Kettlebells, and why I can't feed myself.

My sternum is still giving me grief.  I've been out of the gym for a couple of weeks now, resting it and just doing some kettlebell work and pull-up practice.  Tomorrow I go back to squatting, so wish me luck not getting stabbed in the chest with serious pain as soon as I hit my work sets.  In the meantime, I've been working on one-handed swings with my 53-pounder, Ma'at, Mother of Kettlebells.

Oof, that is heavy.  I'm doing the 2T-2R-2T-2L-2T sets of 10 and so far I can barely swing the bell up to hip level with one hand, let alone chest level.

I've also been trying, in a sort of half-assed way, to cut some fat.  But because I will not ever have time in my life to weigh and measure and count calories - I'm pretty sure if I were stranded on a desert island I would find more pressing things to do - I figured I'd just eat intuitively, cut back on the food a little, cut out the junk food, and watch my carbs.

Well, for the last couple of weeks I've felt like crap.  No energy, anxious, depressed, and so forth.  So I figured, well, even I can log my food for a week or so to see if I'm hitting my macro targets.

I was not.  Not only was I not hitting my macro targets, but my average daily calorie intake over the week I logged was somewhere around 850 per day.  Apparently "intuitive eating", for me, results in yogurt for breakfast and lunch and then something small and light for dinner, because eating is a pain and as a general rule I want no part of it.  I need someone to just tell me what to eat so I don't lose all my muscle.

February is a busy month.  Last weekend was Carmen at the Met.  Next weekend is Iolanta and Bluebeard's Castle.  The weekend after that is the telecast of Andrea Chernier at the Ritz Five, followed in close succession by What We Do in Shadows (vampire mockumentary!) and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (first-ever Iranian vampire movie!).

Things Kettlebells Have Taught Me, #1

When you're doing rep ladders, it is easy as balls to completely lose sight of how many reps you've done in total, and then you spend the next two or three days praying the Lord your soul to take so you don't have to try to get out of bed in the morning.

This was something I hadn't realized before because I haven't done ladders in anything else.  But man, if you want to trick yourself into ramping up volume to ridiculous extents, ladders are the way to go.  I mean, it's only five reps, right?  And then four, and that's totally not very many, right?

Right?

No, it's not.  But 90 reps sure as fuck is, and that is where you will find yourself before your body has even figured out that you're exercising.  Ouch.

Wherein the UPS delivery guy plots my fiery downfall

For the last few days, the kettlebell-swinging internet has been abuzz with RKC-certified instructors handing out codes for 40% off Dragon Door kettlebells, for the benefit of those of us not among the anointed.  (And for their own benefit, since I assume they get referral money.)  As planned, I bought two 12kg and a 24kg.  I already had a 25-pounder, but since it's not the same weight, I'm going to see if my daughter wants that one.  If not, I can always still use it for singles work, or trade it in to Play It Again for something else cool.

Now I'm broke, but I got top-of-the-line kettlebells for less than the cost of most no-name ones, so I'm pretty happy.

Last night was deadlift night.  I did the I'm Not Doing Jack Shit protocol because everything I've done this week has made me DOMS-ish and I want to be on point for the squat and deadlift seminar at Iron Sport on Sunday.  I set a new PR - 185 pounds, which is so, so close to my goal weight of 200.  It was just for a single and I want to be able to do 200 for reps, but still.  Super close.  My top set felt easier, too.

But the seminar is just in time, because I caught sight of myself in the mirror angle when I was pulling my work set, and holy shit is my form bad.  I cannot for anything keep my back from rounding, even on fairly light weights.  Even concentrating on pulling my shoulders and lats back doesn't work once the weight starts coming off the ground.  I don't know if it's a weak upper back, shoulder mobility issues, or just my posture at the start of the lift, but hopefully someone at the seminar can tell me.  I just hope my form's not so bad that I have to deload all the way back to the empty bar and work back up.

In honor of the seminar I'm going to, here's the (classic, hilarious) commercial for the gym hosting it:

Ow, my shoulders.

Today I did a set of five walkouts with 135 pounds.  God damn, that is heavy.  But in a weird way; not in the sense that my leg muscles were shaking under the strain, but in the sense that I put 135 pounds on my shoulders and that weight feels like it's grinding my bones to make its bread.  I've got fat to spare, but the weight squashed right through it.  It was strange and uncomfortable, and I sort of have a little more sympathy now for people who use the pussy pad, though not much.

Other than that, my main lift for tonight was squats with a top set of 85 and a heavy single of 105 (new PR!).  I had to pause and regroup between reps 4 and 5, but last time I squatted this weight I had to stop between 3 and 4, so I'm getting there, slowly but surely.

Last week I tried doing TGUs with my 35-pounder, Mathilde.  I almost dropped it on my head and killed myself.  I definitely need more time under the 25; a TGU is not something you want to fail.  I also gave my arm an epic bruise doing cleans with it, but at least I can do a one-handed swing with it with something resembling good form.  Just... not for many sets.

My kettlebell coach sent out a mass email to his students with the subject "YOU CAN'T MISS THIS!"  I read the email, and lo, he was actually totally correct.  So a big chunk of my paycheck this Friday is going toward Dragon Door kettlebells.  Right now the plan is to buy two 12kgs and an aspirational 24kg.  I can use it for deadlifts or something.  (Or, god save my quads, goblet squats.)

I think I'd like to compete in kettlebell meets.  I just think it would be really cool.  I was never athletic and I was always so, so jealous of my cousins when they competed in gymnastics meets and brought home trophies.  I probably won't ever compete in powerlifting events because having a 400-pound deadlift would require me to have the sort of body that can move 400 pounds off the floor, and while I'm all for strength, I prefer a more streamlined look.  (I say that as though it's all about aesthetics.  The truth is that I doubt I'm physically capable of reaching that level of strength.  I'm just going to tell myself it's all about not getting all bulky and mannish because that will salve my ego a little.)

That means I need to work on my long cycle, because just the thought of doing it for ten minutes makes my shoulders hurt.  That can go on my list of goals too.

What is this strange feeling? It is almost like warmth.

It was actually warm enough to go hiking today, so I went for a four-and-a-half mile one.  It didn't seem that long.  I still huffed and puffed going up the steeper trails, but overall it didn't feel like that much distance.

Still, it reminded me why I powerlift.  If you want a twenty-second burst of maximal effort, I'm all over it.  Sustaining even 75% effort for more than about thirty seconds?  That is a lot of effort and huffing and puffing and cursing everything.  No wonder I was never any good at PE as a child.  Well, that and my inherent distaste for team sports and pointlessly chasing a ball around a field.

After resting a while post-hike, I did S&S.  The swings I got down to 4:37, though holy crap, was I smoked.  If I can keep up that time for the next few sessions I'll move to one-handed swings with the 25lb.  TGUs - again, with the 25lb - came in at 8:09, but they felt awfully wobbly.  I want to wait to move up weight on that one until I really feel like I own the 25lb bell for every stage of all ten reps.  Oddly enough, they get easier on the last couple of reps, so maybe it's the technique I'm having trouble with more than the weight.  Either way, I'm not putting 35 pounds over my face until I'm stable with the 25.  Probably this will happen by the time I get one-armed swings down  below 5 minutes, so I can move everything up at once.

By the way - if you, like me, just started wondering why the hell lb is the abbreviation for pound, World Wide Words via The Google tells me it's because lb stands for libra, which is a shorter reference to libra pondo or "pound weight"; the English pound comes from the second word, but the abbreviation comes from the first.

Grip strength woes

So Friday was deadlifting day.  Which was problematic to begin with, since I sort of overdid it on the bench press/upper body on Thursday.  I may need to rethink my T/Th/F schedule, though it keeps me out of the gym on Monday, which is the only busy day in the weight room.

Anyway; I did 140x5 but my lockout sucked.  I didn't feel strong at the top, or feel like I was straightening up all the way.  So instead of unloading the bar, I glared at it for a couple of minutes and then decided to do another triple.

Same result.  The weight went up, but the lockout sucked.  Also, I could barely hold onto the bar, and on at least one rep it fell out of my hands right before it hit the floor.  So I tried a set with the alternating grip, and boom - the weight went straight up, no lockout issues at all.

I was a little displeased by this, so I tried a backoff single of 135.  It honest to god dropped right out of my hands at the top of the lift.  Between the noise 135 pounds makes hitting the floor and the sound of me turning the air blue upon lift failure, it's a good thing I don't work out at Planet Fatness or my picture would be on Do Not Admit lists all over the country.  Again, 135 with the alternating grip went up just fine.

So I'm going to have to work grip strength.  And this week I'm going to try hook grip and see if that helps.  Also, the tendons in my forearms hurt.

In other fail news, I got the goals backward for S&S - it's 100 kettlebell swings in 5 minutes and 5 TGUs on each side in 10.  That's bad news for my swings, but does mean I should probably think about moving up weight on the TGU.

Link roundup

So it looks like cardio might not actually kill your gainz after all, depending on what you're doing.

A good day squatting, on the other hand...

Awesome workout today.  I usually don't get the same endorphin rush from lifting that I do from a really good yoga class, but today I did, and left the gym totally energized.  The weights felt totally manageable and even light on the top set of triples; they'd probably have felt light on the extra set of five across too, if I'd rested longer between sets.

Today's workout:
Squats: 45x5x2, 50x3, 60x3, 70x3, 80x3, 80x5
Front squats: 45x5x3
Seated dumbbell press: 20x5x5
Kettlebell windmills: 20x5x5

Well, I say "kettlebell windmills."  I was doing them wrong.  Apparently you're supposed to bend forward a little in a way that is exactly not how you're supposed to do triangle pose, so basically I was doing triangle pose with a 20-pound weight held over my head.  I did a few reps after I'd gotten home and watched YouTube tutorials, though, so I feel a little better about my technique now.

Tiredness, S&S, and a music rec

Today's workout: S&S.  I didn't time it because for a number of reasons, mostly medication-related, today was a super low energy day.

I did start alternating sets of one-arm swings with two-arm swings.  Wow, the one-arm swings are heavy.  They definitely make the two-arm swings feel easy, though.

In non-fitness-related news, David Lang, of Little Match Girl Passion fame, has an incredible work called World to Come for voice and cello, which I just discovered today and I am in love with it:

TFW everyone else in the class is doing it differently.

No workouts were done this weekend.  That's because the DOMS from Friday's overdoing-it were epic.  This weekend was a recovery weekend.

Today's workout:

Kettlebell class, an hour of intervals.  Exercises included one-armed swings, clean and press, snatch, really difficult plank variants, and I don't even know what all else.

And goblet squats.

Now, goblet squats during intervals - yay, right?  By the time the squats rolled around I was about to die and would pretty much take any chance I could get to sit the hell down and see how close to the floor I could get my tailbone.  When I do goblet squats I go ATG because why not?  The weight's light and it stretches out my hips and lower back.  At that point my only concern was staying at the bottom long enough to get my breath back without drawing the instructor's attention and making him think I was a slacker.

But then I look around, and everyone else is at or above parallel.

Now, on one hand, oop and all that.  On the other hand, as mentioned before, I was about to die, and fuck everyone - I was sitting my middle-aged ass down between my ankles for a couple of breaths.  Also, the instructor came by and gave me a cue for getting rid of my lumbar slouch, which I've been worried about but haven't quite known how to fix, so bonus.

On the other hand, I still wonder if all those people doing kettlebell squats at parallel know something I don't.  Maybe it's a better workout that way?  Or at least harder to use it as an excuse to catch your breath.

Progress on S&S

Today's workout:

S&S warmup, 15 pounds for halos, 25 for goblet squats.  I feel the goblet squats should be getting easier, but they do not agree.

2-handed swings:  25 pounds, 1x10, 6x15, 11 minutes.

TGUs, 5 per side, 15 pounds, 8 minutes.

My times aren't too far off the goal times, but there's a lot of progress to be made before I start thinking about moving up weights.

Swings: no arm pain this time, and I can definitely get farther into each set, and farther into sets as a whole, before my hip drive starts giving out.  Taking in a sharp breath on the hike definitely helps, and the "breathe behind the shield" cue seems useful for pretty much everything.

TGUs:  Going well on the right side, but my left side is way weak.  I can't lever up onto my elbow without bringing my leg off the ground and flailing like an upended turtle.  I've noticed this in my squats too - when the weight gets heavy I tend to push more through the right side.  Maybe TGUs will help even out my squats, to the extent that anything but a miracle can help my squats.

Overall: exhausted today for some reason.  Took a personal day to run some errands, fed the cats early, went back to bed, and dozed off and on until almost 11, and I'm still worn out.  Ugh.  Fairly sure I've lost some body fat, since I can actually sort of feel my hipbones, but I'm not checking my weight again for a few weeks at least.