Wednesday, July 22, 2015

My squatcentric kettebell complex

I’ll be the first to agree that there’s nothing new under the sun so what I’m about to share has probably already been invented and named by someone else who deserves to have the honor.  

That will not prevent me from presenting it to you here, calling it mine and giving it a Pierini surname.

It’s a single kettlebell complex that uses a pyramid approach designed to blast my thigh wheels.  Here’s a simple explanation of it:


And here's a short video demonstration of it performed by a 60-year young "fitness model".


This was my first time performing this workout and I used a 20 kilogram kettlebell, the only one I own.  My time was 17:56 to complete it as prescribed; not a great time, but good enough for me.   

Erring on the side of caution, I front-loaded my rest time between rounds in a deliberate effort of stave off oxygen debt.  My recovery formula (note that I like exercise structure) was 5 breaths multiplied by the number of total squat reps completed.  So, for example, after the first round consisting of 4 total squat reps, my recovery period was 20 breaths (5 breaths x 4 squat reps completed).  This turned out to be a little more rest than I needed thereby allowing me to complete this new workout for the first time without killing myself.

I suppose when I want to be more of a beastly middle-aged man, I can up the weight, use a pair of kettlebells or decease the recovery time between rounds.  One thing seems seems certain from this experiment and that is completing more than 100 reps in a workout is not something I'm likely to do.  It's so easy to get caught up in rep volume as in the more the better; I've been there and done that and will not do it any more.

For the heart rate (HR) monitor junkies like me, here's what my HR monitor reported for this workout:  time to complete was 17:56, total calories burned were 366 calories, starting HR was 113 bpm (61% of my maximum HR), average HR was 155 bpm (84% of my maximum HR) and peak HR was 171 bpm (92% of my maximum HR).

I’ll add this pyramid complex to my training mix and over time hope to improve my performance by slowly but surely beating my fitness clock.

Give it a try and tell me if you like my squatcentric kettlebell complex.  

Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum

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