You may have recently seen some fitness enthusiasts in the park swinging a funny round weight with a handle. Perhaps you viewed a segment on the news talking about this craze called kettlebell training and aren’t really sure what to think. Although a recent trend kettlebell training seems to be the in thing, largely due to a Russian strength coach Pavel Tsatsouline.
Russian kettlebells
What exactly is a kettlebell you may ask? A kettlebell is an old style type of weight training equipment that resembles an iron bowling ball with a thick handle.
Used previously by old time strong men and popularised by Russian athletes, the kettlebell is now used by top sports teams, martial artists, athletes, Hollywood celebrities and everyday trainers throughout the world, due to the outstanding results people are getting.
The kettlebell swing is the exercise that a lot of the movements are built from. The swing can be done with 1 or 2 hands. It involves hiking the kettlebell between your legs before using your hips and posterior chain to propel the kettlebell forward and up in a circular swing movement before it drops under control back between your legs. Kettlebell swings are a lot harder than they look and the following benefits highlight just how good they are:
1). Kettlebells are highly efficient and allow you to do fitness and weight training in one workout at the same time.
2). The kettlebell swing is one of the few movements that really targets the posterior chain muscles of the hips, back, core and hamstrings. This muscle group is very important for running, jumping and tackling effectively.
3). One option with kettlebell training is to do very brief but highly effective Tabata training. This training involves swinging for 20 seconds with only 10 seconds of rest. Although only 4 minutes long a tabata set is a brutal fitness regime.
4). Forget crunches and other useless ab exercise machines, kettlebell swings really hit the abs and core to deliver functional ab training that gets results.
5). Although some people are a little bit wary at first, swings are great for training your back. performed correctly kettlebell swings target the lower, mid and upper back and train it in one synergistic movement giving you a total back workout.
6). Swings for medium to high repetitions are very beneficial for back endurance which studios have shown to have a very positive effect on minimizing back injuries
7). Not only are swings great for getting you fit they are fantastic for burning body fat. there is a continuing trend towards short and intense workouts for fatloss and kettlebell swings definitely fit the bill
The above are only some of the benefits a program of kettlebell swings can provide. Although it sounds too good to be true there is a downside of kettlebell swings … they are hard work. However, if you build into your program gradually, a program based around kettlebell swing movements will provide fantastic workouts to get you fit, lean and healthy in a surprisingly short amount of time.
For more information then check out this resource about kettlebells
