I'm never bored with numbers! And I always save my favorite for last!

...unless it's tax time, lol!

Today's training was long and light.  I never picked up anything heavier than the 12kg on purpose.

warm up
2 sets x 10 2 hd swing (15/15 x 2)
1 set 20 reps (30/30)
1 set 40 reps (1 min/1 min)
4 min, 80 swings

10 min set, 40 reps per minute = 400 swings
2.5 min rest
9 min set, 41 rpm = 369 swings
2 min rest
8 min set, 42 rpm = 336 swings
2 min rest
7 min set, 44 rpm = 308 reps
2 min rest
6 min set, 42 rpm = 252 swings
2 min rest
5 min set, 40 rpm = 200 swings

59.5 min, 1945 swings

Ouch, just 30 seconds under an hour!  If I had planned it before I showed up I might evened it up, but to be honest my first plan was do to 3 sets 10 minutes long with a 2.5 min rest and play with a faster pace.  I then changed it to 10, 9, 8 and after the warm up I thought, what the hell, right? Let's take the sets all the way down to 5 minutes!  And really the reason was because I had it in my head our workout was only an hour, and then I realized it 90 minutes on Saturday! duh!

I can only do these crazy ass long sets with my two students, Meg and Maribel so too bad for them they had to ride with me this morning!  I chose the 12kg because I strained my elbow flexors on my right arm due to overuse (go figure!).  Anyway, I would love to do this workout with the 14kg, but honestly speeding the pace of the swing up as fast as I did in three of those sets with the 16kg is out of my league!  I may have been able to do almost 2000 reps within an hour with the 16kg if I took shorter rest periods, but not faster swings!

I altered my Roundabout swing progression slightly and came up with another killer combination that I will share with you soon!  But I did purposely swing more on my left arm than my right, and 50% or more of the swings were with 2 hands.  By using a version of the Roundabout I did not pay attention to rep count for the entire set, only for each and every minute did I made sure to hit my faster pace, so I counted all of the reps within each minute and then, just now, multiplied the pace by the length of the set.

On to some easy and light squats and presses, 25 min. (goblet, front squats, presses)  I knew I had to practice jerks at Juno in the afternoon, so I didn't want to do any more ballistics, and this was the only day this week I had a chance to do squats....I made my next class do them too!

8:30-9:30 Intermediate class.  Cleans, lunges, squats, swings...a few more lunges at the end.

10:30-12:00 private sessions

1:00 Juno w/John wild Buckley.  12 kg jerks, 4 sets, 2 min/2 min  15 R/ 15 L (30 reps x 4 sets)

I made my lunch to take with me knowing I'd be hungry while driving back from Berkeley at 2:30-3:30.  I don't normally eat until around 12 noon on a Saturdays, but by 12 noon I'm pretty hungry.  But I can't really eat anything heavy or that requires my body to go into digesting foods before I train!  So, coffee with cream before and after classes, a 2 oz piece of dark chocolate around 11:00.  On the dive up to Juno I had a small piece of sliced roasted chicken breast and a couple of slices of Kabocha squash.

Ahhhh....on my way home I was soooo happy to eat the rest of my lunch!  Started off with the chicken, went to the asparagus and ended with my favorite of all! The roasted squash!  Funny how we all eat out favorites in different orders!  Mark will eat his favorite first, while I always save my favorite fot last! There is some sort of phycological reason depending on your order of birth (me?  middle child, him? youngest!), and or if your family was "better off" (him) or not so much (me!)

Do you eat your favorite first?  Or last?


ps, I took a packet of mayonaise just in case I wanted to stop and buy a bread roll and make a sandwich out of the chicken, asparagus and squash!  I almost always want bread after a long day of training, but today I didn't!  I did come home and finish off the rest of the squash!  I'm a pretty happy girl after today!

Plain Yogurt and Oats. Savory, Sweet, or Both?

I love plain yogurt, full fat if I can find it and, in fact, now that I think about it, if I can't buy full fat then I usually pass, there are a lot of other really good, healthy and tasty foods.  It may be because what I enjoy about plain yogurt is it's salty tangy "cheesy-ness" and when the fat content is lower it's more gelatinous.  I think our Farmers' Market starts tomorrow in which case I should find my beloved sheep's milk yogurt!  uh oh!

Today I kind of ate my meals backwards! I had roasted chicken and mashed cauliflower for breakfast at 9:30 (5:30am yoga), and for dinner I'm eating oats!  Steel cut oats, another food traditionally eaten sweet can also be prepared as a savory dish. The two together, steel cut oats, plain yogurt with a little lime and good pinch of salt is fine just like that! But I did add some raisins because savory sweet is really good too!  And then I remembered I had some pumpkin seeds....I probably didn't need both (no, I definitely didn't need both!), or either, but too late!  It was so delicious!


Do you like, or eat plain yogurt?    99% of the time I add lime (acid) and a good pinch of kosher salt to bring out the cheesy nature of the yogurt.  I've added corn in the summer, sliced almonds, oats (of course!), farro (another fav) and/or other grains, and I've even tried beans (not so great!)  I'm thinking maybe adding in some salsas this year along with the grains (cucumber salsa?), and fresh herbs for sure....now that I'm into the herb thing!

Do you eat savory yogurt meals?

I've posted a couple of recipe ideas for savory steel cut oats, my favorite is topped with feta and a grind of black pepper.  Maribel, one of my training partners was the first person to ever suggest it to me (thank you!) and you can find many other savory oat recipes online.  I've not added any veggies to oats though...

Have you had, or do you have your own recipe for savory oats?



ps steel cut oats take 5 minutes in the pressure cooker, which is great when you don't have 25-30 minutes.  Being able to make them quickly probably saved me from eating the bread pudding I brought home for Mark from the Mexican market!  

Thursday, Me and Maribel, the exact workout (approximately!), and my new schedule!

Unless someone is truly interested I'm only posting this training session to journal it, not to explain it necessarily.  I have a private blog I usually journal my own personal workouts in, using my own shorthand, but I've been a bit lazy about it for over a year, maybe two, so I thought if I made some quick posts here, it would motivate me to keep a better history.  These are my "hardstyle" workouts that sometimes include a bit of scheduled GS training.  I'm really happy to have figured out my new schedule (I think)

Sunday, completely off (unless I feel great, in which case I may decide to go to yoga)
Monday, Get ups, GS, yoga
Tuesday Hardstyle (classes and private appt., no GS)
Wednesday, GS and yoga
Thursday, Heavy HS ,including dbl snatches (Maribel and Brenda), GS, two classes and privates
Friday, yoga (NO kettlebells at all)
Saturday, high volume HS, including squats and presses, 2-3 hours, privates, GS at Juno in Berkely at 12:00noon.

Started out w/ warm up and video taping "turn up the volume"

100 12kg sw (10 x 10)
100 16kg sw (10 tr x 10)
160 16 kg sw (100 5/5 + 60 2 hd sw)

260 swings, 15 min.

transition appx 5 min.

Snatches w/16kg

warm up

12 kg 1 sw, 1 sn 1 sw x 1 minute (12 sn + 12 sw)

14 kg 1 sw, 1 sn 1 sw x 1 minute (12 sn + 12 sw)
24 sn, 24 sw

transition appx 2-4 min.

1 min/1 min all out 16kg snatches x 6 sets  half of them done with the compbell, in fact the first three done with DD bell and the last three with the comp (me and Mari went 'I go you go', picture above!).  I'm going to change it next time and alternate.  One with more speed and then straight away to the comp bell.

11 R, 10 L, 7 R = 28 (11 was probably a mistake, meaning to do 10) (Mari R17, L 16)

10 L, 10 R, 9 L = 29 (started with the left hand on purpose, even though I did not want to!) (Mari R 16, L 16)

5 R, 5 L, 5 R, 5 L, 5 R, 3 L = 28 (Mari R 16, L 16)

comp bell (30 sec R/30 sec L)

13 R, 13 L = 26 (Mari R 15, L 15)

13 R, 13 L = 26 (Mari R 12, L 13)

13 R, 14 L = 27 (Mari R 12, L 12)

164 16kg snatches, 12 min.

transition appx 2-3 min.

24kg 2 hd sw 20 sets of 10 = 200 (15/15 = 10 min)

22 kg 2 hd sw 5 sets of 10 = 50 (15/15 = 2.5 min)

20 kg 2 hd sw x 5 sets of 10 = 50 (15/15 = 2.5 min)

300 swings, 15 min.

Total workout appx 55 min.  Afterwards I said to Maribel, "I can't belive we train for 90 minutes on Saturdays!"  55 min seemed plenty tough this morning before the crack of dawn (5:30am) and in a muggy 50 degree garage!  lol

584 swings

188 snatches

I finished my own workout with my GS practice.  A couple of warm up sets (5/5 x 2 maybe) with the 8kg comp bell in preparation for my first 12 minute set at 20 RPM.  Appx 20 minutes.

120/120 8 kg snatch one hand switch at 6 minutes.

240 sn

11:00 swing class was the next on the list.  12kg appx 570 swings.

Thursday total reps

1154 swings

448 snatches

And this was a light day.

Friday is yoga and not even a little finger on a kettlebell until Saturday morning!

"Turn Up the Volume" video workout!

Here it is!  Do it once, do it twice!  Follow me or follow Maribel, you choose how high you want to turn it up!


Enjoy!

'Use It or Lose It' Cooking

On Monday I went through my cabinets and fridge and threw out a bunch of crap!  Snacks and plain old junk that until that morning I didn't want to waste, but I wasn't ready to eat it either.  I was hanging onto it just in case, God forbid, I ran out of food I guess.  I also had to take a good look at some of the winter hoard I was treating the same way.  A couple of butternut squashes that I bought when I didn't need them out of fear of needing them and not having them....again, in case they disappeared off the face of the earth!  The almost moldy purple Japanese yams that didn't taste as good as I remembered, so there they sat in case of an emergency!  I think I am ready to stop buying food I don't need or can use within a few days time.

The grocery store is just so intoxicating sometimes!  So much affordable luxury and designer foods!  But really, I can, and should, only eat so much and i'm getting better and better all the time about not overbuying.

Still left with plenty of food, early this morning I decided to use some of it, or lose it!  We all need to make a list of meals/dishes that we can cook using all the week's leftover veggies and other stuff sitting around on the kitchen counter or pantry!  Since I've been making meat pies, this is my contribution for the day!

Yes, I could have made a pastry crust and, let me tell you, I wanted to!  But those yams and butternuts were crying out to be saved from next weeks trash!  So in Shepard's pie fashion I topped my meat filling with a Garnet yam and butternut mash.  The potato and squash took 2 minutes to steam in the pressure cooker with 1/4 c rich beef broth (more about that in a sec), into the food processor they went with 2tbl butter and seasoned with salt, anh oh yes, the chives I bought last week for something else that I never got around to using!

I made the meat filling with the leftover beef stock from the neck bones/meat I cooked in the beer and coffee sauce. It came out super rich because of all of the bones and already seasoned from the Montreal spices that were in it.  I defrosted, in the microwave, 1lb of ground beef from the freezer, browned it in a large pan, pushed it to the side and added;

5 mushrooms
10 brussels
1 lg carrot
4 celery stalks
and 1 lg onion
thyme

When onion was translucent and veggies were starting to get soft I added 2 tbl flour (cook off the raw flour smell, 2 minutes) add 2 - 3 c. stock.  Bring to a boil, lower heat and cook for about 5-10 minutes while making topping.

Pour meat filling into casserole or pie dish and spoon mashed veg over top.  Spread with spatula and bake 20-30 minutes until filling starts to bubble through topping.

I forgot Mark is not a big fan of sweet potato/yams argh!  So I guess I'll have to make another with either a pastry top, or try the mashed cauliflower again.  The only thing is I used up every last veg in the fridge!  I do have some peas and corn in the freezer, and I always have onions!

What are some other meals you make out of anything and everything left over?

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

TMI My second ever 10 minute snatch set 196 reps (one hand switch) "whoop, whoop"!

Good-ness!  This morning I completed a 10 minute long 12kg snatch set, one hand switch at 5 minutes, for only the second time ever, so I guess I had a PR (personal record).  On March 21, just a few weeks ago I completed my first ever 10 min, one hand switch 12kg snatch set!  This is kind of a big deal because I've been interested in the mystery of this sport, Kettlebell Sport, for a number of years but there were a few things holding me back from looking into training it more seriously.

The first is that I did not want to give up my own style of training based on "Hardstyle" kettlebell movements, or really what Mark calls "Tracystyle"!  What is the difference?  Well, Mark explains it pretty simply by defining "Hardstyle" as focusing on power and acceleration in the quick lifts and maximum tension in the "grinds".  "Girya Sport" (GS aka Kettlebell Sport) as focusing on maximum efficiency of movement.  A few other reasons but that is the main one.  I love my own training and once I realized I did not have to give one up for the other I was "in"!

Much more to come about this addition in my life, and I describe it as an addition not a replacement.  Back to my workout this morning.

Since I've had an interest in this method of training long sets of snatches and jerks with only one hand switch I started playing around with "pacing" years ago.  Pace work added to my own style of training beautifully!  And wow!  It has given me tons and tons of really great workouts.  In fact way back in the really early days of teaching my style of swing training I recognized the importance of pace and included a pacing drill in my very first DVD Programming the Kettlebell Swing, and of course many times what works for programming the swing works for the snatch as well!  Because of all of my years of training pace I have a pretty darn good timing but never really went beyond 2-3 minutes without switching hands.....because I could not go longer!  I had practiced it enough times to know I could not do it!

Knowing what I know about progression, my first goal was to do it with the 8kg!  I was successful a handful of times with the 8kg, but I was inconsistent.  And to be fair it wasn't my main gig, it was just challenge and play.  I'm pretty sure I did it once with the 10kg...that must have been a good day!  But because I knew how freakin' frackin' hard the 8kg was, I knew how hard the 12kg would be!  I had total respect for it!  Total!  This is why, at the last minute, when I, for some crazy ass reason, agreed to "try" the 10 minute 12kg jerk I was scared as hell!  I had total respect for this sport and never once did I ever think it was going to be easy.

Fast forward...kind of....

January 29 I had my very first GS coaching session with John Wild Buckley.
January 30 I got sick, no practice
February 1, I left for a workshop in Columbus Ohio, no GS training but hundreds and hundreds of swing reps (maybe over 2000), and still not feeling 100%
Feb 3rd, back home, Sunday, no training.
Feb 4th, I better get my ass in gear!  I'm going to be on a platform in less that 5 days
Feb 9th, my first ever 10 min jerk set!  Whew!  Did I really do that?   Tears of joy!

Feb 11th, Monday and completely sold on the whole competition experience!  Sign me up!

Feb 16th, first private session at Juno....what?  What did I get myself into?  Good God I still have to train and survive SFG in Houston in a couple of weeks!
Feb 25th-March 6th, my first week of training GS in addition to all of my other Tracystyle workouts and SFG practice (heavy shit!).
March 6th, the day before I left for SFG I completed my second only 10 minute 12kg jerk set (forgot how many reps but I have it written down)

March 7th, leave for Houston
March 8th, first day of SFG, having fun, feeling strong and happy, pull hamstring at the end of the day....argh!  What?
March 9th second day of SFG, not really happy.  Worried about hamstring and the rest of my life.
March 10th, third day SFG.  5 minute 20 kg snatch test, killed it, and all of my other strength requirements for certification!  Whew, now back to regular programmed schedule, right?

Wrong.

Hamstring pull.  No yoga.  I need my yoga.

Blah, blah, blah.

Not much of any, what I consider, "real" training until Tuesday of last week.

March 28th finally back at Juno.  And what am I treated to?  Oh yes, I'm treated to a whole other world of swings!  GS swings!  One hand swings, 10/10 w/32kg and 5/5 36kg  (80lbs).

March 30th, The Swing Quest! Awesome!  This is what I love about my life!  The training, the practice, the teaching. the coaching, the leading, the following!

Monday, April 1st, GS workout, 10 minute 8kg jerk (I mistakenly did 12 min set, 6/6), and 10 min, 12kg snatch.  Whoop, whoop!  Yikes!  Last week I was scheduled to do a 12 min set! Yeah right!  I managed 8 minutes (4/4), but today 10 min was on the schedule.  Boom!  As my coach would say (and did I might add).  196 total reps!  103/93, blowing away my first ever 10 minute set on 3/21/13 of 84/77 (R and L)!

Now until a possible GS meet in Seattle in less than 4 weeks...should I go?  I'd be competing in the biathlon, 12kg 10 minute jerk and snatch.  One thing I know now is that I'm not scared.  I'm not scared at all!  It's just 10 minutes, 5/5.  I have plenty of respect for the time, but I also have respect for myself.  I am the one that will show up.  Nothing is handed to me or anybody else in this sport, or any other competitive sport for that matter.  The heart does the work, the body follows, and so does the mind.  Do the work, nothing else matters. You can't buy a life, you have to live one.

PS one of the funniest things....if you post video of yourself training GS be ready for all kinds of amateur coaching!  Amateur coaching is when someone tells you what they think you are doing wrong, but doesn't tell you how to fix it!  If you don't offer corrections then you are simply criticizing!  And besides, did I ask you?  I've been doing this for only a few weeks, give me a break!  

"whoop, whoop" is when cardio, grip and technique all go out the window!  Why do I love this stuff?

For your copy of a really great DVD, "Programming the Kettlebell Swing" here is the link (and geez, I was so young!  God bless having videos of when you are younger!  lol)  Although it is not listed as a "work along" video, it was taped during a live workshop that includes over 1000 swing reps! 

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