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What does it mean to be trained with someone who is Russian Kettlebell Challenge (RKC) certified? How does training with kettlebells the way a RKC trains differ from those who are not certified RKC? What are the benifits and how will this style of training make you better at whatever you do?

These questions are easily answered by a RKC:

We are trained under the tutelage of Pavel Tsatsouline. In 2004 Dr. Randall Strossen, one of the most respected names in the strength world, stated, “In our eyes, Pavel Tsatsouline will always reign as the modern king of kettlebells since it was he who poplarized them to the point where you could almost find a country filled with his converts…” The masses dont lie. To be trained by someone like this and with the people he trusts to teach for him is invaluable. The knowledge that is required of a RKC to become certified and to remain certified is above and beyond typical Personal Training Certifications.

This is taken from the RKC Certified Instructor Manual, 22nd Edition (2010)

RKC is a “hard style” of kettlebell training born in the spec ops of the Soviet Union. In the 1970s select units adopted a karate-based style of hand-to-hand combat. The hard style of kettlebell training elvolved in the 1980s to support the hard style of fighting.
As in martial arts, the kettlebell hard style chooses “power production over power conservation.” (Randy Hauer, RKC Team Leader)
“The essence of karate techniques is kime”, explained karate great Massatoshi Nakayama. Kime is usually translated as “focus.” ‘The meaning of kime is an explosive attack to the target using the appropriate technique and maximum power in the shortest time possible.’ The master reminds of karate’s “kill with one blow” history to stress the importance of an all-out effort. To freeze the kettlebell momentarily on top of each swing to work on focusing the power is what is know as Kime. This is exactly how we do swings in our hard style RKC system.
Our “grinds” are performed like the Sanchin kata- with maximal dynamic tension. Because muscles generate force by tensing. Tension=force. The tenser your muscles are, the more strength you display and build. We teach how to get stronger by contracting your muscles harder.
Relaxation is the flip side to this performance coin. Relaxation is speed, endurance, and flexibility. Tension is strength and power. Master of relaxation is a hallmark of an elite athlete. Prof. Leonid Matveyev observed that the higher is the athlete’s level, the quicker he can relax his muscles. “The ballistic loading of the swing also created an alternating cycle of muscular tension and relaxtion,” Mark Reifkink, Master RKC. “The inability to relax the muscles creates too much tension for high speed movement. KB ballistics train this cycle into the muscles in a way no other weight tool does. THis also teaches trainees to learn to create very big forces and then really relax immediately after.” Tense-loose-tense-loose.
The RKC uses the most sophisticated “muscle software” by taking advantage of a multitude of strength increasing reflexes and neurological phenomena (aka, power breathing).
In summary, RKC is a reverse evgineered body language of the strongest athletes.

What limiting thoughts will you release?

What obsolete behaviors will you let go?

What commitment to yourself will you finally keep?

What relationship will you treasure more?

What relationship will you allow to fade away?

What dream will you believe in?

What denial will you dissolve?

What gift will you offer to yourself?

What will you stop withholding from a loved one?

What story will you change?

What inspiration will you follow?

What possibility will you consider?

What discouragement will you dismiss?

What talent will you develop?

What excuse will you stop making?

What power will you embrace?

What encouragement will you give?

What physical condition will you heal?

What will you stop settling for?

What unconscious pattern will you change?

What self-punishment will you stop?

What love will you flow?

What will you bring your very best to?

What will you celebrate?

What forgiveness will you offer?

What will you finally forget?

What will you start to remember?

What will you honor?

What will you do with this list?

Starting a new workout program or revamping an old one, can be intimidating. It requires patience, perseverance, support and time. A healthy lifestyle won’t happen over night nor will your body change after one day at the gym. It’s a matter of changing your old habits into new healthy ones, one small step at a time.
For starters, a healthy lifestyle will require sticking to a moderated, healthy diet including lean meat, fibrous carbohydrates, fresh fruits and vegetables, yet steering clear of sugar, flour and fatty foods. Good fats, as in, nuts and oils(olive and coconut) included in a balanced diet are invaluable for burning fat that the body stores for energy. Eat any starchy carbohydrates early in the day to allow the body to use them as energy and eat fibrous carbohydrates throughout the day.
You will also benefit from doing interval training for cardiovascular health instead of endurance type training. Intervals done at least two times a week will burn more fat and spare more hard earned muscle. An example of interval training would be sprinting as opposed to doing a marathon. Two totally different body types and two totally different ways of cardiovascular training.
One great step in the right direction would be to find a work-out buddy or make an appointment with a personal trainer. A work out buddy will be your cheerleader, your motivator, accountable for shoving when you need a push. A certified personal trainer, however can be a motivator but you’ll also have access to an educated opinion and educated advice backed by experience. Trainers have a fuller understanding of the human body and fitness and will be able to devise a workout plan based on your current level of fitness and your goals, as well as, provide a strong level of accountability that one of your friends may not be able to commit to.
As new habits turn into patterns, you’ll have more energy, for one thing; along with added strength, normal sleep patterns and endurance in cardiovascular activities. Your cholesterol levels will drop and so will the risk of diabetes and heart disease. Your body will be on the way to a new healthier, happier lifestyle.
If you are fully committed to your new healthy lifestyle, it takes about eight to ten weeks for your body to adjust to the added stress you will take on with exercise. This is where a healthy, balanced diet will be invaluable for recovery and combating raised stress levels.
Your muscles may get sore, but be patient; it takes longer than a few months for your body to adjust and begin to build muscle. Success will come to those who have perseverance. In the words of Eleanor Roosevelt: “ You must do the very thing you think you cannot do.”

Kettlebells for Martial Artist’s
Why strength train?
Confusion often surrounds the topic of strength training for the martial arts. There are generally two schools of thought on the subject. One school states that weight training is detrimental to martial skill acquisition because the excessive tension held in the muscles will reduce the fluidity of movement, thus robbing one’s technique of speed and power. The other school says that strength training done correctly and as a compliment to the martial skill training will increase the contractile strength of the body without sacrificing flexibility, the end result being improved speed and power.
Some weight training practices will indeed create sluggishness and a loss of tensile strength but only if the martial artist uses a body-building or train-to-failure approach. Any weight training will also diminish martial skill if it becomes the primary focus rather than a supplement to the martial arts skill training. Strength training, when the appropriate method is selected, will compliment and contribute to enhanced martial art skill, in the form of greater speed, power, flexibility and endurance.
There are many training tools available; kettlebells are the tools that offer the most to the martial artist’s strength training curriculum.
How to strength train with KBs
Of all the physical variables that the well-rounded martial artist must address when designing the right strength training program, there are 4 in particular that kbs address better than other training modes: strength/endurance, mental toughness/body hardening, martial specificity, and efficiency (economy of motion).
I a martial arts or fighting context, strength/endurance, or “enduring strength”, is the ability to fight with intensity for extended engagements. This is even more crucial than maximal strength, of the ability to deliver one very powerful blow. Maximal or limit strength is very important as well, as in knockout power, or a quick submission, but the well-rounded fighter must be prepared to deliver multiple strikes in combinations. This requires tremendous strength/endurance. KB high repetition snatches, for example, develop a strong work capacity and anaerobic threshold. This means that you learn to continue to apply power even while aerobically taxed. For the martial artist this is a very important skill. Often times it is not how strong you are when you are fresh but how strong you remain once you become winded and have expended a lot of energy that determines the outcome. Because KB lifts require full-body integration, it is a much better tool for the martial artist than doing high repetition isolation movement with a barbell or dumbbell.
Mental toughness and body hardening are listed together because they cannot be separated in the application of martial arts. One who is “mentally tough” will fold under an effective Thai kick to the lower leg, if his body is not sufficiently hardened for the impact. Likewise, the fighter with a ruggedly conditioned body will eventually waiver if he is kept in an uncompromising position, such as a lock, unless his focus is perfectly sharpened and mentally tough. KB training helps to develop the necessary psycho-physical balance that is crucial to effective martial arts. In exercises like the KB clean and snatch, wherein the KB flips around the hand, and rests on the forearm, there is body hardening occurring due to the impact of the bell on the arm. In the early stages, the bell tends to come crashing down on the forearm, even causing pain. The perseverance to proceed is an early test of one’s mental resolve. As the techniques become more refined, there is less impact on the forearm, as one learns to move the hand fluidly inside of the KB handle. Even still, the bell rests on the forearm, exerting pressure and over time increasing his density and hardness of the area. Such training as the high-repetition snatch and jerk as seen in the traditional GS of Russia is a real test of both one’s mental resolve to persevere and physical ability to accept pain. These attributes need to be embraced by the martial artist as well.
In sports science, the term ‘specificity’ refers to the adaptations to the physiological systems that occur as a result of the training program design. For the martial artist, the strength that is developed through supplementary weight training must be able to transfer into improved striking, kicking, and grappling, trapping, and throwing skills. If your fighting techniques increase in speed, power, and focus as a result of your strength training program, them your program has a high degree of specificity to your martial art skill. If you become more sluggish and start getting hit by people that couldn’t hit you before then the strength training regimen is ill-designed and non-specific.
Like in martial art technique, in KB lifting the grip, the hips (and core), and the stance are involved in every motion. The highly ballistic nature of such exercises as swing, cleans, snatches and jerks very closely mimic the type of explosive full-body integration involved in executing effective strikes, kicks, and throws.
Specificity- how to integrate KBs into a martial arts program
The concept of training specificity ties in very closely with the concept of training efficiency; you won’t have one without the other. With a strength training program that is specific to enhancing martial skills, we also develop efficiency. All martial art styles pursue an economy of motion. The prevailing quality in the movement of gifted martial artists is efficiency. This is irrespective of the style and is independent of the speed of execution. Efficient movement will remain efficient whether practiced at full speed or in slow motion. Efficiency relates to using only the energy necessary to achieve the result, nothing more. It also relates to spending only the time necessary to achieve the objective, no more. In a martial analogy, this means not using 1000lbs of force, when 4 ounces will do. If you can unbalance the opponent with only slight movement, it is more efficient than using every last bit of energy to send him off balance. When cultivating martial skill, most of one’s time should be spent on mastering the particular techniques of one’s style, not on cross-training. The strength training protocol selected should be one that allows for specific strength gains without demanding too much time away from the martial skill practice. The specific time guidelines are relative to the experience and physical attributes of the trainee, but as a rule of thumb, the strength training curriculum should not exceed 30% of the martial artist’s total training. In other words, to be efficient with his use of time, the martial artist should spend at least 70% of the total practice time on the martial art skill training and not on lifting weights.
To develop an efficient strength training regime, KBs are the ideal choice because the types of movements are similar in nature to many of the basic martial art techniques. This contributes to the economy of motion- you are not being asked to learn radically different motor patterns. Take the 2 KB “rack position”, in which 2 KBS are resting on your arms and body. This position is attained by taking a KB in each hand and cleaning them to the top position. The KBs stay in the top position fro a period of time. This 2 KB rack position is mechanically very similar to a basic guard position, as in boxing. In a fighting stance, there of course will not be KBs in your hands, and one or both hands may be extended slightly in front of the body, with one foot forward. The action of the body, however, is virtually identical: the lats are “full”, in a very strong compressed position, the shoulders are relaxed and sunken, the chest is hollow and the back is rounded, the knees have a gentle bend (springy), and the tailbone is tucked slightly under, Try this: take a fighting stance of your liking and bring the hands up I a guard position. Notice how it feels in the back/lat, abdominals and ribcage. It should feel very full, alive, and powerful, like a tiger ready to pounce. Now do the 2 KB clean and hold them in the rack position. The same sensation of fullness in the torso should be present.
The similarities in mechanics required for the martial technique and the KB technique make the 2 KB clean/rack a highly efficient choice of exercise, due to its specificity. Because you do not have to alter the body mechanics for the two movements, there is no wasted time in your strength practice. There are numerous other examples of KB drills that have a high degree of specificity, and are mechanically efficient for martial artists.
Some of the most significant characteristics of the well-rounded martial artist are strength/endurance, mental toughness/body hardening, martial specificity, and efficiency. These 4 attributes need to be addressed when supplementing martial arts practice with weight training. KBs are the tool of choice for accomplishing these objectives, and when properly integrated will increase the speed, power, endurance and movement skill of the martial artist.

Stephen Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, encourages people to “begin with the end in mind.” In other words, you don’t want to climb the ladder of success only to find that when you reach the top, the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.

I think that this is essential to success in any field, especially in functional training. Before you begin any training regimen, look at the individuals who have reached a high level in that discipline. Do you want to be like them?

Do you want shortened muscles, poor posture, and a neurological disconnect between upper and lower body? Then focus on traditional bodybuilding exercises, work out on the latest “high tech” contraption, and follow the masses.

Do you want increased range of motion and true full body strength with upper, lower and core all working together synergistically? Then grab a kettlebell!!

Kettlebell lifts are psychomotor skills. Psychomotor skills are defined as complex sequences of actions that require perceptual information (input from the eyes, for example) and control of the muscles. What does that mean? It means that as your body performs the task, it learns. It also means that in addition to muscle growth, strength increases, etc., your body also creates additional neurons (nerve cells) to collect more information about the activity so that it can be performed better in the future. The bottom line with these types of activities is that the more you do them, the better you get at doing them.

A great example of a psychomotor skill is the golf swing. Tiger Woods probably has millions of more neurons in his body that convey information about his swing than the average golfer. Why? Because, he practiced golf multiple hours per day for the last 27 years. And each time he did, more neurons were created, so that his brain could collect more information about what his body was doing. Consequently, the brain can make corrections and fine tune the activity.

The problem with the golf swing is that it has little applicability off of the golf course, So the neurons and neural connections that are formed as a result of practicing and improving your golf game are rarely used in life. That is the beauty of kettlebell training in general and the snatch lift specifically. These movements form the basis for most everyday activities. The neurons that are created by performing these tasks repetitively are used all day, every day; lifting, reaching, standing, sitting, etc. If you are training properly with kettlebells, you begin to perform all activities in your life more efficiently and safely because your brain has more control over your body and less stress is placed in you shoulders and low back. Over the course of a lifetime, this results in fewer injuries, decreased risk of osteoarthritis, and better health. Compare that to a bench press or seated leg press. The neurons created by performing those tasks are fairly useless.

So ask yourself, what wall is your ladder leaning against?

YES! A HELL YEA is more like it.

This weekend was the annual Fight Gone Bad charity workout for Wounded Warrior Project, benefiting wounded service members returning home from Afghanistan and Iraq, also Athletes for a Cure, which supports prostate cancer research. It is a wonderful cause but an awful workout. I write awful in the kindest way as I can. It is a very tough workout that never fails to kick my butt.

The workout consists of five exercises: wall ball, sumo deadlift highpull with Olympic bar, box jumps (24 in), push press with Olympic bar, row for calories. The protocol is one minute for each exercise with a running clock. One minute rest after the round is over (5min). Three rounds total. The goal is to get as many reps (calories for the rowing machine) as possible for the entire 15 minutes. Brutal. All out effort with minimal rest.

The workout was given its name by World Ultimate Fighting Champion, BJ Penn, who remarked after finishing, “that was just like a fight gone bad!” The workout was designed by Greg Glassman founder of Crossfit just for BJ Penn. The premise was to simulate what he endures in the ring.

Enter Kettlebells and the workouts we design for our “fighters”. I design workouts to make everyone stronger for their everyday life and whatever that life might throw at them. Whether it is coaching athletes, stay home moms, corporate Warrior, fighters and military, or parents that just want to play with their kids and stay young, our workouts will prepare you for anything! I am confident in this statement because people prove it to me and themselves all of the time.

An example of this “proof is in the pudding” was doing Fight Gone Bad this weekend. I will use myself as an example even though there were others there with similar results as myself but I wont speek for them. I will let them do that in a future article.

I don’t do wall ball. I don’t use the Olympic bar in any of our workouts, ex, push press or sumo deadlift high pull. I dont have a rower machine and I rarely do box jumps. One thing I can say that is similar is that we do sumo deadlift high pulls with kettlebells and we do alot of push presses with the kettlebells. Which in my opinion is WAY harder than using an Olympic bar.

Kettlebell swings are great for box jumps and wall balls. Kettlebell thrusters are WAY harder than wall balls for the simple fact that the kettlebell is usually going to be heavier than any wall ball that you might use.

Is it because I have training in powerlifting that I experience such great carryover effects? Probably. Is it because I have former training in strength training that my endurance is so good? Absolutely not! Have my former bodybuilding days prepared me mentally for the pain? Perhaps. But there is nothing that prepares you like kettlebells. I am tougher because of kettlebells. I am a complete Warrior because of kettlebells. I can do anything that I WANT physically and mentally because of kettlebells.

To be more convinced or passionate about kettlebells wasnt something that I thought I would get out of doing Fight Gone Bad for the second time in two years. But I am even more convinced that the kettlebells and the way we train and program has indead prepared me for anything.

I scored 377 at Fight Gone Bad and I fully expect todo better next year. If you would like to test yourself, come to class, set a goal outside of the gym (marathon, triathlon, mud run, City League sports, hiking a summit, Fight Gone Bad, Corporate Olympics) and go for it!

Perfect practice makes more sense. Step by step practice with the ultimate goal of perfect form is what I am after.
My goal is for all of my clients to do a perfect pistol. For the last two weeks we have been working on pistol squat remedial drills. Last week they worked on squating with feet and knees touching and going all of the way down. Then while in the bottom of the squat, lifting one leg straight out in front while continuing to balance. We just dabbled in that last week.
Today we worked on the same process but once everyone was able to balance on one foot in the bottom end of the squat they worked on pulsing up 2-3 inches. This is to develop strength in the bottom position with a result of standing all of the way up.
Sitting on one foot creates excellent balance and flexibility. But what alot of people have is flexibility but no strength to go with it. Pulsing from the bottom end is a strength flexibilty movement.
We will build on this strength as the weeks go on.
As we practiced the pistol I threw in some overhead squat practice to go along with it. More strength, more flexibility, more balance.
For a little smoker at the end—– VO2 Max for 15 rounds. 15sec/15sec.
Enjoy!

Training a Special Olympian
Robert Budd, RKC II

Down’s syndrome is a genetic abnormality caused by a defect of chromosome 21. People with Down’s syndrome have varying degrees of cognitive and developmental disabilities and suffer from a wide array of other symptoms, such as premature aging with development of Alzheimer’s disease before the age of 40, short stature and flaccid musculature, frequent infections, autoimmune disease, hypothyroidism, leukemia, heart defect, and adults with Down’s syndrome are more likely to be obese.

People with Down’s syndrome were found to have lower muscle strength and lower bone mineral density than both healthy individuals and people with mental retardation but without Down’s syndrome.

Shane Rocha is a 22 year old Special Olympian with Down’s syndrome who I train for powerlifting. We first met in October of 2006 when I volunteered myself along with my personal training gym, Bam Fitness Reno, to train Special Olympians for power lifting. I got certified to be a Special Olympics Coach by Special Olympics of Nevada and started training Shane for a Special Olympics Powerlifting competition scheduled for December of 2006.

When we first started training he had limited exposure to weightlifting and it was in the form of bodybuilding type exercises like working with nautilus machines. I had limited experience working with people with special needs besides stroke and Parkinson’s patients; it was a trial and error relationship. As we all know and as time would tell, the principles of training the body stay the same no matter who you train so training Shane was easier in a lot of ways than training most of my teen age clients.

I immediately got him deadlifting and benching [note: squatting with the bar was not allowed at the Special Olympics and is very dangerous for people with Down Syndrome to do. Setting a bar across the back of the neck puts undue pressure on a very sensitive part of their neck. This made the working with the kettlebells ideal. He took to deadlifting very quickly. He has an unbelievably strong back! Shane trained with me once a week for eight weeks and took first place in both events at the Special Olympics Powerlifting Competition. At a body weight of 96#s he bench pressed 75#s and deadlift of 120#s.

Shane's parents, Pam and Mike Black, loved the way Shane took to powerlifting and how he excelled in the sport in such a short amount of time and asked me if I would train Shane year round. [note: Special Olympics cycles events throughout the year and only allows coaches to focus on the up coming sports for practice.] I agreed and decided to enter Shane into more powerlifting competitions throughout the year through WABDL.

Once this was decided I started training Shane with a little more focus on his deadlift and bench press and limited his exposure to exercises that were not contributing to his deadlift numbers. He started training with me twice a week were we did kettlebells swings, kettlebell clean and presses, kettlebell snatches, kettlebell front squats, deadlifting with 25# plates (Shane is only 5′ tall), 150lb tire flips and pull-ups. Shane is a natural at pull-ups and has perfect form at stiff legged leg raise. I am positive this is the reason he is so good at doing deadlifts. While doing pull-ups he packs his shoulders but lifts his knees almost like doing an L-sit pull-up. This is quite a feat for anyone! He does this naturally while a lot of people with Down’s syndrome have low muscle tone and are unable to pack their shoulders correctly or at all. He naturally knows how to crease and load his hips correctly which helps him with the swing, snatch, tire flips and has a direct carryover to the deadlift. He is still learning to brace better and keep his back “longer”. He lifts as some of the Eastern European lifters do with a rounded back before the initial pull. An example would be Latvian powerlifter Konstantins Konstantinovs. I figure if it is good for Kostantins it is good for Shane.
Shane’s first WABLD meet was in Rancho Cordova, Ca. in July of 2007. Shane weighed in at an astounding 96#s! His body fat is always 6%.

Shane won his weight class, posted a Nevada State record along with qualifying for the WABLD World Championships with a deadlift of 135#s and bench press of 85#s.

The Championships were in November with barely three months to prepare so we went back to Reno and went to work. I focused his training a little more and cut his pull up volume down a little and upped his deadlift and double swings volume since he was more comfortable with a sumo style deadlift. The double ketttlebell swings got him a lot stronger in the sumo deadlift position because of the wide stance he has to take to clear the double bells between his legs. I cut back his snatching to two or three sets twice a week and had him press heavier weight at both sessions. His snatching form is good enough to be safe and effective but I thought that heavy pressing would help him more than the snatches. The heavy presses taught him how to brace with a weight over head and how to continually increase his full body tension as he grinds the weight to a lock out. Slowly lowering the weight engaged his lat which taught him how to use his lat to brace before pulling a heavy deadlift from the floor. What the snatches twice a week accomplished was to develop his explosive hip snap, add to the conditioning he needed and shoulder stability since he was still doing bench press in competition. I cut the bench press practice down to only a “practice” before the next competition. He only practiced this event two weeks before the competition.
At the WABDL World Championships in November of 2007 Shane weighed in at 95#s and lifted 85#s bench press and 155#s for the deadlift. Again Shane won his class and posted a Nevada State Record.

I continued to train Shane for the next meet in Rancho Cordova, Ca scheduled for August of 2008. His numbers were going up steadily so I didn’t change his training much. I stopped having him do front squats because it seemed like it was teaching him to squat down before he pulled his deadlift instead of loading up his hamstrings as the kettlebell swing will do. His cue before he pulled the weight was “pull the bar into your legs like a swing.”

In May of 2008 I moved to San Diego and Dustin Silveri took over Shane’s training and really minimized it to the essentials that in my opinion, was the best thing for Shane, since his numbers are climbing at an amazing rate!

Shane’s new and improved program for the approaching meet was as follows:

Week #1
Bar bell deadlift: 135×5, 155×3, 165×1
Week#2
Deadlift: 135×5, 155×3, 165×1, 170×1
Week #3
Dead lift: 135×5, 155×3, 170X1, 175×1
Week#4
Deadlift: 135×5, 155×3, 175×1, 180×1
Week#5
Deadlift: 135×5, 155×3, 175×1, 185×1 (missed the lock out)

He did snatches with the 12kg: 20right and 18left with no rest in between. They ditched the tire flipping all together as the meet got closer and focused on deadlifting. We all decided that the deadlift was the lift he enjoyed the most and decided not to do bench pressing any longer. Since my leaving Reno, Dustin didn’t have access to a pull-up bar so his training was real focused and to the point and in Shane’s garage and driveway.

In August of 2008 at the WABDL Powerlifting Championships in Rancho Cordova, Ca, Shane weighed in at 96#s and deadlifted 176#s!!!

Shane won’t be doing the WABDL Worlds this year but will be ready to go again next year.

Shane has been a dream to work with and an inspiration to me in my life. I often worked out with him and was always the one breathing hard and sweating profusely. He always looked at me with a ready look on his face as I was ready to quit. He has been an important part of my life as I hope I have been in his. I worked my hardest to make him a better athlete which isn’t a tough job since he is in amazing shape and truly capable to do anything that is thrown at him. This being all done without a word spoken from him as Shane would go mute when around anyone but his immediate family. Get him on the phone and it is a total different story! This story of Shane and I is just begining so expect more of his great feats of strength to come!!

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Robert Budd is a personal trainer in Reno, NV. He is an RKC Level II and holds the ISSA: CPT, SPN. Robert participates as a Special Olympics Powerlifting Coach for Northern Nevada. A competitive deadlifter, Robert holds the Nevada State record for Class 1 Men Single Lift Deadlift (WABDL). He is a personal trainer in Encinitas, CA. Contact him at robert@bamfitnessreno.com.

Sometimes the hardest part of working out is getting motivated to go to the gym. I too feel unmotivated to workout. It might seem hard to believe considering I sometimes workout two times a day with our Kettlebell classes. But going to a Kettlebell class for me is like second nature. I love class, whether it is teaching class or taking class and being instructed. Working out has been such a huge part of my life that I dont even think twice about getting a workout in.

On the other hand, I like to round out my training with other types of sports. Other sports including boxing(MMA style fighting), taking self defense class (Krav Maga and Haganah), riding bikes, going for a run, practicing qigong and tae kwon do or even going to the beach for a swim. I love todo all of these things (love is a little strong for defining going for a run) but getting out and doing them can be a challenge of my will and self discipline.  Sometimes sitting on the couch and getting something to eat sounds and feels so much better.

I can empathize with most people when they say they were just too tired to get to class or they just weren’t motivated to go. My thoughts on this, and this is coming from someone who has struggled with getting out and doing, is that once you get out and get going, it ALWAYS feels better.  If I am not motivated to goto a boxing class, I let the responsibility of motivating me fall on the teacher of the class.  If they don’t come through, I will think twice about going the next time.  So far, my teachers of Haganah haven’t let me down and I keep going.  As we strive todo for our clients, I expect the same when I take a class.

I personally take responsibility of being the motivator in class.  I know how hard it is sometimes to get to the gym. But then to be let down by the teacher?  That is just bad business.  We at Encinitas Kettlebells pride ourselves at being a positive influence to everyone of our clients and work our hardest to make the class fun, educational, and effective. 

I dont want motivation to be a defining factor of whether or not someone makes it to class or not. Just get there (if you need a ride, I will do what I can) and let us motivate you!  Remember the last class you took and use that energy to get you moving in the right direction.  I always have a great time with whatever I do.  I love to workout and I love doing various forms of physical activity.  Let the workout recharge your batteries.  Let the workout relieve your stress.  This is what I do and I feel like a millions bucks afterward.

Getting the mind, body and soul in better shape one day at a time.

I have owned a personal training gym for two years where I have worked and built a good base of clientele that I train with kettlebells, tire flipping, sledge hammer workouts, and a ton of body weight work. I have gone from the body building workouts that didn’t produce results to short intense full body workouts that have my clients hating, but loving the results. Not to mention the majority of my clients are women and are tough as nails since kettlebells have come into our lives. A lot of my clients run and compete in all lengths of races; everything from 5k to ultra marathons (100miles). Kettlebells have helped them all tremendously.