Jason and I are grabbing some breakfast and then we are off to the comp.
Thank you to all of you who have been following us on this adventure. Your comments and emails have been amazing and we are both very inspired by all of you. We will do our very best today. No matter the outcome we have learned so much on this trip. We are new men.
My first rep is for you Nazo.
Kettle,
It’s crazy.
Since the moment Jason and I started on this trip it has been cool awesome thing after cool awesome thing. We keep wanting to write about stuff but by the time we have a moment something that feels more pressing comes along. So we are finally getting around to this stuff 
On the first day of training we were told that a local tv crew wanted to interview us. They showed up and did the interview and right after that another crew came, then another. After our training session we were told we had to go down to the studio to do an interview. It was pretty nuts.
The guy who was interviewing us was nice. He thought it was pretty funny that we are as old as we are and still trying to do what we are doing. The old thing is a first for me. I told him you are never to old to be awesome! He interviewed us for about 30 min and here is the result :
I think it is pretty cool. Can you tell we came straight from the gym ???
The interview from the gym itself is here:
This is a time that we REALLY missed Nazo. Jason and I are built for radio, Nazo has the TV smile!
When we were at the gym later the interview came on the news and everyone was clapping and whistling. The people at the gym are so warm and friendly (and the girls are really really ridiculously good looking) it is unbelievable. We feel very welcome there. I know that Jason and I will be very sad after our last workout.
But I digress.
After all of that there were a few newspapers. Jason and I arrived yesterday and Coach Rudnev was holding up a paper and said “Who’s That?” I said “holy shit!”
This is the front cover It says “Hello from California!!!)
Here is the article
When I saw it I asked Coach if he could bring me to the news stand to get a few copies and when we arrived he showed me another paper:
This is the cover
…and the good stuff 
Later in the week we were in the classroom and another reporter came by. Coach Rudnev explained to us that he was…kind of a big deal…and when he arrived you could tell it was true. He may be the most serious man I have ever met. When he asked me if I wanted to be “World Champion” and Rudnev exploded into laughter he didn’t even flinch. We were all laughing at that one but I guess he didn’t know why it was so funny, which is sort of nice now that I think about it.
I don’t know if his piece is one of the ones on the blog or if it comes out later but I will keep you posted.
Yesterday some guy recognized us on the street and was saying “American!!! Giri Giri!!!” He was smiling. It was pretty cool and another first for me.
I had no Idea that anyone here would have interest in this. It is kind of overwhelming, but in a good way.
kettle,
oh, one more thing. I know those green bells look small. They are small. We brought them back with us from the Military Institute because my hands fit in the handles. The old Russian standard bells are very different and have been giving Jason and I big trouble. Jason broke his middle finger on his right hand. I will write about it tomorrow along with some more details about the bells and some of the issues we have run into. It’s all good though. We are gaining a ton of experience
Over the past few days we’ve gotten more emails and questions than any of us have ever gotten before (Thank You!!!) So many of them were asking about how we can afford to do what we do that I thought it would be quicker and easier to answer you here than via email.
I don’t have money. I really don’t. In 2007 I was coming to the end of my time at Equinox and I was the same as all of my friends that worked there. I was broke. I couldn’t afford to do anything. I couldn’t go anywhere, take the courses I wanted to take, or buy the equipment I wanted to buy. The funny thing is I was making more money working for them than I am now.
2006 was a year of deaths and divorces in my family. I have no doubt that everyone reading this has had one of those periods in his or her life that ended in reflection. I had decided to make some big changes and the first thing I decided was my waiting was over. I liked Equinox but I was finished. It was safe and secure and largely supportive but I was bored and complacent. I needed a challenge so I quit and decided to go out on my own.
I know that most people have a concrete business model for this kind of big move but I did not. I just wanted to be free.
I have always lived low. No car payments, no house, no kids or wife or any of those pleasures. I am largely self-absorbed when it comes to my life. I spent most of my childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood alone. It is easy for me to strip my life down to a backpack and walk away.
I have left my life behind more than once before. You can ask around, I never go back. I don’t know why. I always have one or two close friends that hold over but otherwise I am on the wind.
I live in my gym. It is a loft that I split with my brother from an older life. I live upstairs and work downstairs. I live in Oakland across the street from Oakland Technical High School (Clint Eastwood went there ). Someone gets shot in front of that high school every couple of months.
I have a 92 Jeep (which I love) that I never drive. I’ll hop the transbay bus to work in San Francisco. I take the train and I walk everywhere. My big monthly expense is the gym I belong to in downtown Oakland because they have a pool, an indoor track, and a good whirlpool/sauna/steamroom.
I’ve got 2 cats. They are pretty cool and are good company (which is good because I don’t socialize much). I never go out anymore. I take the $200 I would have spent at the bar and I buy a VISA. The $1000 for Vegas? That’s a plane ticket and a train ride. When I go to SFO to fly out I take the bus, to the train, to the airport. It is super easy once you get the feel.
I have a few clients that are steady and are very dear to me. They believe in me and support me. They are my family. I know I could not do any of this stuff without them. But I have my business stripped down to 2 full days a week plus online training. It allows me the flexibility to travel and teach workshops.
Our workshops are priced low because we love to teach and travel. We give small group discounts and the Military discount to make it accessible. We know that if we get to a certain number we can make the trip. We are not really worried about making a big profit (just ask the people who have hosted us). We get our cut and the host gets their cut even if it is small. Fair is fair. As long as we can cover we are coming.
I know that this is not a million dollar business model but our model is not designed to make millions. It is designed to make us free. I feel very free.
Most of the travel we do is paid for by the workshops. The other stuff (like this trip to Siberia) is paid for by sweat and sacrifice. I could have fixed the jeep twice for what I spent to get here but I will probably end up selling it to by those new weights of kettlebells (14,18,22,26 etc). It’s just who I am, I don’t know why I am like this.
The one thing I do know is this. All of this shit may blow up in my face. I take a lot of risks and one day I may get smashed and end up digging ditches. I am cool with that because I know that even if I grow old digging ditches I’ll be a guy who took his shot. I was afraid but I did it anyway even if I looked silly or out of place. I won’t die wishing I had spent my life doing something else. I am doing this now and I am doing it with all my heart. Maybe in ten years I’ll be doing something totally different but I will also be doing that with all of my heart.
I will dig a ditch the likes of which you have never seen, they will talk about it forever.
Kettle,
Jason and I have been training and preparing for this trip for a long time. We started working towards it in May of 2010. When we first put it together we just wanted to come out and train with Coach Rudnev. We were hoping to spend a week or so lifting and if he felt ok about it we really wanted to learn more about his training method. It was a little after that when we decided to ask if there was a competition we could compete in.
Training for the comp has kept Jason and I focused on this trip. There is a unique perspective you gain by spending time under the bells and there is no way around that. But we never let out of our minds what the meat of this trip was.
We have been training twice a day every other day. Hard kettlebell training in the morning and gpp/stretching/running in the evening. On the other days we have been (among other awesome activities) in the classroom.
So far we have been able to spend 2 four-hour days in class working on programming. We are joined by his wife Natalia who is our translator (she is an English teacher and we are using her classroom for studies). Thank you Natalia!!! We are expecting 3 more classroom days before we leave where we will also cover contest preparation, competition strategies, recovery, and nutrition.
The programming is beautiful. Rudnev said that he developed his system out of necessity. He started out training like the rest of us, long hard sets all of the time. He achieved a level of success and then stopped. His training and progress flatlined. So he started working on his method, which is very similar to other periodization models we know. Macrocycles, Mesocycles, and Microcycles. (He went back to school to study physical method and education to become the best coach he could be and ended up teaching full time at the Far East Military Institute in Blagoveshchensk Russia.) The interesting part of the programming is the mathematics. He has the training broken down into equations with different moving variables.
A few examples of variables are:
(If the sportsman cannot complete a ten minute set already)
1) Sportsman does not have enough static strength.
2) Sportsman lacks necessary flexibility.
3) Sportsman lacks both static strength and required flexibility.
It starts out complicated but as you move further along things begin to fall into place and we begin to have dialogue like this:
John: “So if I can do this here, than I can do that?!?!”
Sergey: “Of course”
There is the general protocol for sportsman who already have good results.
Then, there is the protocol for the beginners.
The beginner protocol involves addressing the variables I have mentioned above as well as other things like available equipment, age, mental makeup, work schedule, and available training time. As you can imagine, there is a much higher level of skill required to coach a sportsman with many variables. A professional sportsman with Kettlebells in every 2kg increment and infinite time who can already go for 10 min is the easiest to train.
If anyone reading this has read any of my other entries you know that I have spent most of the last year working on my personal variables. I am almost ready to really train. I had never made the progress I desired. I needed to address these issues. Rudnev says that the hardest one to overcome is the lack of flexibility, then (by a great distance) the lack of static strength). I have to overcome both. So for those of you having trouble with these common problems, there is hope
All of that being said, there is a certain artistry and imagination required to be a great coach. Rudnev will blush as he tells you this. He enjoys his work and this is clearly his favorite part. He is an artist.
Coach talks about his system and how when you look at the training cycles you will see they resemble a heartbeat on an EKG machine. He says “this is the training of a living man, a man with a heartbeat, not a dead man.” He has worked on his theory and method for over twenty years. He talks about the thousands of sportsman he worked with over the 14 years he was at the Far East Military Institute and how he used that time to work and shape his system with their help. He recorded the data over 14 years.
Coach Rundnev outside the sports hall at The Far East Military Instistute.
Coach Rudnev has used his system to coach:
42 Master of Sport
8 Master of Sport World Class
1 Honored Master of Sport
He smiled and started to talk about the most important variable. The Sportsman. “This is not awesome John, it is a lot of work.” He makes it clear that the sportsman is the one who is responsible for the work. The sportsman is the orchestra with all its moving parts and he is the Maestro.
He is the Artist.
Kettle,
We just got our internet up in the hotel and sent out a bunch of overdue emails. I will hopefully have a chance to write a good blog tonight but I thought I would get a few things out of the way quickly
The flight was a monster.
Jason and I were up all night (we had one last training session to get in at 10pm before we left) so when we got to LAX Mon morning we were wiped. When we got to JFK we were shocked to see the great Fedor Emelianenko was on our flight. I did not approach him but some young fans did and he was very pleasant and gracious.
The flights were so long and cramped that I found myself thinking things like “Suffering is part of the journey” and “there is no rebirth without death”. I know, crazy melodramatic stuff but believe me it was an impressive amount of discomfort spread out over a long period of time, at least for me.
We landed in Vladivostok and we did not even know what day it was or what time it was or what the hell we were gonna do next. We were picked up by the local GS champion…Rudnev just got here to pick us up so I have to run…stay tuned
kettle,
Jason and I were laughing about this today. We are flying from LA to New York (no big deal) to Moscow (bigger deal) to Vladivostok (significant deal). When we get to Vladivostok we will be greeted by a Russian man we have never met. He is one of Rudnev’s students. I am sure that if we look at his hands he will have the scars of a lifter. He is a Siberian weight lifter. So basically, we will be looking for the scariest stranger imaginable and then asking him for a ride…awesome.
He will take us to a hotel (who knows which one???) where Jason and I will rent a room and then maybe we will grab some dinner after our loooong flight. In the morning he will bring us to the Trans Siberian Railroad Station where we do not have a reservation (yet?). We will buy tickets and board the train. 30 hours and an unknown number of stops at small villages later we will arrive at Blagoveshchensk where coach Rudnev lives. I hear we have a reservation at a hotel.
We are signed up for 25 hours of instruction with Coach Rudnev over 5 days. We will be lifting only a fraction of that time because we have a competition that Sunday. We are bringing our notebooks, our training logs from our first cycle, loads of questions and our eager minds.
The rest of the time we are there I have no idea what we will be doing but I have heard references to “Ice Plunging”, “Banya’s”, and something about wild animals and a BBQ in the woods. I have also heard the word “Vodka”, whatever that is…
The competition is February 27, in Blagoveshchensk. Our flight home leaves from Vladivostok on March 2. We have no idea how we are going to get from B to V. Our original plan was to take the train but the dates don’t line up and we will either miss our competition or miss our flight. So I looked for a flight and I found one that will get us there 12 hours before our flight so we would stay overnight in the terminal. It is usually only a 90min flight or so but this little puddle jump takes a detour with two 4-hour legs and a three-hour layover (plus the 12 hour wait in the terminal). We can do this, no problem. Camp out in a Siberian airport overnight in February? Yes thank you and I will have a side of AWESOME with that. We didn’t sign up for the posh trip. We are kettlebums; we’ll hop the damn freight train!!!
Coach Rudnev recommended that we do not book that flight. He is a reasonable man. He said that we can find a better flight and that we can book it when we arrive in Blagoveshchensk. We agreed and as of now we have no flight. We know that we will get to our flight home but we do not know if it will be on a plane, a train, or a wooly mammoth! That’s just the way we like it. I guess we should worry about it. I don’t know why we are not worried, but we’re not. So we don’t think you should be worried either (That means you Mom*)
We honestly have no idea how this trip is going to turn out. There are so many moving parts that anything can happen. All I know is that we are going to a far away land to meet a sage. There are many dangers and strangers and questions along the way. We have no guarantees or promises. What we have is a mission and the guidance of our friends from a distance. We are going to learn something on this trip. No matter what happens I think that is fair to say. We are looking for something and neither one of know what it really is. We don’t need to know. I don’t think we really want to know. If we knew it wouldn’t be what it is.
Our Quest.
Kettle,
*Just a word for those of you who thought “your poor mother” at any time during this post. My mom doesn’t worry about me. I know, I don’t get it either. She really doesn’t. I could tell her I am going to the moon and she would be like, “you do know it’s not made of cheese right?” She has always pushed me towards adventure. I can actually remember a conversation that went like this:
“I just thought you’d like to know I wasn’t in that explosion”
“Who is this?”
“MOOOM!”
“Oh come on Johnny, I wasn’t worried, you are always ok”
Then she started saying something about a tv show she had been watching before I called.
She just doesn’t worry.
So neither do I.
One year ago this month I resigned my position as Master Trainer for the World Kettlebell Club. I was granted the opportunity to teach for the WKC and I am truly grateful for the work and experience the time I spent with them provided. I am proud to have taught the WKC Fitness Trainer Certification course and I am very proud to have been the first Master Trainer to bring a Kettlebell Certification Course to Japan.
I signed a contract when I decided to become a Master Trainer. There were certain provisions of the contract (clearly written) that extended one year past the date of my resignation. This agreement limited the kinds of things I could do. I was fully aware of this when I signed and I considered it (and still consider it) clear and fair. I am happy to say that I have completed my obligation to the contract. I am also happy to say that the WKC has honored their end of the contract and never stopped me from doing the work that I love to do. I was treated with respect, and for that I would like to say thank you to the World Kettlebell Club.
During my year I have taken the time to try and expand my education and rebuild myself as a lifter. I was able to focus on building and improving the Orange Kettlebell Club and it is really humming now. I was able to go to Russia to study and I will be returning in one week to study some more. I was certainly able to make a living. I believe that the time allowed me to expand my creativity. Many of the obvious paths for business expansion were forfeited willingly for an excellent opportunity. I was required to think outside the box. It has been and continues to be a very rewarding experience.
For those of you who are considering this opportunity my advice to you would be, read the contract. Everything is clear and there should be no surprises. Weigh it against your vision for your business and see if the whole thing fits. Think about your goals. It may work very well for you. It may not.
I realize that some contracts are hard to enforce. Several of my friends and some of the Lawyers that I train told me this. What it came down to for me was, no matter what I could do legally or how I could fight to get free or break the contract, I did sign it. I wrote my name on that agreement. I was bonded to it. They did not break the contract and neither would I. So even though I wanted to be free, I honored my word.
Now I have my freedom and my honor.
Kettle,
I love this picture. Everyone is looking their own way.
Ok, so, I’ve been getting a lot of emails about my last blog. (Thank you very much for all of your support and amazing comments!) In particular about Rocky 4. I know that some people will understand this and others won’t but here goes.
When I was a fat little kid on Long Island I spent a few years after school every day on the floor in my den watching the channel 11 version of Rocky 4 that I had on tape. I watched it so many times that it was grainy and hard to make out but it didn’t matter because I knew all of the lines by heart anyway. I was raised on Rocky. It sounds weird but much of my ethical structure is based on Balboa. He was kind, strong, simple, and he had heart. He was a fighter. He was a champion. He was a father and you knew, no matter what, when Rocky Balboa died his last thought would be about Adrian.
I never really outgrew it but I did stop watching every day. I don’t think it is a wonder how I got so deep into physical culture. Going to Siberia to train was a strong twist that brought back many memories of my childhood. It was not intended to line up with Rocky but I am not surprised that it did.
Once we decided to go Jason and I would have conversations like:
“Dude, this is so Rocky 4”
“BOOM!!! CHU…RITZ 45”
That’s it pretty much, add in some “I know man’s” and headshakes and that’s about all there was.
It is not the apex of our lives. There will be more after this trip but I don’t know if there will ever be anything bigger.
A few years ago I had one of those years. We all have them. A year filled with deaths and divorces. A year of breaking down childhoods and leaving lives behind. I was down. I was lost. I felt so weak. It was Christmas and I was at my mothers house, drunk, blathering on about how I just wanted someone to take care of me for a minute so I didn’t have to carry the load all by myself. I think it was my lowest and weakest point as a man. There is no other way to say it, I was a bitch.
The next night we went to see the new Rocky movie.
I cried.
As we were walking to the car I remember thinking that Rocky would be disappointed in me. Not Stallone, Rocky. As if the actual person Rocky Balboa was going to look at me and shake his head. Weird fucking shit I’ll tell ya.
We all know the speech…”It’s not how hard you can hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. It’s about how much you can take and keep moving forward”. (No I didn’t need to google that, it’s almost sad).
That was the moment my life turned. I signed up for the RKC shortly after. This journey that I am on now started that day. I decided that I can take whatever I have to and keep moving forward. I am not afraid to tell the truth, even about this. I know is sounds silly to some folks but I know that I am not one to judge what drives you so I don’t worry about being judged myself.
I hike this mountain in Oakland as fast as I can and I raise my arms at the top.
I will be training in Siberia soon.
I didn’t plan it this way but I am not surprised it happened.
I work hard at the things that I love. I will fight for the people I love. I will admit to my failings as I am confronted with them because I am human. I may never be world champion, or the best in the States, or the best in my weight class, or of my friends, but I will fight as hard as I can and I will find out if I have heart. One day, one day,I will die in love with my wife.
I don’t think Rocky would be ashamed of me now.
Kettle,
One last thing,
My training was awful today. Enough to send panic emails all over. I wrote another entry titled “Epic Fail”. I didn’t post it because by the end I was calmer. I think I am feeling the pressure, but I can take it. I can takes this hit and keep moving forward.
I was lying on the floor in my loft last night. This, this was the hardest training I had ever done. I was lying there in a mess of creamy chalk, sweat and spit, fading in and out (I am sure you all know this feeling) and I had a thought. After all of this time, after everything I have done. After all the things I have seen, people I’ve met, friends I’ve made, loves I’ve lost, and battles I’ve waged I have finally, at the age of 33, tried as hard as I possibly could at something. My body is wrecked. It wasn’t my wind (my running, rowing, swimming, and hill climbing had handled that). It wasn’t my grip (all the glove snatches, farmers walks, pullups, and grip 365 had handled that). It was my whole body. My muscles burned and were melting off the bones. My skeleton, my very structure was pulverized. I couldn’t see anything. The air was hot.
In 14 days I leave for Siberia with my brother Jason Dolby. We have both been training under coach Sergey Rudnev since this past October. We first met him in St. Petersburg, then again in Los Angeles at Jason’s One Hour Long Cycle charity event. We told him that we wanted to go to Siberia and train study under him. We told him that we wanted to compete in a competition if that was at all possible. We told him we had been dreaming of this crazy idea. We thought he would laugh at us. To our surprise and delight he welcomed us with open arms. We are to compete in Siberia on February 27 2011. Lewis and Clark. Why the hell not? What else are we doing? Why not do the most awesome thing we can imagine? This is who we are. We just want to do things. Famous last words…
I tried to sit up. Nyet, no legs. So I broke into my v-snaps, 20…then another 20, then the cramps hit. I was down again. 14 days to Siberia. I need to get better. My Jerks are a joke…my snatches…I need more. I am so scared to embarrass Coach Rudnev. He is a legendary trainer of great champions, titans of the sport, and fat giants from Long Island New York by way of Oakland California. I missed my numbers… again.
I met Coach Rudnev in May 2010, and now I can run 10km without much worry. I can do pullups, pushups, v-snaps, snatches, Jerks. I can swim for an hour without stopping. I am nowhere near where I need to be. I am nowhere near where I am going. I am in the 4th stage of my 1st cycle of training. This is the beginning. It is harder than I could have imagined. I have never felt like this before. All I do is train, eat, recover, and sleep. I hardly work. I never go out. I don’t drink or eat sugar or dairy. I have lost 50lbs since St. Petersburg and I need to lose more so I can rack better. I have thoughts like “If I climb the mountain today I can get some extra cardio in. But, I may be tired tomorrow and I’ll miss my numbers”. Incredible. My training, my numbers, they have taken over my life.
I am staring at my bars now. I have these two 2” thick 7’ long parallel bars in my loft that I do grip work with. They are about 8’ off the ground. I do pullups mostly. Sometimes I just hang and swing from them. They are great for grip work. I am crawling now. I’m a mess. Time to jump up and at least try to hang. I manage to swing for 60 seconds and then I slip and crash to the floor again. It didn’t hurt. I can’t be hurt. Not until I am back from Siberia.
Aleks told us that we are going to get to train and study under the great champion Aleksandr Khvostov when we get to coach Rudnev’s as well. We will fly for 30 hours then take the Trans Siberian Railroad for 30 hours to get there. We will be doing our gpp on the train, running laps around the hotel in Vladivolstock, doing lifts with our luggage…anything we can do to stay fit while we are on the road. Dolby is a much better lifter than I am. He is the hardest working person I know. His enthusiasm is contagious and he actually has me excited about the prospect of running around a Russian hotel in Siberia in February. I can’t think of any place I would rather be.
I’m back on the floor. Thinking about all of this. Thinking about how I have finally pushed myself as far as I can go and I didn’t die. Knowing that no matter what happens now I can’t fail. Knowing that I have pushed myself, and been pushed by Nazo, Jason, Aleks, Rudnev, and the people who love me, all the way to Siberia…in February, to do the thing that I love. I was lying there thinking all of this, seriously. I was thinking of all of this and one more thing. I was thinking about a year from now. February 1st 2012, I know that I will be back on this floor. I will be lying here in my own sweat and sticky chalk. The color of the bells will be different. The numbers will be different. These things are certain, but my resolve will be the same. I know what it is now. I can almost touch it, almost with a fingertip. I am so much closer than I have ever been, even if I am still glued to this floor.
Kettle,
One last little thing. Nazo took these pictures. She has seen the best and the worst of me over the years. She is not coming with Jason and I to Siberia and she will be missed terribly. We are the steak and she is the sizzle. The only two things in this world that make everything better are Bacon, and Nazo. We don’t know how this is going to go. We don’t know how we will lift or what might go wrong. I just keep thinking of Paulie’s reaction when Rocky said he was going to fight in Russia on Christmas “ARE YOU NUTS???” I guess… maybe… probably we are. But, we have this chance to do this thing with these guys in this place soo… if we die, well, we die. (But I think we will make it out alive)
“I have spoken to long for a writer. A writer should write what he has to say and not speak it”–Ernest Hemingway
“You talk too much for a fighting man”–Doc Holliday
“You look like shit…what’s your secret?”–Marlon Brando
In private I talk a lot I guess. Publicly my voice, I feel, is softer. Lately, I have had a lot I wanted to say. Then I realized how big a waste of your time that would be. Who am I to preach to you about things like love, freedom, or loyalty. I found a quiet space and trained without anger. I managed to find some peace, which was nice.
This is a photo that Nazo took of me in LA.
I have been training consistently lately and have been making great progress.
I still have a long way to go.
Kettle,
