets])
3/21: 333 (9x33, 36)
3/23: 666 (3x[56,55], 9x33, 36)
3/24: 333 (3x[56,55]SA)
3/25: 333 (9x33SA, 36SA)
3/26: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
3/27: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
3/28: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
3/30: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
3/31: 666 (2x[9x33SA,36SA])
4/1: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
4/2: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
4/3: 333 (9x33SAA, 36SAA)
4/4: 333 (4x66SA, 69SA)
4/7: 666 (36SA, 9x66SA, 36SA)
4/8: 666 (36SA, 9x66SA, 36SA)
4/9: 666 (2x[9x33SA,36SA])
4/13: 333 (36, 9x33, 10)
4/14: 500 (10x50SA)
4/15: 499 (4x100SA, 99SA)

Total to date: 10,000

Notes: 3/21 - Starting to really nail the snap aspect of the swing. It feels very much like the GHD sit-up hip flexor snap feels, where you actually feel your heels want to slide back on the floor due to the snap action. The upswing motion is much more forceful when the snap is right. 3/27 - despite doing no other exercise other than the challenge this past week, I think this sort of dispersed, daily workout may be having some positive impacts on body composition. Of note, I am practicing LeanGains style IF, which is more or less having a compressed daily eating window (so fasting from say 10pm to 2-4pm everyday). 3/31 - over halfway through this challenge and I just found where I originally read about it at innergrrr.blogspot.com. Key difference to that challenge which is set at six weeks (42 days), I’m doing it in 30. Trivial difference? Surely not! 4/4 - Gotten into the “swing” of doing five sets @ of three left/three right single-arm 11 rep mini-sets of swings. I like this breakdown mostly because the 11-rep swap makes each “big” set feel much smaller, and considerably less boring. I do wonder if I could further compact it into 3 sets of 111. Hmm. 4/7 - I took a two day hiatus from the swing challenge to see if I couldn’t alleviate some lower back soreness. It didn’t quite do the trick though. What’s weird is that it doesn’t seem like muscle soreness and it doesn’t seem like any part of my swing aggravates the sore area. So I’m puzzled.

Sidenote: today was day 4 of my 10,000 kettlebell swing project - that means I’m up to 1,332 kettlebell swings (@35 lb.) in four days (333/day). Of course, I didn’t do any other workout activity on any of those days (except an evening walk with the wife but that doesn’t count). The swing challenge is interesting, but 300+ swings a day is a lot of swings and can feel a bit tedious (Even as I’m guessing the time commitment here is less than 10 minutes total and spread throughout my workday).

Anyway, decided to do some “real” weight lifting today as I’ve been out of sync on workouts for awhile now. So in addition to the 333 swings today, here’s my workout:

5x5 single-arm 70 lb. kettlebell push press

9x10 2x53 lb. kettlebell floor press
9x10 2x53 lb. kettlebell row

Rows were increasingly a struggle requiring a pause or two to complete the set of 10 after say set six or seven.

Did a repeat of the Thrustwingprees 300 workout (TSB300) from February 12^th:

- 100 Single-arm Thrusters, 35 lb. kettlebell (50 per arm, broken down into sets of 20 with a minute rest between each set)

- 100 70 lb. Kettlebell Swings (broken down into sets of 10 with a minute of rest in between)

Elapsed time at this point — 25 minutes on the nose (that includes the jumping jacks).

- 100 Burpees. At this point, goal was to be regimented but mainly going for time efficiency (i.e. as quickly as possible, but regimenting rest).

Total time: 37:40 — I thought I was making terrible time, too, but managed to beat out my time from a month ago by almost four minutes. Woot!

The TSB300 is even more brutal than I remember it. This workout destroys me. As I am typing this, I’ve got sweat runners going everywhere. Totally disgusting. Time to go surprise the wife with a hug*!

Off to a happy hour now. It’s the weekend. Be Active!

*Yeah, right. Do you think I’m crazy?

As an extension of yesterday’s departure from my regular workout norms (See Active Day, 500 Swings, M.E.G., and Positive Addiction 3/4/09), today’s workout was simple, different, fun, and worth working into my more regular workout repertoire.

So what did I do? — I set my watch at 30 minutes, grabbed my wife’s 18 lb kettlebell and just started doing kettlebell drills (i.e. Jeff Martone). The idea was never to let the kettlebell come to rest and to try and not think about the exercises too much. I made it a point not to count repetitions. I stayed as fluid as possible (not always easy to transition between certain kettlebell drills). I made up stuff to do with the bell. More typical drills I incorporated throughout were ATB, Figure-8s, Figure-8 uppercuts, swings, presses, flipping the bell (and pass flips), swinging the bell like a bat, swinging the bell laterally, hot potatoes, etc.

I only dropped the bell twice.

The workout was fun, different, and required little active thought. The concept driving this workout is, like yesterday’s 500 kettlebell swings, to achieve a transcendental or meditative state (a la Glasser’s Positive Addiction) via intense, fundamentally mindless, repetitive, and non-competitive exercise.

Something like today’s haphazard or random kettlebell drills just might accomplish the objective. I definitely managed to “lose myself” intermittently in today’s thirty minute session and the workout felt fast.

Further testing is required.

I followed up the above with 60 seconds (In total, 20/9/11/9/8/3) of frog stands in line with Christopher Sommer’s planche training).

Be active!

Today’s workout was:

60 jumping jacks
20 uneven push-ups (10 per side using a 70 lb. kettlebell to make the surface uneven)
20 standing lunges (10 per side)
20 mountain climbers (10 per side)
20 air squats
60 second plank
5 burpees
10 70 lb. kettlebell swings
Rest 1 minute

Repeat for a total of three rounds

Rested around 45 minutes and then did it all again subbing a 45 second wall squat for the air squats.

First time was 16:15 – second time took 17:20.

About 26 hours fasted, I did one hour of low intensity (about 120 bpm heartrate on average) stationary biking while watching the first episode of season three of Dexter.

Dexter aside, it was pretty boring, but I bet you could have guessed as much. Goal today was to take advantage of fasted-state free fatty acid oxidation while minimizing protein catabolism, thus the low-intensity cardio. Who knows if it was actually worth it (probably not).

On another note, I bought a road bike off eBay that should be arriving by UPS this evening. It’s a brand new Felt F80 (circa 2006/7 model). Woot!

Too bad 1) I almost certainly don’t have all the tools to assemble it 2) it’s 28 degrees outside here in Atlanta and it’s probably going to stay cold for the next couple weeks. At least I can look at it!

It’s difficult to call today’s exercise a workout. I’ve been wanting to smoke a cigar all holiday but with the super-blah weather the past three days I just haven’t gotten ’round to it.

But cabin-fever was peaking out and I just decided to grab a Maduro and go to the garage.

Cigar-smoking is a great activity to combined with a fellow-smoker or a pretty view. Having neither on this foggy day, I did random sets of exercises, most of which were kettlebell-based, between cigar puffs. So over the course of an hour or so, I did any number of swings, ATB uppercuts, pull-ups, dips, and some other kettlebell drills.

By the time the cigar was growing short, I had reached a great meditative state and actually had begun to appreciate the drab, foggy weather and the supremely quiet neighborhood street. I never broke a sweat, but I definitely got my heart rate pumping between easy drags on the stogie.

Thus today was sort of a rest day (Though not quite). All said and done, I feel a lot better – sanguine, even.

And I think I’ll have to mix cigar-smoking and random exercises again one day. It’s a weird combo, for sure, but today it was a needed one.

I managed the Ballantyne’s Crazy 8 Bodyweight 300 Cardio Circuit (C8B300) today in a record 17:27. I’m coming off a full day of rest and a weekend where I had a carbohydrate refeed and otherwise normal eating.

After, I rested for about five minutes and then did two sets of the following three kettlebell combos using my 35 lb. kettlebell:

• Kettlebell swing/flips x 20
• ATB Kettlebell uppercuts x 10

Then:

• Kettlebell rows x 10 per arm
• Kettlebell military press x 10 per arm

Then:

• Kettlebell swing/flip/catch/press/flip x 10
• Kettlebell snatch x 5 per arm

Since that wasn’t enough (???), I did 5x20 35 lb. single-arm (switching with a flip) kettlebell swings (100 total).

And then finished off with 2x20 35 lb. kettlebell upright rows mixed with 2x15 35 lb. kettlebell front squats.

Entire time was about 47 minutes.

You might be wondering why I did such a long, mixed up (aimless?) workout. Well, the goal here was glycogen depletion, which is accomplished by lots of repetitions across all body parts. I figured the C8B300 is a great glycogen depletion circuit though it is mostly composed of presses (making it short on pulls). Thus, the complement to the C8B300 would be doing a number of kettlebell exercises since kettlebell drills focus more on pulling motions. That was the idea anyway.

Why do you want to deplete glycogen? Well, the idea is to fast-track the fat mobilization process by exhausting glycogen stores in the muscles. Once depleted, the muscles will need fat for energy, which the body will be forced to provide (So you are putting the body in a catabolic state).

Of course, the only reason I have glycogen stores to deplete in the first place is because of the aforementioned carb-refeed. Why did I carb-refeed? To protect against downregulating metabolism from dieting/fasting/low-carb’ing – I was also trying to make it more likely that my weight training workouts over the weekend actually result in some muscle growth (anabolic state). In short, this is a pseudo-modified implementation of a cyclical ketogenic diet (maybe?).

I’m fasting until dinner tomorrow night.

In other exercise news, my brother stumbled on a local who is getting rid of his 70 lb. RKC kettlebell. I’m gonna nab it in the AM for a steep discount to the dragondoor.com price* (honestly, buying a used kettlebell is going to be a steal no matter what – its not like a used kettlebell is any worse than a brand new one**).

* I got my two 53 lb. RKC kettlebells together off eBay. I suspect that Dragon Door unloads the kettlebells that get returned to them under their extensive, satisfaction-guaranteed one-year warranty on eBay. I highly recommend keeping an eye on their ebay store for this purpose – their brand of kettlebell is just obscenely expensive if you buy new off their website. Ebay FTW!

** That is, of course, unless the seller has painted a unicorn, hearts and/or rainbows on it (Okay it could conceiveably be all rusted up, but that seems unlikely, and you’d figure that out upon seeing the bell anyway)