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In This Year, I will Start to… Scratch it, I Will Continue to…

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My New Year’s resolution: Keep doing what I am doing.

Better.

The plan is simplex:

Do my breathing & joint-mobility exercises every morning.
Enjoy good Pu-Erh tea with my wife and our cats before the work.
Do my swings and get-ups. Sinister – coming soon. Sooner or later.

Kettlebells in the Movies: “Ivan the Poweful”

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“Ivan the Poweful” is a film telling an outstanding life story of Ivan Firtsak who was born in June, 1899 in a Ukrainian village Bilky, Irshava district in Zakarpattia Oblast.

At the age of 18 he became a performer with a Czechoslovak circus and traveled to 64 countries of the world, astonishing everybody with his victories. He was a weightlifting champion of Czechoslovakia, a bodybuilding champion of Europe.

How to Keep your SFG Skills Sharp

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I am currently practicing Simple & Sinister, i.e. Get-Up and Swing.

I have divided the remaining skills into 2 groups:

Grinds: Military Press, Front Squat, Windmill, Bent Press
Ballistic: Snatch, Clean, Push Press, Jerk

Two Hands Anyhow

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Two Hands Anyhow, a magnificent feat of strength, usually performed with a barbell and a kettlebell (like the legendary Arthur Saxon’s world record of 203 kg), two kettlebells, two dumbbells (Thomas Inch used to show this variation with his Inch Challenge dumbell), or 4 kettlebells (Hermann Goerner’s incredible 195 kg).

Thomas Inch, Secrets of Strength: A Dumbbell Get-up

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Lying down and rising with dumb-bell. Hold the bell overhead, right hand. Bend both knees, place left hand on the floor a little to the rear, extend the left leg forward and sit down. Now extend right leg, bending left arm until you are resting on the elbow. Lean slowly backwards to prone position.

A Few Words of Gratitude

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It is said that the key to the success in practice is a good method, a good teacher, and a good student. I am very lucky to have the best teachers and a great method. I am patiently working on being a better student, a better teacher, a better person.

StrongFirst – the School of Strength – is a school of personal development, hidden behind lifting iron. The principles, skills and values that I learned in StrongFirst, literaly changed my life.

Kettlebell Swing Tip: 4-Count Movement, not 2

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Most people do the swing wrong because they think it is a 2 count movement:

1 – down (= evading to soon, which leads to all kind of troubles like the weight pulling you forward, ending too low between the legs etc.)
2 – up (= lifting with the hands)
Think of the swing as 4 count movement (let’s start form the top):

Hermann Görner and Kettlebells

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Each training session of Hermann’s contained a mixed programme of kettlebell, dumb-bell and barbell lifting. Sometimes a workout would also include the supporting feats.

For instance, hen Hermann trained three times per week, he might in the first training session give preference to kettlebell exercises, but he would also include barbell and dumb-bell lifts too.

The Stronger Person Will Win

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I am working on some stuff regarding Chinese martial arts. I have found an interesting saying from our tradition (Southern Chinese Hung Ga Kyun), written by Grand Master Lam Sai Wing in his “Taming the Tiger in Gung Pattern Manual”, regarding the combat applications of the system:

Shaolin Code of Honor

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I was digging though an old martial arts manual (from around 1911), loosely translated by late Robert W. Smith in his book Secrets of Shaolin Temple Boxing and have found this interesting part called something like “Five must follow commandments”:

Combatives & Strength Training: Hack Away at the Unessential

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My combative training is heavily influenced by StrongFirst principles – few things, but better, waviness of the load, continuity of training process, etc.

Example from our MMA lessons: Most of the time we work on the same drills in a “same, but different” way – jab, cross, hook, uppercut, overhand, low kick; Thai clinch, wrestling clinch; takedown from the distance and from the clinch; positional drills on the ground (mount, back mount, side mount, guard), ground and pound, and few very reliable submissions (rear naked choke, armbar, guillotine, Americana, Kimura, triangle choke).

Carl Gustav Jung: How Difficult It Is To Be Simple

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This paragraph for C.G. Jung’s autobiography Memories, Dreams Reflections caught my eye:

I have done without electricity, and tend the fireplace and stove myself. Evenings, I light the old lamps. There is no running water, and I pump the water from the well. I chop the wood and cook the food. These simple acts make man simple and how difficult it is to be simple!