Discover What The Chinese And Bulgarians

Know About Russian Kettlebell Training That

You Dont

Learn from the best strength athletes in the world on how to get as
strong as you want using your kettlebells in less time than you
thought possible


From the desk of Geoff Neupert
Overlooking Pikes Peak, CO
July 2014.


Dear Kettlebell-Swinging Amigo,

Maybe youre not into this whole tness and fat loss thing like many other kettlebell
users.

Maybe, like me, youre an old-school iron-addict who has collected injuries over a
lifetime like some people collect stamps, and you just want to gure out how to regain
as much of your lost strength in as many ways as possible and feel strong again.

Or maybe, you have been bitten by the strength-bug later on in life and love the
simplicity of one or two kettlebells and the myriad of lifts you can do from the comfort of
your basement, back yard, porch, or patio.

I wanted to share with you some secrets that have been working great for me and some
of my private clients for gaining strength quickly, without cutting too much into the rest of
our lives.


The Problem With
Traditional Strength
Training

If youre anything like me, you may have spent your fair share of time working out - in a
gym - or maybe at home. Maybe too much time. It was not uncommon for me when I
was younger to spend 2 or more hours a day working out. Sure, I got big. I got strong.
But when I got married, I also got into a lot of arguments with my wife about spending
so much time working out.

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Part of that was due to the technical nature of my sport - Olympic Weightlifting, and the
other part of that was due to the traditional lens through which I structured my workouts.

Most Western inuenced strength workouts are 60-90 minutes long with 3 to 5 minute
(or more) rest periods, performed 3 to 5 times a week. And it seems that all the scientic
research proves this.

The problem for me and some of my clients is that we just dont have 5 plus hours to
work out any more. We have families and other responsibilities like work. And some of
us, just dont want to spend that much time working out anymore, no matter how strong
itll make us.

Kettlebell training provided a relatively simple solution because we found we could work
around old injuries, often rehabilitating them in the process, with exercises like Swings,
Get Ups, and even Goblet Squats. The problem for many however, is how exactly to
program the lighter-than-normal kettlebells into traditional strength programming, while
still maintaining all the benets of resiliency and work capacity that come from kettlebell
training.


How The Bulgarians
Bested The Best
In Business

I know, I know, I couldnt help the use of alliteration. Have to admit, though - catchy, no?

Anyway, back in the late 1970s the great Soviet Sports Machine ruled the world of
Olympic Weightlifting. That is, until a tiny country, Bulgaria, came from nowhere and
started beating their weightlifters.

How did this tiny country beat they mighty Soviet Bear?

They simply changed the way they viewed weightlifting.

They discovered that the longer workouts of the day - 2+ hours - depleted their
weightlifters ability to recover. They determined that after 45 minutes, testosterone
levels dropped. Testosterone is an anabolic (growth) hormone responsible for muscular
growth and recovery.

At the time, the Soviets were using one or two training sessions per day that lasted
anywhere from 90 minutes to 2.5 hours.

One of the things the Bulgarian coach did was change their workout schedule to shorter
30 to 60 minute - workouts.

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Heres what a typical training day looked like:

9-930am: Front Squat
930-10am: Break
10-11am: Snatch
11-1130am: Break
1130-1230pm: Clean and Jerk
1230-1pm: Front Squat

430-530pm: Clean and Jerk
530-6pm: Break
6-7pm: Snatch
7-730pm: Front Squat
730-8pm: Pulls

Yes, youre right - that is A LOT of work. Im in no way suggesting that you and I
need to do multiple 30 to 60 minute training sessions (averaging 45 minutes) per
day.

What I am suggesting is that we model these shorter workouts.

I have gone through periods in my training career, including right now, when Ive
used these shorter workouts and not only have I never felt better, surprisingly,
Ive always made great jumps in strength.

You may be thinking at this point -

How are shorter workouts possible when we still need longer rest periods
between sets?

Wont we lose our ability to get strong?

Worse yet, wont we get weak and end up training for endurance?

Au contraire mon frre


What The Best
In The World Do

I have made no bones about the fact the I love Olympic Weightlifting. Much of my
kettlebell training methodology is based on my experiences as an Olympic lifter.

Even though the Western strength literature concludes that absolute / maximum
strength is best trained with longer rests, 3 to 5 minutes, others in the world - the
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best in the world - seem to be, at least anecdotally, using much shorter rest
periods.

There is no doubt about it, the Chinese are the greatest Olympic lifters in the
world by medal count. Theyve won 255 medals at the world championships, and
154 of them are gold, recently beating the Soviet Union who had 151.

As a result, more and more Olympic lifters and their coaches are looking carefully
at what the Chinese are doing with their training.

Recently, rumors have been circulating that the Chinese use much shorter rest
periods than the West says is best.

Yatan Parasher, a Canadian weightlifter, who visited and trained in China, with
his Chinese coach, reported the following in a recent interview at http://
www.bethettest.co.uk/tness-blog/chinese-weightlifting:

We know the Chinese weightlifters train at high intensity, how long usually are their
rest periods between each lift or pull etc?

Rest periods are surprisingly short between sets and reps. A lot of it is done by athletes feel
so there is no set amount of rest. The girls tend to rest a bit less 1-2 mins and even less on the
warmup sets. Up to 2 mins rest was mostly at 85-90%+ plus. Once again it was all dependent
on the athlete. In general though rest was short around 60-90 secs, this was much different
than what you might read in western strength books. Personally, my training has improved
vastly with shorter rest periods. A lot of western science says 3-5 min between heavy sets but
that was unheard of in China even with heavy squats or pulls.

Read that again in case you missed it.

These lifters routinely squat 3x their bodyweight and routinely snatch 2x their
bodyweight and clean and jerk 2.5x their bodyweight and they routinely rest
60-90 seconds between most lifts, approaching 2 minutes on 85-90%+ lifts.

Hmmm

Might be something we can learn from them.

Some of the best in the world are training and getting stronger in ways that are
opposite of whats supposed to be scientically proven.

Therefore, we cannot discard empirical evidence just because it doesnt t with
what we currently think we know. (Refer back to the fat loss report on the fat loss
protocols we used to use based on endurance training.)

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The Chinese are proving that you can get really, really strong - world class strong
- using shorter than proven rest periods.


Olympic Weightlifting
v.
Kettlebell Lifting

You may be wondering why I refer to Olympic Weightlifting so much. Its because in my
book, its one of the ultimate expressions of strength, power, balance, and coordination -
in other words, athleticism. (That plus its my background.)

The problem with Olympic lifting is that its incredibly time-consuming, takes specialized
coaching to really be good at it, and it requires specialized equipment.

Kettlebell lifting on the other hand, is like, as Pavel pointed out in 2001 in The Russian
Kettlebell Challenge, is like Olympic lifting for regular people. They both share very
similar lifts - snatches, cleans, and jerks.

I started using kettlebells with my clients in 2002 because I agreed with Pavels
assessment and saw them as a better alternative to dumbbells. Furthermore, I saw that
you could train the one quality most people needed: Work capacity.

Work capacity is simply the ability to do and recover from work. The higher your
work capacity, the more work you can do, to the point that you rarely, if ever, get
tired.

And kettlebells, in case you didnt know this already, provide a very unique type of work
capacity - strength-endurance and power-endurance, which are what everyday Average
Joes and Janes need: The ability to be strong for long periods of time.

(Case in point: Prof. Stuart McGill, one of the worlds leading spine researchers, has
determined that lower back injuries do not come from a lack of lower back strength, but
rather, a lack of lower back strength-endurance.)

Kettlebells give you everyday strength.

Everyday Strength is useable strength that allows you to bend, twist, turn,
run, and do pretty much anything you want - and not get injured or tired.

Thats something traditional strength programming using traditional strength
training tools, like the barbell, just cant give you. (Im assuming you know some
of this already.)


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Training For
Everyday Strength
AND
Maximum Strength

This is what makes kettlebell workouts so great - you have the possibility to train
for both everyday strength AND maximum strength.

In case you were wondering, it doesnt have to be an either/or proposition.
Gone are the days when we thought that improving your conditioning would
affect your max strength.

You can now do BOTH.

How?

Simple.

Use the Bulgarians short workout templates - 45 minutes or less (I prefer
30) and use the Chinese short rest periods - 60 seconds to 2 minutes.

Yeah, but how well will that really work?


The Russian Lions
Strength Prescription

I refer a lot to my experience as an Olympic lifter inuencing my kettlebell
programming and methodology. I fail sometimes to refer to my other inuence -
wrestling. I wrestled in high school and briey in college and then went on to be a
college strength and conditioning coach, with one of my teams being the
Wrestling Team.

Wrestlers have amazing everyday strength.

They have great stamina and great usable real-world strength. They can bend,
twist, turn, roll, crash-bang-fall without getting hurt.

So most of my metabolic kettlebell programming reects how I trained my
wrestlers. Interestingly enough, by the time I left Rutgers where I coached, not a
single wrestler ever lost because he lacked conditioning.

One of the greatest wrestlers of all time, and the rst heavyweight champion of
the world, lived at the turn of the 20th Century. He was called the Russian Lion
and out of approximately 3000 pro matches, he only lost two - to the same man.
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George Hackenschmidt was a physical specimen. At age 28, in a time before
supplements his stats were as follows:

Weight - 204 pounds; Height - 5', 9 1/2"; Reach - 75"; Biceps - 19";
Forearm 15 1/2"; Neck - 22"; Chest 52"; Waist - 34"; Thigh 26 3/4";
Calf - 18".

He was an author of multiple books, uent in seven languages, inventor of the
Hack Squat, and even the President of the United States wanted to be [like]
him. Theodore Roosevelt, known for his manly ruggedness and can do attitude,
said, If I wasnt president of the United States, I would like to be George
Hackenschmidt.

In 1908, Hackenschmidt said this about training:

About thirty minutes are fully sufcient to the acquisition and
preservation of strength and endurance.

30 minutes.

Hardly seems believable.

Sure, maybe for fat loss. All the science proved that.

But maximum strength?

As Tony Robbins said, Success leaves clues.

Let me ask you this:

Do you have similar measurements and athletic pedigree as George
Hackenschmidt?

Im guessing the answer is no.

So you have to admit that he might know what hes talking about and combined
with the Bulgarian and Chinese strength secrets, you might have just found the
proverbial magic bullet.

If youre still not fully convinced, lets take a very practical look at why these
strategies will work for you.


5 Reasons
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Shorter Is Better

Whether its shorter duration workouts, or shorter rest periods, or both, heres
why its a better option for most people.

Based on studying what the best do better than me, what I know about human
physiology, and 20 plus years of training others, Ive come to the conclusion that
shorter workouts are just better for all types of strength - everyday strength,
maximum strength, strength-endurance, work capacity, and more

You may or may not think so, but unless youve given them a shot, AND are
currently exceeding all your training goals, I encourage you to reserve your
judgment until you read the following.

1. Hormones

Hormones. Theyre what makes your body tick. Recall that one of the reasons
the Bulgarians used shorter workouts was because testosterone, one of the
hormones responsible for growth and recovery, is supposed to decrease
signicantly after 45 minutes.

Another hormone, cortisol, which is naturally released from training (as a
response to stress) and is also responsible energy mobilization, can be over-
produced, making recovery next to impossible. Its one of the reasons some
people get fatter and weaker the more they work out. The key is to manage your
stress (including workouts) and therefore manage your hormones.

2. Focus

We live in an electronic age. I personally used to think that was a good thing until
my iPhone notications started going off every couple of minutes. There are so
many distractions, its hard to get much done these days. The gap between
busy and productive is ever-widening.

Shorter workouts allow you to turn off and tune out the rest of the world for a
short enough period of time to not get anxious about doing so.

3. Effort

One thing many kettlebell users forget is that theres an inverse relationship
between the duration of your workout and your effort level.

Consider a 5 or 10-minute snatch test for example. Do one of those, and youre
done for the day.

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Shorter workouts allow you to put forth more effort without having to worry about
burning out due to lack of recovery.

4. Recovery

Speaking of burning out The one thing that 99% of all people fail to take into
consideration about working out is recovery. You cannot make progress, no
matter how hard you train if you cannot recover. Shorter workouts make recovery
not only possible, but probable.

5. Consistency

Why do most people fail to get results?

Consistency.

For one reason or another, they just cannot keep keeping on. Something always
comes up. Especially if you have a longer workout. It becomes hard to justify
spending 3 hours a week working out when the kids have to be at after-school
activities, dinner needs to be cooked, and quarterly or monthly reports are due,
which means you have to stay up late to do them.

Whos going to do all this stuff if not you?

It becomes easy to put off your workouts if they seem too overwhelming to t into
your busy schedule.

However, anybody can nd just one hour a week to workout.

Three times per week for 20 minutes will get it done.

The bottom line is this:

Shorter workouts are easier to t in your life, and therefore youre more
likely to see the results you want by switching from longer to shorter
duration strength workouts.

All of this begs a pretty big question that you may have right now


Yeah, But How Do I
USE This Information?

Admittedly, there is a lot of information in this report, yet the concept is relatively
simple:
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Shorter kettlebell workouts, with shorter rest periods will make you
plenty strong, increasing both your maximum strength and your
everyday strength giving you the best of all worlds.

Thats the take home point.

Applying it is relatively simple.

There are probably two types of kettlebell strength enthusiasts reading this. The
rst, is routinely consistent in his or her training, and you tend toward the longer
more traditional workouts. Well call you Type 1.

The second type of person is the one who is inconsistent in his or her workouts
because you have a crazy-busy life and are under the impression that you wont
make progress if youre not doing the longer workouts. Well call you Type 2.

Below youll nd two different prescriptions based on your type.

Type 1:

The rst place you can start is by simply cutting the length of your longer
program in half. If its at 60 minutes, cut it to 30.

The second is to cut your rest periods from the longer traditional rest periods of 3
to 5 minutes to something shorter - use the Chinese range - 60-90 seconds, 2
minutes if over 85-90%.

Doing the second will allow you to do the rst.

And yeah, I know that what Im suggesting you do may sound difcult, and
maybe downright impossible based on what you may currently want to achieve.
Remember, I wouldnt ask you to do anything that I havent done myself.

At the time of this report, my main workouts are only 30 minutes long.

They allow me to stay fresh, and train frequently, thus getting the most out of the
Universal Strength Maxim.

Type 2:

You just need to carve 20 to 30 minutes 3 times per week out of your schedule.
Before work, at lunch, after work, after the kids go to bed, whenever. Then pick
ONE exercise and do it.

Heres what else:
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Regardless of which type of kettlebell strength enthusiast you are, if youre at a
loss of how you should structure these types of workouts, dont worry, Ive written
100 different programs for you in my new book, Kettlebell Express! ULTRA -
Reloaded.

There are all kinds of time-efcient workouts in there that you can use to get
plenty strong.

Incidentally, like the Chinese, these types of short-rest programs will also make
you lean too.

Unfortunately, you cant get your hands on my new book Yet.

Keep your eyes on your inbox because in the upcoming days Ill send you some
more time-efcient workout info to help you get more results in less time.

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