Dr. Mark Cheng's Kettlebells Los Angeles

Kettlebells for Beginners

2011-01-08T18:50:00.000-08:00

Photo courtesy of Coach Ron Jones, KBLA RKC

If you've decided to start training with kettlebells and devote time to experiencing the improvements that they can offer you, you'll need to actually get your hands on some kettlebells! BUT WHICH ONES?!?

Here's my personal guideline.

Because the most fundamental exercises in kettlebell training are the Swing & the Turkish Get-Up, I strongly suggest having two different kettlebells. If you're thinking that having to shell out the money for two kettlebells is expensive, let me tell you that coming to see a doctor or therapist after you injure yourself trying to be a badarse with horribly compensated technique is much more expensive.

Invest on the front end, reap on the back end. Skimp on the front end, pay terribly on the back end.

The lighter kettlebell will allow you to learn the Turkish Get-Up with a weight that should allow you to be challenged safely without being too stressed to pay attention to good form. It will also allow you to make tweaks to your Swing form without great risk of injury to yourself.

Men - You'll ideally need both a 12kg (26lb) kettlebell and a 20kg (44lb) kettlebell. I know, I know, I know... You bench press with 5 plates on each side & can squat with a buffalo on your back. I don't care. The Swing & Turkish Get-Up CAN be done as strength movements, but finesse and technique are primary concerns in the RKC method - NOT brute strength. Remember that every point of technique you overlook will come back to haunt you eventually. Trust me on that.

Ladies - You'll ideally need both a 14lb kettlebell and a 16kg (35lb) kettlebell.

Now if you're one of those folks who's ridiculously strong, coordinated, and un-injured, you can certainly err towards the larger sized kettlebells. As long as you can maintain correct form on BOTH sides for Pavel's Program Minimum, which I believe he goes over in Enter the Kettlebell, use whatever sized bell you want. Remember that the sizes I mentioned in this post are nothing more than general guidelines for the average male & female based on my experiences in teaching around the world.

Remember, too, that NOTHING takes the place of working on the above exercises with a skilled instructor, not just a skilled athlete!

Proprioception is Sexy - RKC Snatch Test Preparation & other Sports Performance applications

2010-12-11T15:31:00.000-08:00

It never fails. Regardless of the field of endeavor, there's always someone with a serious disconnect between reality and actuality. Like the word proprioception. Would you think that something so nerdy could be sexy?

Let's look at how that works with movement, for example. If you've ever lifted a weight overhead as an adult, the odds are pretty good that when you thought you achieved the lockout position, you probably were a bit shy of straight at the elbow. Nonetheless, you were probably dead sure that you'd locked out that elbow and pressed or snatched that heavy weight to a perfect apex.

Sorry to break this to you, but you might've missed the lockout.

If you've ever done the RKC Snatch Test and heard the words "No count!", that could've very well happened because of an incomplete lockout. Yeah, I know you're sure. I know you've never had a no-count doing the snatch test at home. I know your form is perfect.... when YOU'RE THE JUDGE!

Subjectivity is the primary means of enabling the self towards failure. And as the legendary Functional Movement Screen founder Gray Cook says, "We all need systems to protect us from our own subjectivity." So the system that we need to refine is that which gives us feedback as to whether or not we're really moving the way we think we're moving and takes away our ability to argue defensively like bratty little children.

Proprioception is the ability to distinguish where one part of the body is in relation to another. We develop that ability somewhat as children during the growth process. In the years from newborn to childhood, you developed the ability to go from randomly poking yourself in the eye to picking that booger out with surgical precision. But with our increasingly sedentary lifestyles (and even in grade school since physical education programs got the ax years ago), proprioceptive deficits are building up faster than fat on the waistlines of American youth.

And as a result, you get to hear about proprioception from me. But here's the good part... Proprioception IS sexy!

Good proprioception affords you two very big advantages.
1. Accuracy in movement - which means that you very likely execute very precise, very controlled, very graceful, and very efficient movements. If you have great awareness of your own movement, then when your nervous system tells you that you locked out, then you REALLY did lock out. If your body is telling you that you locked out your back leg on that stance, then your Sifu likely agrees with you too. If your nervous system is masterfully in control of your body's movement, then that fadeaway jumpshot that you launched from 3-point land has a much higher likelihood of creating that sweet sound of nothing-but-net. That makes you not only a better athlete, but a more attractive specimen as well. Not to rip on bodybuilders, but you could be the most buff dude on the beach & unable to tuck your own shirt in.

2. Reduced injury rates - make everybody happier, except your competition. Someone with great proprioception can push harder on the field or in battle and get more out of his or her body. Someone with terrible proprioception will push hard and either waste move clumsily & get hurt or lurch like a car with the parking brakes on and create repetitive motion injury.

So for those of you who want to come to the RKC, I encourage you to find the strictest feedback mechanism that you can find (like a combination of Flip video & a solidly qualified instructor) and apply it mercilessly towards yourself. Why? Because if you're allowed to lie to yourself, you probably will. And your reliance on faulty proprioception may cost you a rather pricey certification, airfare, & lodging (as well as a few days off from work and wickedly sore muscles).

On the other hand, if you use this blogpost as a call to really invest the effort into re-calibrating your proprioception, you'll find that you not only perform better under pressure, but do so with less effort, more grace, and a decreased likelihood of injury.

If you're not interested in the RKC, no problem. But you STILL have to deal with the reality of your own movement patterns and develop a REAL awareness of them. As I often tell my students in martial arts, kettlebells, or any other form of movement, if I tell you to do something such as straightening your leg, and you think you're already straightening your leg, try to straighten it a little more anyways. If your leg moves, then you didn't have it as straight as you could have. And then that little bit of movement should humble you enough to self-check more & more and develop sharper & sharper awareness of your body and your control over it.

Don't wait until life takes away all your compensations before you take the time to self-check your perceptions against unflinching reality.

It's been long overdue

2010-10-31T14:33:00.000-07:00

Ladies & Gentlemen, I'm the first person to admit it...

I've fallen way short of my own expectations for this blog and for my own websites, especially www.kettlebellslosangeles.com.

So to remedy that, like any responsible person should do with a problem that's beyond their management capabilities, I'm seeking out professional help.

I have a whole slew of domain names that I've reserved, and I want to spend the next few months populating the vast majority of them so that I can start using them to get more information out and to increase my productivity.

Soon, I'll be launching my new portal website, which will hold a whole slew of links to my other websites. Those other websites will include everything from compendiums of my articles for different martial arts magazines, to information on the different Chinese medicine modalities that I practice, to my particular insights on Russian kettlebell training, to the different styles of martial arts that I practice and/or teach.

You've been incredibly patient as I've been traveling all over creation and not blogging or posting anywhere near as much as I'd like to. And if all goes well, I won't have to give the FMS company line of "2 more weeks" as a nebulous deadline of when this portal will be ready to open.

While it may not always seem like it, I hear you very clearly when you ask me for insights, for help, for solutions. And I am going to make sure that starting in 2011, you get the best I have to offer through the best of the world wide web's technologies.

Keep on me, keep pushing me, keep supporting me, and keep growing with me! And if you have some thoughts on how I can get my online presence sorted out sooner and smoother, please shoot me an e-mail at kettlebellsla@yahoo.com!

The LA Times & Yahoo News Jillian Michaels Kettlebell Controversy

2010-10-13T18:23:00.000-07:00

Just in case you've been lucky enough to be off the grid for a while, let me fill you in.

Not too long ago, I was contacted by James Fell, a fitness writer for the Los Angeles Times, to speak on a new kettlebell DVD featuring The Biggest Loser star, Jillian Michaels.

To say that I had a few issues with the quality of her instruction was to put it rather lightly. Then again, my situation is a little unique. My very first exposure to kettlebell training was directly from the man who essentially revived the use of the ancient Slavic strength training device, Pavel Tsatsouline himself. The VAST majority of what I've learned about the use of kettlebells and strength training comes directly from time spent directly under Tsatsouline's tutelage.

And as someone who makes his living as a health care professional dealing primarily with musculoskeletal pain, I see plenty of people who come into my clinic with injuries sustained while "exercising" or "training" or "working out". That's why I think so highly of the Functional Movement Systems information that's taught by another of my mentors, Gray Cook.

Cook's teachings echoed the same emphasis on disciplined movement that I'd grown up with in traditional martial arts. Moving in a sloppy fashion for the sake of exercise is just a precursor to "repetitive motion injury", a.k.a. "non-contact injury", a.k.a. "weekend warrior syndrome". The names are many, but the outcome is simple = PAIN.

With that in mind, it's not hard to see why I'm a stickler for details in movement, especially in teaching movement for the sake of exercise. If you try and muscle someone around in a combat situation instead of relying on well-developed finesse, you'd better be damn strong, or else you're going to be injured rather often. If you try and muscle around a weight, especially without the guidance of a qualified instructor, your likelihood of injury just went through the roof.

So as much as I'd prefer to be diplomatic and not ruffle any feathers, there's the small issue of integrity that I had to deal with. As much as it might benefit my bottom line, I don't like seeing my patients over and over again for the same or similar pains or injuries. If I do, that means that there's something I'm not doing right or addressing completely. It's a horrible business model, I know, but I'm the one who has to be able to sleep peacefully at night. Thus, I felt compelled to speak honestly about what I saw Ms. Michaels teaching as far as her movements and the safety of her kettlebell technique.

Mr. Fell quoted me accurately, even if he didn't name me or Kettlebells Los Angeles accurately (...Who the heck is "Dave" from "Kettle Bells Los Angeles"?). The words I spoke voicing my concerns about Ms. Michaels's teaching methods & technique were reproduced word for word.

So shortly after the article hit the net, the buzz started happening surprisingly fast. Here's the link to the original LA Times piece... fortunately with the correction to my name printed as a sidebar...
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/homeentertainment/la-he-fitness-jillian-michaels-20101011,0,5152686.story

And just today, the Yahoo! TV Blog posted a story about this as well, thankfully with my correct name.
http://tv.yahoo.com/blog/health-experts-call-foul-on-jillian-michaels-regimen--1642

Some folks are interpreting what I've said as a personal attack on Jillian Michaels. The truth is that as much as I appreciate what she's doing as a motivator, I think she needs to learn more about what's at stake with biomechanical errors like the ones she's propagating. As well-intentioned as she may be, that's no excuse for taking the persuasive power she wields and treating it carelessly.

Whether she gets her RKC, her HKC, or whatever other internationally recognized kettlebell instructor certification that's solidly recognized by kettlebell experts the world over, I'd hope that she'd be conscientious enough to invest the time & sincere effort to learn the safest & most effective means of training with kettlebells that she can find.... not the easiest, not the most streamlined, not a few lessons.... before putting out an instructional DVD that will be used by thousands of people in the hopes of getting in shape.

The bottom line to me is this, as I posted on my Facebook page under the link:

"Folks, let's call it the way it is. I'm not out to get Jillian, and I'm glad that so many people see her as a motivator to get healthier. Rather, I'm out to make sure that we're not "adding fitness to dysfunction". We all need to go back to... what my mentor, Gray Cook, outlines as priorities: "Move well, then move often." Tons of reps that don't observe strict form are enabling movement patterns that are counterproductive and potentially injurious in the long run. Exercise professionals need to hold themselves to a higher standard, even if the industry or the public doesn't."

Functional Movement Systems & Hard Style Kettlebells Workshop in San Clemente

2010-07-31T16:31:00.000-07:00

If you ever wanted to see, feel, and learn Gray Cook's FMS screen and Pavel Tsatsouline's Hard Style kettlebell training method and you live between Orange County and San Diego, here's your best, easiest, and cheapest opportunity!

*Has pain been pissing you off?
*Has your training plateaued?
*Do you want more out of your life, your training, your movement, and your quality of life?

I'll PERSONALLY be teaching down in San Clemente next weekend at the elite studio of Valerie Waldron, RKC. ~~We've extended an early bird discount (just $50) until Monday, August 2, just before midnight.~~ After then, the price goes up to $75... still a steal for 4 hours of some of the most mindblowing training you're sure to get.

To register, please click here! - https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=YHYMDQPWL8ARL

For the USMC stationed at Camp Pendleton, it'll stay at $50 regardless of when you register. Please use THIS link - https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=B2JJ8XAY2CPDS

If you're with USMC 1st ANGLICO, e-mail me directly at kettlebellsla@yahoo.com for an even better registration special.

Some of the concepts we will cover are:

- Foot mechanics: Is your foot killing the rest of your body?

- Hip mobility: The hip is a bad neighbor!

- The Hard Style Lock: The importance of tactile cueing in effective instruction

- Breath & the Neck: The gateway to internal work and external structure

- Primitive Patterns: I've fallen & I can't get up!

- Lats: Reflexive Shoulder Stability

- Half-Kneeling & Back Pain: Are your Quads punishing your back?

- Goblet Squat: Reversing the damage of desk jockey life!

It's open to the public, and it'll be on Saturday, August 7th from 12-4pm.

PACIFIC STRENGTH
KETTLEBELL & PERSONAL TRAINING STUDIO
154 Avenida Victoria
San Clemente, CA 92672
www.pacstrength.com

949.291.6093

SEE YOU THERE!

Is Lower Back Pain Tying a Knot in Your Movement - Joint Mobility vs Stability vs Power

2010-07-23T14:42:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I've had a chance to blog about little more than letting you know that I'm in or out of town or announcing some other random developments in the RKC or FMS worlds.

While those two things are always happening (and as I head out of town tomorrow for Danville, VA to see my mentor - Gray Cook), ideal training ISN'T always happening.

For some reason, there's a whole slew of people that think that as long as they buy the next cool tool or shiny, new toy, they'll get better performance out of their bodies....as if simply having the new kettlebell or TRX technology under your roof will osmotically make you a better athlete or decrease your pain or help you lose the stubborn fat around your midsection... as if simply buying the highest quality nutritional supplements like Shakeology without regularly using them will dramatically transform your state of health.

WHO ARE YOU KIDDING OTHER THAN YOURSELF?

Higher reps with heavier weight DOES NOT necessarily mean that you're moving better.

And now for the smasher...

Moving without pain DOES NOT necesssarily mean that you're moving better either!

Moving WELL, with biomechanically advantageous patterns REFLEXIVELY and without pain, means that you're moving better. Once you've established that as your BASELINE, then adding sets & reps makes for a better, stronger, more sound body.

That said, what's one of the easiest ways for you to trash your body (aside from picking a fight with an angry Beast)?

Let's make it an even easier question. Suppose the human body's like a car (not that I know jack$h!t about cars). Let's think of what we might do to destroy a car without actually crashing it into something deliberately. There are 2 main ways of destroying a car in a non-contact fashion:

1. operating the car when the fluid levels are far too low, or
2. driving the car too rough when there is some mechanical impediment.

Operating the car when the fluid levels are too low is an obvious one. Start driving in a car without brake fluid, with a leaking radiator, or without sufficient motor oil. Breakdown is imminent. It's not a question of if, but when the car will seize up either in rush hour traffic, or while you're speeding down the interstate.

No, that ain't my car!

Driving the car with a mechanical impediment goes back to what Pavel calls "driving with the parking brake on". I think we've all done it at some point or another, but the hard part is to realize BEFORE we put the car into drive that the brake is still on. For some of us, that takes a long time. We fumble about with recurrent injuries that seem to get better and then get reaggravated.

The lower back is a common site of pain, injury, reinjury, and eventually debility for some. Now while it's easy to focus on alleviating the pain at its most painful location, the "brakes" might still be locked down elsewhere in the vehicle.

Studies have shown a high correlation between hip movement dysfunction and lower back pain. So let's think about this by defining 3 terms and seeing how they might apply in lower back rehab:
- Mobility is the unfettered ability to move a joint through an optimal range of motion without pain.
- Stability is the ability to hold a joint in a given position or shortened range of motion.
- Power is the ability to recruit muscular contraction for the purpose of bearing or moving a load through a given range of motion.

There are many ways of approaching the hip dysfunction, which is paining the lower back.
1. You can stretch or treat the living hell out of the lower back in an attempt to "decompress" and restore range of motion. This is focusing on mobility at the site of pain.
2. You can do crunches and ab exercises until the cows come home in order to create more stability for the lumbar spine.
3. Or you can try to power your way through to hip extension by clenching your glutes so hard that even Jean-Claude Van Damme would be jealous.

Looks like pretty mobile hips to me, but what are we missing?

Gray Cook's mantra has always been to focus on mobility FIRST. But sometimes, trying to pry movement out of a stuck joint without taking the brakes off first is easier said than done.

The trick is sometimes to encourage the reflexive action of the weakened "accelerator" muscles while simultaneously training the hyperactive "parking brake" muscles to turn off. In this case, that would mean strengthening hip extensors, such as the glutes, while stretching hip flexors, such as the psoas, iliacus, and rectus femoris.

Pavel's long been too kind in complementing me publicly on my form with the Front Squat, and it's something I never really paid attention to until after he had me demonstrating some sort of horse stance drill at the Feb 2010 RKC II. I couldn't appreciate the drill at the time, and I'm still investigating its worth from a movement quality standpoint, but the Boss's comments still made me question what I'd been missing.

While teaching the RKC Squat back here in Los Angeles, I felt like my own form wasn't the same as what it was when I first started training with kettlebells. Keeping in mind the most common mistakes in the Front Squat (i.e., lumbar flexion, valgus collapse, etc.), I started looking at ways of optimizing necessary attributes for this particular movement pattern.

What I came up with revolved around this...

Yup... old-school Shaolin & Tai-Chi stance training. Just as with any field of endeavor, there are tons of ways to execute/perform anything. Sure, there are plenty of different versions of the horse stance floating around, and in my own martial arts studies, I've seen, learned, and taught more than one variation myself. But this isn't the time or place to get dogmatic, especially if you're not clear on context.

The earliest version of the horse stance that my father taught me revolved around achieving vertical alignment from the midfoot, the hip, the shoulder, and the center of the head when viewed from the side. When viewed from the front, this stance was referred to in Cantonese as "sei ping ma bo", meaning "four levels horse stance". The four levels referred to 4 perpendicular lines, as formed by the two lines from the knees to feet, and the lines from knee-to-knee & foot-to-foot.

To perform this stance correctly, the aforementioned alignments of leg and of spine must be achieved and maintained. But to achieve these alignments requires simultaneous mobility of the anterior portion of the hip joint with stability coming from the drive of the glutes in the posterior chain. Instead of doing the movement in strict Shaolin format, I took a modified version of it and drilled my students on it one Sunday morning.

Without exception, each one of them was shaking, sweating, and swearing while I had them perform very subtle movements, adjusting them slowly, yet thoroughly into the essential points of the stance. But at the finish of the exercise, everyone reported not only better hip mobility, but also a marked decrease in lower back stiffness.

Just as a knot is only as useful as it is secure under pressure and moveable enough to untie when offloading, the lumbar spine and hips must also be able to reflexively stabilize under load while able to move under load to create powerful movement. With the hip flexors and quads unbound enough to take the parking brakes off while the posterior chain keeps driving the pelvis forward, the entire spine can remain in neutral under a relaxed neck and a tall chest.

Wanna see & experience more of this and other correctives in high-detail? Get to Hard Style Ventura in November! In the meantime, read & re-read this post for the little details that can make or break your hips & back!

I know... I know... Updates are coming soon

2010-06-29T23:15:00.000-07:00

And they'll be well worth the wait, folks.

I know I've been more than a bit lax with blog updates. While I can join the rest of the crowd and blame it all on my new microblogging habits on Facebook & Twitter, the reality is that I've been hauling a$$ all over creation like a Chinaman with a burning rickshaw.

What have I been working on?

Aside from a plethora of changes in my personal life, my current area of deep investigation is centered around the FMS mobility correctives. One of Gray Cook's constant exhortations is "mobility FIRST". Yet many of us are far too quick to assume that we're moving just fine and fast forward ourselves to strenuous exercise, such as strength training.

I used to think that exercises like high kicks would cause the body to reactivate lost mobility. Unfortunately, the reality is often otherwise. If joints necessary for achieving the high kick (such as the hip joint) are compromised in their mobility, your body's going to borrow mobility from somewhere else that isn't supposed to move in the manner that it's being forced to.

Say for example your hip is a little locked up, guess what's going to have to do double duty to get your foot up that high. Most likely, your lower back will be paying the price the day afterwards, and your hamstrings will be so full of microtrauma that you'll be walking around like mummy instead of martial artist.

What other areas, aside from the hip, are crucial for performance?

While Functional Movement Systems talks about the lumbar spine being stable, the thoracic spine being mobile, and the cervical spine being stable, ALL joints need to START with MOBILITY. Stability has to be reflexive, not immutable. So if you heard the joint-by-joint approach and confused "rigidity" for reflexive stability, you probably either ran into limits with performance or just got hurt.

For me, inadequate mobility in certain ranges of motion in my hips, lumbar spine, and neck have caused me to compensate in countless ways over the years. Even as a child, I was ridiculously stiff. By 9 years old, I was unable to touch my toes. So martial arts training helped me to regain some of the lost mobility.

However, without regular practice of some of the fundamental exercises that were much less appealing than the combat skills development, my body merely learned to compensate its way through the movements and training. So as you heard me say in a previous blogpost, I've been going back to the basics, relearning how to move well in ranges that I've not moved through in decades and investing the time & resources to get therapy & treatment to deal with adhesions & locked up joints.

OK... back to work now. More later, and rest assured that it'll be worth the wait! :)

Knee Pain - Part II: Are your Quadriceps punishing your Knees?

2010-05-18T12:27:00.000-07:00

It never ceases to amaze me how many times our bodies can hurt in one place with the cause being somewhere else. Physical therapy & human performance guru Gray Cook is constantly admonishing us to use the Selective Functional Movement Assessment not to seek out what hurts as much as to look for the DN - dysfunctional non-painful link in the kinetic chain.

In an earlier blogpost on the Three Prys, I mentioned how some knee pains & injuries can be caused by faulty knee tracking. It's possible that even with fairly decent knee tracking, you might still be suffering knee pain that's due to other imbalances or asymmetries.

To review the concept of asymmetries in the Functional Movement Systems paradigm, please remember that we're looking primarily at Left-Right asymmetry as a predictive biomarker for injury. But we're also looking at asymmetries in:
- Medial - Lateral
- Anterior - Posterior
- Top - Bottom

So with the knee, let's quickly review the anatomy (since I'm dying to get this blogpost done before I sprint off to see patients and before I need to hop on the plane to St. Paul, MN again for the CK-FMS workshop).

According to a rather insightful entry in Wikipedia, the quadriceps are the most powerful knee extensors.

All 4 heads attach to the patella via the quadriceps tendon, so it's not exactly a stretch (really, no pun intended) to see how this muscle group might play into stubborn knee pain. So if you've been either overtraining your quads or overstretching your hamstrings, that sort of anterior-posterior asymmetry might be leading to dysfunction manifesting at the knee joint itself.

The rectus femoris, since it originates on the ilium, can be considered a hip flexor as well. So knee, hip, or even lower back pain that isn't resolving might warrant a careful look for trigger points in the quads. As soon as you visit your orthopedics or sports med physician to rule out more serious issues, such as meniscal/ligamentous tears, you might want to some deep tissue done on the quad on the troublesome side.

If that gives you a noticeable improvement, pattern some good movement on top of your newly found range of motion with a corrective exercise like the one we're demonstrating here:

Optimization - the Ancient Chinese Secret?

2010-04-25T12:46:00.000-07:00

Tell me what this sounds like to you....

A system of training that progresses from very thoroughly developing systemic mobility, to spinal alignment, to breathing, to foot/leg/hip power, to leg-waist-spine-arm coordination, to foot-leg-waist-spine-arm sensitivity & responsiveness.

It is a system that both prehabilitates and rehabilitates. There are no shortage of populations (from the feeble to the fighters) worldwide that have benefitted from its practice, its study, its total application.

Sound like Hardstyle with the FMS fusion? It is.

Know what else it is? Yang style Tai-Chi.

Just like Fast & Loose, there's a heavy emphasis on not just creating muscle relaxation, but maximizing it! Just like Super Joints and Relax Into Stretch, there's a fundamental emphasis on maximizing powerful, effortless range of motion. Just like the RKC principles, there's a solid dedication to developing a strong, powerful base from the waist down in order to be able to most efficiently utilize the upper body to issue power.

My father first introduced me to Tai-Chi when I was 10 years old. He studied a Yang style Tai-Chi derivative from one of Prof. Cheng Man-Ching's students, named Master Chao. [For those of you who are unfamiliar with Prof. Cheng Man-Ching, his writings on Tai-Chi, Chinese culture, martial arts, and human development are extraordinary. I've included a link to a compilation of his writings below.]

I remember watching the slow-motion movements one morning and trying in vain to stifle my laughter. As a youth, I was more visually familiar with the hard-fast, bone crunching power that karate or "external" kung-fu systems demonstrated. So seeing him move in what seemed like ridiculously slow motion was utter hilarity to me at the time.

Knowing the mind of his son, my father stopped training and confidently asked me to punch him in the face as hard as I could. With a challenge like that, almost no boy will back down, and I shot a fist out with all I had. What happened next blew my mind.

Without using rigid force, he deflected my fist without blocking, keeping the muscles of his arm and shoulder very relaxed. When I thought I was sure to make contact with his face, I instead fell forward off balance into an upward armbar and then was launched across the room.

"COOL!"
That was almost 30 years ago.
After that, I was hooked. I learned all that my father had to teach me about Tai-Chi until I headed out to LA for college. Shortly after arriving in Pasadena, I was fortunate enough to meet and train under Prof. Daniel K. Lee, a former Bruce Lee student who was also one of North America's preeminent Yang style instructors. I've had a few other influences since then, but my father & Prof. Lee were my two main teachers in that system of martial arts.

Fast forward to the present....

Working on rehabilitative issues & strength challenges that I've been trying to overcome, I keep coming back to the ideas of "best training methods" and optimization. My mentor, Gray Cook, speaks volumes about "authentic movement", and the more I research his teachings, the more I keep getting drawn back to my original martial arts training with my father and my earliest Sifus (masters).

The countless hours of Shaolin & Tai-Chi training that I'd received in my teens and twenties set the stage for my body to be able to achieve what it did in more recent years. However, I'd lost sight of that. I'd lost sight of the deep relaxation practices that had kept me healthier, the incredible joint mobility routines that had kept me agile & flexible, and the incredible movement patterning drills that had made me function, flow, fight, and feel like an animal.

Don't get me wrong.

RKC style training did a LOT to improve my functionality, but I've been beating my head against a brick wall lately. The FMS principles kept pointing me towards something different than what I was doing (which was trying to improve my Press by just working my Press MORE), but I wasn't completely sure about what I was looking for or how to achieve a change in my state of being & performance. I did know that emotionally & spiritually, I sorely missed martial arts training.

So a few weeks back into more focused martial arts training, I went back to revisit the kettlebells. For the first time in months, the right shoulder didn't hurt with a 24kg kettlebell strict military press. I didn't do many reps or push the load past the 24kg mark, but simply being able to move that weight without having to wince or grit my teeth was a major improvement.

Additionally, I'd been spending more time on getting treatment (soft tissue & joint mobilization) as well as working on corrective exercise patterns. The areas that seemed to need the greatest focus and yielded the greatest improvements were those that seemed to point me straight back to traditional martial arts stance & flexibility training.

One of the biggest insights I've had lately revolved around the Yang style "front stance". The proper hip positioning for this fundamental stance, in conjunction with the proper weight distribution & spinal alignment, is essentially the same as the FMS half-kneeling corrective position.

The Tai-Chi & Chi Kung breathing progressions I learned from my father almost 30 years ago are essentially the same as those that I'm learning from Gray Cook, Brett Jones, & Dr. Lee Burton as far as crocodile breath patterns for neurological resets.

What does this all mean? Is the old-school Chinese martial arts training better than the FMS or the RKC methods?

To quote one of my most beloved mentors, Prof. Roy Harris, the real answer is "It depends"...... depends on your goals, depends on what you're coming to the table with, and depends on the timeline and means you favor to achieve your goals.

For me, the traditional martial arts of ancient times & the modern RKC-FMS marriage that is the CK-FMS system fit together like a hand in a glove. It's not a question of which one is better than the other. It's knowing how to use approaches from both that will give me (or my clients) the best possible results at any given moment, depending on the pre-existing conditions. At this juncture in time, restoring my combat skills abilities while simultaneously improving my functional/fundamental movement patterns is at the top of my list. And traditional martial arts training is what's helping me get there fastest.

Would it be easy to go back to focusing my training on strength with kettlebells? Absolutely. But the better question would be, "Would it be intelligent for me to focus on weight training of ANY sort at this time with my movement screens looking the way they are now?"

Remember that ANY tool is good or bad only in the sense that it's either appropriate or inappropriate for use in a particular context. And sometimes, we already have the tools we need right in front of us. We just need the occasional reminder from something "new" to teach us how to appreciate something "familiar" in a new light!

Step back to leap forward - Is it Strength you're building or just more Compensation?

2010-04-08T10:34:00.000-07:00

You know it's time to update the blog when someone who doesn't read blogs very often asks you what's up with your lack of blog updates. I've been called out & guilty as charged, so here it is... The latest of what's been brewing on my mind & consuming my efforts in the field of human performance lately.

As many of you know, I've had YEARS of problems with my shoulders in some form or another. It started being obvious to me in high school while playing tennis. Practicing hours & hours of serves in the attempt to have a Boris Becker-like cannon and hours of groundstrokes led to a right arm that would essentially go dead after a set of matchplay just before tennis season started during my senior year. Being a right hander, that made serving, volleying, & my beloved forehand harder & harder. So I'd play matches just gutting through the pain, willing my right arm to whip through the strokes, clutching the racquet grip as hard as I could since I often couldn't feel it. The rotater cuff muscles had essentially gotten so swollen that they were cutting off nerve signal and blood flow to the arm. But I didn't know that at the time. I just wanted to play.... desperately.

With that kind of debility, it's little wonder that after high school, I decided to go deeper into another love of mine - martial arts. The full body training I'd found in martial arts such as Northern Shaolin kung-fu put me through different ranges of motion that I'd not trained before, developed stability through stances I'd not really practiced before, and forced me to use both my left and right sides like other prior physical pursuits had not.

Tai-Chi gave me yet another training factor to benefit my body by ratcheting down the speed to super slow-mo and forcing me to pay extra attention to efficiency and softness in my movement, as well as the correctness of my trajectories. I'd done Tai-Chi with my father as a boy, but focusing on it in a more formal manner during my college years made me realize how difficult it can be to let go of muscle tension that we don't need. It forced me to examine what the difference was between being "powerful" and being "rigid" - a lesson that I'm going back to re-examining now thanks to conversations about Z-Health that I've had with Kenneth Jay, Master RKC.

POWER is generated by a change in force (or muscular tension) over time. So the less tension you start with and the more tension you can consciously generate over the smallest possible time frame is your key to being powerful. The maximum change in tension over the shortest amount of time equals your power output.

But pain messes with your nervous system's ability to both relax and to tense. It leaves you in neuromuscular limbo with "guarding" tension that's not so useful when you want to move, want to perform, want to lift, want to fight, or want to really live. That guarding tension starts to create immobility in an area or system that's been injured or threatened, forcing the neighboring joints to try to create more range of motion in order to preserve general task ability.

Such neurological flip-flopping is a damn slippery slope to be on. It's one thing to be able to flip-flop the functionality of any given joint based on your position in relation to the ground or based on intention. Good athletes NEED to have that skill. Just look at any gymnast, grappler, tactical operator, dancer, or martial artist! But when a joint gets locked into one function - hypermobile or mobility-compromised - it's ugly... and usually painful.

Can we compensate around such injuries? SURE!

We do it all the time. And just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean that you SHOULD do it. FMS founder, Gray Cook says, "You might be able to fake and lie your way through the entire Functional Movement Screen by doing every movement with maximal feed-forward tension and denying that you're in pain on every step, but what's your goal? Is your goal to cheat the screen, or is your goal to perform better in your chosen sport and move better in your daily life?"

Honesty's sometimes a hard pill to swallow. For me, I've been so thrilled with some of the improvements in strength that I've made over the years with my strength thanks to the RKC Hardstyle training method that I've allowed myself to, as Master RKC Mark Reifkind puts it, "live in my sport". Having had countless neck & shoulder traumas thanks to martial arts training, especially from the one system I love most - Combat Shuai-Chiao, I've been building my house of strength on a foundation of sand.

I won't lie. Sometimes we fall in love with what (or who) might not be best for us.

It's that way with me & Combat Shuai-Chiao. In all the years I've done martial arts, nothing gives me a greater thrill than having a format to be able to kick, punch, throw, and lock like I do in Shuai-Chiao training. Throwing someone through the air at high speed with amplitude & spin is a rush. And being able to be thrown that way and to hit the ground with a successful breakfall is a rush too. Knowing that the untrained recipient would likely either die, be incapacitated, or seriously injured by a throw that you just stood up from is a rush like no other. Yes, that's me hitting the sand in the pic below.

The only experience I've ever felt like it is going at high speed with live blade double swords with my Krabi-Krabong teacher in Thailand on my last day of training and emerging without a single cut or scrape.

Pressing a 32kg kettlebell is a similar rush. When you've gone from barely being able to hold your tennis racquet after the first set to being able to strictly military press a 70lb kettlebell overhead, it's a rush. No lie. When I walked into Tait Fletcher's Undisputed Fitness in Santa Fe, NM, this past winter, the first thing I did when I saw the kettlebells was walk up to the biggest one I saw (a 32kg) and strict pressed it without even taking my jacket off. Strength is a calling card that lends instant credibility to whatever you're going to say.

But when I tried to up that press strength to tackle the 36kg kettlebell, I ran into problems. The right shoulder that had benefitted so much from the strength training of the RKC method and FMS corrective exercises started hurting more & more. The left arm started experiencing weird strength losses at the RKC II in February after doing VO2Max Viking push-pressing. Luckily Master RKC & CK-FMS creator Brett Jones was there to have a look at me and gave me the most sensible explanation yet. The brachial plexus was getting impinged by my scarred-up deep neck muscles that were irritated by the repeated stretch that was happening at the bottom of the re-rack, and that was severely dampening the motor signal to my left arm. Not a good sign.

You know you own something when you can step away for it for a long while and still do it. It's that way with riding a bike, right? And it's that way with any skill set that your nervous system completely owns in an uninhibited fashion. Injured, sick, sleep-deprived, or inebriated, I can do this one Shaolin hand set and not miss a single movement. There have been entire years (or a few years) that have gone by when I haven't done even 1 rep of this set, yet it's still mine. It's still part of me. And that same thing should be the case with my press. If I can press a 32kg kettlebell one week, and then can't press a 16kg without pain the next in the absence of a traumatic incident occurring in the meantime, I don't own that 32kg press. Do I?

I could be stubborn and just build more on top of more, but then I'd be building more guarding and compensation on top of pre-existing guarding and compensation. So what would happen? As soon as I stop practicing it, my body will reject the load movements that I placed on it. In other words, the pressing strength will shut itself down... as it has in my case.

So I'm having to backtrack a little. It's frustrating to have to put yourself in the remedial education room when you wanna go out & play with the other kids, but I've learned that I'm not a kid any more and I've got an international spotlight shining on me. My time for gross irresponsibility is long over, whether with myself or others. And my first and primary responsibility is to be the best father I can be for my son. If I can't play with him or protect him because my shoulders are in too much pain, what kind of father would I be?

What's on the agenda for my rehab? Go back to what Gray Cook always talks about with ANY discussion about human function.

What's the FIRST prerequisite?..... MOBILITY. So I'm working on restoring maximal range of healthy, unfettered, pain-free, smooth movement to my arms, my shoulders, and my neck - the fusebox of the human body.

What's involved?.... MOBILITY WORK - BOTH PASSIVE & ACTIVE. That means that I'm receiving treatments to seek out the trigger points that are binding up my movement, to mobilize the joints that have been locked down, and to to restore elasticity of the soft tissues.

That also means that I'm re-focusing my exercise time to temporarily steer away from weighted strength work and towards bodyweight mobility.

How do I do that?.... With my old UCLA Kung-Fu Warmup routine and its variants that include movements, exercises, & concepts from systems as diverse as Northern Shaolin, Capoeira Angola, Shuai-Chiao, & soon incorporating Z-Health drills that've been prescribed by Kenneth Jay.

Through the years of combative arts training, I've damaged my body and made it bear a heavy load by taking punishment without balancing it with equal amounts of restorative practice. As a result, I hit the wall and bounced off it when I tried to up my strength past a certain point. Now it's time for me to backtrack a bit and work on the resilience of my body, maximizing effortless, pain-free mobility again, and then rebuilding my strength to new heights of Hardstyle.

NYPD, NYFD, and the rest of the first responders & military around the Big Apple...

2010-03-01T19:42:00.000-08:00

We're showin' you love.

That's right. The Chinaman & the Viking are showing you mad love for all you do for the Big Apple. All your hard work & sacrifices are earning you a big pat on the back from the 2 of us in the form of today's decision to offer you a 50% off discount from our already low "early bird" workshop price.

So if you're POLICE, FIRE, EMT, or any other first responder or active duty military, drop Antonio Cordova, RKC II, a line at antoniorcordova@gmail.com with the Subject line reading "Doc & Dane First Responder Registrant", and we'll get you squared away.

You'll still have to register via Paypal or your department will have to issue a check (contact Antonio for instructions), but we want you to know how much we appreciate you, and how much we know that you CONSTANTLY put your bodies on the line for us.

We want to make you more efficient at:
- taking down the bad guys,
- yanking a kid out of a rain swollen flood channel,
- hoisting an old lady out of a burning building,
- controlling an inmate who's trying to test you for weakness,
AND
- getting out of bed without pain,
- having the strength, energy, & endurance to play with your kids after work, and
- living life with the vitality of a warrior, even if your job is not combat-based.

So let us show you how to take care of that precious body of yours so that you've got stronger, faster, leaner, better, happier, and healthier years ahead of you with it!

This time, we've got your back!

Shakeology (R) - Meal Replacement Shake that's too good to be true?

2010-02-08T22:11:00.000-08:00

Lately, I've made mention about my use of the nutritional product, Shakeology, and some folks have been questioning if I've abandoned the RKC ranks and gone P90X on them. So let me set the record straight... definitively... once and for all.

I heard about Shakeology before there WAS a Shakeology directly from the mouth of its inventor - Isabelle Brousseau. The wife of Beachbody CEO, Carl Daikeler, Ms. Brousseau is a singularly talented coach and highly educated researcher. She's spent years studying the advanced principles of elite human performance from authorities around the world, and I was honored to have the chance to share Pavel Tsatsouline's Hardstyle RKC kettlebell training method privately with her. As adept student, she was on the fast-track to preparing for her RKC instructor certification when she decided to take time off upon learning she was expecting her first child.

During the times I spent training her, Isabelle and I spoke about Chinese herbal medicine, and she mentioned she was researching ways of combining all-natural foods with the highest possible nutrient values into a meal-replacement shake designed for athletes and people on-the-go. When she mentioned wanting to put in high quality Ayurvedic herbs, Chinese herbs, antioxidant rich fruits and vegetables, prebiotics, and a host of other vitamins and minerals, my initial reaction was.... "Yeah, right!"

My doubts were not unfounded.

Having spent years studying (and consuming) Chinese herbal medicines, I had a familiarity with a good deal of what Brousseau was talking about. The ingredients she'd mentioned sounded like a wishlist that only insiders would know of and only the filthy rich and well-connected could afford. On top of that, the taste of such a mixture, I surmised, would probably make even the least sensitive tasters wretch with disgust. To make a mixture that would contain the type of ingredients she mentioned, be stable enough to ship & store, and not taste like the bottom skim of a Los Angeles sewer was a pipe dream as far as I was concerned. So I filed the conversation away in my mental round file.

A couple of years later, when I met with Carl to discuss a project idea, I saw the finished product on his shelf. Eager to see how far from the initial ideal the finished product had to compromise, I was in for a shock.

Not only did Shakeology have EXACTLY the type of ingredients that Isabelle had mentioned during our training sessions, but it had MORE!

Some notables...

- Astragalus: widely used in Chinese medicine as an immune system regulator

- MSM: one of the most popular supplements for joint health

- Chia: the Mayan super-seed with more calcium than whole milk, more Omega 3 & 6 than salmon, and more protein than kidney beans

- THREE different proprietary blends and some vitamins & minerals that actually exceeded the US RDA.

This stuff looked like it was fit for a king for sure. So I was damn curious to put it to the final 2 tests - taste & performance. I wanted to know if it smelled or tasted anything like what I thought it would and was damn curious if it'd make a difference for my high-velocity, high-output, high-mileage lifestyle.

A little background... I'm a caffeine junky by virtue of workaholism. Ever since discovering the "joy" of all-nighter homework sessions in high-school, I became keenly aware of the value of being able to work harder and sacrifice sleep. So when the No-Doz, Vivarin, & Mountain Dew lifestyle needed an adult turn after I'd graduated & started writing, teaching, treating patients, travelling, training, and trying to spend time with my family, I dove hip deep into energy drinks like Red Bull & Monster and caffeinated energy bars like Pit Bull. When I speak well about a nutritional product, it's for one reason - it helps me get my work done while keeping me healthy.

Another bit of background... I'm a glutton. I love food, especially food that tastes good. I never met a filet mignon that I didn't like, and never met one that I didn't like better wrapped in bacon, with a side of bacon-wrapped scallops, and mashed potatoes... topped with bacon. If it doesn't taste good, I don't care how good it is for me. I'll STILL probably not like it well enough to be disciplined about taking it.

The Shakeology greenberry bag that Carl gave me turned my ball of preconceived notions and stood it on its ear. From the moment I opened the bag, the scent was wonderful, like a dessert that you're eager to tear into. So I dumped some ice & water into the blender and dropped a scoop of the bright green powder in with it. I didn't add juice or other fruits because I wanted to know exactly how this taste by itself, unadulterated. The next sound I heard after taking my first sip was, "Yum!" It passed the taste test.

Next was the travel test. I wanted to see how it kept me going while travelling, so instead of my usual chain-drinking habit of Monster or Red Bull, I tried a shake or two during the day, usually with one in the morning. I brought Shakeology with me to New York, New Mexico, & most recently to Australia to see how I'd do with it, and the results were remarkable. I had sustained, stable energy, but without the jitters, aggression, and hard drops aftewards. When I travel, I travel to teach, and I have to be up, energetic, strong, and focused. My days here in LA revolve around teaching, training, treating patients, and trying to steal moments with my family. So if something doesn't give me the energy to do what I need, I can't waste my precious time or hard earned money with it. Shakeology has proven itself to be able to give me all of that on multiple occasions, both while travelling and here in Los Angeles.

You can draw your own conclusions about any product you want, but I'm sharing my experiences with Shakeology here openly. And if you think I'm endorsing it only for financial gain, you couldn't be more wrong. I signed up as a "coach" so I could buy the product for myself! If you want to try it, you know where to find it, and get ready to be surprised how little such high quality nutrition costs!

Breath, Chi, Prana, Ki, Core, STRENGTH

2010-02-05T20:02:00.000-08:00

One of the first things I ever learned in martial arts training was how to breathe. One of the most advanced, yet crucial concepts of core strength is breath.
One of the first things that I struggled painfully with in my youth was breathing.

During my Australian 2-Day workshop in Adelaide, one of the first strength concepts I covered was breath - specifically diaphragmatic breathing. We didn't talk about RKC-style power breathing or anything specifically related to martial arts. We talked about health & functionality.

Babies & little kids, when you watch them breathe, especially during sleep, breathe from their abdomens. This is called abdomenal or diaphragmatic breathing, as it uses the uppermost muscle of the core, the diaphragm, for powering the respiratory process.

Adults, by contrast, have learned to breathe from their necks, using their scalenes and intercostal muscles to power their breath. This is called apical breathing, as the center of the movement is no longer in the lower abdomen, but rather in the apex of the torso. Apical breathing patterns DO present in children, but usually in those who are asthmatic.

How do I know about this?

As I mentioned above, one of the things that I struggled painfully with as a child was asthma. My lungs were horrible. Between repeated bouts of pneumonia, allergies, sinus infections, and asthma attacks, it's a wonder I made it to high school. As I told one of my Twitter followers, I had asthma attacks so severe once that I had to kick the wall to wake my parents up because I couldn't draw the breath to cry or scream.

Now if you've ever been under water a bit too long, you know what it's like to not be able to inhale and slightly suffocated. Unless you're into the uber-kinky, that sort of thing is no fun at all and leads to a panic reaction. Over time, the simple experience of being short of breath often trains asthmatics to lunge for their inhalers to provide a bit of relief for those bronchial spasms and allow a deep inhalation.

However, using diaphragmatic breath training gleaned from my father's Tai-Chi lessons, my lungs were able to reverse the process of asthmatic inhaler dependence. Those same lessons would reappear in different forms throughout the years. In college, while training with Fukienese Shaolin master, Andy Hong, he spoke of the the way college kids breathe so shallowly and how unhealthy he thought it was. During that same period, Shotokan karate's first master to set up shop on American soil, Tsutomu Ohshima, said that the hara or tanden is the true center of ki and that breathing is less of a lung/chest thing as it is a belly-centered process.

Over a decade later, I heard a former Soviet Special Operations PT instructor named Pavel Tsatsouline say a very similar thing in the context of strength training and kettlebell lifting. And within a few years of meeting, training with, and certifying under Tsatsouline as one of his RKC instructors, a self-described "Redneck" of peculiar genius in the fields of human performance & physical theraphy named Gray Cook would also speak in great detail about how diaphragmatic breathing is one of the most crucial keys to understanding how the core fires and how movement becomes both powerful and natural.

In an asthmatic attack, all of that becomes halted. As Gray Cook is renowned for saying, "The neck becomes your core", and the muscles around your neck become far more tonic than they should be in comparison to the muscles of your midsection.

So do all asthma attacks require the immediate intervention of an inhaler to block the pathological cascade effect of bronchospasm, panic, sympathetic nervous system dominance, and greater bronchospasm?

NO.

How can you tell?

Easy... If you're asthmatic, try this. You have to teach yourself to breathe through the following process and eventually apply it successfully under duress (meaning, during an asthma attack).

Learn to breathe from your lower abdomen, and yes, there are steps for this process too. One of the simplest, I've found, is to start from lying down in the supine (face-up) position.
a. Place your fingertips a couple of inches below your belly button.
b. Make sure you drop your head, neck, shoulders, back, hips, and legs down into the floor as if they were melted onto it. Try to keep your body as loose and unwound as possible, short of having an accident. This gives the spine a position of passive axial extension (or as some would refer to it, neutral).
c. Re-focus your attention onto your fingertips.
d. Let your breathing become slow, even, and deep.
e. As your breathing deepens, try to initiate your inhalation by pushing out against your fingertips. What normally happens is that people breathe with their chests heaving, and then the abdomen inflates only secondarily, if at all. We're trying to get the abdomen to inflate FIRST, leaving the chest relaxed and heavy throughout the inhalation process.
f. To exhale, just let the breath fall out of you naturally.

Now if you can do this while lying down, then repeat the process from prone (face-down, a.k.a., Crocodile Breath, as taught in Secrets of the Shoulder), then seated, then standing, then walking.

Once you can do it while walking, you might be surprised how consciously applying the diaphragmatic "belly-oriented" breathing can actually arrest an asthma attack, decreasing reliance on inhalers and improving posture, sports performance, and quality of life. This method has proven its worth more than once, and I encourage you to try it (with your doctor's approval) if you or someone you love is asthmatic.

Make sure to go SLOWLY through each step outlined above, and keep the inhaler nearby if you can't control the sense of suffocation. Keep the neck muscles nice & relaxed, keep the spine long and tall, and keep the breath sinking down into your lower abdomen. I did this with an asthmatic friend in Australia, and he was able to finish a martial arts class without having to take a puff.

While it's easy to take breathing for granted and blow it off (no pun intended) as a natural & vital body process that "everyone knows", it's still a process that our neuromuscular system can have bugs in. Once in a while, we need to scan/test the software for those bugs, and upload newer, cleaner software to the system. That keeps our bodies running optimally and us breathing easy.

As always, let me know how this goes for you!

Australian Trip Diary

2010-01-24T15:39:00.001-08:00

I'd have posted this much earlier, as this was written on Friday early
AM Australian time, which was Thursday 1/22 American time.

More is coming.... Much more!

Australian Trip Diary

En route
I have to say that the Aussies I've interacted with so far have been
warm hearted, generous, & civil folk. From the flight attendants on
Virgin Australia who have perhaps the best customer service attitude
I've ever seen, to the young lady who saw me waiting for the restroom
and walked across the plane to let me know that another one was open,
to the bloke sitting to my left who took every bit of food, water, or
whatever was distributed while I was sleeping and put it into the
seatback pocket in front of me, to the French expat who was heading
back home to Melbourne and offered me some suggestions on how to kill
time in SYD airport, this travel experience has so-far brilliantly
exceeded expectations.

As I'm recovering from the last bits of a sinus cold, I didn't know
how I'd fare even getting to Sydney. But the trip has been restful...
far different from what I was expecting. LJ, the Aussie gentleman to
my left with the window seat, was quick to point out the harbor as we
approached for landing. And Carlos, the Mexican exchange student who
was spending a semester abroad in Melbourne, sat in the aisle seat to
my right, giving me a new perspective on America's southern neighbor,
its challenges, its hopes, and its must-visits.

Between bits of sleep and listening to Malcolm Gladwell's Blink and
podcasts from Michael Josephson's Institute of Ethics, I could feel
the very slow trickle of energy back into my batteries. Speaking of
batteries, it's thanks to the USB charger ports in EACH of the economy
seats that I'm typing this to you at all. Richard Branson has it
figured out. I'm making sure my next trip to NYC is on Virgin America,
and I might try to do 1 leg of my Copenhagen trip on Virgin Atlantic.
When I saw that the prices for Virgin Australia's flights were so much
cheaper than others while searching on Yahoo Travel, I was rather
suspicious of the service. I couldn't have been more wrong!

Times like this, as I kick back in a Wi-Fi less terminal and type
these notes out on my iPhone, I realize how blessed I am to have the
chance to experience the goodness of other people around the world.

Time for a bit of drink, some reading of John Maxwell's Winning with
People, and off to board the 9:40 Virgin Blue flight to Adelaide. More
later, folks!

Dr. Mark Cheng, L.Ac., Ph.D., FMS, RKC Team Leader

Sent via mobile phone

New Year's Day Sobriety Kettlebell workout

2009-12-31T16:16:00.000-08:00

Hope you're all having a GREAT wind-down to your Holiday Season!

And knowing full well that many of you are griping about how much you ate (and the griping about how much you drank tomorrow), I've got a quick, easy solution for you.

If you want to get the post-inebriation haze out of your system, take a small sip of water, grab a light kettlebell (guys - 16kg, gals - 8kg), set your iPhone timer for 3 minutes, and Swing rep for rep with a proper Hardstyle hip snap.

Now you're very likely going to want to go from 2 hands to 1 hand to the other hand and back to 2 hands, which is all well & good, but concentrate on keeping your neck out of it, keeping your eyes and your mind focused, and keeping your glutes snapping strongly behind each & every rep. Do NOT stop until the timer goes off, but REALLY concentrate on making each rep as explosive as possible. Shoot your hips forward as powerfully as you can, keep your shoulders linked, keep your gaze straight ahead. You'll find that if you can keep all of these points constant, you'll be done in no time flat and your tummy will feel flatter too!

Not only will you feel like you got rid of the booze haze, but you'll also have kick started your metabolism to shed off that wee bit of pudge that you may have packed on! Fatloss fast & furious, folks... welcome to Hardstyle!

If you don't own a kettlebell and aren't sure what a Swing is, then click on that Quick Start kit to the right and get started!

The Kettlebells Los Angeles holiday shout-out

2009-12-23T14:59:00.000-08:00

I just posted this to my KBLA Yahoo mailing group, but the Holiday message in it bears repeating. So with a few edits and additions, please read it below.

Happy Holidays to each of you, and may you find the inspiration to redefine yourselves to a standard higher, stronger, and healthier than you've ever lived before!
--------

The Christmas/Holiday Season is upon us again, and it gives us time to reflect on our accomplishments of the past year and to set goals for the next one.

You've all been instrumental in the growth of Kettlebells Los Angeles and are proof positive that the KBLA standard of quality control is setting the bar higher & higher with each passing year.

Expect some changes to come in 2010, along with a shuffling of the guard. We want to bring you only the FINEST instruction from the FINEST instructors, so we'll be not only revamping our website to show the attendance dates of each & every KBLA affiliated instructor, but also highlighting those individuals who show consistency in their dedication to improving their pedagogical skills.

Also, look for a series of SoCal-based summer workshops featuring both Master RKC Kenneth Jay and I. Just like this past year's workshop in Irvine, we're going to gear it towards not only the total beginner, but also the highly seasoned RKC. If you doubt that we could do that successfully, just ask anyone who was in attendance there this year!

We're not just raising the bar. We're also giving you the means to clear it, too!

I'll be teaching the Sunday morning KBLA class (weather permitting) at Clover Park, in Santa Monica on Dec. 27th and on Jan. 3, so if you're in So Cal, get up, get out, and get to work shedding the pounds that you packed on from Holiday eating, and redefine your boundaries of your own human performance!

Finally, on behalf of the KBLA RKC instructors and our affiliates, I'd like to wish each and every one of you & your loved ones a very Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and a Strong, Prosperous 2010!

Please keep those who have less or are suffering more than you in your thoughts and prayers, and take the time to:
- drop a new, unwrapped toy off at your local Fire Station,
- volunteer a few hours of your time at a homeless shelter,
- give some canned foods to church or other group that works to alleviate hunger, or
- send an e-mail to the troops overseas via http://www.amillionthanks.org/

With warmest wishes to you & your loved ones,
"Doc" Mark Cheng, KBLA Chief Instructor

Kinetic Confusion: Does your butt think it's your foot?

2009-12-21T09:09:00.000-08:00

It's an undeniable fact of life for many of us.

We sit.... and we sit a LOT.

Whether it's in front of the computer, the steering wheel, the TV set, the boardroom table, or the dining table, life's become increasingly sedentary for far too many individuals in the "modern" world.

With long commutes, with computer-based jobs, with the TV culture, the effects on our bodies are almost too slow to perceive until they're ingrained and it's almost too late.

As I was watching my son play outside at the park, I got into a conversation with another parent about my mixed feelings about Squealie going to grade school. Watching him move so well on the playground and develop balance, proprioceptive awareness, and other neurological skills made me happy with his progress and concerned about the long hours of enforced sitting that he'd have to endure in school. As schools have less time for recess, no resources for physical education / gym classes, & fewer sports programs, I can't help but be a little uneasy.

Looking at the adult population that I work with clinically and consult for internationally, one of the biggest things that I see with pain seems to be the result of long-term kinetic confusion.

Let me explain it to you...

Looking at the joint-by-joint view of closed chain movement that FMS founder Gray Cook talks about, the foot is the root of our movement and what relates the body to the ground for leverage. Thus the foot needs to create a stable platform of linkage to the ground to allow the rest of the kinetic chain to create effective, powerful movement.

Next up the chain, the ankle needs to be mobile, which in turn allows the knee to be stable and the hip to be mobile.

So remember, in an ideally functioning kinetic chain per Gray Cook, we've got:

* Foot - stable
* Ankle - mobile
* Knee - stable
* Hip - mobile
* Lumbar spine (lower back) - stable
* Thoracic spine (mid-upper back) - mobile
* Lower C-spine - stable
* Axis & atlas vertebrae - mobile

So you can see that each successive joint or joint "team" has the opposite function of the neighboring joints. Thus, problems arise when these joints or joint teams get locked into functioning in the opposite manner in which they were intended.

Let me make it absolutely clear that I NEVER said that these are the ONLY ways in which these joints & joint teams are meant to function. However, when muscles are trained to move or hold joints reflexively in a certain fashion, we need to pay attention to whether or not the joints are meant to function OPTIMALLY in that fashion.

So let's look at what happens in sedentary culture.

Your rear end becomes the primary point of contact for your body to the ground (via a chair). So those hips which were meant to be mobile and driven by the glutes turn into your primary point of stability. The glutes spend hours on stretch and the hip flexors shorten.

Moving up the "sedentary chain", your lumbar spine starts becoming more & more mobile as you reach for things and move around while maintaining your seated position.

The T-spine stiffens up to maintain some semblance of posture, and the next thing you know, you're suffering from lower back, shoulder, & neck pain... and your butt now thinks it's your foot.

Wanna un-do this kinetic confusion? Get out there & do some Swings!!!

Doc Heads Down Under - Hard Style, High Density in Adelaide, Australia!

2009-12-16T20:19:00.000-08:00

For those of you mates who are in the Southern Hemisphere or in Australasia, I'm heading your way VERY soon!

I'll be teaching a special TWO day workshop in Adelaide, Australia, going over the ins & outs of Pavel Tsatsouline's Russian Kettlebell Challenge (RKC) system of kettlebell training.

Pavel's RKC system hinges on a system of movement and a strength concept known as "Hardstyle", where the ability to maximize tension is a central focus. The "Level 1 RKC" kettlebell instructors' certification is known as the most demanding and thorough kettlebell instructor preparation and certification course in the world. It requires candidates to demonstrate proficiency in teaching and performing 6 main lifts:
- Deadlift & Swing
- Turkish Get-Up
- Clean
- Front Squat
- Military Press
- Snatch (including the RKC snatch test)

For those of you interested in providing BEGINNER level kettlebell instruction, Pavel Tsatsouline has also come up with an entry level certification called the Hardstyle Kettlebell Certification (HKC). The curriculum for this level of certification revolves around the Deadlift, Swing, Goblet Squat, & Turkish Get-Up. Two dates have already been confirmed for the HKC certifications in Melbourne. These techniques will be the focus of Day 1 of our workshop.

On Day 2, we'll be conducting a quick review of Day 1 and covering the advanced ballistics (Clean & Snatch) and the King of the Grinds... The Military Press. The RKC Snatch Test is perhaps the most intimidating part of the RKC certification weekend, but only because instructor candidates failed to learn the lift in proper detail, foolishly choosing instead to gamble on their abilities to either rely on pure athleticism or muscle through it.

We'll be covering these exercises in consummate detail, along with introducing concepts from Gray Cook's Functional Movement Systems (FMS). The FMS technologies have allowed some of the world's most elite professional sports teams & military units to dramatically decrease their incidence of injury while also accelerating their return to functional movement and high performance.

For those of you who are fitness professionals, personal trainers, strength coaches, physiotherapists, martial arts instructors, or other movement professionals, the information you're going to get will make you more competent in your field and quickly improve the results you're getting from your clientele.

For those of you who are trying to get back in shape or lose weight, for those of you who are recovering from injury, for those of you who seek to prevent injury, for those of you whose earning potential is based on your optimum physical performance, the information presented in this workshop is PRICELESS.

On January 23rd & 24th, I'll be teaching all of this and more in Adelaide. We're running an EARLY registration special and we're SEVERELY limiting the number of registrants for this workshop. We're going from 9am - 5pm on Saturday and roughly the same time for Sunday.

Expect about 14 hours of some of the most high quality and high density information that you've heard to date! Just ask anyone who's been to one of my workshops or come to LA to take my tutorial and they'll tell you that you'll leave with enough material to make your head spin and jumpstart your career!

I want to make sure that each and every participant comes in and gets to work DIRECTLY with me, feels the tactile cueing that I've become known for, and improves their ability to move powerfully and reflexively. So I'm making sure this workshop stays small and the quality stays HIGH.

If you want to make sure that we've got a place reserved for you, I strongly suggest that you pre-reg now while there are spaces available and the price is AUS$100 lower than what it'll be after 9 January 2010!

The Paypal registration links are below, and the address is:
THE ENERGY CLINIC
(rear of) 54 Sir Donald Bradman Drive
Mile End, South Australia
(entrance from the corner of South Road and Daringa Street)

Contact Nino Pilla (08) 8212-5606 for more information!

Register NOW & see you Down Under!

What's a Pattern?

2009-12-02T21:04:00.000-08:00

Functional movement patterning is something I'm fascinated immensely by. And that fascination boils down to a two part question:
1. Etiology: How does dysfunction develop?
2. Treatment: How do we take dysfunctional patterns and re-educate them for optimal function again?

With screening & assessment tools such as the Functional Movement Screen & the Selective Functional Movement Assessment, we are able to identify dysfunctional movement that lies at the root of problematic movement or pain. With any variety of corrections that are available - ranging from manipulation/mobilization, to corrective exercise, to Z-Health, to yoga/martial arts - we can directly affect how the body's neuromuscular system deals with a particular motion.

Wait a minute!!!

What about joint problems?

What about muscle cramps?

What about tendinitis?

What about bone spurs?

What about compressed discs?

Yep... I hear you... and I want you to think slightly outside the box for a moment. Follow me through this line of thought, please.

All of the situations you've described above can be seen as mere symptoms. Not the true root of an underlying problem.

One of the mantras I've heard Z-Health practitioners use is "The nervous system is plastic."

No, that doesn't mean that your brachial plexus is 99% nylon. That means that you are capable of change.

Your body's muscular movement patterns, which are controlled by your nervous system, can be RE-PATTERNED by re-training your nervous system. And retraining the nervous system is often done by imposing a different level of awareness on an action.

My mentor, Gray Cook, calls that "proprioceptive awareness" when spoken about in the context of movement. But there are a growing number of studies where researchers are showing that movement training can directly impact individuals with cognitive disorders.

No $h!#... The Chinese have been saying for millenia that "The inside manifests on the outside, but the outside can change the inside."

Fortune-cookie-speak translation: If you recognize someone (or self) with psycho-social issues, no matter how minor or how major, you can positively affect that person if you can get him/her/yourself to modify your movement patterns.

NOW... back to the title of this post... What's a pattern?

A pattern is an established way of doing things that has become ingrained through practice. What oftentimes is dismissed as genetic or "inherited" is more likely a learned behavior.

Whether the pattern in question is valgus collapse under load, poor spinal posture when typing on your laptop, inappropriate scratching in public, binge eating, saying "uhhh" every few words, or being pathologically late, the reality is that all of these patterns are manifestations of a LACK OF CONTROL.

And that lack of control comes from two things: a lack of SELF-AWARENESS and a lack of understanding of CONSEQUENCES.

Let's take posture for example...

Someone may not be aware of their posture being kyphotic (slouched forward), and as a result, when they think they're standing straight, a 3rd person observer can see clearly that they're not. The nervous system, in this case, has calibrated itself to read the flexed T-spine as "neutral".

For that pattern to be broken, an intervention of sorts has to occur. Whether the person in question decides on his/her own to QUESTION and EXAMINE his/her own posture, OR a therapist intervenes to re-train the posture, the pattern needs inspection, analysis, and active modification to be re-learned. Ask anyone who's successfully changed their posture how difficult it was, and they'll almost all tell you that it took a lot of mindfulness - constantly reminding themselves to sit up straight, walk tall, etc., etc.

The same is true for speech, for movement, for any moment of any action that we are involved in. Mindfulness is the key to recalibration, the key to growth, the key to change.

KBLA's Sunday Group Training Classes - Special Missive for the remainder of 2009

2009-11-25T17:16:00.000-08:00

Everyone,

My "little brother", George Samuelson RKC II/CK-FMS, gave me a great example of generosity of spirit and greatness in times of scarcity.

We live in a world where the have-nots have even less these days. And I'd like to ask your help in changing that.

For the next 4 Sunday classes at KBLA, I ask that instead of your usual $20, you bring a new, unwrapped toy worth at least $20 or $20 worth of canned groceries.

This is not the time to be "looking out for #1", but rather the perfect time to look out for those who are way down the totem pole.

I CHALLENGE YOU TO JOIN ME!

Joint Function - Where's the problem?

2009-11-05T09:29:00.000-08:00

"My neck hurts."

"My elbow hurts."

"My back hurts."

"My knee hurts."

"My head hurts."

How often have you heard or made these complaints? And how often have you thought that there was something wrong with the joint(s) in question?

Anna Shum, RKC, posted on her Facebook page "what does a stuck door and your [insert ailing body part] have in common?" with a link to Coach Mike Boyle's very insightful video that accurately explains the nebulous approach towards human aches & pains.

So much of what's put out there in terms of healthcare these days is myopic. And when the younger hotshot surgeons who get paid megabucks to do the total knee or hip replacements or other snip-shave-bolt-sew procedures for others make sure to exhaust every "alternative" option before they themselves go under the knife, that SCREAMS something loud & clear.

Let's face it.

A joint, by definition, is the meeting point of two or more bones. Bones are held together on the deepest level by ligaments, and they're buffered by things like bursa, cartilage, and synovial fluid in the joints that do the most movement.

Muscles span joints. They're the reason that bones move or don't move, depending on the neurological command executed in any given situation.

So when there's pain that seems centered on a joint, wouldn't it also be logical to do a thorough examination of the muscles & tendons that span the joint? OF COURSE!

But how often do physicians look past the X-rays & MRIs and take the time to appropriately evaluate muscle function and movement patterns with the appropriate tests & palpation? RARELY.

The most common knee-jerk replies to a patient's joint pain that I've heard far-too-often are "It's arthritis" and "Stop doing that movement and take these pills."

If arthritis is defined as an inflammatory condition in the joint, then what's the underlying cause of that inflammation? MOVEMENT! And if there's a defect in the movement, don't we need to address that?

One of the best lines I ever heard from an ortho specialist that I admire is...

"MRIs are snapshots of the body. Just as a photo can make things look disproportionate in size depending on perspective and angle, so too can an MRI or X-ray."

So unless the radiologist sees something incontrovertable, like a fracture or bony growth, how dependable is the medical imaging at portraying the situation with absolute accuracy and relevance?

That depends on the skill of the "photographer", or the imaging technician in this case.

If you're experiencing aches and pains that seem to be joint related and you're not suffering from acute trauma, deformity, or similarly serious condition, please look past the joints and pull the focus back a little. When your doctor says, "Let's schedule a surgery to have a look around in there" and the doctor's talking about your joints, that generally means that he or she isn't certain enough to bet money on. But they'll certainly bet with your money and your wellbeing.

The neuromuscular movement pattern and how it affects the skeletal system may be to blame for your discomfort!!

Look outside the box and see what the underlying cause of things might REALLY be, folks...

- The neck pain you feel may be because of T-spine strength/weakness & immobility issues.

- The knee pain may be because of weak intrinsics in your foot and poor recruitment in your hip.

- The headache may be stemming from you gritting your teeth and ducking your head every time you hear your neighbor's kids.

And once you take the time to LEARN HOW TO IDENTIFY and then RESET the movement patterns, you may find that your aches and pains are a thing of the past.

Doc's Travel Calendar - Kettlebell Workshops around the world

2009-10-13T23:17:00.000-07:00

There's been a lot going on lately, folks. I won't deny that that's been why it's been a month since the last major blog update.

Rest assured that there's been some major stuff afoot on this end, and the new blog updates will have all of the CONFIRMED upcoming travel dates posted on the sidebar.

I'm essentially maxed out for travel in the first half of 2010. So please drop me a line at kettlebellsla@yahoo.com with the subject line reading "Workshop request" if you'd like to have a workshop for the second half of 2010 on of any of the following topics:

1. "Hard Style, High Density": RKC & FMS fundamentals, geared towards the fitness or medical professional & covering the 6 basic lifts required for RKC level 1 instructor certification as well as the rehabilitative and prehabilitative applications of these exercises with Functional Movement patterning.

2. "Hard Style, High Impact": RKC fundamentals as geared towards both traditional & mixed martial artists and combat personnel. Tactical applications will be shown and drilled. Usually taught with SrRKC & World Taekwondo Federation 7th degree black belt, Jon Engum.

3. "Yin & Yang of Kettlebells: Kettlebell Yoga & Viking Warrior Conditioning" with Danish Olympic strength & conditioning coach and Master RKC Kenneth Jay

All of the Hardstyle Kettlebell Certification appearances will also appear in the sidebar updates, so if you're reading this post in Facebook, please visit http://kettlebellslosangeles.blogspot.com.

Looking forward to seeing YOU in a city near you soon! In the meantime, for those of you in LA, I look forward to seeing you training out with me on Sunday mornings when I'm in town and when I'm not, you'll STILL get top-notch instruction from the KBLA-RKC crew.

Kettlebell Form Clinic: Squatting Swings

2009-09-18T10:41:00.000-07:00

One of the most common errors that appears with kettlebellers of ALL levels is the squatting Swing. Instead of the kneecaps staying relatively fixed in space and the shins exhibiting minimal motion, some folks perform Swings with their shins swaying back & forth and their knees jutting forward over their toes. This happens when people "squat" into their Swings.

The Swing operates essentially on the same biomechanical platform as the Deadlift from the armpits down to the soles of your feet. That said, we need to revisit the 3 Prys and the Hard Style Lock again.

There are 2 main problems that need to be addressed with squatting Swings: lumbar strength & pelvic rhythm.

Lumbar strength
The lumbar spine needs the strength to maintain extension (a slight arch). Under load, the joints of the lumbar spine are in a biomechanically advantageous position if you keep them in extension. As soon as you fall into flexion, a couple of things happen.
1. The lower back is more vulnerable to injury because of the lesser degree of protection from the lumbar extensors.
2. The kettlebell drops out of the "upper triangle"* (formed by the knees and the groin), which tends to cause the lumbar spine to flex even further, the shoulders to elevate & protract, and the neck to "shorten". The arc/trajectory of the kettlebell becomes less of a Swing and more of a "scoop". If it sounds ugly or dangerous to you, that's because it is.

Pelvic Rhythm
How your pelvis rocks back & forth is absolutely crucial when it comes to the ballistic lifts - Swing, Clean, & Snatch. The apex of each of those lifts should result in a solid Hard Style Lock. At the apex of the Hard Style Lock, the pelvis is posteriorly rotated slightly, thanks to the maximal contraction of the glutes.
--- BUT, the bottom of those lifts should look identical to the bottom of a good Deadlift, a la the 3 Prys. Thus, relative to the femurs, the pelvis is anteriorly rotated at the bottom. So the pelvis has to be MOBILE and COORDINATED enough to move with the direction of the load dependent on where it is.

The timing of the pelvic rhythm is actually pretty simple. If you maintain the Hard Style Lock as long as humanly possible while the bell is on the downswing such that the KB Swing trajectory stays well within the "upper triangle", you'll find that the hips "hinge" or "pry" backwards instead of squatting downwards.

Get back to your training, and train with intelligence and humility. The top dogs in the RKC organization aren't those who are clamoring to show off, but rather those who are jockeying to receive corrections from those who have taken their lifts and their understanding of those lifts to new heights!

As an RKC who came through to the recent workshop Kenneth Jay & I taught at Kettlebells Orange County said to her colleagues, "Things you know the Swing?.... THINK AGAIN!"

*More on the "upper triangle" another time.

This Sunday's events - KBLA morning class and the Doc & KJ workshop

2009-09-12T14:59:00.000-07:00

Doc & KJ at the 2008 UCLA RKC

For those of you who were dying to come to the Yin & Yang of Kettlebells workshop that the Dane of Pain & the Doc are teaching at Kettlebells Orange County but slacked on registering and are now wishing that you'd registered sooner, fear not.

The Kettlebells Los Angeles (KBLA) Sunday morning Line-Up* will be in full effect tomorrow morning. What're we covering?

Well, since it's gonna be a warm one tomorrow, it'll certainly have to do with the TGU and the 4 Knots mobility stuff that I've been hammering home for a while now.

Bring your beach towels if you have them, and bring your friends. I keep hearing from folks how they think kettlebell training is potentially the most dangerous fad in fitness these days... and I HAVE TO AGREE.

If you look at half of the bovine feces that's on Youtube these days and how many people take that trash as credible reference material, you too will think that kettlebell training could seriously damage someone.

That's where WE fit in.

KBLA's on a mission to spread the most solidly taught movement science training around. So regardless of whether you're an athlete preparing in the off-season, a child learning the basics of fundamental movement & strength training, a mom who's getting back into exercising after your second kid, or an executive that wants to get back in shape after ACL surgery, we've got the method to help you meet your goals and do so SAFELY!

* moniker courtesy of Coach Ron Jones, RKC

Mobility FIRST - Strength training and optimal joint function

2009-09-10T06:26:00.000-07:00

A question I often get asked is whether or not someone can exercise around a restriction or limitation in range of motion/movement. Clients/patients and their coaches/trainers often want to simply train around a restricted joint or pattern. Their rationale is that if there's enough muscle around a limited or painful joint, then the muscle will protect the joint from further injury and hopefully take away the pain altogether.

The problem with that logic is that strength training perpetuates and reinforces existing patterns. So if there's a problem with the way a joint moves, strengthening the muscles around the joint might often do more harm than good.

While there are certainly times when a limitation is unavoidable - due to serious musculo-skeletal irregularities like bony outgrowths, implanted hardware, or completely severed tendons - more often than not, such limitations CAN be dealt with successfully.

HOW?

- When in doubt, refer back to one of the FMS system's mantras - MOBILITY FIRST!

What sort of mobility are we talking about improving here? Active or passive?

- YES. If there's at least passive mobility, then you know that a joint or a series of joints has the ability to move through a range of motion unimpeded. When a joint is restricted, the body tries to create movement somewhere else in the chain. And that's the essence of compensation. When you have neuro-muscular compensations that cause stabilizers to exert their force to create movement and prime movers that become hypertonic (tense or tight) to add stability, the body starts moving in a manner that it wasn't designed for. This, in turn, leads down the road of self-destruction. Exercise starts exerting greater-than-normal shear forces on joints, and that is NOT a good place to be.

What if stretching, foam roller work, and massage therapy don't work?

- Then maybe you need something a little more hands-on to regain range of motion in the locked-up joint spaces.

Sometimes, what a joint needs most, especially a joint with deep intrinsics that are guarding a pathological positioning or movement pattern, is a passive mobilization that a skilled chiropractor, PT, osteopath, or Tui-Na specialist can provide.

After the mobilization, re-check the movement patterns and see if they improve. If the movement patterns improve overall, you've got your answer as far as the efficacy of the approach!

More later... sprinting off to another hectic day!

Training this weekend

2009-09-04T08:22:00.000-07:00

I'm praying for rain. In fact, I'm praying for it to rain like hell for a couple of days.

Now if you know me, you know how unusual that is since I grew up on the Eastern seaboard where there was rarely a paucity of rain.

However, with air quality so bad from the MASSIVE wildfires that even the spiderwebs in parts of West LA & seaside Santa Monica look like they've been spraypainted white & sprinkled with ash, there's no way that I could teach outside in good conscience.

To that end, I'm cancelling my Saturday morning Tai-Chi class, as well as the Sunday morning KBLA Line-Up, in the interest of keeping your lungs just that much healthier.

Later this weekend, I'll be posting a special workout for you guys, assuming the Flip camera I just got works properly. :)

But in the meantime..... PRAY FOR RAIN!

Training, Health, Performance, and Body Image: Look the Part

2009-09-01T18:41:00.001-07:00

OK... I live on the Westside of Los Angeles. We're known for good looking people, many of whom are... "enhanced", "sculpted", "augmented", or whatever else you care to call it.

Now while the only blades that have so far made contact with my skin are those that have malicious or combative intent behind them, cosmetic surgery is not a big deal to me. I can understand that sometimes our bodies need a little jump start to get to where we'd like them to be.

However, that's a totally different issue than
a) a lack of discipline or unwillingness to consistently modify one's lifestyle & behaviors to achieve fitness and overcome weakness, obesity, etc., and/or
b) a surgically sculpted physique that has only cosmetic appeal yet no functionality of athletic movement behind it.

Following the 2009 Camp Pendleton RKC, Team Leader Mark Toomey & I had a discussion that centered around one of the comments received from the Marines who took the course. The Marine commented something to the effect that it was somewhat surprising to have a couple of PT instructors on the field who looked like they'd be totally useless after trying to jog a mile, do a snatch test, or bang out a few pullups.

The comment was not without merit.

The RKC is not only a school of strength, but also a lifestyle of true physical fitness. Now that the RKC is essentially married to Gray Cook's FMS system, there's even less excuse for anything less than optimal human performance and health. Plenty of people use all sorts of excuses to weasel their way around getting in shape. They argue for everything from injuries, to strong vs. skinny, to metabolic disorders, to all kinds of $h!#.

It's rubbish. It's cowardly. It's over.

As adherents of the Hard Style RKC School of Strength and students of Functional Movement Systems, the KBLA-RKC crew has a missive. We, as RKCs, represent the elite among the elite within the fitness and human performance world. If all we have are unique looking training tools and 3 extra letters behind our names, but still look and move like sauntering livestock, that's wholly unacceptable. We have to LOOK THE PART! Our bodies not only have to perform like athletes, but also look like athletes as well.

Our job is to INSPIRE others with every facet of our being - from how we act, to how we perform, to how we look. We CANNOT be part of the institutionalized hypocracy that plagues the fitness world and allow ourselves to be just another fat trainer with an embroidered polo shirt, telling others to do what we don't or can't.

Some folks are reading this and thinking, "Oh, my God... I've gotta get to the gym and hop on the treadmill and do a hundred crunches a day."

More rubbish.

Just stop shovelling the ice cream into your mouth and bang out a couple of 2-3 minute swing sessions, do some pull-ups, and start your day off with some Janda situps!

Yes... it IS that simple.

The people who clamor up & down that it's not that simple to get in shape are the ones who usually lie to themselves (and thus to others) about what they eat, what they drink, and how little they train. While there are certainly those RARE few who have endocrine disorders and the like, more often than not, there are those who use such labels as excuses to let themselves look like Jack Black.

If you think injuries are an excuse, then you obviously haven't seen Master RKC Mark Reifkind. The man is no spring chicken, has sustained more serious orthopedic injuries than many professional athletes, and still looks good with his shirt off.

Tyson Penrod, a newly minted RKC from the San Diego certification weekend, completed not only his snatch test, but the entire weekend of training with a fractured wrist.. discovered after he returned to Reno & had an X-ray.

Excuses are endless for poor performance or failures. However, successes, especially multi-faceted successes, are the result of sacrifice, of diligence, of focus, of integrity of purpose, and of inspiration.

Choose your side, choose your weapon, and jump in the fray!

Training on Sunday 8/30/09

2009-08-29T19:54:00.001-07:00

Kettlebellers ---

Due to the unhealthy air quality from the fires, I am cancelling KBLA's Sunday 7am class tomorrow.

Stay indoors during the fires and stay safe.

Looking forward to seeing each & every one of you when I get back from RKC San Diego!

Doc

Dr. Mark Cheng, L.Ac., Ph.D., FMS, RKC Team Leader

Sent via mobile phone

The Yin & Yang of Kettlebells - What is real Power?

2009-08-20T18:25:00.000-07:00

Russian Kettlebell training has always been seen as hardcore, as strong, as aggressive (or yang) in its movement. But there's a balance. There's a yin side to the training as well.

For those of you who follow the RKC's principles, tension = strength. If you can't generate tension, you can't demonstrate strength.

However, the equation is a little more complicated than it first appears. Power is evidenced by the change in tension per unit of time. So the greater the change in tension through the smaller the amount of time, the greater the power output.

THUS... if you're fairly stiff to begin with, and then you generate an MVC (Maximum Volitional Contraction) in say 0.5 seconds, the change in tension levels isn't going to be that impressive.

However, if you're able to relax your muscles to the point of almost total flaccidity and then generate the same MVC in the same 0.5 seconds, your power output is phenomenally better than if you were stiff.

This is where the concept of "intelligent mobility" comes in to play.

If you spend all day stretching and kneading your body until you're as pliable as Gumby, that's great as far as being able to tie yourself into postures that'll be the envy of everyone at yoga class. But it doesn't necessarily mean jack when it comes to having the power to punch through a car window or an attacker's larynx to save a life.

I first heard this principle from my Combat Shuai-Chiao master's elder son, Sifu James Lin, before I started training with kettlebells under Pavel Tsatsouline. The late Grandmaster Chang Tung-sheng believed that stretching too much can actually inhibit your strength and power. Thus, Master Lin said that it's not good for a fighter to be too flexible.

This is where the Turkish Get-Up & Viking Warrior Conditioning methods come in. The Turkish Get-Up, taught in the FMS-influenced manner, is one of the premier movement patterning exercises in the US today. Its slow, precise movement trains the body to use its musculoskeletal system in the most linked fashion possible, giving you strength and control while developing grace and coordination.

The RKC Hard Style snatch with the VO2 protocols developed by Kenneth Jay train the body like no other to load & explode like a cross between a cheetah and Michael Jordan. When combined with the Turkish Get-Up, these two exercises will help you maximize your human movement potential like few others can!

Who in their right mind wouldn't want to have a physical training regimen that gave them strength through a maximal range of motion?

Who doesn't like the idea of having both the POWER and COORDINATED CONTROL to both pull a child to safety in a crisis situation OR to comfortably handle an unruly person in a non-life-threatening situation?

Who doesn't have a few pounds that they'd like to shave off in the right places?

When Master RKC Kenneth Jay & I hit Irvine, CA to teach our Yin & Yang of Kettlebells workshop at Kettlebells Orange County, be ready for some of the most detail oriented training of your life.

The 4+ hours you spend training with us will leave your brain (and probably a few muscles) aching for more... more insights... more training... more fun... more mobility... and more POWER without bulk.

The available slots may already be sold out. But drop Kingston Heng, RKC, a line at www.kettlebellsorangecounty.com and see if he'll squeeze you in.

The Viking & I are looking forward to seeing you!

How to make your wishes come true

2009-08-15T16:01:00.000-07:00

I'll do a blogpost on something more corrective & kettlebell related soon, but I just had a Facebook conversation with a friend that brought to mind a lot of conversations that I've had over the past year(s).

As I look at today's date (18 August 2009), I realized that I've yet to complete my SCHEDULED travel for this year. I still have San Diego, St. Paul, New York, New Jersey, Korea, and perhaps 1 more destination on tap before the holiday season.

And the roster for the first HALF of next year (2010) is looking pretty hectic already. Australia & New Zealand in late January & early February, probably a couple of domestic trips in late Feb - April (including Gray Cook's CK-FMS workshop in St. Paul in May), Scotland in May (or June), followed by Denmark in late May, and Japan sometime in June or July.

One of the comments I keep hearing is "You're so lucky to get to travel like that". And the other is "You're so lucky that you get to meet & train with the people you do."

TRUST ME... I KNOW.

Not a day goes by that I don't count my blessings. From the people I get to meet, to the people I get to teach, to the people I get to study and train with, it's frickin' amazing being me.

But for every sunrise, there's a sunset. Don't get me wrong. I'm not boohooing my life, but there'll come a time when the piper needs to get paid, and I keep thinking back to that line in Spiderman where "With great power comes great responsibility."

And that just reminds me how much work I have yet to do to make the most of what I've been taught, what I've had the chance to learn, what resources I've been given, and what people I've had the blessings to have in my life. And that keeps the fire lit under my backside at all hours, every day, in every season, year after year.

If you want to live your dreams, be ready to suffer. If you can work hard enough to suffer, you'll get to have glimpses of the best parts of your dreams in the moments of your waking hours.

To all of you who've come into my life, thank you for all the richness you've brought to it. Whether from meeting me at the Inosanto Academy and telling me that you learned English from my articles & columns in Black Belt Magazine, from talking to me at an RKC instructor workshop and telling me that a blogpost made the difference for you in your rehab, from an e-mail of thanks from a clinic patient who can finally breathe deeply without pain, to the sweet hugs & kisses I get from my beloved wife & son at the end of a day, YOU ALL ARE PART OF MY DREAMS COME TRUE.

Thank you.

Training with Legends

2009-08-01T10:41:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry it's been a bit longer than usual since my last blogpost. Right now, I don't think I could possibly be busier unless I changed my name to John Du Cane. Normally, I like to share some insights with my blog readers, but this post is going to be a glimpse into one of the most hectic, yet rewarding, days I've had in ages.

This week, I've had the pleasure and honor of having Dr. Vadim Kolganov visiting me here in Los Angeles. As we both share three common loves (Hard Style kettlebell training, manual medicine, and martial arts), there never seems to be enough hours in the day.

We both couldn't help but realize that +2 hour training sessions felt like barely 30 minutes, even when wearing a thick Judo gi top in the Los Angeles summer heat. Whether reviewing Sambo fundamental mobility drills, throw set-ups & entries, pins, submissions, or Kali blade work with Guro John Spezzano, the training sessions were always over far too soon.

Yesterday was an action packed day. Starting with a morning get-together with Dr. Kolganov & RKC Chief Instructor Pavel Tsatsouline for a brief workout, we continued on with a private training session for Raleigh Enterprises President, Mark Rosenthal, who is graciously hosting Dr. Kolganov at the Sunset Marquis Hotel & Villas, and after a couple of errands, returned back to the Rosenthal house for a powwow with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu/JKD/Kali expert, Prof. Roy Harris.

To watch two brilliant minds and two high level experts like Harris & Kolganov exchange technique and talk about their favorite techniques in their respective fields of experience and preference was about as cool an experience as someone could hope for in martial arts. Dr. Kolganov gifted a kurtka (Sambo jacket) to Prof. Harris and shared techniques from both Sambo wrestling & Retuinskih's ROSS system, and Prof. Harris shared his insights into Kalis Ilustrissimo weaponry, the JKD mindset of streetfighting, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

Later in the evening, Dr. Kolganov & I drove down to the Perform Better Summit in Long Beach and met up with Functional Movement System masterminds Gray Cook & Brett Jones. Every time I meet up with Gray, no matter how short the interaction, I always leave with some clinical pearl (or 10) that leaves me both dumbfounded and inspired at the same time. By the time we made it down to Long Beach last night, I was dead tired. On the drive back, I was re-energized from Gray's insights, keenly aware of how much and how urgently I have to grow and improve as a clinician.

Today.... R&R.

Kettlebell & FMS Workshop and Seminar Scheduling Changes

2009-07-20T18:37:00.000-07:00

In keeping with my promise to spend more time with my family and devoted to my OWN training, I've decided to postpone the Australia and New Zealand Hard Style kettlebell training & FMS certification workshops until early 2010.

Right now, we're looking at late January for Australia (Sydney & Adelaide), and early February for New Zealand (Auckland). I'm working with my local coordinators in Australia & New Zealand to set dates & venues. So if you'd like to help out, please drop them a line.

The extra time will allow us to arrange for bigger, better, international-level learning experiences for you Down Under & in Kiwi-land. Rest assured that if you're anywhere near Oz or New Zealand, the workshops you come to of mine will be worth every penny, Yen, Won, Dollar, or RMB you spend to get there. I guarantee it!

I know this is a bit of a schedule change from my previous post, but it's all for the good.

Why? For a few reasons...

1. First & foremost, I'll get to spend more quality time with my family. I can pretty honestly say that my family life's never been better... and I'm LOVING it that way.

2. My physical training is slowly coming back to what it should be. I'm getting some good hours in on the mats, practicing throws, doing a little rolling, training with some of the best & brightest in their chosen styles, schools, and systems.

If it's a choice between some money & notoriety or having a first rate, once-in-a-lifetime learning experience with Southern California-based legends like the peerless Dan Inosanto, Combat Shuai-Chiao champion James Lin, Tsutomu Ohshima disciple Tom Muzila, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu genius Roy Harris, or Hwa Rang Do grandmaster Taejoon Lee, the choice is obvious.

Even visiting masters like my Krabi Krabong teacher Col. Nattapong Buayam and Sambo master Dr. Vadim Kolganov make it REALLY hard to want to leave right now.

The same can be said for my own kettlebell training with RKC Chief Instructor Pavel Tsatsouline. The chance to train with my mentor at the October Hard Style Ventura workshop is a large reason as to why I decided to reschedule.

Why am I prioritizing this so highly right now?
Teaching around the world has taught me one very clear lesson. There are plenty of people who'd gladly cut off a finger (theirs or mine) to be in my shoes, to have access to training with the people I have on speed dial, and to enjoy the kind of relationships that I've worked to cultivate and enjoy with these very special individuals.

I've seen that kind of jealousy manifest in many varied ways, and the only thing that I can do to properly and professionally address that sort of sentiment is simply to work HARDER to be deserving of the relationships, rights, and privileges I enjoy now. The skill sets that I'm learning and researching are not for me to hoard jealously. Rather, the workshops that I'm teaching are for the express purpose of improving the quality of life for each and every participant who comes to learn THROUGH the optimum application of those skill sets.

Remember... it's all about social synergy for me. If your agenda's different, that's on you, not me.

3. I WILL be heading back to the US East Coast sooner than expected. I'll be making a stop at City Wing Tsun to meet Grandmaster Leung Ting in late September, and then teaching an in-depth RKC prep course in Hamilton, New Jersey with George Samuelson, RKC II, CK-FMS during the October 3rd weekend.

We've JUST finalized the details on this workshop in the past 24 hours. From what I gather, however, spots are ALREADY selling briskly..... AND WE HAVEN'T EVEN FORMALLY ANNOUNCED THIS YET!

So please visit www.thisfeelsgood.com and register ASAP before the pre-reg spots all sell out.

The Summer '09 KBLA update & Fall '09 Workshop Updates

2009-07-10T18:58:00.000-07:00

Wow....so much has happened in the past few months. Where do I begin???

Better go with a list format to make sure I hit the points I need to:

1. East Coast Debrief: The East Coast Workshop Tour was AWESOME. Starting with Chris Wright-Martell's Modern Self-Defense Center in Middletown, CT, followed the next day by the inaugural Delaware Kettlebell Workshop in Middletown, DE's St. Andrew's School, and finishing with a special workshop in Hamilton, NJ's Israeli Krav Maga Center, and with a few private consults along the way, the tour was a whirlwind of maximum energy and minimal rest.

Sandy Sommer, RKC of Charm City Kettlebells did a great job organizing the Delaware Kettlebell Workshop, and George Samuelson, CK-FMS followed suit in NJ. Rest well assured that I'll be back to both of those places. In fact, we've already got the dates locked down for next year's Delaware Kettlebell Workshop, so get ready for more of the best comin' your way!

What did we cover? Some of the points we touched on are here in this blog: 3 Prys, Hard Style Lock, Swing Cues, Naked Get-Up, combat applications, etc., etc., as well as a plethora of cues & teaching tools that gave even the most experienced of lifters, athletes, & tactical personnel benefits that they weren't expecting. ;-)

I got to see colleagues I hadn't seen in a while (such as RKC II Rolando Garcia, Sr RKC Will Williams, CK-FMS & RKC II Phil Scarito, RKC Jen Morey, RKC Dr. Don Berry, RKC AJ Oliva, RKC Steph Myers, & RKC II Prof. Steve Freides), while meeting other RKCs I'd never met before, like Anton Iskersky, Deb Vollers, & a bunch of kettlebell instructors from other associations & federations. To say it was a blast is understatement at its most blatant. The hospitality, the respect, the warmth (both socially and climatewise), and the

At every stop along the Tour, I had the opportunity to work with people who are some of my favorite folks to interact with - martial artists & tactical personnel. It warmed my heart to see operators from the NJ State Police & PA State Police, as well as other departments make it out to the Tour stops. Their feedback on how these teaching & training methods directly affect and improve their on-the-job performance means perhaps more to me than anything else, as these are the men & women whose lives are on the line constantly for our safety.

I got to log in several hours teaching Sifu Alex Richter at City Wing Tsun in Midtown Manhattan. Sifu Richter is the USA's representative for Grandmaster Leung Ting's Wing Tsun organization, and he's a perfect example of the "yi wu hui you" (Mandarin - "making friends through martial arts") ideal. He's been working with Rolando Garcia and is going to make an AWESOME RKC someday soon.

David Kahn is another such instructor who's a class act all the way. As Chief Instructor of the US branch of the Israeli Krav Maga Association and with a list of high-profile clientele longer than an Oly bar, he made me feel completely at home while teaching at his facility. I'm pleased to call him a friend, honored to have worked with him, and look forward to seeing him again.

My NJ Workshop Participants - For some reason, the pic's getting truncated. Click on the image to see the full pic and all the participants!

To everyone who participated in the East Coast Tour, I'm deeply grateful for all your feedback, I've noted your requests for future workshops, and I'm hard at work RIGHT NOW on putting together more dates and stops.

I may have to sneak back east for Philadelphia's first ever East Coast RKC certification workshop in early October!

2. Going Down..... Under - Yes, the rumors are true. I'm heading to Australia & New Zealand in October. The dates & city stops are almost finalized, but I need to tie up all the loose ends with the organizers. Rest assured that once things are nailed down, the first place you'll get registration info is RIGHT HERE!

3. Apologies: I need to take a moment to apologize to the folks who were looking forward to the Irvine & Riverside, California workshops that I'd originally scheduled for June & July. After coming back from the East Coast, I did a bit of soul searching and realized that the one person who depends on me most was perhaps seeing me the least.

If you're not sure who that is, look up at the top of the page and watch the slideshow. Most of the pics are of him in some way, shape, or form. So in the interests of being a better Dad and spending time with my beloved son, I asked the organizers to work with me to reschedule those workshops, which we will do at some point in the future. I apologize again for disappointing you & promise that these workshops will be held at a future date.

As Sean Schneiderjean, RKC told me on Facebook, Zig Ziegler is quoted as saying, "Love is spelled T-I-M-E." And that precious lesson is one that I'm going to keep in the forefront of my head & my heart.

4. Hit the Beach with Pavel Tsatsouline! - Speaking of Sean, he's set up a very special workshop with RKC Chief Instructor Pavel Tsastouline in Ventura, CA on the beach! If you've ever wanted to learn directly from Pavel without the pressure of a certification or having to spend multiple days at an event, this one-day event in October is your hot ticket. Sean's even set up a special discount code for those of you who are coming as referrals from KBLA, but it's ending at the end of this month! The official deadline is August 7th, but I wouldn't drag my arse on registering. Even some Sr RKCs (Will Williams & David Whitley) are coming in from the East Coast just to have the chance to work more directly with Pavel himself, so please don't sleep on that. REGISTER NOW before the discount ends and the spots are gone!

5. USMC - 1st ANGLICO: I had the honor of attending the Change of Command Ceremony at the invitation of Lt. Col. Michael Gann, RKC. Heading back to Pendleton brought back memories of a great RKC weekend there, and it was a pleasure to see the Devil Dogs again. Please join me in wishing Lt. Col. Gann and his family nothing but Godspeed as they relocate to the Army War College in PA. The Marines of 1st ANGLICO were damn lucky to have a leader like him. And I've NO doubt that his successor will be Hard Styled soon! We salute you, Sir. OOOOO-RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

6. Foot Fundamentals: Instead of a monthly workout, I challenge you to do this...
Set your feet about shoulder width apart at a STRICT parallel along the centerline of the foot. Without allowing the balls of your feet to lose contact with the floor or pivot/slide in any way, bend your knees and pry them out until the center of your kneecap is moving in the same vertical plane as your foot. Get 5 reps of that perfectly throughout the day, and use that as your summertime repatterning drill. You may be amazed at how much your feet feel like they're working overtime, but the rest of your lower body will thank you for it. Wanna know more about the science behind that exercise? Get to one of my workshops or classes & find out!

Self-Limiting Exercise: Are you ready, willing, and enabled?

2009-07-08T15:39:00.000-07:00

Ever since the CK-FMS workshop of May 09 and hearing the strong endorsement of my mentor, Gray Cook, I've changed my opinion of the Vibram Five Fingers from "interesting" to "must have". How did this come about? Well, let me backtrack a little bit.

Cook's explanations years earlier about how core development patterns can often be thrown off in childhood really struck a chord for me as a new Dad. Newborns evolve through a progression when it comes to developing movement patterns - rolling, sitting, kneeling, crawling, and standing, with reaching included at every step along the way. Those are the same movements we develop in the Turkish Get-Up sequence, and that's something Gray, Master RKC Brett Jones, and I discuss & break down in depth with the Kettlebells from the Ground Up manual & DVD.

However, we as a society have learned to circumvent the natural processes of evolution with technology... and it's not exactly in our best interests!

Case in point - The baby walkers that are so popular right now are actually robbing our babies of crucial core development. A quick search on Target's website just yielded 11 items in the "baby walker" category. It's not like these things aren't selling, and I've seen them in homes of every socioeconomic strata. As Gray has said many times, core development is at its best in the infant & toddler stages.

One of Cook's more humorous quotes is "Want a great core workout? Try moving around with a head to body size ratio like a toddler's. Go strap on a 40 lb motorcycle helmet, crawl around a little, lie down, get up, and walk around. Then tell me how your body feels."

But technology has allowed us to shortcut development, allowing us to develop strength where we may not have an adequate based of functional or fundamental movement. Most children, as they develop, build the strength to stabilize their bodies in the sitting, kneeling, crawling, and then standing positions before they ever go for a walk. The baby walkers artificially suspend children in an upright position, giving them external stability and robbing those core stabilizing muscles of training that these youngsters will need later on in athletics and movement.

We are artificially ENABLING each generation to do movements they are not ready for, and their bodies are paying the price. Want proof? Look at the data as far as what's become acceptable as far as childhood fitness and adult ranges of motion.

Per Gray Cook, authentic movement systems are SELF-LIMITING. In other words, if your baby's not strong enough to walk and stand unassisted, then the lack of strength and coordination are limiting factors. Allowing the child to struggle on their own and develop those attributes gives him/her a chance to bump up against their limits, acknowledge them, and then overcome them. Believe it or not, a growing baby knows what he/she can or can't do, but that doesn't stop them from trying... or trying your patience. ;-)

The same can be said for the equipment we use on our feet.

The multimillion dollar athletic shoe business has evolved by making what should be a self-limiting exercise (e.g., running) and facilitate it past the point where many peoples' intrinsic foot, leg, and hip muscles are ready to maintain solid movement patterns. Over time, we get used to training longer and harder than those muscles are ready for because of the equipment (i.e., shoes) that we consider de rigueur.

So what happens when we switch back to a more "natural" system, such as created when running with the Vibram Five Fingers? We bump up against our limits.

If you're used to running 2 miles a day, the first time you go for a run in your Five Fingers, you might have to drop back to 3/4 of a mile. While I'm not an avid runner by any stretch of the imagination, my first run in the Five Fingers forced me to realize some movement patterns that were grossly amiss with that particular exercise. A 2 mile run, which is not terribly unusual for me, became wickedly uncomfortable shortly after 1/2 mile. My right calf was starting to scream at me, and I realized that I'd been able to run for longer periods because the running shoes I'd worn heretofore had essentially trampolined my every step, catapulting my body forward off the cushiony midsoles.

Instead of training my body for optimum performance, I'd been enabling dysfunctional or weak movement patterns in the guise of exercise. Going back to what is essentially barefoot running has been quite an eye opener as far as posture, body mechanics, and humility.

Instead of muscling through the 2 miler I'd set out for, I walked for the remainder of the mile with very tall posture, paying attention to how my feet were relating to the ground. I'd come up against my limit, I recognized a weakness, and I'm going to take my time pushing the envelope as my body develops the mobility, stability, strength, and coordination to be able to get back to 2 miles in the VFF shoes.

Balancing Instruction with Pushing the Envelope

2009-07-07T19:15:00.000-07:00

For the past few months, I've been focusing the Sunday morning KBLA training sessions intensely on form, technique, corrective exercise, mobility, and the soul of the RKC system - the Swing.

Now it's time to continue the circle, back to the format of the original KBLA beach training sessions. Those who are intermediate/advanced will be assisting with teaching in order to prepare you for RKC certification or re-certification, and those who are beginners will be benefitting from your guidance.

The pace of the class will be faster, more intense, and will go back to finishing with a circuit, so make sure you communicate with your partner of choice! I'm going to be joining in with the circuit. Bring beach towels or be ready to get dirty for anything from Brettzels, Armbars, Turkish Get-Ups, or Deck Squats (aka Rear Breakfall to Squat/Stand).

We're gonna DO WORK! Don't think for one second that we're going to sacrifice the quality of instruction that's made KBLA a magnet for people from as far away as Phoenix, Bakersfield, and San Diego. Instead, we're just going to set the standard as far as how we demonstrate having it all by working it all.

For people complaining about not having the body they desire, we're going to set the standard of training. All you have to do is repeat it at least twice more during the week, eat along the lines of either the Warrior Diet or a similar format, and enjoy the results!

KBLA is going to always strive to set the standard in the RKC community. Whether from our strict KBLA-RKC quality control standards, or our "look the part" missive, we're not going to sit back and be content to rest on laurels, ranks, or accolades. Real achievement is constant, not sporadic.

Amnesia of the Gastrocnemius?

2009-07-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

The first time I heard Gray Cook talk about a "sleepy calf" muscle, I was intrigued. But as always happens with Gray's presentations, there are a thousand and one things that I go back to study & review. So inevitably, something slips through the cracks.

The sleepy calf comment had to do with a tight hip, something with which I've recently been stuggling with. In spite of being able to drop down cold into a full Van Damme, my right hip is a little tighter than my left, and I can feel it. It irritates me occasionally during sleep, I feel it change my biomechanics when I kick, and for decades now, I always feel like I want to get a serious cavitation ("pop") from my right hip joint.

But I figured, "No, it must be something else for me. My calves are symmetrical. And I do enough footwork with martial arts that it can't be my calf."

So this morning I went for my first run in the Vibram Five Fingers. About 3/4 of a mile into it, I noticed something odd. My right calf & Achilles felt like they were starting to ache. The left side felt NOTHING. So instead of bullheadedly finishing off my run, I changed pace to walk out the rest of the mile, paying close attention to my stride.

With each few steps, I could feel how my right hip was starting to move more freely as my right calf was starting to howl. It's going to be interesting to see how this all plays out in the coming weeks as I work to make a habit of putting in at least a mile in these Five Fingers every other day. Needless to say, I'll keep you posted. :-)

Off to do a few errands before Courtney's birthday dinner!

Have a great Independence Day weekend, and remember to give thanks to the Vets that you come across. Were it not for each & every one of them, we'd not be enjoying the beer, barbecue, & blessings that make up our lives here in the USA & the rest of the free world.

THANK YOU!

I know... I know...

2009-06-28T19:01:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm well-aware that the blog posts require some updating. There's just been so much going on since I've been back east, and of course since I've arrived back home.

Just been spending the last few days unwinding, enjoying Squealietime, and attempting to catch up on the sea of e-mail that's been accruing since I had such limited Wi-Fi access back east.

Rest assured... The blog and the full debrief on all 3 stops of the East Coast Tour will be updated sometime this week. Thanks for your patience, thanks for your viewership, and thanks for your support.

I have to say once again that I was totally blown away by the depth of interest in what I had to teach, as well as the quality of the people I met and had the honor of working with.

For this week (and hopefully for this entire Summer)... Lots of TGU & pressing, lots of mobility, and lots of high quality martial arts training!

Coach Al Wood on The Delaware Kettlebell Workshop - Debrief #1

2009-06-23T19:09:00.000-07:00

This has been such an amazing trip. In so many ways, this has exceeded my expectations, and I've got so much to write about and recap for you. But it's a little late and I have to get up early tomorrow to catch a train to Jersey.

Here's a little glimpse into my Hardstyle Homecoming at my alma mater - St. Andrew's School - as written by the Strength & Conditioning Coach & Associate Athletic Director, Coach Al Wood.

With his permission, his e-mail to me has been reprinted below, and I look forward to the day when he can add the letters RKC to his name.

-----

Dr. Cheng,

First, I would just like to thank you for the outstanding workshop on Sunday! It was a great experience. I also want to thank you on behalf of St. Andrew's for your gracious donation to the school.

Second, I'd like to share with you a few things I took away from the workshop that I'm very excited about:

Before the Delaware workshop, I had seen the youtube video ad for one of your workshops where there was a lot of kettlebell swings being performed. I had tried a mutated version of the kettlebell swing with a dumbbell and considered it a hybrid of a smooth clean and a front raise. When doing my version of the exercise, I felt the primary amount of fatigue in my shoulders, upper traps, t-spine, and unfortunately, lumbar spine. At the time, I thought it might serve a useful application as an introduction to my athletes who had trouble learning an olympic hang clean. You know, power shrug, up on the toes, triple extension but don't lock the knees. I think a lot of RKC's would have vomited had they seen what I was teaching as a kettlebell swing.

Then, after 4 hours of re-educating my body on how to contract certain muscles, on how to relax other muscles, and on how to breath, I picked up a kettlebell and performed 10 reps of proper swings. I immediately noticed how hard my glutes were contracting. There was no effort in my lower back or neck. The fatigue was in a completely different place than I had predicted. While I found this interesting, my "Ah ha" moment didn't happen until the next day.

The morning after the workshop, I awoke with soreness in my glutes. That's not really something new for me. I've had some pretty killer traditional leg workouts. At a bodyweight of 181lbs I've squatted 605lbs x 1 and 405lbs x 22. I use a low bar, powerlifter style squat and go deep. Trust me, I couldn't get those numbers without knowing how to activate my glutes hard and I've had leg workouts that have left me almost crippled for days with soreness. It wasn't that I was sore in my glutes that surprised me, it was where I was sore in my glutes that surprised me.
The upper, outer glute medius was sore and still fatigued (no doubt from prying my knees out all day) and the upper, middle glutes were sore (a place that I've never had sore before.) But before you close this email thinking, "Who is this crazy guy and why is he telling me what parts of his butt are sore?", just bear with me. My "Ah ha" moment came when trying to recreate that sore, flexed feeling in my upper, middle glutes.

It only came when I locked my knees out very, very hard. We discussed during the workshop that there was this long-standing wisdom in weight training of "never lock your knees out". Not only that , but in the exercises that I rely on most to activate my glutes like squats, split squats, glute-ham raises, and RDL's, there really isn't a hard emphasis on the knee lockout. When I squat or split squat heavy, the last 6 inches or so at the top I am decelerating to a stop. I've accidentally locked out too hard at the top of a heay squat and it can make a bar with 405lbs. resemble a bodyblade in the way the plates start to flap up and down.
It's not that I hadn't been taught to lock my knees out during squats, it's just that it felt very unstable and unbalance when I did. To activate my glutes with squats, split squats, and RDL's I'm relying primarily on the deep eccentric stretch at the bottom of the movement and a hard concentric contraction to return from the bottom. 95 percent of the contraction is occuring with my knee in front of my body. The top part of those movement are to "come in for a landing" and rest or
sometimes to give a voluntary squeeze of all the muscles in the legs as an afterthought. Even if you consider the clean to be a great glute activator at the moment of triple extension, the activation is extremely short lived and softened by dropping into the catch of the movement.

This may seem like a long-winded explanation of how I contract my glutes, but it occured to me that in my current program (and the programs that many of my athletes follow) I am leaving a lot of unrecruited gluteal fibers on the table. And not just any fibers, but the ones that are responsible for explosively contracting the glutes while both the hip and knee are in full, hard extension like the left leg of Michael Johnson below:
[Image:michaeljohnson.jpg]
It's not that I've been performing or teaching leg movement exercises incorrectly all of these years, it's that those exercises are simply incapable of producing the same pattern of gluteal contraction as a kettlebell swing. No other exercise powerfully locks the knees and contracts the glutes safely. This is truly amazing to me.

I wanted to write you this email not only to share with you what I took away from your workshop, but to also share with you that I fully believe that the integration of kettlebell training, in particular the kettlebell swing and clean along with the other resistance training and speed development tools that I already use will result in faster, more explosive, and less injured St. Andrew's athletes. That is priceless and I thank you for the donation of your time, experience, and wisdom.

Al Wood ATC, CSCS
Director of Sports Medicine
Athletic Trainer
Strength and Conditioning Coach
Associate Athletic Director
St. Andrew's School

A little martial nostalgia

2009-06-11T19:30:00.000-07:00

Today's hangtime with Shotokan karate legend Sensei Tom Muzila, and the subsequent review of some of the Black Belt Magazine instructional videos that were shot over a decade ago, brought back more than a few memories from the days I think of as my first set of "golden" training days - college.

Tom was working as fight coordinator on a movie called The Hunted, with Highlander star Christopher Lambert and The Last Emperor star John Lone. They had some re-shooting to do for some scenes at the end of the movie, and Tom brought me on board to double John Lone as we were roughly the same height, and Tom was familiar with my martial background of Chinese martial arts and some training with our mutual teacher - Master Tsutomu Ohshima.

Close Range Combat Academy Wing Chun headmaster Sifu Randy Williams was staying with me at the time as he was in town shooting his own instructional video series with Unique Publications, then owner of Inside Kung-Fu Magazine. So Sifu Williams & I went to the set, a feudal Japanese castle rebuilt inside a Santa Monica Airport hangar.

Tom had me come in to watch some of the non-fighting reshoots and to get a feel for the project, so I got to the set and sat quietly in the back with Sifu Williams. Not wanting to let Tom down, I was focused on taking in the whole process of filmmaking and the flow of the set when suddenly this tall guy stands RIGHT in front of me, obstructing my field of view. Mind you, back then, I had way more fight in me than diplomacy, so I took a bokken (wooden training sword) in hand and gently nudged the man to the left, out of my field of view. Not even looking up to take my eyes off the scene being filmed.

As soon as the director yelled "CUT!", Sifu Williams and Tom looked at each other in total shock, and I looked up to see the man who immortalized Connor MacLeod standing right in front of me.

I, of course, didn't remember pushing anyone out of the way, as I was so focused on studying the scene, but Sifu Williams and Tom didn't let me live that one down, saying, "You pushed Christopher Lambert out of the way on his own set!!!"

Lambert graciously dismissed my profuse apologies saying, "No. You were doing what you should have been doing, and I was in the way. I'm the one who's sorry to you." And I was completely dumbfounded by the classiness with which he handled my faux pas. During the re-shoot, which took something like a week, Lambert was always kind to me, always unpretentious, and never too busy to mingle. Shooting the fight scenes with him at the end of the movie was a great honor, and I'll look back on that memory with fondness.

OK... flashback & nostalgia time over.... BACK TO WORK!

But in case you're done with work already and too curious to let this one lie...

Reactive Neuromuscular Training: Reverse Psychology for your body

2009-06-08T17:48:00.000-07:00

One of the problems that is often identified in sports training, athletic performance, or rehabilitative medicine is when a muscle or muscle group isn't firing to its potential or is firing asymmetrically compared to the opposite side.

When muscle recruitment is less than optimal, that can be a sign of anything from injury to compensation to poor motor learning. Neuromuscular patterns are akin to thought processes or computer programs. Over time and without proper education/training/debugging, corrupt bits of "code" sometimes pop up in the program, making the execution of the program, thought process, or movement dysfunctional.

To deal with this from a neuromuscular standpoint, therapists, trainers, and clinicians sometimes employ a strategy known as Reactive Neuromuscular Training (RNT). RNT operates on the premise that the body will do what it needs to maintain balance - homeostasis.

WHAT'S AT RISK
However, with faulty movement patterns, the body doesn't recognize that the pattern it's maintaining is sub-optimal. Left unchecked for a long time, these simple proprioceptive errors (such as being unaware of the knee position) can lead to a plethora of other compensative mechanisms and injuries (meniscal tears, TFL & IT band pathologies, etc., etc.).

Think of it like a person driving a car who doesn't realize that the passenger side wheels are drifting into the next lane because he's using his driver's seat perspective to keep HIMSELF in the middle of the lane instead of the vehicle. Now on a countryside dirt road and at a low rate of speed, there's not much that could go wrong aside from scraping up the side paneling a little. On a Los Angeles freeway, where speeds can hit well over 80mph during non-rush hour times, such a mistake in proprioception can be fatal.

REVERSE PSYCHOLOGY
So to assist the "driver" in recognizing the error in proprioception, the therapist, trainer, or clinician simply "feeds the mistake" with barely enough force to get the movement pattern to correct itself.

In other words, if the knees tend to drift medially from the midlines of the feet during a squat, then pushing the knees inward while instructing the patient/client to resist the push will cause him/her to activate the muscles that externally rotate the femur (thigh) in the hip more intensely. Instead of telling the body "not" to do something, you give the body something to push against, forcing it to react neurologically and muscularly to implement a better, safer, stronger muscular recruitment pattern.

In this way, the movement pattern in question is used to clean itself up, rather than reverse engineering the movement down to isolating a single muscle in a fixed axis machine. As Gray Cook often says, "Does turning on your glute give you a better squat, or is giving you a better squat a better way of teaching you to fire your glute?"

RNT is a quick means of training the brain & the nervous system to recognize and implement new movement patterns quickly and efficiently, helping them become habituated faster when the body must perform a given fundamental movement.

DON'T THINK... FEEEEEEEEL!
These cues rely on tactile stimuli for maximum learning. So if you're performing a hip bridge and can't quite get the glute to fire the same way on the right as it does on the left, then...

1. Bridge up,
2. Tighten your abs and make sure you're not arching your lower back to cheat a little more hip height,
3. Relax your neck (so that you focus all that much more neurological energy down into your hips & legs), and
4. Have someone gently press down on your hip at the anterior superior iliac spine (ASIS) as if they were dribbling a basketball.

That irregular pressure will give your body something to react to, giving you the tactile cues needed to activate the glutes and create the hip extension against the bouncing push.

Need a more self-sufficient way of experiencing RNT? No problem. Gray Cook has designed elastic bands that allow you to rig up tactile feedback cues for yourself or with a therapist. Click on the pics below to find out more about them!

His exercise tubing program DVD helps take all the guesswork out of it for you, so if you want to fast track your progress, grab this as well...

Hope that helps, folks! We'll be covering RNT, as well as the ins and outs of Hard Style Russian kettlebell training in the workshops that I'll be teaching on my East Coast kettlebell workshop tour from June 20 - 24!

Please check the sidebar on the right for more info on these workshops!

East Coast kettlebell workshops - New England & Mid-Atlantic

2009-06-01T07:51:00.001-07:00

Back from assisting at the CK-FMS weekend with my mentors Gray Cook & MRKC Brett Jones, as well as my Redneck brother, SrRKC Jeff O'Connor. To say it was a first class learning experience would be gross understatement.

The new 4 day format for the CK-FMS made for a much less stressful learning experience. The FMS system is a new concept for most people to begin with. To try to learn the importance of it, the execution of it, the analysis of it, and the application of it in 3 days was something akin to cerebral suicide. With the added learning hours an extra day afforded, plus a smoother, more logical teaching format that Brett & Gray came up with, the entire experience was not only less stressful, but far more effective.

And perhaps this time more than last time, the emphasis of sticking to the outline of the screening system and enjoying its effectiveness were hammered home.

Some points to recap...

- Stick to the screen & let the screen mentor you
- Bottom 4 fix top 3
- Movement (or rather "mobility") FIRST, FIRST, FIRST
- Find the asymmetry
- Be disciplined on the front end with sticking to the screen, and be creative on the back end with your correctives.

And finally, for those of you at the CK-FMS workshop from the East Coast, I hope to see you at either New England's 6/20/09 Connecticut workshop (which, in spite of its name, is NOT just for martial artists, fighters, & tactical personnel) where I'll be reviewing FMS movement patterning in addition to in-depth review of Hard Style RKC kettlebell training, or the 6/21/09 Delaware Kettlebell Workshop for the mid-Atlantic region.

If you attended the CK-FMS workshop this past weekend, just e-mail the organizers and let them know. Bring along someone you've wanted to introduce to kettlebell training or Functional Movement patterning, get them registered at the regular price, and we'll bring you in for 1/2 off! We'll make sure to get you in, as it's crucial for you to get the chance to reinforce what you've been taught, and how to see it correctly with your students, clients, and patients!

Needless to say, don't hesitate to drop me a line with any questions you might have.

Looking forward to seeing you back east!

Memorial Day weekend kettlebell training

2009-05-23T07:14:00.000-07:00

As has become KBLA tradition, when there's a holiday that honors those who sacrifice in the name of our safety, we follow suit.

I don't need to remind you all of the importance that the men & women in uniform hold to your country, to your society, and to your way of life. If I do, then you might want to pull your head out of the sand.

There are a few individuals whom I've seen poo-poo the efforts of civilians to pay tribute to those who've made the ultimate sacrifice while serving their country. Those individuals might want to perform a serious gut check and take a long look in the mirror before blurting out any more garbage.

This weekend, this Sunday, if you've been on deployment or are currently active duty, come by.
Come train.
Come get the best that the RKC system of strength and kettlebell training has to offer.
And come as our guest.

We salute you.

More pics of the new KBLA gear

2009-05-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I know... the Denmark debrief will be posted later. So much to catch up on right now, and still fighting the jetlag. I have no idea how constant travellers like Sifu Dan Inosanto do it.

Here are a couple more pics of the new KBLA long & short sleeve T's fresh from the field of battle in Copenhagen... as well as a pic of me stylin' the new KBLA RKC jacket.

Here's Dr. Zolnai Vilmos, a Hungarian Shotokan champion, a dental school professor, a student of the legendary Gabi Katschthaler, and Team Cheng's technique champion styling the new long sleeve T-shirt

And another pic of Danish Army Sgt. Kevin Lassen with me in the KBLA short sleeve T.

The backs of the shirts have the same logo, but smaller, just underneath the rear neckline URL. It's exactly like what you see on Squealie's shirt below. Remember that the prices have shipping & handling included, so a short sleeve shirt to Europe is just $30 total. These are selling faster than I expected so get yours while they're still in stock!

The new KBLA gear!

2009-05-10T11:44:00.001-07:00

We'll get the adult pics posted soon, but these pics of Squealie stylin' the KBLA T-shirt should give you an idea of what we've got. These 100% cotton black shirts are available in short & long sleeve. The adult sized shirts have a large logo on the front and a smaller logo in the upper back, crested by the KBLA URL.

To order, just follow the directions on the drop down menus, and we'll get your gear off to you once I'm back from Denmark. Orders placed between May 10 & May 19 will ship out on May 22.

NOTE: The KBLA RKC gear (such as jackets & dri-weave shirts) is for only those RKCs who train with me regularly.

Why kettlebells?

2009-05-06T07:11:00.000-07:00

From L to R: Pavel Tsatsouline (RKC Chief Instructor), Prof. Roy Harris (Harris International), Darryl Grauman (Kettlebells Auckland), Dr. Courtney Cheng (RKC II, holding Squealie), me, & Guro Daniel Inosanto (Inosanto Academy) at Squealie's Chinese christening dinner

This post is a little bit of a throwback.

Most of my readers know what kettlebells are and have their own reasons for coming to train with them. But lately, I've frequently found myself having to answer a few questions about why I came to train with kettlebells, so here it is... the most common questions with my straightforward answers. I hope you enjoy.

1. How did you find out about kettlebells?
I first heard about kettlebells sitting in the lobby of the Sports Club/LA with a man I refer to as my white father, Dr. Terry Robinson. Dr. Robinson is one of the pioneers of the physical culture industry, having opened one of the first movie gyms out here in LA, trained stars such as Mario Lanza, and discovered the father of American Kenpo Karate - the late Ed Parker, Sr. His resume is far thicker than that, but that'd take 2 books to cover. Suffice it to say, he's TRULY been there & done that.

I'd head in early in the mornings on Tuesdays & Thursdays to train one of my students and then I'd sit in the lobby with Dr. Robinson afterwards for a while. He talk to me about his thoughts on fitness, training, medicine, and the personalities behind the early years of strength training. He used to always smirk when the trainers would excitedly come in with something they thought was a new invention or discovery and say, "Terry, have you seen this?", and it was something that had been around before their parents were even born.

It was that way with kettlebells too. Even in the 90's, I clearly remember Dr. Robinson showing me pictures of oldtime strongmen training with kettlebells. He said, "Watch, these'll make a comeback, too!"

He was right.

Fast forward a decade, and I'm finishing up an treatment with former Ed Parker student, Dan Inosanto (more well known as the star pupil of the late Bruce Lee). Concerned that he might overtrain or re-injure his back, Guro Inosanto asks me if I'd observe a weight training session that one of his students set up for him.

I go to his Academy the next week and meet Pavel Tsatsouline. The rest, thanks to God and Guro Inosanto, has been history in the making.

2. What is it about kettlebells that attracted you to them initally?
Honestly, nothing. Not a damn thing.

I've hated weight training my entire life up to the point when I met Pavel. There was never a weight training device or method or coach that I'd trained with and really felt like I was doing something that was truly good for my body... aside from mere bodysculpting. I'd always felt some sort of pain the next day that was above and beyond the usual "I just worked out hard" sort of feeling. I'd also seen plenty of guys in the weightstacks moving around like they were in the early stages of being cripples. So in my mind, I'd equated weight training with injury. And even when I first saw kettlebells up close & personal, I had no reason to think they'd be any different.

3. What changed your mind?
Pavel.

Pavel Tsatsouline's method of training is absolutely singular. Nothing I've ever seen out there compares to it. As soon as I heard him open his mouth while teaching Dan Inosanto, I knew he was heading in a direction that was dramatically different from the rest of the pack.

Instead of having Inosanto dive right into tons & tons of reps with some random weight, the first thing Pavel had him working on was a Wall Squat - a sophisticated mobility/stability exercise - to pry mobility into his spine and strength into his hips. Mobility first!

As I listened to Pavel talk about Dr. Vladimir Janda, the posterior chain, the weakness of the glutes, and hip flexor tightness as the root cause for a GREAT DEAL of lower back pain, I realized that I was in the presence of no ordinary trainer. This man was taking my understanding of clinical medicine and turning it on its ear!

The more I listened, the more captivated I became, until finally, after adequate goading from Sifu Inosanto & Professor Roy Harris, who had also begun training with Pavel, I joined in.

4. So what were some of the "benefits" you experienced from kettlebell training?
There are 3 main benefits that I experienced very quickly. I'm sure there are more if I stop to think about it, but these are the ones that stand out the most in my head.
- Lower back pain DRAMATICALLY reduced thanks to Pavel repatterning my lower back and hip movement with "Hard Style" methods
- Shoulder/neck/arm pain & weakness RESOLVED (when almost every other form of treatment short of surgery failed) thanks to ONE exercise - the Turkish Get-Up,
- Lost 20 lbs. thanks to the metabolic repackaging from Hard Style.

Let me clarify for a moment here. "Hard Style" doesn't mean hard in the sense of having to endure bitter hard training, but rather "hard" in the sense of employing selective tension in the body to dramatically increase strength and improve performance without having to bulk up.

As a clinician myself, the first two were enough to knock my socks off. Losing flab and toning up were just icing on the cake.

5. AWESOME! There are kettlebells at my gym now, so I'm gonna ask my trainer to show me some stuff!
You COULD do that, but I have to, as Gray Cook would say, "smack a beehive with a canoe paddle" and tell you that there are far too many trainers out there who think they know what they're doing with kettlebells and actually couldn't tell you the difference between their forehead and their backside in those regards.

Case in point... A well known athlete came to me a couple of years ago with his well-paid trainer in tow and complained that kettlebells were hurting his back. His well-paid trainer came up to me, puffed out his chest, and started doing what he THOUGHT was a kettlebell swing. I had him drop the bell and told the athlete point blank, "No wonder your back was hurting you."

The trainer was demonstrating something hunched over, hardly rooted to the ground, and lacking any semblance of hip extension, posture, or kinetic linkage. I had the trainer sit on the sidelines as I dissected his client's technique and took him from tenuously working with a 35lb kettlebell to confidently and powerfully swinging a 70lb kettlebell, and then swinging TWO 53lb kettlebells.

While it might not've been to coolest thing to do, I kept asking the athlete, "So how's your back doing swinging those HEAVY, HEAVY kettlebells?" Every time he answered that his back was fine, I kept looking over at the trainer and cocked my eyebrow to rub it in a little more.

The kettlebell is a tool. The tool isn't nearly as important as the method that you use to employ the tool to meet your goals. It's like a knife. If you really know how to use a knife in its broadest application, you can basically handle everything from surgery to shaving to sushi to self-defense. If you are clueless and don't respect the knife, you'll probably cut yourself or someone else thinking you know what you're doing.

So while I'm glad that you're enthusiastic about kettlebell training, I think the more important thing is to find someone qualified to teach you. How do you know who's most qualified? Check the list of RKC certified instructors. While some are undoubtedly better than others, this group represents the gold standard in training and qualifications.

Hope this post was somewhat entertaining & informative. I look forward to seeing some of you in Denmark on the 14th and some others in Minneapolis on the 28th!

The Inflexibility Myth - Stiffness or Intrinsic Weakness?

2009-04-07T05:59:00.000-07:00

Demonstrating the Deep Squat with two 24kg Kettlebells in Seoul with Sr RKC Jon Engum looking on

It's a common complaint in the fitness world. You hear individuals complaining that they're too stiff or too inflexible to achieve a certain range of motion. Even coaches & instructors criticize their athletes & students this way as well. Especially in martial arts, where kicking is a priority, this phrase hangs in the air more than Michael Jordan did in his prime.

The first exercise we usually teach in the RKC progression is what's called a "Wall Squat". It's essentially a squat patterning drill that teaches the user how to squat by means of loading the posterior chain (glutes, hamstrings, etc.) without relying on his/her anterior chain (quads).

In many groups, there's always someone who complains that he/she can't squat down because of being "too stiff" or "too tight" in the back, the legs, or wherever. They'll try to squat down, and it'll take an act of God to get their hips down anywhere near their knees.

But if you put those people on their backs and all of the sudden they can bring their knees within a fist distance of their chest, then the root problem ISN'T stiffness. It's WEAKNESS.

When prime movers are allowed to get weak, the stabilizing muscles have to create movement in their place. So the kinetic chain gets flip-flopped.

What does that mean for the squatter?

Simple, instead of using the proper postural muscles to stabilize during the squat, the "stiff" squatter doesn't have the hip strength to pull him/herself down into the squat, trying to achieve the depth by bending forward from the lumbar spine instead... or in some cases by coming forward onto the tiptoes.

There are plenty of ways to rectify this, but perhaps the simplest and quickest way is to practice an assisted squat while working to develop the strength needed for the 3 Prys (see the previous post below).

You'll find that one you can stabilize better, your active range of motion usually increases! For this and more such fixes to your movement problems, check out the technologies in the "Secrets of" series presented by the Functional Movement Systems gang and the Kettlebells from the Ground-Up pack that we put together!

Knee Pain - How do you bend?

2009-04-02T06:59:00.000-07:00

Image from www.urbandictionary.com - Don't even click on that link unless you're prepared to laugh uncontrollably and waste about 2 hours reading that stuff!

During Hard Style Hanguk, one of the participants cautioned me strongly that he wouldn't be able to do much because his knee was injured. I asked him about the mechanism of his injury, and the history he gave me sounded like it had nothing to do with his knee.

What he did say was that after he'd go running, his knee would balloon up and be sore for days afterwards. He also demonstrated very obvious valgus tendencies just as he stood talking to me. The foot on his affected side was rotated externally to 90 degrees from the centerline.

While there are certain pains that are undeniably caused by structural misalignment and shock-based displacement, most such knee pain is simply the result of long-standing faulty movement patterns, as taught by FMS founder, Gray Cook.

Those people who tend to walk with their toes turned outward also tend to allow their knees to collapse inward when they bend. That allows the muscles on the lateral aspect of the leg to get too strong and the muscles on the medial aspect of the leg to get too weak. Some of the external rotators of the hip are also turned off, as the person in question has figured out how to move without engaging those muscles for proper leg stability.

As a result, the connective tissue along the inner part of the knee (near the MCL) gets strained, and the lateral meniscus has to bear more pressure.

What's the solution?

I've called it the "3 Prys" and it's one of the teaching tools we use at KBLA.

While squatting down or bending, think of prying 3 parts of your body open simultaneously. The trick here is that you MUST keep your feet flat on the floor the entire time and in strict parallel position. If they rotate, slide, or tilt, start over again! The best thing to do is to train this in bare feet so that the mechanoreceptors of the feet can "hear" the differential pressure information coming from the floor without the muffling effect of cushioned shoes.

1. Pry the knees apart and pick your toes up off the ground. That forces you to load your heels properly while you push your knees outward until they're tracking in the same vertical plane as your feet.

2. Pry your butt backwards & downwards. That, too, forces you to load your heels and engage your posterior chain instead of wallowing in quadricep dominant movement patterns. It also strengthens your lumbar muscles by forcing them to engage in a strong extension pattern.

3. Pry your chest open vertically. Keeping your head pulled upward and your eyes looking forward, squat down with the feeling of lengthening your neck and prying your chest forward. That helps create thoracic spine mobility that you may have lost, as well as adding to the stability in the lumbar region.

If you can't go down very far without losing form, DON'T go any further. Work back & forth in the region in which you get stuck to create the simultaneous mobility and stability needed to re-pattern your squatting movement.

Once you've done that, then go back & revisit the Hard Style Lock. We did this with the guy who was certain that his knee wouldn't hold up during the kettlebell workshop, and he excitedly told us after a 7 hour day of training that his knee no longer bothered him.

You may well find that your chronic knee pain wasn't so unfixable after all!

Epilogue: The Hard Style Hanguk experience in highlights

2009-04-01T02:08:00.000-07:00

I think I've said it before, but I'll say it again... I can't remember the last time I travelled (for any reason) and found it as invigorating as I did this last trip to Korea.

I've finally downloaded a bunch of pics from my iPhone to my hard drive, so after long delays, now they're going up on this blog. They capture a bunch of the highlights of this trip, so here we go in scrapbook style.

The trip would've never happened if it weren't for Kettlebell Korea CEO Kenneth Lee. You won't find a more unassuming, gentle, incredibly polite, and diligent man in the kettlebell world. We took this picture shortly after he met me at the airport in Seoul as we were waiting for Jon Engum's flight to arrive. I am so honored to call him my "hyung".

Cindy Kye, PR Manager for JK Golf Conditioning, which is Korea's unparallelled training center for golfers of ALL ages, helped tremendously during the workshop. Because of her previous experience with Gray Cook's work through TPI and having travelled to the US several times before to hear Functional Movement presentations, she really stepped up to help out when the translation was above & beyond the range of the translator on hand. She came into the workshop saying that she hadn't been exercising for quite some time, and we pitilessly made her jump right into the fray. Here she is doing a bottoms-up press with an 8kg KB, an exercise that had obvious benefits for her golfing clientele and one that I used on Michelle Wie with great success.

Shin Tanaka, a Japanese national living & working in Seoul as CEO of Access, had taken kettlebell training sessions with several members of the kettlebell community. Yet the feedback he gave me while treating me to breakfast the morning after the workshop was perhaps the most valuable I received. He is another great example of the type of people we got to interact with there - soft spoken, gentle mannered, humble, and diligent beyond compare. I count myself privileged to have met him.

The Olympic Park was something that I was almost ready to ignore, but thankfully Jon didn't let that slide. The Olympic flame, and the Seoul Peace Declaration inscription on the plaque in front of it, filled me with an incredible sense of awe and duty.

Here's a closeup of the plaque:

Here's a piece of sculpture from the Olympic Park that Jon pointed out to me that I thought was odd as hell...

until I read the plaque and was just moved to my soul.

The Olympic Park was full of things like this that give strong examples of how great humanity can be when it wants to be.

And finally, the guy who perhaps left the strongest impression on me was Kim Kyoung-Han, Korean national Judo team member, Asian Games Judo champion, trainer to the stars, and Kettlebell Korea staff member. Despite his formidable resume', Kim's demeanor is quiet, impeccably mannered, diligently disciplined, and generous to a fault. Knowing that I love the throwing arts, he took some time on a lunch break to share one of his favorite combinations with me. His teaching skill became readily apparent, and I thought immediately of featuring him in a full-feature spread in Black Belt Magazine.

On my last evening in Seoul, I wanted to he made arrangements to meet up with him to leave him a memento of one of the shining stars of American martial arts - a T-shirt from the world famous Inosanto Academy. He, however, completely one-upped me by presenting me with the Judo gi that he won the Asian Games in.

I'm back home now, more determined than ever to evolve into a better instructor, a better athlete, a better physician, and a better man.

To my co-instructor, Sr RKC Jon Engum, thank you for being there with me. I could not have wished for a better friend, guide, and TKD coach to have along with me. The next time, we're bringing the Viking & the Russian!

For the priceless gift of inspiration that came from so many directions, thank you, Korea!

The Heights of Humanity - Doc & Jon's Excellent Adventures: Final days in Korea

2009-03-30T22:30:00.001-07:00

In front of the Olympic Gate in Seoul

As I blog to you now just a couple of hours before my flight's scheduled to take off, I wanted to share with my readers a tremendous awareness that hit me time and time again over the past couple of weeks.

For those of you who've been following my blog, you know that I've had a hectic few weeks. From the San Jose RKC, to Col. Nattapong's arrival & seminars in L.A., to being here teaching & doing meetings in Seoul, there's been very little rest for a very weary Chinaman.

However, there are moments when the inspiration is so tangible that you can almost touch it. And in some ways, when the inspiration comes in the form of a man-made edifice, you actually CAN touch it.

Leave it to Grandmaster Jon Engum, WTF Taekwondo 7th degree black belt & SrRKC, to drag me out of a hotel room when I want to lounge & unwind on the last day of this trip. Instead of sleeping the day away like a hibernating bear, we took the subway down to the Olympic Park. Coming out of the subway station, the first thing that falls into your field of view are the Olympic Gates (pictured above). The 5 rings that make up the Olympic logo send a rush up my spine and cover my arms with goosebumps. I am walking into a place of greatness.

When we walk into the courtyard of flags, it happens again.

I am overwhelmed by the sense of pride, of cooperation, of dedication to excellence, and of using sports as a vehicle for peace as I look around at the countless flags that surround the courtyard as they flap gently in the breeze.

I have other pictures that will have to wait until I get back home to upload here on this blogpost, but one of the sculptures and the Olympic flame itself were two of the best highlights of that excursion. The pics will tell their stories by themselves.

These sorts of moments, along with the good vibes I've been enjoying with so many people around the world, reminded me that because of my involvement in martial arts, so many blessings have been afforded to me. From friendly phone calls with Kru Bryan Dobler (one of the USA's best Muay Thai fighters and coaches), to my friends & family at the Inosanto Academy, to earning the appreciation of my Tai-Chi students, to having met my kettlebell & physical culture mentor Pavel Tsatsouline, to being offered the championship gi used by a Korean Judo superstar as he took the gold medal in the Asian Games, I'm still floored by the kind of good vibes and warmth that I've experienced through involvement in the arts of war.

Physical culture is a vehicle for creating friendships, improving health, and promoting the drive to succeed. Without it, without a sense of our bodies, we lack the awareness of self and other that lead to chaos, distrust, and violence. When we deprive our children of the means to exercise or participate in sport, they fail to realize their human potential on more levels than just the athletic.

More pics soon!

Kettlebelled Korea - Doc & Jon's Excellent Adventure: Day 5 & 6

2009-03-29T20:15:00.001-07:00

We gave it to Hanguk Hard Style!

The second and final day of our Seoul RKC Prep Course went over smashingly. As with any training workshop that's taught in an immersion setting, it's inevitable that you'll see serious jumps in the skill levels of the attendees. From barely swinging 12kg KBs with questionable form to snatching 24kg KBs, it was a pleasure to see once again why the RKC's Hard Style method stands in a class by itself.

While the language barrier certainly didn't facilitate things, it wasn't insurmountable either. We had a couple of people in the audience that were fluent enough to translate accurately, as well as a translator with a physical therapy background.

And once again, I'm thrilled that SrRKC Jon Engum is with me on this trip. This having been his 9th trip to Seoul, his familiarity with the layout of the city, his comfort with Korean culture (manners, food, & some terminology), and his teaching style are great assets to have. He & I teach in ways that fit together perfectly, and the flow between the two of us made the tagteam teaching feel both easy and powerful.

The comments we heard repeatedly right after the workshop from Kettlebell Korea CEO Kenneth Lee were that the participants were simply blown out of the water. They not only learned how to tap into strength that was lying dormant, but also learned a tremendous amount of detail about Functional Movement training and applications for RKC-style kettlebell training in the prevention and rehabilitation of injuries.

Before the workshop started, I took a second to share some of the simplicity and effectiveness of Kalis Ilustrissimo that Prof. Roy Harris taught me with one of the American attendees using sticks to demonstrate. Hunting the hand and hacking the head, I nullified every attack that came in with superior footwork and positioning retirada-style and returned with the salto to the face or neck. The military academy professors were watching carefully.

I also had a chance to get my throw-on with Korean Judo superstar Kim Kyoung-Han. I can't remember all of his titles, but I believe he won the Asian Games and some other major international tournaments. During the lunch break, he showed me one of his favorite combos, and I showed him one of mine. Kim's girlfriend, a champion fitness model, is pictured above perfecting her Press.

Day 2 started with a quick review of the Turkish Get-Up and quickly moved into the Clean, Front Squat (& variations), Press, and Snatch. I took the first 2 for the morning shift, and Jon bat the ball out of the park with the second 2 after lunch.

The Q&A session at the end led to some outstanding questions (ranging from training youngsters and the elderly, differences between kettlebell sport and Hard Style, and training with injuries), which then led to some strong answers.

The wrapup Korean BBQ dinner was absolutely delicious, and with a bit of Baek-Se-Ju to wash it down, we capped a great weekend.

Now, on the morning of our last full day in Seoul, it's almost a bittersweet moment. But it'll be great to be back at home in LA with my family, friends, teachers, students, and patients.

Next on tap... Riverside Kettlebells - April 5th!

Kettlebelling in Korea - Doc & Jon's Excellent Adventures: Days 3 & 4

2009-03-28T13:57:00.000-07:00

No rest for the wicked.

While Friday was supposed to be a day of NOT teaching and R&R before the weekend workshop, it ended up being anything but.

While our morning didn't start with roll call at 6am, and we had the chance to enjoy a leisurely breakfast of bulgogi (YEAH, BABY!!! First thing in the morning!!!), the R&R stopped there. In the later part of the morning, Men's Health - Korean edition came by our place for a photo shoot. They knew about as much about kettlebells as I do about speaking Swahili.

I'm gonna digress for a moment here.

Since we got here, the Koreans have been nothing but critical about almost every aspect of how we do things and what we do initially. I got an earful about the lack of PowerPoint presentation and handouts making it harder for students to learn, and then another earful during the photo shoot about how the RKC instructors' uniform (khaki Patagonias & black T-shirt) were unstylish and made me look fat... like I give a $h!#.

But with all things on this trip, Jon & I seem to meet the initial Korean skepticism, and turn it on its ear Hardstyle.

So back to the point at hand... Having had plenty of experience directing photoshoots for Black Belt Magazine, I told the photographer which angles to shoot from, and the results were far more than satisfactory. So while you won't see Doc & Jon in colorful Nikes with spandex shorts and neon T-shirts on with bright pink kettlebells, you WILL get to see some of the RKC's finest representing the system and the organization with the integrity that matches the RKC Code. Just wait, folks.... the pics'll be posted here when I get them.

Following that shoot, which ended up being rather long, we had an interview with MFight Magazine, which is Korea's MMA-focused periodical. Trying to verbally describe the benefits of kettlebell training and FMS-style repatterning with any semblance of accuracy to someone that's never experienced it is almost futile. So we forcefully invited the interviewer to attend the first day of Hard Style Hanguk. His protests about knee pain were met with my cocked right eyebrow and a deadpan reply to just show up.

Day 1 of Hard Style Hanguk was a blast!

We got there at 9am, people filtered in on Korean time, and we rocked the house at Sportime. Much to my surprise, there were at least a half a dozen women in attendance. And in a country where the fitness movement is still in its infancy (although they don't think so) and where female trainers are not as common as in the States, their presence was a pleasant surprise.

The rest of the attendees ranged from a couple of Americans who were working in Korea to personal trainers to physical therapists to strength coaches to athletes to military educators. Hmmmmm, sounds like the roster at a regular RKC, doesn't it?

The first day was obsessively focused on Program Minimum and its myriad of applications. Squat patterning, Hard Style Lock, Deadlift, Swing & Swing variants, Naked Get-Up, & Turkish Get-Ups made for the menu on Day 1. Between my detailed explanations and Jon's corrections that are straight out of the RKC Manual, the participants were treated to a level of training that we heard was "unexpectedly thorough!"

Kettlebells in Korea: Jon & Doc's Excellent Adventure, Days 1 & 2

2009-03-25T15:18:00.000-07:00

The CEO of Kettlebell Korea, Mr. Kenneth Lee, practicing the Naked Get-Up progression

Annyong hasseyo? Howdy from the Land of the Morning Calm!

The RKC's favorite Chinaman & TKD master are over here in Seoul, Korea, about to start Day 2 of our excellent adventure here. I should've brought the USB cable to be able to post pics directly to my blog, but I'll have to post some individually after I get back stateside or just point you to my Facebook page (search for kettlebells.losangeles@yahoo.com) to see the ones I was able to upload via iPhone.

Immediate impressions upon landing: It's FRICKIN' COOOOOOOOLD!
I haven't seen snow in person since a brief encounter back at the April RKC in 2008, and far too many years of shoveling it in my childhood. When I walked out of Incheon International and saw the white stuff descending from the heavens, I thought (to borrow a phrase) "No good can come of this."

Exhasuted from the trip, I fell asleep in the car on the ride to the center where our host is housing us. A hot shower & a comfortable bed made falling asleep far too easy.

The morning of our first day in Korea was spent preparing our organizer (Kenneth Lee) for the work that lay ahead of him. Deadlift, Swing, & a very brief intro to the Naked Get-Up put his brain into overdrive, along with giving him a taste of what Hard Style is really about. He'd taken an instructor course with a non-RKC group before, so I knew right away we'd be rocking his world off the foundations upon which it was built.

He struggled with the changes and the concept of "tension is strength", but you could tell that his brain was ruminating on everything he was fed from us all day long. During the meetings we had in the later morning & afternoon with some of Seoul's mega-gyms (we're talking like 11 floors in some of these, folks!), I heard his presentation go from simply pitching kettlebells as a new training tool to explaining the merits of the Hard Style method. From one meeting to the next, you could almost hear the gears turning in his head as he was mentally digesting the information taught to him in the morning.

Interestingly, one of the people we met with is an instructor who goes by the nickname of JK. JK's an enthusiastic member of the Gray Cook fan club, he's Titleist Performance Institute certified, and he's got some of Korea's top pro-golfers coming in to train with him one after another.

By the evening, Mr. Lee helped translate for us while we taught a small presentation to some physical therapists. And I heard him recap the material Jon & I'd taught him that morning almost point-for-point. "Korea's off to a good start!" I thought.

The next day was more of the same. Jon & I awoke early, had a massive Korean-style breakfast, and then spent the rest of the morning exchanging Taekwondo & Combat Shuai-Chiao training before Mr. Lee arrived. Going over the TGU in high definition blew his mind again & again, and Jon Engum's presentation on the Clean & Press using the principles of high tension made a bunch of light bulbs go off (both in the morning & evening presentations).

The afternoon was once again filled with meetings. From seeing Korean high-tech applications to fitness training to meeting with the Korean Olympic weight training facility directors, the meetings were high powered all the way.

The 2nd evening picked up where we left off, but with a slightly larger group. Jon & I sped through the Naked & Turkish Get-Ups, the Clean & Press, and the Snatch in what must've been record time. It's been an absolute pleasure to have Jon Engum along with me on this trip, since watching him teach is a reminder of some of the useful cues that I tend to overlook or fail to appreciate.

Again, more pics will be posted when we get back to the States, and more adventures will be posted hopefully at the end of today. We've got 2 interviews & a photo shoot today, so hopefully I'll have a chance for a nap somewhere before then!

REBOOT! - the aftermath of the Level 1 Movement Repatterning workshop

2009-03-16T19:41:00.000-07:00

After one of the most demanding weekends I've had since the RKC, I'd like to thank Kingston Heng, RKC, Kettlebells Orange County, and the staff of California Martial Arts for hosting me this last Sunday afternoon for the inaugural Level 1 REBOOT! workshop.

While the workshop was a resounding success, although I do have to begin with one very serious apology. I grossly underestimated the amount of time needed to cover the information in the level of detail that the participants were able to appreciate.

Usually people who are not fitness or medical professionals could care less for all the details and concepts behind what makes the human body work. They just want to feel better and let that be that. But this group was different. After unintentionally going 30 minutes overtime, I realized that people who are non-fitness professionals are eager for the insights, corrections, and concepts that feed into the sources of their pain.

INSIGHT #1: The consumer has become educated and wants more than just a bandaid to cover their symptoms.
So what we're going to do (possibly even before I get back from Korea) is work to set another date when we'll have the Level 2 REBOOT where we can actually get to work on loaded movements using KETTLEBELLS and review the foam roller techniques.

INSIGHT #2: People will do what you've taught them IF you remind them.
So here are a few of the highlights... which I'd like everyone to practice, even if you didn't make it to the workshop.

- The 3 Prys: Pry the knees outward so that as you squat, your knees stay in the same vertical plane as your feet. You'll need a mirror to verify what you're doing is correct. Don't trust yourself. For most people, proprioception is little better than self-deception.

- Glute Strength: If you haven't gotten to the point where your glutes are strong enough to bite your finger off, practice more. Load your heels, lift your toes, lock your knees, and try to pinch your finger at the top of your glutes the way you were taught. Even when you get up out of a chair, drive your heels down and start firing your glutes. You'll find that your movements take on more power with less pain!

- Rolling: If you're too weak to roll on the ground for at least 10 reps to the left and to the right, then work on it! It may seem like something either too easy or too irrelevant, but rolling is one of the most important primitive movement patterns that American adults lose. Don't be one of them!

Need someone to train with? Then have a look at our RKC certified instructor roster and get together with one of them! The roster for some of the people I've personally trained and had a hand in preparing is here at http://kettlebellslosangeles.com/instruct.html

INSIGHT #3: Prepare for the unexpected.

Perhaps one of the things I expected least was the amount of questions I'd be getting afterwards regarding when the next workshops I'm teaching are scheduled for. That's quite a compliment. And like an idiot, I didn't refill my wallet with business cards as I was more preoccupied with lugging around a dozen Thai swords in my van for the Krabi-Krabong workshops I was assisting with.

So if you attended the workshop (or the training session at Clover Park that morning) and had a strongly positive experience, could I bother you to post it on my RKC instructor review page?

Looking forward to meeting you at one of my workshops or appearances in the near future -- Seoul, Riverside, Modesto, Copenhagen, St. Paul, etc.

Women & Heavy Weights - The Bulking Up Myth

2009-03-06T18:13:00.000-08:00

What a crock... Everytime I hear this, I just smirk or want to change the channel.

Here's the bottom line. If a woman uses ANY weight (even her own bodyweight) and trains with movements that do not put the body through a full range of motion or trains consistently to failure, then the odds are pretty good that she'll experience hypertrophy (bulking up).

But I DARE anyone out there to tell me that my wife (Dr. Courtney Mizuhara-Cheng, RKC II) is bulky. And the pic of her above shows her doing swings with two 24kg kettlebells (that's a total of 106 lbs).

In fact, doing swings with heavier weights helped her to shed the weight she'd put on during her pregnancy even faster.

Do big weights make women look manly?

NO.

Improper training methods & crappy movement patterns make women look manly. In Courtney's case, bigger weights helped her slim back down to the svelte Asian chick body shape after the birth of our son. Heavier weights actually forced her to engage her core more fiercely to control them - dramatically firming her post-partum midsection and turning her legs into rock-hardness.

And as many of our female comrades have said, Hard Style kettlebell training is the butt modulator. If you have too big of a butt, the kettlebell will fix that. If you have no butt, the kettlebell will fix that.

Come to one of the workshops listed above or on the right and find out what the hype is all about!

More Workshops and Seminars & A Quick Thank You

2009-03-03T06:53:00.000-08:00

Coming up next week - Some VERY intensive Thai martial arts (Krabi Krabong & Muay Boran), as explained briefly in the post below. Right now, it looks like the only "OPEN" workshop we're having is on Saturday, March 14th from 4-6pm at the Inosanto Academy. Contact the Academy for more information or to register.

The day after that will be the REBOOT! kettlebells & corrective strategies workshop in Irvine, California, hosted by California Martial Arts & Kettlebells Orange County. From what I hear, this is almost completely sold out. If you're interested in attending, holler at Kingston Heng, RKC right away.

Right after that, off to Korea for Hanguk Hard Style for the last week of March.

A few days back to get re-orientaled with the time change and then Hard Style, High Density" in Riverside, California hosted & assisted by Gary Toppins, RKC on April 5th.

Easter Sunday will be here in LA with my family, and then the next weekend, we're off to the Selective Functional Movement Assessment - Level 2 with Gray Cook in Phoenix, Arizona.

And just added to the schedule is a special kettlebells and combatives workshop that we're unveiling at F2 Strength in Modesto, CA, where I'll be assisted by Chuck Halbakken, RKC II.

That takes us to May, where I'll be heading to Denmark to assist & hang with my Viking brother & Master RKC Kenneth Jay, and to Team Lead at the RKC Instructor Certification Workshop in Copenhagen, and sprinting back to the states to assist with the CK-FMS workshop with Gray Cook & Master RKC Brett Jones.

I'm scheduled to be attending the RKC II in June, but we may have a schedule conflict with moving, so that's a little iffy.

There are a couple more workshops requested for the later half of 2009, but the details are still being hammered out. You'll be kept posted for sure.

Every time I travel, I come back shocked at how many people I meet who give me an incredible amount of positive feedback on this blog. It still shocks me how many people read and benefit. To all of you who are reading and have found worth in these posts, thank you for making it so worthwhile to do what I do.

Thai Martial Arts - Krabi Krabong & Muay Boran with Colonel Nattapong Buayam

2009-02-26T20:25:00.000-08:00

He's cooooooooooming!!!

My Thai martial arts master, Col. Nattapong Buayam is coming to LA starting on March 9, 2009, for just over a week of hardcore Thai weaponry (Krabi Krabong) and old-style empty hand fighting (Muay Boran). I'm going to be one happy (and probably quite sore) Chinaman for the time that he's here!

Wanna talk about a badass? Col. Nattapong taught hand-to-hand and weapons tactics to the Thai Special Forces, some of Southeast Asia's most rough & tumble warriors.

I last saw the Colonel in November 2007 in Thailand, where I spent just over a week training with him. The picture above is of us just after my discipleship ceremony with him immediately following my last training session with him. I went from barely having any experience with weapon sparring to being able to freestyle with him just hard enough to see sparks come flying off the swords in the broad daylight of Bangkok.

Right now, we have ONE public workshop scheduled for Saturday, March 14th, but the details on that are still being hammered out. Keep checking back for more details!

UPCOMING KETTLEBELL WORKSHOPS for the first half of 2009!

2009-02-11T19:27:00.000-08:00

Wow... 2009's off to a seriously busy start. Boy, was I stupid to think that it'd be otherwise. A Chinaman's work is never done.

To answer a few of the e-mails that I've been getting lately requesting a blogpost of upcoming kettlebell or Functional Movement workshops where I'll either be teaching or appearing, here's what you asked for!

Hope to see you at one or more of them!

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2/20-22/09: San Jose, CA / Russian Kettlebell Challenge Instructor Certification Workshop

3/15/09: Irvine, CA / REBOOT! - Movement Patterning & Corrective Strategies Workshop, hosted by Kettlebells Orange County

3/25-29/09: Seoul, Korea / "Hanguk Hard Style" - Russian Kettlebell Challenge Instructor Prep Course - Contact Kenneth Lee at kettlebell@naver.com for more info or to register

4/5/09: Riverside, CA / "Hard Style, High Density" - Please visit www.east-wind.com for more info or to register. Contact Com. Gary Toppins, RKC at GTOPP@aol.com to register

4/17-19/09: Tempe, AZ / SFMA II w/Gray Cook

5/11-19/09: Copenhagen, Denmark / Russian Kettlebell Challenge Instructor Certification Workshop

5/27-31/09: St. Paul, MN / Corrective Kettlebell - Functional Movement Specialist (CK-FMS) Workshop w/ Master RKC Brett Jones and FMS founder Gray Cook

6/26-28/09: St. Paul, MN / RKC Instructor Certification Level 2 Workshop

Stay tuned for more info and upcoming dates and locations near you, including RKC event appearances! We're working on finalizing dates for Europe, the US East Coast, the Middle East, Hawai'i, and points in between. Man, every time I think I've listed all the locations that I'm supposed to be teaching in this year, I realize that I've left one off.

Friends and Kettlebells

2009-02-08T10:35:00.001-08:00

The morning started off with relatively dry ground and a negligible drizzle, and it blossomed into a great training session with the sun shining down on us for a respite from the rain!

I'm sure everyone else must've thought that there was no way I'd be out holding class, but I woke up with the drive to move some iron, and anything short of a downpour wouldn't have stopped me.

RKCs Dr. Jeff McCombs & John Spezzano and one of our regulars (Carl) joined me out at the park this morning for what was a fun, and surprisingly challenging workout. Since the crew was small and everyone was fairly experienced, I decided not to teach, but just to workout for a blessed change.

The rules were simple. Everyone picks a bell that we're not afraid to do anything with for reps. Each person picks an exercise & reps that won't require us to lie down on the wet grass (i.e., Turkish Get-Up or Armbar), and sets reps that are considerate of the possibility that the next guy in the rotation will call something out that will be challlenging in another way.

With a smorgasbord of Swing variants, Clean & Jerks, Clean & Presses, Snatches, Overhead Walks, Hot Potatoes, Goblet Squats, and Squat Cleans, my legs left a little more rubbery than when they arrived, and my upper body felt grooved. I'm glad to be spending more time training lately. With such a focus on the integrity of teaching, it's proof positive that "change of activity is a form of rest"!

Training in the Rain - Catharsis

2009-02-06T18:55:00.000-08:00

"Lord, wash away my iniquities and cleanse me from my sins."
- Invocation during the celebration of Mass

Generally speaking, you will almost never hear me say anything good about any sort of precipitation. I tend to dislike rain, and I have a violent allergy to snow.

But the past few days of rain haven't been so bad for drought stricken LA. It's nice to be able to train and do simple stuff indoors, although I sorely (literally & figuratively) miss my training sessions with Taekwondo coach Scott Dilalla. I stopped by his apartment (all of 2 yards away from my front door), for a quick check-up on my basic footwork & posture, and all seems good.

The rain's preempted my outdoor classes (Tai-Chi & Kung-Fu on Saturday morning, and probably kettlebells on Sunday morning), but for once, I have no problem with that. Having a daily goal of 100 swings, plus GTG pressing and other fundamental movement patterning to do is keeping me plenty busy. And while I've had to spend the last few months over-teaching and under-training, the soreness feels good... almost cathartic.

So what am I doing indoors? The simplest stuff.

- Knee-ups - Trying to keep my upper body totally still and my neck completely relaxed
- Swings - Whether using a 24 kg or 32 kg kettlebell, I'm making a point of doing at least 100 swings at LEAST 1x/day, on top of my other martial arts training
- Primitive Movement Patterning - If I can't stand properly, I can't lift my knee correctly. If I can't lift my knee correctly, I can't kick efficiently. These fundamentals of movement are so telling, so revealing.

The gift of spending time with my family is a long overdue blessing, and I can't wait to just have the chance to chill out and watch Squealie play with the newest addition to his Thomas the Tank Engine collection. He should be walking in the door soon, leaving a trail of rainwater on the rug, and looking forward to playing with his train before even bothering to remove his raincoat. Simple pleasures.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

:-)

Goals require Sacrifice

2009-02-04T20:14:00.000-08:00

Mark Humphries, one of the seniors during my freshman year at Caltech, had one of those life changing heart-to-heart talks with me not too long before I made the decision to make my way towards UCLA.

I was having a hard time deciding between the rigors of CIT-level academia and having a more "well balanced" life, which at that time included spending more time pursuing my life-long love of martial arts. Humphries listened intently and said, "You can have it all, but you have to put 100% of yourself into EACH thing you're doing."

Now, you may be thinking that a Caltech grad should have a better grasp of mathematics than that, but he was dead right. Fast forward more than 15 years later to a martial arts academy in San Diego.

I'm listening to Prof. Roy Harris talk about skill sets in combat. "People want it all," Harris said. He continued:

"They want to be good at guard passing, they want to be good at throws, and they want to be good at boxing. I'm telling you that it's impossible. If you want to really own something, you have to focus COMPLETELY on it, almost obsessively. And when you do that, you're going to get some real improvement in that aspect of your game or your skill. But you're also going to sacrifice your level in other aspects. Your knife fighting may not be as fluid. Your kicking may suffer. But you have to know that THAT'S LIFE. You CAN'T have it all at the same time. It's a balancing act of what you want to sacrifice in order to have something else."

For me, that means setting EVERYTHING else martial arts wise aside for the next 2 months and focusing with absolute intensity on Olympic style TKD training and kettlebells.

For you, that might be as simple, but as profound, as sacrificing your own excuses to the discipline of getting up out of bed and coming out to train on a Sunday morning at 7am. Or just getting your arse out of your chair and doing sets of 10-20 swings between emails.

We CAN have it all, but we have to give 100% of ourselves in different directions at all times. Life is about intensity, about passion, about prioritizing, and about not confusing prioritizing with compromising.

Welcome to HARD STYLE... It's just what the doctor ordered!

There isn't a Monopoly on Common Sense...

2009-02-03T21:16:00.001-08:00

From the Harris International website... I just saw this tonight and thought that it goes along perfectly with my earlier post:
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Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Common Sense, who has been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape. He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as: Knowing when to come in out of the rain; Why the early bird gets the worm; Life isn't always fair; and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don't spend more than you can earn) and reliable strategies (adults, not children, are in charge).

His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well-intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place. Reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate; teens suspended from school for using mouthwash after lunch; and a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job that they themselves had failed to do in disciplining their unruly children.

It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer sun lotion or an Aspirin to a student; but could not inform parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.

Common Sense lost the will to live as the churches became businesses; and criminals received better treatment than their victims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn't defend yourself from a burglar in your own home and the burglar could sue you for assault.

Common Sense finally gave up the will to live, after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled alittle in her lap, and was promptly awarded a huge settlement.

Common Sense was preceded in death, by his parents, Truth and Trust, by his wife, Discretion, by his daughter, Responsibility, and by his son, Reason.

He is survived by his four stepbrothers;

I Know My Rights.
I Want It Now.
Someone Else Is To Blame.
I'm A Victim.

- Author Unknown

Hard Style, High Density... The Aftermath

2009-02-02T17:07:00.001-08:00

I thought the workshop I did at the Harris Academy this past weekend was fun, but evidently the initial reviews are rockin'!

The best moment of the whole seminar was working with a Marine who injured his back on deployment. Just by implementing the basics of proper Hard Style with an MVC, I had him return to doing the swings that had irritated his back and asked him how his back felt afterwards. His reply was as priceless as the Mastercard commercials - "Bulletproof!"

Read about it here: http://www.royharris.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6911

Wow... I'm flattered! Now to get back to practicing my Press and my Korean. "Hanguk Hard Style" is coming up soon...

Sacrifices & Strength

2009-01-28T10:47:00.000-08:00

As I'm hanging out on set today at Raleigh Studios Hollywood, I'm reminded of a priceless experience I had just hours earlier. Once in a while, a youngster gets lucky enough to unexpectedly receive the guidance and advice of an accomplished elder. Last night, that lucky youngster was me.

While hanging out near my office, waiting to meet up with dear friend and Master RKC Kenneth Jay, I happened to bump into a patient of mine, one of Hollywood's elder lions. He's been working in this town for 40 years and become one of the entertainment industry's most recognizable faces and successful actors. Obviously for patient confidentiality reasons, I can't disclose his name or provide his picture, but that's not nearly as important as the words of advice he gave me.

When I bumped into him, I hadn't seen him for a while, and after the intial pleasantries, he had me grab a seat and we started talking about family. I asked him how he'd been able to maintain a solid family life with all the distractions and temptations and inevitable challenges that both this town and relationships bring, and he offered me some outstanding words of advice.

One of the points he made early in the conversation was that the whole current thing about "following one's bliss" is a crock of $h!#. He explained that most people take those words and interpret them at their barest face value. Whether because of ignorance, outright willful stupidity, or abject denial, these people fail to look beyond the obvious and recognize the myriad of reactions for their actions and consequences for each of their choices. No matter how foul these people can make a situation, they have an excuse. Whether the excuse is...

"Don't judge me because I'm an individual."

"I have the right to follow my freedom."

"My values are different."

"I deserve to be happy."

"I deserve to be recognized for my contributions."

"I'm in touch with my spirituality."

"That's not my fault."

"My personal savior forgives and loves me."

or any of a zillion other stupid lines, it doesn't matter. The bottom line is that people who choose to be irresponsible will latch onto these lines and subvert them away from the direction in which they were most likely intended by the original speakers. The sick or weak minded use these lines as excuses to repeatedly give in to weak will and feeble character and dodge responsibility for their actions.

When he broke these points down for me in such straightforward talk, a lot of thoughts crystallized in my head. And he reminded me that for every choice an upright person makes, there's a consequence.

Those consequences, he said, can play themselves out in a bunch of different ways. There are people who pursue their immediate happiness, and while they give in to momentary pleasures or weaknesses or conveniences, they give rise to a web of pain and suffering that afflicts not just them, but also the ones they love. These are also the people who will usually deny tooth and nail that they are such. So it is in our best interests to not only avoid such people, but to also work assiduously against becoming such a person.

This wiser, older lion said a lot more to me, but perhaps the most applicable essence of his talk with me lies in the lines above. If you stop to consider how those lines can apply to the different areas of your life, it's amazing how it ties over to diet, exercise, time management, and relationships.

We have to investigate more incisively, reason more responsibly, declare more decidedly, and act with an awareness that extends far past the "A meets B", but to see the ripple effect of our actions throughout eternity.

So you can do those last few sets of swings with poor form, eat all of that carbonara, drink those next 2 beers, skip the following few days of training, shoot off your mouth without putting real thought into what you're trying to say, kick the dog, and leave your friends & family in the lurch when they need you. It's OK... because you've got the right to follow your own bliss.

Just make sure you have the strength to handle the consequences when they come knocking.

USMC Kettlebell Training - RKC Camp Pendleton 2009

2009-01-21T09:32:00.000-08:00

There is something truly special about teaching kettlebells, combatives, or rehabilitative exercise training to people who are active duty military operators. The people who've been there and done that in their real lives, the people who've had to fight for their lives and the lives of others, the people who've had to march for miles with a pack that weighs more than some of our children, the people who know what an advantage that strength and powerful, pain-free movement is and what a potentially life-threatening disadvantage it can be to lack it... these folks appreciate what you're teaching them in a totally different way.

The men of the 1st Anglico FMF (and a few other operators) got treated to the Russian Kettlebell Challenge directly from the RKC Chief Instructor - Pavel Tsatsouline. Accompanying him were seven of KBLA's finest, and we brought the love for the troops (most of whom were just back from deployment to the Sandbox) in Hard Style.

The Pendleton RKC took the standard 3-day course and compressed it into 2 action packed days. From sun up to sun down, calls of "Snap those hips!" were heard across the field. Looking at the physical development of our troops, specifically our Marines, it's evident that the particular training methods developed by Pavel are a quick and highly effective means of giving our fighting forces what they probably need most - durability.

As Gray Cook speaks of all the time in his presentations, it's great to have raw strength and stubborn endurance. But without the ability to undergo stress, exertion, & fatigue, and emerge uninjured, all of that is for naught. Thus, Pavel's mantra to keep good form was shouted at full volume repeatedly throughout the day... leaving a hoarse Chinaman by 1700.

While I went over some corrections and finer points on the Turkish Get-Up section [as seen above], the need for corrective shoulder girdle reprogramming became quite obvious. The human animal lives most of its life by means of its hands these days. We move about thanks to our legs, but we've become so hand-dominant that we've lost the knowledge of how to move our arms in a linked fashion. ENTER THE T.G.U.!

OK... the next patient just arrived in the waiting room, so it's time for me to wrap this post up. More later... probably from LAX!

International Kettlebell Training Workshops & Seminars

2009-01-19T19:58:00.000-08:00

Before I met Pavel Tsatsouline, if you told me that I'd be travelling the world to teach how weight training can actually rehabilitate the body, I'd have told you either to go somewhere that Dante wrote about or to ease up with the inhalants.

Nowadays, I can't believe my eyes when I look at my monthly calendar and see the places I'm off to and how often I'm back at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). When the emails come in asking me to do a workshop here or there, domestically or internationally, part of me is still shocked that I'm getting paid well to do what I would have never imagined was even possible - to use a kettlebell to dramatically improve someone's quality of life by taking them out of pain and putting them back in the game of life with powerful movement.

2009's barely begun, but already, I'm fielding emails from 4 continents asking me for local workshops this year! The domestic USA requests are mind-boggling... nevermind the RKC instructor certification workshops that I'll be appearing and teaching at.

To those of you who've been e-mailing, to those of you who've been reading this blog, and to those of you whom I have and will have the opportunity to interact with... I PROMISE you that I will constantly make every effort to deepen my understanding of the subjects I am passionate about and improve my abilities to communicate the myriad of benefits that my mentors' training methods can and will bring.

And, yes, I'll blog about the Camp Pendleton RKC sometime this week before I'm at LAX again on Friday morning!

Hard Style at the Harris Academy - BJJ & Kettlebell Workshops in San Diego, CA

2009-01-14T06:30:00.000-08:00

Think you know BJJ? JKD? Strength training? Think you know kettlebells?

Get ready to have your world rocked!

The Harris Academy is having 2 back-to-back days of seminars that will spin your whole world upside down and inside out.

On Saturday, 1/31/09, from 12noon to 3pm, Prof. Roy Harris will be personally teaching a seminar on leg locks. This is a no-gi seminar, so there's no excuse for you not to make it if you're in the area!

And on Sunday, 2/1/09, I will be teaching a workshop covering the 6 Fundamentals of Hard Style Kettlebell training (for RKC Certification) and Program Design. The workshop will go from 1-5pm. For more information, please view the associated post on the Harris Forum, and e-mail me at kettlebells.losangeles@yahoo.com if you'd like to pre-register.

Inspiration

2009-01-11T13:17:00.000-08:00

There are times when you just get a gift, an absolute breath of fresh air or invigoration on a day or at a moment when you didn't even know you needed it.

This morning, my students at KBLA gave me just that sort of lift. Combined with a bright sky, crisp breeze, and outstanding enthusiasm and attention from my students, I went from dragging my arse out of bed to ready to rock & roll.

I got a great compliment this morning from a visitor who drove a little more than an hour to get down to class this morning at 7am. He said that while other instructors provide a great workout, nobody gives the kind of detail and attention that I do. While I'd qualify that by saying that he's never trained with Pavel, I'm honored and glad to receive his compliment.

On a separate note of inspiration, the buzz here in the USA has been growing lately for the new Yip Man movie. While I'm not primarily a Wing Chun kung-fu man myself, I've had some tutelage in the art from Prof. Daniel K. Lee (student of the late Bruce Lee) and Sifu Randy Williams (who studied with Ho Kam-Ming student, Augustine Fong, and with George Yau). Those two were my main teachers, and I've also had a chance to take WC seminars with instructors like Sifus Francis Fong and Robert Chu. Through Sifu Dan Inosanto, I've had a chance to study Wing Chun's most famous offshoot - Jun Fan Gung Fu / Jeet Kune Do.

So while I qualify myself as a Wing Chun outsider, I have a bit of affinity for it.

And while I'm proud to be American born and raised, the blood that flows through my veins is pure Chinese. Call it nationalism or ethnic pride or whatever you want, when I saw the trailer for Yip Man and some sneak clips that are out on Youtube right now, every hair on my head and neck stood up with goosebumps.

There are certain stimuli that inspire the best from us, that inspire strength, courage, and determination from us. The clip above is one of those things for me, so hopefully you'll get a bit of the same buzz that I got from it, whether or not you're Chinese or a Chinese martial arts afficionado. It might not hurt to be a Donnie Yen fan either. :-)

And if you're looking for a world class intro to Wing Chun, Sifu Francis Fong will be teaching 2 days back-to-back at the Inosanto Academy on Jan 17-18 from 12noon - 4pm. Go there to check it out if you've ever had a remote curiousity about Wing Chun, JKD, Bruce Lee, or martial arts. Fong's own master, Jiu Wan, was (according to some) supposedly the BEST of Yip Man's students in the baat jaam do or Wing Chun butterfly swords.

Back to the dummy to practice my sets. It's been a while....

Foam Rollers - Laugh all you want

2009-01-04T17:59:00.000-08:00

The first time I saw someone using a foam roller, I remember thinking, "What a total crock!"

The exercises I saw on it left me completely nonplussed, and when I saw it on the schedule at the RKC II workshop, I thought that I'd just sit there and try to stay awake.

Funny how things change.

After a presentation from Mark Reifkind (now Master RKC), a little over a year later, and a lot of research hours, I've found the foam roller to be one of the most intelligent self-care, maintenance, and restorative tools I could share with many of my clients, students, and patients.

Case in point...

I came across a patient who'd been downing over-the-counter pain medications (ibuprofen, aspirin, whatever...everything that was legal without a prescription) like most people won't even down vitamins. He'd been suffering for years with knee pain that was slowly working its way up to his hip and lower back.

His orthopedist told him that he'd likely need surgery for his knee, which horrified him as someone barely in his 30's.

This was a guy who was athletic, strong, and did a lot of very active things until his knee pain started getting in the way of what he could do. Surgery was something he wanted to avoid at all costs, so he sought out chiropractic, physical therapy, and acupuncture treatments, but he complained that the results were marginal at best.

Frustrated, scared, and close to wits end, he came to my clinic. After a couple of tests, I said, "Aside from the cost of this initial consultation, the solution to your problem's gonna cost you about $20."

He looked at me like I just slapped his little sister in front of him.

I explained my diagnosis and the mechanism of his knee pain. Then I had him try just ONE specific release pattern on the foam roller.

Screaming like Mel Gibson during the electrocution scene in Lethal Weapon as he performed the release pattern, he got up afterwards and tried out his knee. He was shocked at the dramatic reduction in pain... a reduction that nobody else had been able to provide him with!

Like a true results-oriented man, he e-mailed or texted me every few days after that with "still good". One day his e-mail read "I can't believe how a few minutes on that $20 foam roller did more lasting good for me than hundreds of bucks that I spent on other treatments, but what really scares the sh-t out of me is the realization that I almost went in for surgery on this knee. Thanks, man."

Now don't get me wrong. There are PLENTY of great reasons to get orthopedic surgery. But if you're intelligent, you try to exhaust all of your more conservative options FIRST and use surgery as a last resort. Even the best surgeons I know say that to their friends & families!

I'll be doing a foam roller workshop down at Kettlebells Orange County in Irvine and again as part of my Hard Style workshop at the Harris Academy in San Diego later on this winter. We haven't finalized the dates yet, but if you're interested in attending, please join the KBLA Mailing list by clicking here!

In the meantime, get a hold of your own foam roller from Perform Better. It's a quality item that will hold its shape and resilience better than 99.99% of the imitators out there. This is some of the safest, cheapest, yet most high-yield stuff you can do for pain relief that gets right to the cause of your agony in many cases. Now just come on out and learn how to do it right!

Do YOUUUU understand the words that are comin' outta my mouuuuuuth?

2008-12-29T08:44:00.000-08:00

It's amazing that there's always someone who'll wait 'til close to the 11th hour and then email people in a panic, wondering how to cover their arses.

The updated RKC certification requirements have been out for a while now, folks. Get to know them. Start to love them. We've posted these new requirements on the main RKC website, on the Dragon Door forum, and on the instructor forums. More than a few RKCs have sent these new requirements out in emails and posted them on their blogs & websites. If information is light, then this updated RKC prep information should be downright blinding at this point.

If your instructor doesn't know these and prepares you to take the snatch test differently, fire your instructor! If you told your instructor that the RKC snatch test requirements were anything other than what you see posted below, fire yourself. [Have I heard of both of these situations happening at RKC certifications where I taught? YOU BET!]

I was thinking of cutting & pasting the entire page on here for such folks to read, but then I realized that they were missing the "bottom line". So here it is... taken directly from the RKC website.

Kettlebell Snatch Test Requirements
An RKC candidate is required to put up the number of reps matching his or her weight in kilograms, up to 100 repetitions.

Students heavier than 100kg are still required to do only 100 reps. For instance, an 60kg student needs to perform 60 snatches, an 82kg student 82 snatches, a 100kg student 100 snatches, a 122kg student 100 snatches.

Kettlebell Sizes

Men Open Class 24kg
Men Masters (50 and Older) 20kg

Women Open Class 16kg*
Women Masters (50 and Older) 12kg

* Women under 50kg /110 pounds in the open class may opt to perform 80 repetitions with a 12kg kettlebell instead.

You will be given 5min to complete the test.

You are allowed to make as many hand switches as you wish. The sum of both arms is scored.

You are allowed to set the kettlebell down and rest. If you have let go of the kettlebell before it has touched the ground (dropped it rather than set it down), your attempt will be disqualified. This applies to the last repetition as well.

You are allowed to make multiple back swings.

FINALLY... one last piece of advice: Don't "eyeball" anything. If you think you had good form on your snatches, you think you got your reps done in 5 minutes, you think you weigh a certain number of kilograms, and/or you think you were using the right kettlebell, then CHECK, CHECK, CHECK, and RE-CHECK until you are ABSOLUTELY SURE.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-24T08:59:00.000-08:00

To each and every KBLA blog reader out there,

You've all been tremendous gifts to me throughout the year. 2008 has brought me more blessings than I could have ever dreamed of. For a nobody kid from central Delaware, I've seen more of LA International Airport (and a others) that I'd have ever imagined in my wildest dreams this year... Scotland, Denmark, Hungary, New Zealand, countless trips domestically, and plenty more to come in 2009.

Your comments, your e-mails, your instructor reviews, your phone calls, your text messages, your handshakes, your pats on the back, and your hugs have made me and my mission heartier, higher, and HARDer, and I can't thank you all enough for that.

My thoughts are never far from the men & women who are serving their countries overseas, far from their families and loved ones. May God watch over them and bring them home safe, sound, & sane.

My martial arts teachers & masters are due their special respects, especially Master David C.K. Lin & his son Sifu James Lin (Combat Shuai-Chiao) and Master Arthur Y.S. Lee & his son Sifu Harlan Lee (Sil Lum Fut Ga). I remain lifelong in your debt.

I'd like to express a very special note of thanks to one man who changed the course of my life with a few introductions that he made. Guro Daniel Inosanto introduced me to both Prof. Roy Harris (my BJJ and Kalis Ilustrissimo mentor & big brother) and to Pavel Tsatsouline (my human performance & kettlebell training mentor). Pavel, in turn, introduced me to Gray Cook, and the two of them have turned the direction of my life and my life's passion inside-out, upside-down, washed it, dried it, and ironed it to military spec.

To my students and readers around the world, thank you for opening your hearts and minds to what I've had to say, to teach, and to share. I've had unique blessings to drink directly from the fountains of knowledge that are shaping our understanding of orthopedic medicine, physical therapy, elite human performance, and combative martial arts. With each time you open your worlds to me, you allow me to share the experience with you. And I get the greatest satisfaction when I get to see you all share that message with your clients, students, and patients. This is why the KBLA RKC instructors are my greatest professional joy!

I wish you and your loved ones a VERY Merry Christmas! May 2009 bring us all a STRONG YEAR!

The Shoulder Series - Part V: Secondary Compensations

2008-12-22T09:39:00.000-08:00

Image courtesy of Lauren Keswick at www.medicalartstudio.com

Just one look at the lattice work of soft tissue and bone that makes up the shoulder and its neighbors, and it's little wonder that damage or injury in one area can lead to a ripple effect in others nearby.

Many of you have heard the orthopedic saying - "If you injure the neck, the shoulder suffers too; and if you injure the shoulder, the neck suffers, too." Well, that's just the tip of the iceberg...

Let me give you a few examples of how a problem elsewhere in the system can manifest as a "shoulder" issue. Looking at the shoulder anatomy image above, it's not too hard to see how these situations might arise.

1. Neck: Some sort of soft tissue trauma occurs with the neck, whether from a car accident, a fall, or a stiff jab to the face. Even a bunch of swings done improperly such that the shoulder is raised to try to pull the bell upward will cause strain to the neck muscles! The soft tissue will recover from the strain/sprain and knit more easily when it's in a shortened position. However, that means that the shoulder will be drawn up closer to the neck. This can lead to what Gray Cook refers to as "stabilizers acting as prime movers and prime movers acting as stabilizers." As the neck tries to regain its stability, it recruits the shoulder into helping with extra stability. That, in turn, forces the muscles of the shoulder and arm to work harder to create "ordinary" arm & hand movements.

2. Elbow: Just as Gray Cook and Brett Jones used the tagline that "The hip is a bad neighbor", so too can we argue that the elbow is that way too. Movement pattern issues in the elbow can manifest either as wrist or shoulder pain. As regards the shoulder, if the elbow doesn't have its usual ranges of motion in an unfettered manner, the nervous system will recruit other muscles nearby to create the movement that's been compromised.

3. Thoracic Spine: The T-spine is a source of mobility for the shoulder. No two ways about it. If the muscles that move your T-spine start to exhibit the length-tension imbalances that are usually part & parcel of a sedentary lifestyle (office worker, long distance driver, etc.), then you're going to lose ranges of motion when you try to do overhead work with your arm. If you just try to lift your arm straight overhead without moving your T-spine in the slightest, you'll notice that you've probably maxed out at something like 20-30 degrees away from vertical. If you remove the limitations in the T-spine and do the same ROM test, you'll notice that ROM improves towards the vertical if not achieving it!

All of the above mechanisms create patterns of compensation. And compensation's like fire. It spreads and spreads until everything that can be burned is burnt out.

What's the long & short of this as relates to the RKC's HARD STYLE kettlebell training? Simple...

1. Mobility is a pre-requisite to stability. If you're going to do strength work, make sure you have unfettered ranges of motion. If you don't, then work on achieving them.

2. If you're injured, you can still train around your injury, but you have to make VERY sure not to feed any compensations.

3. NEVER push yourself past the limits of your form. If you lose form on one rep, put the bell down. If you've not lost form so badly that you can still regain perfect form on the next rep, go ahead & continue. If you do 2 reps with poor form, put the bell down.

People immediately get defensive when I say to "put the bell down", but that doesn't mean that you have to go and check yourself into an ER or give up your beloved way of training. Rather, it means that you need to cease the exercise you were doing when you lost form, and change your activity temporarily.

- If you were doing Swings, then go to the Turkish Get-Up.
- If your hands are too tired to even grip the bell, then go for a jog.
- If your legs are too shot to hold you up, then do the cobra stretch.

There are always options in intelligent training. So please go back and re-read all of the installments of the shoulder series and think about how the neck, upper back, hand, or shoulder discomfort that you or one of your clients/patients might have could be avoided or addressed.

The KBLA brain trust

2008-12-16T07:56:00.000-08:00

photo courtesy of Coach Ron Jones

Below are some excerpts of an e-mail I sent out to my RKCs last night. I have to say that the talented group of individuals that are KBLA continues to awe and humble me time after time.

The sheer fact that so many people would get out of bed on a cold Sunday morning, load their iron into their cars, and drive out to Santa Monica (sometimes from as far away as San Diego) is a testament to how great you've all made the Kettlebells Los Angeles family. From Singapore to San Jose, from Auckland to Arizona, and from La Mesa to Los Angeles, we're going to continue to improve as much as we can, bringing the most methodical, progressive, and safe kettlebell training methods to make you faster, stronger, leaner, and healthier..... HARD STYLE!!!

Thank you all for what you've made Kettlebells Los Angeles into!

---
RKCs ---

This past Sunday morning, as I looked around the class and made introductions to our Kettlebells Orange County RKC Candidates, I was awed by both the sheer number of RKC certified instructors who continue to train and learn and improve with me. This e-mail was addressed to only my fully-certified RKCs, of which there are 22 of you... That's nothing short of amazing when you consider that in December 2006, there was only me!

And while this e-mail isn't addressed to the RKC Candidates who were also in attendance, I can't help but be awed by the accomplished group of people in their ranks as well.

The KBLA roster boasts a brain trust & skill set like no other... elite athletes, world class martial artists, sports performance specialists, doctors of all sorts of specializations, wellness coaches, physical therapists, and plenty of "just ordinary folk" who are anything but ordinary.

The Shoulder Series: Part IV- Pain Compensation

2008-12-07T18:50:00.000-08:00

It feels good, or it hurts.

Those are the 2 main reasons why we do what we do. If an action elicits a pleasure response, most organisms gravitate towards repeating that action. You can think of this as the "Club Med" response. Contrarily, if an action elicits pain, then most organisms tend to avoid reproducing that action. This is the "Yipes!" response.

Now, let's say that something you might do (whether in sport, in work, in daily life, in whatever) causes you some sort of injury or discomfort. Guess what's going to happen? Your neurological system trains you to avoid it like the plague. You either mentally associate some sort of distaste with the action, and/or find some way around it if you have to continue to move the affected joint(s).

In the case of the shoulder, I've heard it described by former professors as the body's loosest joint when compared to the loads that are placed on it. If you look closely at the skeletal anatomy of the shoulder, there's not a lot of support for it. The bones that make up the shoulder interact with thin, relatively small surfaces that are tied together with thin ligaments and relatively narrow muscles (with the exception of the lats... This is sorta giving away the ending already, but I have to mention it here). That relative looseness allows the shoulder to achieve incredible ranges of motion compared to other joints, but the construction sometimes gets pushed beyond its limits thanks to either excessive forces or faulty movement patterns.

In fact, most of the time, you see patients whose injuries result from forces that would NOT have been excessive if the proper biomechanics were being followed. Let's look at a few examples...

- A martial artist or boxer throws a hard punch on a heavy bag that jars his shoulder because his shoulder was too protracted at the point of impact. Instead of keeping his elbow in FRONT of the plane of his body, he wound up for the punch by drawing his arm way behind it. Additionally the shoulder elevation further weakened the stabilizing ability of the shoulder girdle muscles, most likely straining both his rotator cuff and his pec. The next time he hits the bag, the strike will be more painful and probably less committed. If the round continues, there will be more guarding, reticence, and compensation.

- A young mother is holding her young toddler for extended periods, but she leaves most of her shoulder stabilizers too relaxed. The shoulder can't handle the load of her child's weight for such long stints, and the muscles become congested and fatigued.

- While training with his trainer, an athlete is playing catch with his trainer using the medicine ball. The trainer throws the ball short once and the athlete bends forward kyphotically to reach for the ball. His shoulders are loose, slack, and unbraced, and the medicine ball jerks his arms forward as it drops.

That's how the injury happens. The compensation mechanisms for those same 3 individuals might look like this...

- The martial artist's punches start to become more grazing rather than heavy, penetrating blows. Instead of reaching forward with that injured side or attacking with it, he chooses to block or shield with it instead. Additionally, while training or sparring, the injured shoulder is drawn in tighter and tighter as a protective response. That, in turn, manifests as pain and limited range of motion during the rest of the day.

- The young mother starts exhibiting neck & shoulder pain. Her neck becomes her core, and she tries to lift the sagging child by shrugging her shoulder up and also by kicking her hip out underneath the load. Eventually, if the problem is left to go on long enough, she'll feel pain, numbness/tingling, and/or weakness down the affected arm and into her hands, not to mention lower back pain (which sorta takes me towards my next installment).

- The athlete will likely start getting closer to try to catch the medicine ball more conveniently. However, when throwing the ball back, he'll be trying to generate the forward momentum in ways that allow him to protect that injured shoulder. He'll likely recruit muscles that shouldn't have a role in stabilizing the shoulder for a throwing motion. As Gray Cook would say, "The prime movers become stabilizers, and the stabilizers become movers." No good can come of that.

As you train yourself and watch those around you, keep your eye on the shoulder mechanics you see. You might find that you start noticing connections between certain movement patterns and certain aches and pains that people complain about. And then you'll hopefully start looking at your own movements with a keener, sharper, more disciplined eye.

NOT GOOD

2008-12-02T22:50:00.000-08:00

The shoulder analysis will continue this weekend, after I've touched down in PHX. Just too much to do in too little time right now. But this little bit of news alarms me, and again, makes me glad that although I live & work on the Westside, I won't be at home defenseless!

Police plan raises fears on Westside
LA Times

Residents worry that fewer patrols and the shift of LAPD officers elsewhere could mean increase in burglaries.

By Richard Winton and Martha Groves
December 2, 2008

A plan to slash the number of Los Angeles police officers who patrol some Westside neighborhoods has reignited long-standing political tensions over the priority the department gives to nonviolent property crimes in affluent neighborhoods.

The Los Angeles Police Department plans to move 26 officers out of the West Los Angeles Division as part of a citywide reorganization designed to free up officers for police stations opening in the West Valley and Koreatown.

One reason given for the reduction in Westside patrols was that there is so little violent crime there. But residents argue that the far-flung canyons and hillsides of upscale homes need regular patrols to deter home break-ins, robberies and other property crimes.

"It unfairly disadvantages our whole side of town," said Richard G. Cohen, chairman of the Pacific Palisades Community Council. "It's a particular problem for the Palisades, which is geographically remote so response time will be jeopardized."

To Councilman Bill Rosendahl, it is the latest example of how those who pay among the highest taxes and garbage fees in the city are getting shortchanged because their streets aren't teeming with gun violence. He and some residents wonder how the mayor's trash fee hike to pay for an extra 1,000 police officers is being used when the city cannot maintain 241 officers in West L.A., the largest geographic division in the city.

"I'm upset about it. We are the ones who put in the most tax dollars, yet we're getting fewer patrols," said Rosendahl, who will meet with Chief William J. Bratton next week on the issue. "They say they are not singling us out. But to me it is unacceptable. We pay good money for good protection. We are not happy."

LAPD officials said the reductions in the West L.A. station were necessary because the new stations would require 75 officers for each 24-hour period. But Bratton said the decreases in staffing were not limited to the Westside. The shifts were made with help of a computerized formula that considered crime types, response times, distance and 22 others factors at stations across the city.

For decades, the LAPD, in a city with vast geography and hugely different demands, has had to carefully balance the need to patrol the more upscale Westside and Valley neighborhoods against the demands in the decidedly more violent areas on the east and south sides.

Bratton said the shifting staffing levels were designed to put officers where they were needed -- including in some Westside areas that sometimes need extra troops.

"We put significant numbers of officers in Venice Beach each summer," the chief said.

Councilman Jack Weiss, who represents parts of the Westside, backs Bratton's approach, saying: "The best way to protect low-crime areas is put the cops on the dots in high-crime areas. That protects us all."

He noted that when Bel-Air and Brentwood experienced a string of serial robberies last year, the LAPD created a task force to deal with the crime wave.

But that is little comfort to homeowners in Pacific Palisades, Brentwood, Bel-Air and other communities.

Cohen said it took Pacific Palisades residents years of "arguing and fighting" to secure a dedicated patrol car that the police agreed not to pull out except in emergencies. Cohen said the department has pledged to keep the dedicated patrol car.

"Otherwise, it just would be open season," he said.

Shirley Haggstrom, president of the Pacific Palisades Historical Society, is also concerned about having fewer officers around. "I think good police protection prevents us from having violent crime," she said.

Michael Moore, senior lead officer for Pacific Palisades, said residents have a point that response times could rise.

"Realistically, one car is not enough" to cover an area the size of the Pacific Palisades, he said. "Generally speaking for West L.A., there is a tendency to have cars assigned to huge amounts of territory they couldn't possibly hope to cover. . . . You look at it and say, 'Why is it that such a big area is left almost unprotected?' "

If the number of police officers is reduced, senior lead officers such as Moore could be ordered into patrol cars, limiting the amount of time they could spend dealing with a neighborhood's particular issues or speaking at community meetings.

Phillip Enbody, Brentwood's senior lead officer, said the potential loss of officers in the area worried him.

"I like to have 24-hour coverage," Enbody said. "We are a property crime division. When a person comes into an area to break into cars, they break into multiple cars. In one night, I can have 10 to 15 crimes."

Winton and Groves are Times staff writers.

Denial again - Turning a blind eye to compensation

2008-11-30T14:35:00.000-08:00

We'll get back to the Shoulder series when I'm back stateside. I'm about to get a quick workout in before showering up & hopping on the plane, but I just saw this article, and I think it sums up a lot of what's at issue with a lot of the world.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081130/ap_on_re_us/students_dishonesty

We do it in our training, too. We're too quick to allow errors in form or compensations to slide under the radar. And with each successive rep, we "add strength to dysfunction"... allowing our stubbornness to be substituted for sensibility.

Remember what Ohshima Sensei said about having the strength, honesty, and courage to look inside and cut out one's weaknesses? Let's get back to that... HARD STYLE!

Shoulder Dynamics - Observation & Mimicry: Part III in the Shoulder Series

2008-11-27T12:58:00.000-08:00

Still here in NZ and taking a quick moment to try to append the blog and finish this discourse on the shoulder. Since I'm trying to do this in between running out & doing touristy stuff, teaching, and God-knows-what-else, I'm doing this sorta piecemeal, so please forgive the briefness of these posts.

Human beings learn through one or more of 4 basic routes of input - visual, audio, tactile, or conceptual. Let's define each of these as they apply to functional movement, strength, and potential dysfunction.

Visual means that you see a movement, and you mimic it based on what you saw. This is perhaps the primary means of learning for the vast majority of people... Thus the phrase, "monkey see, monkey do". I don't say that disparagingly, however. Sight offers us perhaps the quickest means of making a "rough copy" of someone else's movement pattern.

Unfortunately, sight relies on our brains to take the information we saw and comprehend it as completely as possible almost instantaneously. Once it's comprehended, then the actual motor neurons and muscles have to interact properly for the observed movement to be reproduced correctly and effectively. If it wasn't this way, everyone would be Bruce Lee after watching Enter the Dragon.

However, I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone try to reproduce a motor pattern after seeing it and managing only the crudest sort of facsimile. In my own experience, I must've tried countless times to imitate Agassi's forehand, Becker's canon-like serve, Sifu James Lin's unstoppable throws, Grandmaster Arthur Lee's thunderous hand speed, Prof. Roy Harris's BJJ positional controls, or Kenneth Jay's pressing technique. Yet more often than not, even after repeated practice, I fall well short.

It's in falling short yet trying stubbornly to achieve the same results that I've often found myself afterwards dealing with some sort of injury, usually due to strain.

So... the easiest way to change the likelihood of injury is to change the focus or redefine the goal. We can see an example of this very clearly with the kettlebell swing. Instead of trying however to get the kettlebell to swing up high and to keep it moving in "Malcolm X" style (i.e., "by any means necessary"), the goal gets redefined to create a swing with a Hard Style Lock at the apex, a symmetrical and pain-free Deep Squat pattern at the bottom, and a well-timed backswing that loads the hips and unlocks the hips and knees only at the last possible millisecond.

That combination of attributes, especially when focused on one bit at a time, creates a process through which we can learn more effectively and safely. The audio cues we get from more advanced movement experts, such as our coaches, masters, and instructors, help us more completely comprehend the facets of movement that need to come together to create ideal technique. Tactile feedback, whether as simple as a smack on the head to remind a fighter to keep his hands up or as subtle as Gray Cook's Reactive Neuromuscular Training methods, help further reinforce the total learning process. With input from the visual, audio, and tactile routes, the conceptual "fermentation" process becomes more rich, and the actual applied skill improves dramatically.

With shoulder specifics, this deals a lot with awareness. At the outset of learning, there's no real depth of awareness that's going on... just crude mimicry.

For example, a pitcher might wind up his arm too far, a tennis player may over-relax the stabilizing muscles needed during a powerful serve or overhead, a martial arts student may lift his shoulder up towards his ear before throwing a punch, and a kettlebeller might swing the kettlebell up so high that his or her neck becomes the core instead of the midsection.

The awareness and understanding of what constitutes proper form (in this case, when stabilizing the shoulder via the lats while in motion) is a HIGHLY necessary step in the process of learning movement that should be emphasized more than upping the number of reps, adding weight, or increasing measurable output. The last thing we should be doing is "adding strength to dysfunction" as Gray Cook would say.

Shoulder Stabilization & Dysfunction - Part II

2008-11-25T11:15:00.000-08:00

Kia Ora from New Zealand, mates! The Chinaman's once again hit the ground swinging, teaching Combat Shuai-Chiao on the first night and Functional Movement Systems repatterning & Hard Style Kettlebell Essentials on the second night.

As many of you know, my passion in kettlebell training & teaching revolves around using kettlebells as rehabilitation tools. Over the past 2 nights of teaching, I've had the chance to convey to my Kiwi audience that proper functional movement patterns are essential for REAL performance. While people often tend to dismiss movement fundamentals as necessary for those who have the inability to perform exercises. However, the strongest are sometimes the most injured, as they compensate their way through the tasks at hand.

Back to the shoulder...

In my last post, I talked about some of the signs & symptoms of shoulder pattern dysfunction. But let's talk a little more about WHERE these problems originate. The next post will talk about HOW those problems come about from a pathophysiological perspective. [I'd write on it all right now, but I've still gotta shower up and get ready to roll around Auckland & do touristy stuff within 30 mins.]

Dysfunctional movement patterns can happen all sorts of ways. When it comes to the shoulder, these patterns can be learned or developed through:

1. Observation & mimicry - seeing someone else do a movement and learning to reproduce their dysfunctional pattern or mimicking someone else's proper movement pattern improperly

2. Pain inhibition - pain at the site of movement (usually from some sort of injury) creates a pain inhibition situation, where the motor neurons that guide muscle firing patterns are being overruled by pain signals arising from injury

3. Secondary compensation - pain or limitation in range of motion somewhere else in the system creates a compensation pattern in an otherwise unaffected joint.

OK... crap, I'm running later than I thought. I'll expand on each of those 3 concepts in my next posts. If you're enjoying this series of posts on the shoulder, please feel free to either drop a comment here on the blog or shoot me an e-mail. For those of you who've already e-mailed me with such appreciative comments, I thank you too. You're the reason why I do what I do and the reason why I continue to love what I do!

Shoulder Stabilization & Functionality - Part 1

2008-11-20T14:23:00.000-08:00

Amazing how hectic it gets right before a trip... a zillion & one things to check & double check, and the on-the-fly prioritization that always seems to go right out the window. This afternoon, I've gotta get this blog entry done and wrap up an overdue article, hopefully all within the next 2-3 hours.

One topic I've been meaning to blog about for a while is shoulder stabilization. As I mentioned in a previous entry, there are times when I write posts to give advice to others and there are times when I write them more to remind myself. This is one of those that's more of the latter than the former.

Throughout most of my life, I've had shoulder, neck, & upper back problems. Whether from rotten posture (years of playing the piano, nerding out, & full-contact sparring), traumatic injury or strain (from a twist serve in tennis or overly enthusiastic joint locks), or just downright rotten movement patterns, my shoulders have given me years of grief.

It wasn't until well after I'd earned my RKC and started studying Gray Cook's materials that I realized how much neck and shoulder damage I'd been suffering senselessly. Here are some symptoms to look for in yourself or your clients... I'd suffered almost all of these at one point or another.

1. Neck stiffness
2. Headaches
3. Tight traps (or shoulders)
4. Achiness between your shoulder blades
5. Numbness & tingling going down your arms or in your hands
6. Throbbing in the shoulder joint or upper arm
7. Pronounced weakness in one arm/hand compared to the other
8. Chest pain
9. Jaw pain

Now while some of these may seem a little "left field", bear with me. For right now, all I want you to do is think about these symptoms and start opening your mind as to how they might arise from shoulder dysfunction.

OK... off to crank out the article. For those of you who're interested, let's just say that it has to do with a certain legend in the martial arts world and one of mankind's most primitive weapons.

Smoked Out

2008-11-15T19:30:00.001-08:00

The air outside tonight is downright unbreatheable. If you're looking here to see if we're training tomorrow, the answer's NO WAY!

Hard Style Kettlebell Training & RKC Prep in Phoenix, Arizona

2008-11-13T14:01:00.001-08:00

As if you thought we weren't hardcore enough, the weekend after I teach in Auckland, New Zealand, the Hard Style Gospel is coming to Phoenix, Arizona!

On the morning of Saturday, December 6th, 2008 I'll be giving TWO (2) HIGH-DENSITY, IN-DEPTH workshops - 1 on how to get the most out of the least by using Pavel Tsatsouline's "Program Minimum" and the other on the RKC's "Final Four". As anyone who attended my more intimate workshops in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Los Angeles, or San Diego can tell you, you'll leave my workshop with a whole new level of comprehension and ability... REGARDLESS OF YOUR PRIOR SKILL LEVEL!

The morning workshop on Program Minimum will be some of the most enlightening 4+ hours of your life, dealing with the 6 most useful exercises you may ever encounter. The first three "NAKED" bodyweight exercises set the stage for perfect movement in the next 3, accelerating your learning process and solidifying your understanding more than any other instruction you'll find out there.

As revealed in his Enter The Kettlebell textbook, Pavel Tsatsouline laid out a deceptively simple plan called "Program Minimum" for making extraordinary gains with kettlebell training. Those gains are not only in the sense of bodysculpting, strength, and wicked endurance, but also in terms of remarkable rehabilitative and rejuvenative results!

Because the KBLA teaching method is so powerful and so detail oriented, we're keeping registration numbers FAR lower than any ordinary kettlebell workshop. The material covered in this workshop will blow your mind as far as fitness, strength & conditioning, flexibility, spinal health, athletic performance, and injury rehabilitation.

Whether you're a personal trainer, an aspiring RKC candidate, a wellness coach, a chiropractor, a martial artist, a tactical operator (police, military, EMT, firefighter, etc.), an athlete, a soccer mom, or a weekend warrior, this workshop's going to have all you want & more.

Pre-registrations are being accepted right now, so don't be late. We are trying to coordinate an adequate number of kettlebells for everyone, as well as making top-of-the-line Dragon Door brand kettlebells available for those who are interested when pre-registering. If you have one or more of your own that you train with, please bring it (them) since you'll want to be learning on the same tools that you're going to be using when you get home. If you don't have one, we'll e-mail you once you've registered to discuss which is the appropriate size for you to pre-order based on your weight, sex, goals, and any pre-existing physical conditions.

Early bird registration ends on November 21, 2008 just before midnight so sign up via Paypal now to reserve your spot. If the spots sell out before the 21st, we're not adding more. Make sure to let us know if you don't have a kettlebell of your own and need to purchase one from us on site.

That afternoon is an RKC-prep workshop from 1:30 - 5:30pm. We'll be covering the RKC Final Four techniques that come after Program Minimum. They are the Clean, the Press, the Snatch, and the Front Squat. For those who are interested in becoming RKC certified kettlebell instructors, this workshop is an absolute MUST. Even if you think your technique is airtight or you're already certified as an RKC instructor, this is going to be some priceless review and correction.

As with all of my workshops, we'll be covering not only the proper execution of these techniques, but also revealing teaching and coaching tips for the ultimate in higher performance and rehabilitative results!

Please click on the buttons either in this post or on the side of this blog to register for the Hard Style KBLA-Phoenix workshops! If you sign up for both, you'll get a $50 discount!

Location details will be announced after 11/23/08 to all registered participants.

I look forward to seeing you there!

And if you're in the Australia / New Zealand neck of the woods, I look forward to seeing you at my workshops there!

VETERANS!!!

2008-11-11T08:32:00.000-08:00

The ranks of gireviks around the world are filled with men and women who are either Armed Forces veterans or active duty from their respective countries. If you come across one today, whether in the line at the mall, pressing two 24kg kettlebells in your gym, asking for change on the side of the street, meeting you in the executive boardroom, or praying at church, please (at the very least) give them a smile, a nod of respect, and a "Thank you so much for your service and sacrifice."

Dogs, Destroyers, and Dragon Door

2008-11-07T11:56:00.000-08:00

As I was putting dear friend and Dog Brother Mike Florimbi through his snatch test preparation, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver walked by. After a quick "Good morning, Governor", answered by nods & smiles from both of them, the man who played Conan the Destroyer watched the Dog Brother snatching the 24kg Dragon in Hard Style while his wife looked on with interest.

OK... Back to the book. More in a few, God-willing.

---

Back again. So as of maybe 6pm last night, the manuscript got sent out to the powers that be for additional editing and contributions. While I don't feel like I'm completely in the clear yet, I do at least feel like I can go and spend time with Squealie guilt free. Hopefully, I won't find a bootprint from a Good Ol' Boy on my backside after the manuscript is actually reviewed.

Reformulating how I'm going to spend my time has become a major goal, and I plan to make inroads on that this weekend. Using an idea I heard on the RKC Instructors Forum, I'm going to schedule my OWN training sessions and restorative sessions first and then input everything else around those. Let's see how this affects my time management. Once I've battled it out, I'll let you guys know the outcome.

For now, I'm glad to just be home for a couple of hours before heading off to teach at the Inosanto Academy again. This morning's Fut Ga Kuen & Tai-Chi classes were outstanding - solid progress and a deeper appreciation of how the fundamental concepts and movement patterns apply in everything from Chi-Kung to swordsmanship. Days like today are what keep me teaching traditional martial arts.

OH, and before I forget, Nikki Shlosser, RKC, did a bottoms-up Turkish Get-Up this morning with a 16kg bell on both sides. Still think you're hard?

M.I.A.

2008-11-06T14:55:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I know it's been a while since I blogged, but with a book that's long overdue, parents that have been in town for the past 2 weeks, and being under the weather (or fighting to not go back under the weather) for the past couple months, the Chinaman's run the soles off his kung-fu shoes and the rims off his rickshaw.

While I've still been doing my best to keep up with my group teaching committments, I've had to put a lot to the side for the past couple of months. If I can crank out what I need to crank out this week, there'll be a new dawn in more than just American politics.

Keep your eyes peeled, folks..... And thank you all for all your comments, your e-mails, your text messages, and your phone calls of support.

Oh, and by the way, any of you guys good with layout design? Holler at me ASAP if you are, please... kettlebells.losangeles@yahoo.com

THANKS!

Safety, Sanity, and Salutes

2008-10-28T22:55:00.000-07:00

Safety: Oft overlooked, never overemphasized. I'm going to give you one rule that will help you develop strength while minimizing downtime. As soon as your form deteriorates, STOP. I can't tell you how many times I've pushed myself too far and suffered some stupid sort of injury from trying to "gut out" those last few reps of whatever. To quote THE Chief Instructor of the RKC, "Change of exercise is a form of rest." So follow that advice and watch your performance take a jump! Change the exercise and the intensity to see how well your neurological system adapts.

Sanity: And in that same vein, change of workload outside of physical endeavors is also an intelligent idea. I've been awfully guilty of overdoing my own workload lately, and it took almost everyone in my circle to tell me the same thing before I realized that I really have been overdoing the pace and intensity of my work. Once this one project's off my plate, I'm REALLY going to fall off the grid for a couple of weeks! (Let's see if I can hold to that.)

Salutes: I'm so glad that many of this blog's readers took the time to email me with positive comments about the prior post. After posting it, I was concerned that some might not read it carefully and misconstrue my remarks as a challenge or disrespect to organizations like the USMC, LAPD, or NYFD (when in fact, those institutions are what I've constantly credited with mad respect and gratitude for keeping us safe). I'm very pleased that everyone who dropped me a line, including some individuals from those organizations, absolutely got the spirit of my message... that we ALL are responsible for creating a powerful, orderly, and effective learning environment.

If you read Power By Pavel Issue #165, Pavel Tsatsouline cites the KBLA offer for first responders in there. We are DEVOTED to creating the safest, strongest, most efficient learning environment for you. You've been good enough to meet the needs of others. Let us meet yours.

I know... it's a short post, but it's 11:15pm, and I've gotta sack out now to wake up early and get some work done. Hopefully this one big project will be off my plate in less than 2 weeks, and you'll get to meet a VERY happy Chinaman. :)