Advanced "Turn Up the Volume", Tracyrif's 'work into rest' swings

Tuesday morning, The Swing Quest just a memory.... a great memory but back to regular workouts.

My Tuesday morning class starts out with 30 solid minutes of swings.  I lead my students through a minimum of 500-600 reps, but there are many different "levels" of kettlebellers.  Some need more rest and less reps, some it's just right and then there are some that have been doing this a long time and like to do as many reps as possible!  In fact I don't doubt they would go nonstop.....hey, it's been a while amybe we should give that a go.....maybe not!

It's rare these days that I take the highest volume option because I'm the leader and I want to swing side by side with everybody, but mostly with my students that are unsure how to scale back and I want to make sure they do not overdo because I want them to #1 stay safe. #2 have fun! #3 come back often! #4 feel capable and confident not matter how many swing reps they do.  Showing up consistently and working to your own level is the only thing I care about!

Because I scale back my reps I usually increase my bell size, this way "equal work to rest" is completely appropriate.  My EWR bell weight starts with the 16kg and may go up.  My 2-3-4 to 1 work to rest is the 14kg and 16kg.  And just so everybody knows when I know I have to swing thousands of reps over a 2-3 hour period I use what I call my "marathon" swing weight, the 12kg (DVD's workshop), because I have to talk and intruct the entire time, although I do pick up and demo with a heavier bell for about 25% of the time..

Today's workout was crazy high volume, so much so that I think I can include this in a group of workouts I'll start calling "Turn Up the Volume"!  In fact this is the first time I'm writing it and counting up the reps, so here is is!  All rest periods, ALL rest periods are only 15 seconds long.  Using a method of increasing workloads while decreasing rest I call "work into rest".  This means that instead of resting you continue on, swinging another 10 reps through the rest period onto the next work set of ten!  How many rest intervals you choose to work through are completely up to you!  There are 10 works sets, 10 rest sets and in this version only four of the ten rest intervals, a total of 1 minute per 5 minutes of swings were not optional to skip.  Personally, today, I chose to work through all of the ones that weren't mandatory!

Foundation before you 'Turn up the Volume'

10 2 hd swings x 10 sets (15/15)
all rest periods were mandatory during these first warm up sets

100 swings, 5 min.

This is the base, 10 sets of ten work sets and ten "rest" sets.  I have numerous workouts that give everybody the option of swinging through a "rest" set (interval).  If you could visualize the work and rest intervals they might look like this:

Set 1, rest 1, set 2, rest 2, set 3, rest 3, set 4, rest 4, set 5, rest 5, set 6, rest 6, set 7, rest 7, set 8, rest 8, set 9, rest 9, set 10, rest 10 

(rest # 1, 3, 6 and 10 are always mandatory in this workout)

If you are working at an equal work to rest ratio, or working up to it, you only want to focus on the 10 sets of 10. DO NOT do any extra reps during the rest periods!  If you do "work through a rest", then you NEVER get that rest back!  So it's not like yo'll ver get extra rest for working more!  You just get to work more!

10 swings, rest
10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, rest (30 reps, 2 sets of 10 working through one rest interval)
10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, rest (50 reps, 3 sets of 10 working through 2 rest intervals)
10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings, 10 swings (70 swings, 4 sets of ten working through 3 rest intervals!)
REST!

So basically it's
10 x 1 (15/15)
30 x 1 (45/15, 3 to 1)
50 x 1 (1.25 min/15 sec, 5 to 1)
70 x 1 (1.75 min/15 sec, 7 to 1)

160 reps, 5 min

After the initial 10 sets of ten we started optional "work into rest"  I did not take video, but I may on Thursday showing how I used my swing combinations in the work sets and 2 hand swings as the optional rest/work sets.  Here is an example, and actually the exact workout!  Why not share, right?

10 tr, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr
REST! 

(I will post a video demo of this rotation tomorrow if anybody is interested)


5/5, rest
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, rest
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, rest
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5
REST!

10 minutes, 320 reps

To make it harder...like it needed to be harder...I repeated these same combinations only I laddered up slower by alternating tr sets and 5/5 sets.

10 tr, rest
5/5, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, rest
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, rest
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, rest
10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr, 10 2 hd sw, 10 tr
5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5, 10 2 hd sw, 5/5
REST!

To make it even harder?  All two hand swings of course!  I did take a one minute long rest before this last round of work into rest!


10 2 hd sw x 1 (15/15)
30 2 hd sw x 1 (45/15, 3 to 1)
50 2 hd sw x 1 (1.25 min/15 sec, 5 to 1)
70 2 hd sw x 1 (1.75 min/15 sec, 7 to 1)

160 reps, 5 min

total workout
900 swings, 31 minutes

If you did continuous swings for 30 minutes that would equal out to 1200 swings.

For more about "work into rest" you can find it on my first DVD Programming the Kettlebell Swing

http://www.otpbooks.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=OTP&Product_Code=TRSWG