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?
Showing posts with label rkc snatch test. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rkc snatch test. Show all posts
Friday, November 7, 2008
Friday, June 20, 2008
And for this weekend...
Man, I can't believe it... About to get on another plane. Luckily, this is just a short trip.
As I was writing a note for my KettlebellsLosAngeles Newsletter, I liked the content so much that I figured it might be beneficial if I posted the message here too.
Enjoy, Folks!
-------------
Hello, Kettlebellers!
One of these days, I'll be able to follow my own advice and PROPERLY moderate my workload, but right now, it's just moving at the speed of absolute insanity. I'll be heading out of town this Sunday morning, but there will still be plenty of KBLA's RKC-certified instructors and instructor candidates on hand to teach in my absence. My wife, Dr. Courtney Cheng, RKC II, may be under the weather, so don't expect her to be on hand.
For this week's training, there are 2 things I want people to work on:
1. Maximum Volitional Contraction (MVC), and
2. Efficient Explosiveness (EE).
Through my training with Pavel Tsatsouline and my conversations with Gray Cook, both mentors of mine, I've realized that more often than not, people think they're contracting a muscle to its maximum (i.e., generating an MVC) when they're really not.
How does this happen?..... Simple... we lose touch with our bodies and develop really awful habits of motion and of stability. Some people refer to this as having poor ergonomics, but it's also an issue of having rotten movement patterns.
What's the first, most vital movement pattern that people tend to unlearn?.... BREATH!
Why is breath crucial?..... Aside from the obvious issues of asphyxiation, how we breathe is one of the most fundamental factors deciding whether we're in an efficient and powerful state (parasympathetic nervous system dominant - i.e., calm & in control) or a highly inefficient and weak state (sympathetic nervous system dominant - i.e., fearful, panicked, defensive, & in denial).
When I was discussing this with Gray Cook this past weekend, I almost thought that I was sitting in a psychology class, but these are all the SAME messages that we hear in Traditional Chinese Martial Arts training, starting with Chi Kung (aka. qigong). We try to shift our breathing down to the lower abdomen to train diaphragmatic breating, instead of breathing in our upper chests. As Brett Jones, MRKC, said in Secrets of the Shoulder, the lungs expand downward because of our diaphragms, and that's 2/3 of our lung volume!! But in many cases, we've unlearned how to breath properly. Want proof? Watch a baby breathe. The belly rises and falls, not the upper chest.
And how does that tie into Russian Kettlebell training?..... The sharp and short "sssst!" sound you make on exhalation while doing KB ballistics is a rapid intraabdomenal compression, coming from your lower abdomen. If you try it from your chest, it's weak. Not as many stabilizing muscles fire. Now try it exhaling sharply, almost from your groin. Feel how different it is in terms of the power you generate???
So this is how class is going to run this weekend as far as a rough schedule:
- 10 minutes of joint mobility (basic warmup)
- at least 5 minutes of VERY focused lower abdomenal breathing:
*Start with your feet shoulder width and parallel, relax your legs, reach up to the sky with the vertex of your head, and overlay one palm on your sternum and the other palm just under your belly button. Now breathe slowly, evenly, and deeply.
*You should feel the palm on your lower abdomen push outward against your hand as you inhale, and fall back in towards your spine as you exhale. The hand on your sternum should ideally not even move.
- Divide the class up into beginners, semi-experienced, and RKC candidates
- One of the RKCs takes the beginners & semi-experienced through the Hard Style Lock, wall squat, KB deadlift, KB swing, and Naked Get-Up. Remember that for a first-timer, less is more. The Hard Style Lock is a crucial skill where you get your first exposure to MVC. If you "think" you're clenching your glutes or "think" you're locking your knees, the odds are pretty damn good that you COULD and SHOULD engage them even MORE forcefully. We live in a "good enough" society, but you need to remember that "good enough" means "first idiot injured from carelessness" in Chinese.
You want to be able to pull off the ENTIRE 5 point Hard Style Lock with real synchronicity and your real Maximum Volitional Contraction, and the KBLA instructional crew will show you how. As Pavel always says, "Tension equals strength." So learn WELL how to generate tension right from the get-go..... A leakage in tension is a liability in structure!
NOTE: For the instructional crew, if you see someone zoning out or ignoring your instructions, don't let them touch a kettlebell. Have them do bodyweight exercises until they learn how to move properly. Moving improperly with a kettlebell is just a means of reinforcing compensation mechanisms, and as the saying goes, "nothing good can come of it."
- RKC Candidates: Instead of doing the Hard Style Lock and all of that, grab a relatively heavy bell and do 5 - 10 swings with 2 hands, and then 5 swings per hand of 1 handed swings. You're trying to achieve 2 things: a) maximum explosiveness from the legs and glutes, and b) note the feeling of smoothness at the bottom of the arc with the 1-handed swing.
Once you've done that, go through your snatch test with the strict RKC rules. I want to see numbers posted on my blog under the corresponding post. Coach each other as you go through it, forcing each other to adhere to maximally correct form.
THIS RKC SNATCH TEST is your lesson in Efficient Explosiveness. What are the salient points of EE?
*Sensing exactly how much muscular force/explosiveness to use to get the KB to float up to the apex
*Guiding the arc of the KB more vertically than diagonally. If the KB bounces on your wrist, it's usually because you're either overthrowing the bell or you're finishing the snatch with the apex in front of you. Adjust accordingly.
*Sense the smoothness at the bottom of the arc. Lowering the KB from the apex doesn't mean "turn your brain off". Rather, you should be just as mentally engaged and aware of the feel of the bell while you're lowering it as you were while you were snatching it upward. If it feels like there's any jerkiness or strain, you need to adjust your form.
You are each allowed only ONE attempt on Sunday. Rest well on Saturday and bring your A game!
Once you've gone through your snatch tests, rejoin the class and spread the lovin'.
This weekend's circuit will be designed by KBLA's own Dr. Jeff McCombs, DC, RKC, if he's present. Doc Jeff is highly competent in both putting a hurt on you and taking the hurt off of you!
Train hard, train smart, train kettlebells!
"Doc" Mark Cheng, RKC Team Leader
As I was writing a note for my KettlebellsLosAngeles Newsletter, I liked the content so much that I figured it might be beneficial if I posted the message here too.
Enjoy, Folks!
-------------
Hello, Kettlebellers!
One of these days, I'll be able to follow my own advice and PROPERLY moderate my workload, but right now, it's just moving at the speed of absolute insanity. I'll be heading out of town this Sunday morning, but there will still be plenty of KBLA's RKC-certified instructors and instructor candidates on hand to teach in my absence. My wife, Dr. Courtney Cheng, RKC II, may be under the weather, so don't expect her to be on hand.
For this week's training, there are 2 things I want people to work on:
1. Maximum Volitional Contraction (MVC), and
2. Efficient Explosiveness (EE).
Through my training with Pavel Tsatsouline and my conversations with Gray Cook, both mentors of mine, I've realized that more often than not, people think they're contracting a muscle to its maximum (i.e., generating an MVC) when they're really not.
How does this happen?..... Simple... we lose touch with our bodies and develop really awful habits of motion and of stability. Some people refer to this as having poor ergonomics, but it's also an issue of having rotten movement patterns.
What's the first, most vital movement pattern that people tend to unlearn?.... BREATH!
Why is breath crucial?..... Aside from the obvious issues of asphyxiation, how we breathe is one of the most fundamental factors deciding whether we're in an efficient and powerful state (parasympathetic nervous system dominant - i.e., calm & in control) or a highly inefficient and weak state (sympathetic nervous system dominant - i.e., fearful, panicked, defensive, & in denial).
When I was discussing this with Gray Cook this past weekend, I almost thought that I was sitting in a psychology class, but these are all the SAME messages that we hear in Traditional Chinese Martial Arts training, starting with Chi Kung (aka. qigong). We try to shift our breathing down to the lower abdomen to train diaphragmatic breating, instead of breathing in our upper chests. As Brett Jones, MRKC, said in Secrets of the Shoulder, the lungs expand downward because of our diaphragms, and that's 2/3 of our lung volume!! But in many cases, we've unlearned how to breath properly. Want proof? Watch a baby breathe. The belly rises and falls, not the upper chest.
And how does that tie into Russian Kettlebell training?..... The sharp and short "sssst!" sound you make on exhalation while doing KB ballistics is a rapid intraabdomenal compression, coming from your lower abdomen. If you try it from your chest, it's weak. Not as many stabilizing muscles fire. Now try it exhaling sharply, almost from your groin. Feel how different it is in terms of the power you generate???
So this is how class is going to run this weekend as far as a rough schedule:
- 10 minutes of joint mobility (basic warmup)
- at least 5 minutes of VERY focused lower abdomenal breathing:
*Start with your feet shoulder width and parallel, relax your legs, reach up to the sky with the vertex of your head, and overlay one palm on your sternum and the other palm just under your belly button. Now breathe slowly, evenly, and deeply.
*You should feel the palm on your lower abdomen push outward against your hand as you inhale, and fall back in towards your spine as you exhale. The hand on your sternum should ideally not even move.
- Divide the class up into beginners, semi-experienced, and RKC candidates
- One of the RKCs takes the beginners & semi-experienced through the Hard Style Lock, wall squat, KB deadlift, KB swing, and Naked Get-Up. Remember that for a first-timer, less is more. The Hard Style Lock is a crucial skill where you get your first exposure to MVC. If you "think" you're clenching your glutes or "think" you're locking your knees, the odds are pretty damn good that you COULD and SHOULD engage them even MORE forcefully. We live in a "good enough" society, but you need to remember that "good enough" means "first idiot injured from carelessness" in Chinese.
You want to be able to pull off the ENTIRE 5 point Hard Style Lock with real synchronicity and your real Maximum Volitional Contraction, and the KBLA instructional crew will show you how. As Pavel always says, "Tension equals strength." So learn WELL how to generate tension right from the get-go..... A leakage in tension is a liability in structure!
NOTE: For the instructional crew, if you see someone zoning out or ignoring your instructions, don't let them touch a kettlebell. Have them do bodyweight exercises until they learn how to move properly. Moving improperly with a kettlebell is just a means of reinforcing compensation mechanisms, and as the saying goes, "nothing good can come of it."
- RKC Candidates: Instead of doing the Hard Style Lock and all of that, grab a relatively heavy bell and do 5 - 10 swings with 2 hands, and then 5 swings per hand of 1 handed swings. You're trying to achieve 2 things: a) maximum explosiveness from the legs and glutes, and b) note the feeling of smoothness at the bottom of the arc with the 1-handed swing.
Once you've done that, go through your snatch test with the strict RKC rules. I want to see numbers posted on my blog under the corresponding post. Coach each other as you go through it, forcing each other to adhere to maximally correct form.
THIS RKC SNATCH TEST is your lesson in Efficient Explosiveness. What are the salient points of EE?
*Sensing exactly how much muscular force/explosiveness to use to get the KB to float up to the apex
*Guiding the arc of the KB more vertically than diagonally. If the KB bounces on your wrist, it's usually because you're either overthrowing the bell or you're finishing the snatch with the apex in front of you. Adjust accordingly.
*Sense the smoothness at the bottom of the arc. Lowering the KB from the apex doesn't mean "turn your brain off". Rather, you should be just as mentally engaged and aware of the feel of the bell while you're lowering it as you were while you were snatching it upward. If it feels like there's any jerkiness or strain, you need to adjust your form.
You are each allowed only ONE attempt on Sunday. Rest well on Saturday and bring your A game!
Once you've gone through your snatch tests, rejoin the class and spread the lovin'.
This weekend's circuit will be designed by KBLA's own Dr. Jeff McCombs, DC, RKC, if he's present. Doc Jeff is highly competent in both putting a hurt on you and taking the hurt off of you!
Train hard, train smart, train kettlebells!
"Doc" Mark Cheng, RKC Team Leader
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Courage Corner
You never know what you're made of until you really put it on the line.
One of my students is a case in point with that sentence. Adam Chiplinsky, a computer animator, former Australian full-contact kung-fu competitor, and RKC candidate in the KBLA stable, recently suffered a serious injury to his skull and jaw. He's undergone at least a couple of corrective surgeries VERY recently and still struggles with difficulty breathing.
Today was his first real workout in months.
While Adam didn't exactly make his snatch test numbers due to a lack of endurance, his form was none too shabby. His legs were tired from a lack of training, but his effort was admirable... a solid 40 reps.
He's got bit to go before cleanly passing the RKC Snatch Test, but his spirit is all there. Instead of postponing his participation, he's going to San Jose as scheduled next week. He'll be training alongside his wife Grace, another RKC candidate.
Grace, by the way, like most of the KBLA women, did her snatch test numbers beautifully with just 1 hand. Like I told you, KBLA has the baddest (and hottest) chicks around. :-D
I have every faith that Adam will represent himself and KBLA with his utmost. He's gone from spitting out mouthfuls of blood and stitches to doing some serious snatching with minimal recovery time.
That's spirit. That's balls. That's KBLA.
One of my students is a case in point with that sentence. Adam Chiplinsky, a computer animator, former Australian full-contact kung-fu competitor, and RKC candidate in the KBLA stable, recently suffered a serious injury to his skull and jaw. He's undergone at least a couple of corrective surgeries VERY recently and still struggles with difficulty breathing.
Today was his first real workout in months.
While Adam didn't exactly make his snatch test numbers due to a lack of endurance, his form was none too shabby. His legs were tired from a lack of training, but his effort was admirable... a solid 40 reps.
He's got bit to go before cleanly passing the RKC Snatch Test, but his spirit is all there. Instead of postponing his participation, he's going to San Jose as scheduled next week. He'll be training alongside his wife Grace, another RKC candidate.
Grace, by the way, like most of the KBLA women, did her snatch test numbers beautifully with just 1 hand. Like I told you, KBLA has the baddest (and hottest) chicks around. :-D
I have every faith that Adam will represent himself and KBLA with his utmost. He's gone from spitting out mouthfuls of blood and stitches to doing some serious snatching with minimal recovery time.
That's spirit. That's balls. That's KBLA.
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