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Regimen Kettlebell workout progress

Fahcough said:
Do tell more. Hand conditioning from 1 sport does not carry over into the other. I can swing on ropes and gym rings for an hour but heavy KBs tear my hands up in sets of 10. The handles get rust under and just dig into calluses , rolling them in your grip.
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You have to clean them off pretty regularly if you are doing high rep work with finer grain sandpaper and or a metal brush. Especially if you use chalk.
The chalk and sweat cake onto the grip. I use 2 adjustable 32kg kettlebells and they are the pro grade girevoy sport ones. The thinner RKC style ones used to be terrible for it.
Yesterday I did 6 sets of 8 Double kettlebell swing with a 30 second rest between rounds. No issues at all hand wise. Today I did 3 sets of 12 gorilla rows and my callouses are feeling it now.

I looked at my handles just then and they were due a clean up. If I was to do snatches with them as they are, I reckon I would be ripping chunks off my hands.
I haven't been doing the volume needed to do any hand work, but I think I will give them a clean up and moiturize today today for the first time in ages.

I am betting with all that rope swinging etc, it's not your grip giving up though haha.
 
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GearSolidMetal said:
Bumping this thread to say I fell off the wagon for multiple months and decided to get back on it.

My first workout was 40 minutes, doing 32 sets of 20 reps of two handed swings... with the 20 pound kettlebell.

Why the 20 pounder? Because I bought it but its received the least use. Might as well use it to ease back into things. Just want to be sure I wouldn't injure myself.

My second workout was 15 minutes of straight snatch & presses, then 10 single-hand swings each side each minute for 15 minutes. After that I was sweaty but not exerted, so I busted out the 30 pounder and did snatch & presses for 10 minutes and single-arm swings for 10 minutes.

Still got the strength for the lighter weight kettlebells. I hope to graduate back up to the 40 and 50 pounders within a few weeks.
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5 weeks later I'm able to do 16 straight sets of 20 swings with my 50 pounder.
Great progress to getting back to my prior standard.
 
GearSolidMetal said:
What is 'high reps' to you?
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I am doing 10-12 reps with the 32kg each side but with 30 secs rest between sets (once both sides are done).
I might do 6-8 rounds of that, so closing in on 100 reps as a finisher.

I was doing similar with double 32s till about 10, that was a really hard effort for 6 rounds.

Don't get me wrong I know I could just add more and more reps but the aim is explosive "hard style" reps.
I have done Girevoy sport before and could definitely pump out higher rep sets, but I would rather just do other activities.

If I am swinging a kettlebell (currently) it's with max power.
 
Nailed a set of 50 two handed swings with the 97lbs. About pushed my grip to the limit.
 
I had Kettlebell clean and squats with 24s for 3x6 as part of my first round of exercises today. Surprisingly hard considering I can rearward lunge with 2x 32s.

I hadn't done squats with 2 bells in years.
 
Woah, remember this thread? I almost forgot it.

I have been remarkably inconsistent with my kettlebell routine. Sometimes I'm doing it for months at a time, and then I fall off for months at a time.

I got back on it around a month ago, starting my 2025 resolution early, and a month later this is what's happened.
Previously I have just doing my DVDs that I have posted in the OP of the thread, and I was getting bored doing the same workouts over and over again.
So I got a cheap TV with SmartView so I could play YouTube workouts on it, and that's made a world of difference.

And believe it or not, following workouts with female instructors is another layer of motivation because are you, as a man, going to fallout of a workout that a woman is leading? She can do it so why can't you?



This workout is a BITCH with a 40 pounder, especially with the exercises get tougher near the end.

So I've been mostly been doing that workout three times a week, and today I tried my old DVD workouts and.... they were so damn easy in comparison.

Originally planned on doing one workout, 20 minutes of 20-rep sets of swings with 30 second rests.... all one-handed alternative swings... and I barely broke a sweat.

That was so easy I popped in another workout which was cleans&presses for 15 minutes with the 30 pounder, but I upgraded to the 40 pounder for the last 5 minutes and thats what broke me.

The last 15 minutes were.... one handed swings with the 40 pounder, but with 20 second rests rather than 30 seconds... and that 10 seconds makes alot of difference. I admit I took a long break after 10 minutes and did the last 5 minutes with the 50 pounder.

Feels damn good.
Hoping to be consistent for the long-term for now on.
 
So I did another one of my old DVD workouts, and intended on doing the same 1st workout I did on Wednesday - 20 minutes of single-handed alternate swings - but the first 10 minutes with the 40 pounder, and the final 10 minutes with the 50 pounder.

Previously single-handed swings with the 50 pounder have tore up my palmskin in a very unpleasant way that dissuaded me from doing them at all although it was the next step in my endurance training. It really is tricky to instinctively hold the kettlebell handle with your fingers rather than grip it into your palm with heavy weights, but I think I made a very wise decision to exclusively do single-handed swings rather than double-handed swings this entire month.
First started off with the 30 pounder.
Then graduated to go up to the 40.
And I did 10 minutes of swings with the 40 pounder, and switched over to the 50 pounder for the last 10 minutes.
It felt pretty good. Was getting decently tired without feeling so strained I needed to skip a set to take a break.
After 20 minutes total I felt like I could do another 10 minutes. So I did and it felt great.

30 minutes of kettlebell swings was what I did with the 10K challenge I did a year and a half ago. 20 workouts in 30 days, and... I'm interested in doing that again.

So February 1st I'm starting the 10K challenge, exclusively doing 10,000 Single-Handed Kettlebell Swings in a month.
 
20250124_114543.jpg

By the way, this is what my right hand looks like right now.
No blisters.
No blood blisters.
Just lightly calloused skin.
Surprising to me because I learned this the hard way.

My left hand is weirdly untouched. So somehow I'm doing something better with my grip on my left hand I'm not doing with my right.
 


This and EMOM swings comprise the kettlebell part of my training. Doing both twice a week with clubs and slamball.
 
GearSolidMetal said:
View attachment 1080592

By the way, this is what my right hand looks like right now.
No blisters.
No blood blisters.
Just lightly calloused skin.
Surprising to me because I learned this the hard way.

My left hand is weirdly untouched. So somehow I'm doing something better with my grip on my left hand I'm not doing with my right.
Click to expand...
I just took a callous off for the first time in years. I was doing a 5x5 deadlift and pulled the last rep double overhand.
Unfortunately I had 32kg swings a few exercises later, so I had to plug it with chalk.

Lucky this week doesn't have too many grip related things planned. I keep accidentally using hand sanitiser on it and forgetting.
 
maximus__ said:
Lucky this week doesn't have too many grip related things planned. I keep accidentally using hand sanitiser on it and forgetting.
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Ouch.
Did that before.
Just had to bite down hard and deal with it for a few seconds.
Like hitting the your kneecap or elbow wrong and there's a moment of excruciating pain.

Day1 of my 10K Challenge began today. Saw no purpose in waiting until Feb1st.

Did a 35 minute workout this morning.
28 sets of 20 reps = 560 reps.
Skipped no sets. Only took two gulps of water during the 35 second rests.
Considering increasing the reps per set to 25 which would decrease the rests to around 25 seconds.
I'll play that by ear.
 
deadshot138 said:


This and EMOM swings comprise the kettlebell part of my training. Doing both twice a week with clubs and slamball.
Click to expand...


Although I'm quite experienced with kettlebells at this point I still check out kettlebell tutorials for helpful advice and double-checking issues with form to avoid injury.

But this guy said something in his single-hand kettlebell tutorial video that is just stupid.



Never have I heard anyone else say to have your thumb pointed down in a swing. Ever.
One of the issues I've noticed with 'workout gurus' is they come up with something insane they feel is an improvement, and they don't cite the source for why they are doing it correctly and everyone else is doing it wrong.

Even if this is only supposed to be a technique for beginners, its a no where near as important as the specific grip you should use with the fingers rather than the palm for single-handed swings to avoid tearing and blistering. Feeling pain after an exercise for days is the #1 way to convince anyone to NOT do that exercise again. I'm speaking from experience on that subject.

By the way, the #1 best source of info on kettlebells on YouTube is LebeStark. Not saying absolutely everything he says is correct, but I haven't heard a single bit of 'everyone else is wrong and I am right' elitist-guru bullshit.
 
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