For
the longest time I’ve wanted to make more workout videos and finally got around
to it last Friday. Today I’m sharing
what I hope to be one of many to follow this year. This workout uses my favorite exercise
implement, the kettlebell (KB) of the 24kg load variety. Of course, if you decide to take this workout
for a test drive, size it as to duration and load according to your current
abilities.
This
is something that doesn’t always come easy for me. For example, when viewing various workouts posted
on fitness-related websites and YouTube, it seems that so many of them are intended
for the younger fitness enthusiast in mind.
We “older folks” - the middle-aged men fitness enthusiast around the
world - can easily be lured into believing that we should also be able to do
these workouts with the same loads and in the same time as that younger
whippersnapper demonstrating it in “dog and pony show” fashion during classroom
show and tell time.
In my gracefully-aging journey, I confess that I’m at a different chapter in my fitness life. It’s, therefore, essential to scale my workouts according to my current abilities. Yet, they need to be challenging and requiring me to reach for the stars in my pursuit of middle-aged man fitness excellence. I’m sure you’re no different.
Blah, blah, blah, blah! Let’s get down to business with today’s workout that I’ve named the Pierini Fitness kettlebell (KB) carries complex. It consists of three single-arm KB carries, each performed with your right arm first, and then left arm. Each carry is held for one minute. You have 15 seconds to change sides and carries. When performed as prescribed, it’ll takes 7:30 to complete one round. If you perform this workout for the first time, you may find, as I did, that one round is enough.
Eventually, I advanced to two rounds and that’s what I did the day I filmed this video, but only the first round is included in the video you’re about to view.
I gave myself 2:30 of recovery after the first round before beginning the second round. Soon I’ll be ready to tackle three rounds but need to attempt this on a day when that’s all I do. When filming this video last Friday, I had already completed a 25-minute “grease the groove” workout of alternating pull-ups and chin-ups. I need to be 100 percent fresh to attempt three rounds of this KB carries complex.
So,
when completed as prescribed, here’s what a timeline of one round looks
like:
KB carry
|
Time
|
Cumulative time
|
Waiter carry R
|
1:00
|
1:00
|
Transition
|
0:15
|
1:15
|
Waiter carry L
|
1:00
|
2:15
|
Transition
|
0:15
|
2:30
|
Rack carry R
|
1:00
|
3:30
|
Transition
|
0:15
|
3:45
|
Rack carry L
|
1:00
|
4:45
|
Transition
|
0:15
|
5:00
|
Suitcase carry R
|
1:00
|
6:00
|
Transition
|
0:15
|
6:15
|
Suitcase carry L
|
1:00
|
7:15
|
Done!
|
0:15
|
7:30
|
Here’s
a video demonstration of me performing one round last Friday.
With
the current KB weight, the time under tension of this workout will make your shoulders
and entire core musculature feel that they’ve been worked hard.
This
workout will also give you a decent serving of cardiovascular training, like it
did for me, as indicated in the snapshot image below of heart rate statistics reported
by my Garmin Forerunner 35:
My
average heart rate (MHR) during this workout was 146 beats per minute. Since I’ve self-assessed my MHR at 180 beats
per minute, this means that I worked at 81 percent of my MHR during this
workout.
My
highest heart rate during this workout was 163 beats per minute, or 91 percent
of my MHR.
Make
no doubts about it, this KB carries complex is a bona-fide cardiovascular conditioning
workout.
Take
it for a test drive the next time you’re up for something different and then
let me know what you think about my Pierini Fitness KB carries complex.
Pax Domini sit
semper vobiscum
4 comments:
Excellent work! I do the Stuart Mcgill Big 3 and afterwards I do rack and suitcase carries. Since I do most of my workouts in my basement the waiter carry would be hard.
All my pressing and Turkish Get Ups are done between my rafters. So not much room to walk long distances. But most definitely will be try this outside when the weather breaks here. Walking like the with weight is definitely cardiovascular, especially over Your chest.
Couple of questions. What do You feel is the best percentage range for our heart rate while exercising? Also, how often are you GTG with pull ups and chins? Are You doing it 3 days a week with days in between?
Michael,
I haven't added Turkish get-ups to my fitness training toolbox. I suppose that's next. It becomes challenging trying to decide what to add and what to eliminate. We can't add it all, otherwise that's a set-up for over training. Something has got to give and there are so many things I'd like to have in my training mix.
With regard to heart rate training, I think it's good to spend time in all ranges. I've become a fan of walking as in 30 minutes minimum to up to one hour. I think it's good at my age and contributes to my weight reduction goal. Problem is it's time consuming. The exception would be if you're training for something specific, such as a running event; for example, a 10k run, But, for middle-aged man training to stay in above-average condition, I say once a week in all three HR zones.
With regard to the KB stuff, now we're talking about anaerobic zone. My workouts seem to take me to 85% average and peak 93% of my maximum HR.
Assuming your training pays attention to HR, I say once a week aerobic, once a week anaerobic and no more than once a week approaching red-line, such as for example, if you were doing burpees and a Tabata-cadence workout. Obviously, the higher the HR the less must be the duration. I find my body and mind does a good job of keeping me safe because they won't let me go where they don't want to go if that makes sense.
Just started GTG with pull-ups, an exercise that I've done a lot and with some decent volume in my training past. The last workout I did was for 25 minutes, and did reps as often as I could. Believe I got to a total rep count of 77. Short term goal would be 100 reps in 30 minutes. With all I want to do, I can't see myself doing it more than once a week at this time. As I said, we can't do it all and something has to be eliminated to make room for something new.
Thanks for your visit; enjoy your weekend.
Nice KB workout. I will put this on my fitness to do workout for next spring. I will have to make a best guess for the weight I should use. I am still using your Plan B indoor workout, once a week. Bob
Assuming you have no shoulder issues Bob, you don't have to wait for nicer weather to get a feel for this workout which can be done by performing stationary holds. In fact, doing these holds standing in place is probably a good way to start. It'll give you a feel for the correct and safe load to use and an appreciation of how slow a minute takes. As mentioned, the waiter carry load will be the correct load. Let me know how it goes.
Thanks for visiting Pierini Fitness; enjoy the rest of your weekend.
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