What Would Kettle Do?

Errr…Monday Blog…

Sorry all. Dolby got Juliet and I sick when we went to LA last weekend and I for one have been having trouble kicking this chest cold. (Thanks Chu-Hu!) BOOM!

That, along with our camera breaking has led me to this. I have no footage for the week. Which is ok because I have another thing I want to talk about.

Digging

You ever get the feeling that when someone comes to you they need coaching that doesn’t really have anything to do with kettle? I mean, it does, in the respect that they want to get in shape but sometimes it feels like more than that. I know when this happens it is my job to lay out a comprehensive blah blah to help them with their fitness blah and their aesthetic yawn ca-ching. It is my job. It is my least favorite part. I always keep thinking “why are you here?”

After attending Balboa University in the 80′s and then again in the 00′s for a little post grad work I can pass along this gem for sure…You can not buy your new you from me. It must come from you. You can’t buy your health from me either, sorry we are all out of that…check back next week. Did you want to buy a heart? Does this look like OZ?  I don’t even think you meant to ask that did you? Not knowing where to start is like being lost at sea. This is not Star Trek, I can not teleport you to the finish line. I don’t even sell gps. I do have some maps though, they are a little worn, and I don’t know exactly what they are maps of, but I’ll sell them if you want them…cheap.

It’s funny. These maps, they always get you to the beach, some beach, any beach, your beach (wherever the hell that is). You’ll be happy for a little while just to be off the ocean. You will be happy to have made that progress until you see the shovels. You didn’t expect the treasure to just be sitting there waiting for you did you? You are going to have to dig a little bit, maybe a little more than a little bit. Some people have to dig deeper than others to find what they are looking for.

Hey, at least the shovels a pretty new right? Lots of people have been to this beach. Lot’s of us have landed here but that shovel man…that shovel is sooo heavy…ughhh. People really hate that shovel. Most of them just pick it up for a minute and then drop it, get back on their raft and drift back off to sea. 

But you look like a digger. I bet you gonna rip right in it. You are almost there now. How deep could it be really? Digging, digging, digging, boy you are tunneling past some crazy stuff. You are getting pretty deep now, you can barely see the sun at the top of the tunnel any more. The light is just about gone. Is this the deepest you have ever dug? Have you found what you are looking for? Did you find your treasure?

You are all alone. There is only room for one down here. I promise you that. It gets lonely. When you are down that deep it will really get your gears turning. You start to think about what matters, who matters, why you are in this deep and what it is you are really looking for.

You keep digging. Eventually the light is gone. You have dug so deep that it is just you, your shovel, and your thoughts. “I must be near the center of the Earth by now.” “How long have I been digging?” You have to rest.

You have to dream.

When you wake up you will only want one thing…out. You want to feel the breeze on the beach. You want to feel the sun. At the very least you want to see the light. It is time to climb. You climb all day, all month, all year. It’s hot and dark and endless. It is different from the ocean though. You are not lost. You know what you need to do. Hand, foot, hand, foot…just keep going up. 

A white scratch.

That is all you needed to see. It is time to go. You just have to finish. You just have to get to the light. It is your whole life.

When you are in the hole. When you dig all the way down to your center. When the light goes away and you keep going…this is when you find what you are really looking for. I don’t know what it is about the digging. But it is not the boat or the beach or the shovel or the map (although they do help and they are all ON SALE right now for CHEAP at the okcblah blah blah), it is your will to use them. That’s it. No secret.

You’re back on the beach. You are out of the hole. Give it a second to let your eyes adjust. Give them a second to focus. Can you see which way to go now?

kettle,

The LA Comp

This week was a fun week of training. A few of us were getting ready for another IKFF meet so our training was a little altered. Juliet Kyrsten and I Road tripped it down to LA on Friday to lift on Saturday and it was Super Fun! I want to thank Luke Sniewski and the crew at LEAF Fitness for putting on a great meet. The vibe was excellent and the people there were max fun. We got to see some of our friends and make some new ones. It was the first time I ever just did a snatch set during a comp but lifting was kind if a list minute decision and I want to stay on my training program so I tried to look at it as just another training day but in the end I still felt the good jitters before the set and I ended up eating it. I only got 95 reps total which is lower than any 5 min set I have done over the past few months. I really did earn the lousy result though. I have not been as locked in as I should be. I have been having a little trouble transitioning out of stage 5 but this weekend helped…A LOT! I saw the results of my friend John Lesko hitting his CMS this weekend (Congrats John!!) and that combined with my own poor result has helped me clear my mind of all distractions. I am ready to get back in the gym tomorrow and push myself away from the dinner table so to speak.

That being said…it was really great to get to lift and support some of the team and feel the energy of some up and coming lifters. Watching the sport grow is a real thrill! I am proud to be a part of it and I am happy that during one of the sets Juliets Camera was destroyed and the footage of my set was lost forever…so so sad…so very very sad…

We did however manage to salvage the video of Juliet hitting CMS in Long cycle. She really did walk into this set. She does not train long cycle and only had about 2 and a half weeks to prepare for this meet. She got 91 reps with the 20kg. I know it looks like a 24 but all the bells at Leaf Fitness are green. That aside they were nice bells. They have good handles and felt pretty balanced. I am sure people set PR’s with them and I think they are excellent for a gym if anyone needs to stock up (Contact Luke Sniewski at www.leaflifestyle.com if you are looking for quality bells in bulk at a good price).

Here is Juliet making a smash on the Kettle:

I know that some of the other sets were recorded by different people and I was thinking about waiting for them to post the sets before I wrote the blog but since it is called “The Sunday Blog” I figured I should get out what I could no matter what. I do have a few videos from the week of training. None of my stuff is here because I thought I would have my comp video and I didn’t bother recording my lifting but I do have a little treat. I kept the video rolling a little after the set and I think I got some cool stuff. I don’t know how long I can get away with this before the guys catch on and start hamming it up… but I think these are pretty real.

So, here is a set by Nazo from this week. I like the end around 8:40

Here is a vid of one of Juliet’s new students Rebecca with her first 10 min Jerk set with the 12. I caught some of her thoughts at the end of her set too. She has no idea LOL!!

And I got some footage of Sarah lifting after taking a little time off. She is kicking the rust off. My mom would say she talkes like a truck driver!

Also, my friend Mike Noritake wrote a super cool blog about the meet and OKC. You can see it here http://kettlebellsandsinglefins.tumblr.com/day/2012/01/22

I can’t wait to get some rest and kill it tomorrow at Juno!

Kettle,

one last thing… sometimes there is a lady named “Elle” who comments on my blog. My father really likes to read her comments, but I am a little worried. Juliet swears she is real but I don’t think she actually exists. I mean, she was supposed to be in LA and I brought her an OKC shirt and everything but she didn’t make it. Hmmmm…. something doesn’t add up. Stay tuned, I will get to the bottom of this!

This week was a little better in practice than last week. We are all working on different things. Nazo is working her way back after a long layoff. Juliet is going to do a set of Long Cycle this Saturday at the IKFF meet in LA. I am trying to work myself back into shape after a sweet and awesome stage five! BOOM!!

I have not really posted any Jerk sets on the blog because I am embarrassed of my numbers. I have this mental block when it comes to Jerk and I am always stuck between 30-35 reps. This week I did ok on Monday. Wed was terrible and I crashed during the second set but Friday was a good day. I was happy with my pacing and I got 37 reps with the 28′s. I know this is not an earth shattering number of reps but it is a pr for me with the 28′s. I started to get excited once I got to 30 and lost my concentration a little bit and dropped them at 37. I was happy with the set but the normal emotions crept in afterward. “I could have done 40 but I quit”. It is what we call the “steady state” around here, no matter how good the set is it still sucked.

Juliet needed a little break from Biathlon and this weekend she is going to take a shot at Long Cycle. We have not trained long cycle in over a year and she has about 2 weeks to prepare for this competition so one of the things she is stuck doing this week is “clean with extra swing”. We use this drill to build grip strength and timing for the clean. It is a great drill to write on a program and a terrible drill to see on a program…Boom!

Nazo has been a blast to train with as she is working her way back to the platform! Most of you know about her time being stuck in Japan during the earthquake and it has been a long road…BUT SHE’S BACK BABY!!! She is working on long cycle and we are building up her strength with a 14kg in a 5×5 drill. 5 seconds in the rack then 5 seconds in the lockout. It’s nasty. It’s double nasty with two bells! She really guts it out on this set and puts up with a cheeky camera man as he keeps it rolling after the set!! Chu-Hi!!

This is my snatch set from Wed. It is 32kg snatch+extra swing. Coach Rudnev is a mean man. Doesn’t he know I’m out of shape?! Well, I’m in shape if the shape is round! Anyway…I survived and finished the set. I have been working on my backswing because I get lazy and let the bell bend behind me. Apparently I think I am so big and strong that I can get away with being lazy...nyet. You can see in the beginning I am bending around the back badly. I try to get every rep clean but I still have much practice ahead. Coach calls this “A major flaw” in my technique. He is right naturally. I am working on it.

My student JT Killed his 10 min Long Cycle set in Hawaii with 65 reps in 10 min with 24kgs! I am very proud of him!!

And in Singapore my student Ian did a great set of 40 reps in 5 min with the 20′s Long Cycle. Ian has come such a long way and I am proud of him as well. What a great student and friend!

Next week I hope to get some footage of Dolby, Salemi, and Sarah up here…Stay Tuned

kettle,

I had forgotten what it was like to be free of the routine. I had been so locked into the training that life without it seemed distant. Like riding my bike with my childhood friends seems distant.

Now the training is back and it fits a little too snugly around the thighs if you get my drift.

Stage 5 was epic. 4 weeks on the road in Japan and a 4 city tour. Did you know that in Japan they have all you can eat and drink menus? It’s a preset price and they just keep feeding you food and Chu-Hi hour after hour?

Needless to say I am fat. Fat fatty fatpants fat. Fatter than normal that’s for sure, but it was worth every last sip I do promise you!

Now I am dealing with the repercussions of sweet, beautiful excess. I am struggling through my training with this softer body and it is not fun. *

My wind is not what it should be and my rack has regressed.  That being said Coach Rudnev did pull me aside in Detroit and explain to me that I was still bending in my backswing and if I do not fix this error he would…eh…eh…kill me.

So I have been working on that.

Every rep has to be a good one. Not just the fixation but the backswing, breathing, acceleration pull, and insertion. Going into Detroit I got onto this speed kick. For example, if I had to finish my workout with 100/100 glove snatches I wanted to get through it as quickly as possible and in a dominant way. This was a change from my “just hold on for ten minutes” attitude that I had in the middle of last year. I was cranking out reps at light speed but I was letting my technique go and using my strength to lift. This was great for my wind because the bell was a 16kg or a 20 kg but when I switched back to the 32kg bell there was less than ideal transfer. I had been practicing sloppy reps.

See…Here is me with a 30kg rushing and getting sloppy

So I have been working on that.

Every rep, every set, has to be perfect. My speed is down a little but I can feel my technique improving. I am still out of shape and that slows me down but I am getting fitter every day. The diet is getting better. The running is getting better. The reps are getting better. It is all starting to come together.

Next weekend I will be in Los Angeles at the IKFF competition. I had not planned on competing this early, I am really looking more towards May, but the OKC has a few lifters going and I couldn’t miss it! I am just going to do a snatch set and stay on my program. It will be fun (I think). It will be a good early test for me to see if the month of work I put in on my tech has been paying off or not. I think it has but we will see.

Kettle,

* This is not to say it was not fun to soften up this body. It was fun. IT WAS MAXIMUM FUN!! I needed it and I am happy I did it. You can’t even imagine the footage Nazo has of Jason and I in Osaka tearing apart a whole floor of the hotel from our room to the elevators in cowboy hats and Kimonos with wooden swords and countless Chu-Hi’s! We can’t post it but if you see her ask her to see it, she has it at hand ALL OF THE FREAKING TIME”.

Quiet,

I needed a little quiet.

Last year was a wild one for me. Not that it was more stressful or harder than any other year. And I am not saying that it was more challenging than your year or the year Nazo had, or the year my neighbor had, but for me it was a time of change.

I knew it was going to be. I put myself out there and I knew there would be interaction with others. I wanted to make it a regular thing. I wanted to be more of a public guy. I thought it would be good for me, and it was, I think.

It started with the Siberia trip. I loved that. I trained so hard and it was really a leap into the unknown for me. Thank you Aleks and Coach Rudnev.

I was in the frozen river man. I went to Siberia in February and I touched it. It was like when I went to Africa and I had to touch the dirt, I had to touch it. I had to take my shoes off and feel that dirt between my toes. I’m big John from Long Island, what am I doing in Africa? Siberia? 100 years ago this never could have happened. But it did happen so I can check those boxes off now.

Far off places between my toes…check.

Last year I learned what it was to train. Training with success and through failure. Training when I am tired or cranky or sore or manic. Training even on the days my mind broke. Training my head, training my body and my heart. Training with Dolby and Nazo and Juliet.

I got to compete in Russia twice last year. I earned it in the only way I could, I showed up.

I entered a tournament knowing I was going to lose to a guy I didn’t like. He knew he was going to beat me. It was a strange emotion.  He beat me. I didn’t like it, but I took it.

I coached my team all year and I am so proud of all of you. I am proud of your students. I am proud that I played a role in what you are becoming. All of you.

We did the One Hour Long Cycle Charity event for the second time and we raised around $6000 for Japan Relief. Nazo was stuck in Japan during the earthquake. It was not good. It was not easy. So many of you came out to lift and support the cause. Thank you so much!

We went to Detroit. We focused on that meet since February. As we got closer to the meet I started withdrawing. I stopped blogging and we were not even teaching workshops. It was just training and recovering. That was it. Looking at my blog now I realize I did not even report on the results of the OHLC. I just couldn’t do anything other than train. I really let my business go. The funny thing is with Juno’s help I ended up with more clients than I had before the training got deep. For some reason I guess people are attracted to you when you are eating it as hard as they are.

The team Killed in Detroit. I did not hit what I wanted to but I did not crap all over myself either so I will take it and build on it. Met a few cool people and got to reconnect with some old friends. It was great.

Straight to Japan again from there for 6 events in 4 weeks including Japan’s first GS tournament. It was stage five part one. We were still focusing on Kettle teaching and lifting but we did not have numbers to hit. Just that ability to relax was huge for us. We needed it so badly. We had been locked on for almost a year non-stop.

After Japan I got a week of real, true stage 5 BOOM!! I got fat and slept in and really got away.

3 weeks ago I got back on the training horse.

2 weeks ago I really gave it my best effort.

Last week it started working and I am pleased with the progress.

Tomorrow the diet tightens up and the weight will come off again. It is going to be a big year with some big goals.

I am starting a new thing on my blog (new to my blog but surely not to the universe). Nazo, Juliet and I train together at Juno. Sometimes Sarah and Mike are there. Sometimes Dolby comes up or Rebecca stops by to lift. You never know who is coming by. I will write about the week of training on Sundays. I have creatively titled this “The Sunday Blog”.

So since the last few weeks have been about Quiet, I do not really have anything to say about training or to show you about training this week. I am just writing to write I guess. It has been a long time since I have done that

It feels good, like a far off place between my toes.

Kettle,