CHAPTER 3:
The RKC Rite of Passage

The emphasis on brute, low-rep strength differentiates the RKC system. Most S&C methodologies aimed at the military and fighters heavily lean into conditioning while deemphasizing strength. Probably because it is a lot easier to smoke somebody than to make him strong. RKC practitioners get their share of conditioning, but strength always remains a priority.

Enter “Slow Strength”

Low-rep training, so heavy that the weight barely moves, is the stepchild of the strength-and-conditioning world. Pros and amateurs alike are afraid of low-rep “slow strength” training. After all, doesn’t it slow you down? And where is the conditioning?!

Wrong. “Slow strength” happens to be one of the counterintuitive and rarely revealed secrets of Russian athletic might. It is defined as one’s ability to exert the greatest force regardless of the time it takes. The guts to grind it through. The powerlifting deadlift and the military press with a heavy kettlebell are classic displays of slow strength. Slow strength is always trained and tested with low repetitions, one to five.

“All fighters and coaches understand the importance of roadwork,” says Boston boxing coach extraordinaire Steve Baccari, RKC “They understand the importance of working the heavy bag, the hand-pads, and of course, sparring. But what is commonly overlooked, and possibly the most important piece of the strength and conditioning puzzle—is strength training. Or what Pavel refers to as slow strength. What does slow strength do for a boxer? First and foremost, when a fighter has a good strength base, it reduces his chance of injuries. Second, it makes him more resilient in the ring. Finally, strength translates into more power in his punches. After all, power is strength times speed. Most coaches over-emphasize strength endurance. Granted, this is very important, but before you can endure strength, you must first develop it.”

Slow, heavy lifts or “grinds,” done for one to five reps are one side of the RKC coin. High-rep, quick lifts are the flip side. When we train to “endure strength,” we turn everything around: the lifts are quick and the reps are high. Kettlebell swings and snatches done for 10, 100, and even more reps are unbeatable for developing championship conditioning. Countless tough hombres have been humbled by these drills. Fighters, athletes, and special operators have admitted that they were shocked to discover they had met the hardest workout of their lives. Here’s how Mike Castrogiovanni, RKC, a strong, tough-as-nails wrestler, describes his first encounter with the Russian kettlebell:

I was visiting with a friend, strength coach Mark Reifkind. He kept on ranting and raving about these things called “Kettlebells.” If Mark is ranting about something, you best sit your ass down and take notes. He said, “Look, man, if I told you I had a strength tool that will raise your heart rate over 200BPM you would want to see it, right?”

Now, I’ve known Rif for quite a while and for him to make a statement like that was pretty absurd, especially since all my kinesiology teachers and textbooks had been telling me that a man of my age should not be able to do so physiologically. After hearing Mark’s outlandish claim I decided to pay him a visit to make sure he hadn’t killed too many brain cells from all those years of powerlifting and try to bring him back to reality. So, with the intention of proving my old teacher wrong and showing him what a stud I had become, I went to his house.

We went to the garage where I viewed three cannon balls with handles resting on the floor. I thought to myself, “Cannonballs! This guy has lost his marbles.” Despite my initial resistance I became very interested as soon as Rif began to demonstrate some of the basic movements. It literally forced my mind to open; I had never seen anything like it nor had I ever been able to conceptualize such a possibility. My experience with explosive movements consisted of the O-lifts which I rarely performed for reps and when I did the reps they certainly were not fluid and continuous. At this point, my interest peaked; but I still felt the skepticism that had been implanted in my mind by the many lectures and late nights of reading. After all, I was on my way to becoming a “Kinesiologist”!

Eventually, my natural child-like curiosity forced my overgrown ego to step down and before I knew it, Mark was teaching me swing techniques, both two and one hand varieties. After Rif felt confident in my ability to perform a safe swing, he introduced the clean and the snatch. It took a little while for me to get the movements down, but eventually I did. The learning process alone elevated my heart rate and breathing. I had begun to think that he might be right and science might be wrong. For the love of God, what was I to do? My whole world was about to collapse before me, in a garage, of all places, at the hands of my old strength coach, of all people, and because of a cannon ball, of all things.

I accepted the inevitable, stood my ground and attacked the bells as if it were my last dance on earth. I remember very little of the workout itself. I know we did swings, cleans, and snatches, and that the workout lasted no more than seven minutes. I remember my heart beating so hard that I could feel it in my pelvic floor, and my heart rate elevated to 221+BPM. [Karvonen formula tables show 195 as “the maximum heart rate” for a 25-year-old.] The thing that stands out most in my mind was my prideful attempts to refrain from vomiting all over Rif’s garage and my feeble attempts to act as though I was unaffected by the workout.

Mark Reifkind, RKC, points out another reason kettlebell quick lifts are so valuable: they teach the natural athletic rhythm of tension and relaxation. A former powerlifter and powerlifting coach, Rif could not help noticing how stiff and tight Comrades who do nothing but slow, heavy grinds get.

Tension and relaxation are the two sides of the performance coin. An always-tight powerlifter can hardly move. An always-loose yoga practitioner is weak. A karate master, who moves like lightning and then freezes for a split second to put all of his mass behind the punch and then recoil with relaxed quickness like a snake’s tongue, has both. In the words of the late Okinawan karate master Chozo Nakama, this is “relaxed tension.”

Like hard-style karate punches, RKC kettlebell swings and snatches rely on a rapid-fire sequence of high tension and relaxation. “Tense-loose-tense-loose.” A killer one-two combination for the gym and the ring.

“Pavel," wrote Texas powerlifter Phil Workman, RKC. "I have been training a friend of mine using the PTP [the ultra-abbreviated routine from Power to the People! ] for the deadlift and he has made great progress (315 dead to 450 in about a year). Now he wants to do kettlebells but would like to use a PTP format. Is there any workout for the kettlebells that would be close to the PTP?”

Enter the Kettlebell focuses on doing fewer things better. I have ruthlessly reduced the number of exercises, even if they were favorites of mine. (See you later, windmill!) You will structure your training around the familiar Power to the People! foundation of one overhead press and one full-body pull. Note that this is what the RKC Program Minimum is made up of. The swing is a “big” pull, and the get-up can be classified as a static press.

An ultra-abbreviated program consisting of a pull and a press has the power to spectacularly fill most Comrades’ strength needs. For a couple of years I have been following the posts of Eddie “the Green Ghost” Kowacz on the RussianKettlebell.com forum. Eddie is a USMC and SWAT veteran, a defensive tactics instructor, and a World Martial Arts Hall of Fame Instructor of the Year.

“When my father saw my full set of KBs,” Eddie wrote me, “he knew what they were right away. He spent time in Russia during WW2 and remembers the Russian soldiers swinging them in the sub-zero cold of Kolyma. He saw me do some and was pleased by what he saw and smiled so I must thank you for that.”

This hard man’s training has been narrowly focused on military presses with two kettlebells and variations of a “big pull”: dead lifts and kettlebell swings and snatches. Details vary—for instance, Eddie might do hang snatches and swings with rubber bands attached to the kettlebells, but the essence of the Green Ghost’s training has remained the same: a big pull plus an overhead press.

Now why a pull rather than a squat? Big pulls—kettlebell swings and snatches, barbell dead lifts, Olympic pulls—will not replace squats if you are after huge legs or you compete in PL or WL. But if you are not, they rule.

Eddie “the Green Ghost” pulls rather than squats because his knees are “plastic,” as he puts it. Unlike squats, even very heavy pulls rarely irritate the knees.

Ken Shamrock of UFC fame pulls rather than squats because a fighter has no need for heavier legs. Pulls strengthen the legs and hips without overdeveloping them. Chafing is no fun. And for some comrades, for instance special operators and infantrymen, bloody thighs are simply unacceptable. I was walking in the officers’ quarters with a Marine friend who had just returned from a tour in Fallujah. We had just worked out and had our shorts on. A passing-by jarhead buddy of his joked, “Are those your legs, or are you riding a chicken?!” Fighting men ride chickens (they don’t eat them). Got a problem with that?

As Randall Strossen, PhD, put it, to a man of strength a muscular back is what big arms are to a bodybuilder. Pulls build backs.

For reasons listed in the FAQ chapter, kettlebell pulls dramatically reduce your chances of a back injury.

“Kettlebell swings work the abs well,” observed famous powerlifting coach Louie Simmons. At least in experienced lifters—who employ a heavy kettlebell, crisp technique, and forceful breathing.

Dr. Fred “Squat” Hatfield stated, “The best grip exercises are always going to be pulling at heavy weights ballistically.” Kettlebell pulls forge a vice grip.

“Coach, I just don’t get tired!” This is music to the ears of Chris Holder, RKC, strength coach for the teams at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Repetition kettlebell swings and snatches develop championship conditioning and burn fat without the dishonor of aerobics.

Easy on high-mileage knees.

Strengthen the legs and hips without overdeveloping them.

Build backs.

Dramatically reduce the odds of back injuries.

Forge a vice grip.

Develop championship conditioning and burn fat without the dishonor of aerobics.

Do not interpret the above as a statement that squats hurt your knees. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, properly done squats are great for the knees. “Does this dress make my butt look big?” a woman asks her husband. “No, honey, your butt makes your butt look big.” On the same note, Dan John has nailed the truth about squatting: “Squatting does not hurt your knees, the way YOU squat hurts your knees.”

Squat—if you are taught how to do it properly and if it is consistent with your goals. We teach the front squat at the RKC instructor certification course. But the foundation of the RKC system will always be the Big Pull.

As for presses, militaries and other overheads, they fill in the small gaps in your armor left by the pulls’ blanket bombing. It is obvious that overhead presses strengthen the shoulders, the upper back, and the arms. What is less obvious is their effect on the lats—when you press the RKC way. One of my students, Justin Qualler, RKC, accidentally worked up to a one-arm chin by focusing on pulling his kettlebell military press negatives with his lat!

“After years of dreaming—my eighth grade gym teacher said he’d pay 100 bucks to anyone who could do a one-arm pull-up—and relatively little doing, I stumbled upon, quite accidentally, the side road to the one-arm pullup,” wrote Justin in his article for RussianKettlebell.com. “You can bet that I used every tension technique that Pavel’s books talk about, including the anal lock, power breathing, ab and glute flexion, and the crush grip. Learn the techniques well. . . . The unexpected exercise that helped me on the OAP side road was the military press. . . . I was pulling hard with my lat on the negative of every rep. Actively pulling down with your lat will groove a motion strikingly similar to the OAP. . . . Remember: you must pull like hell with your lat when the weight is descending!

There’s no magic formula, but at some point you’ll feel very comfortable and strong when you are pulling the weight down. . . . It took me a few months. Then one day I tried an OAP and was surprised that I could actually pull myself up—but I couldn’t do a complete rep. Remember, I had not been training pullups at all during this time.”

A short stretch of pull-up practice and Justin bagged his OAP. Don’t hold your breath hoping to repeat Justin’s feat, but you will definitely build strong lats if you press the Party way.

As soon as you start pressing heavy, you will be pleasantly surprised at the powerful effect this drill has on your abs and obliques. “Trust me, a forty-five minute workout of Military Presses will work the abdominal muscles as well as any machine advertised on late night television,” assures Dan John, a thrower and weightlifter with a cult-like following.

Build classic torsos and strong arms.

Make the shoulders flexible and resilient.

Fortify the abs and the obliques.

Following is an ambitious yet realistic set of goals for a regular guy aspiring to be a hard guy:

The U.S. Secret Service 10-minute snatch with a 24-kilogram kettlebell—200 reps.

The clean-and-press with the kettlebell closest to half your bodyweight—1 rep with each arm.

The Secret Service snatch, explained further on in the book, will build a fighting man’s spirit and conditioning, melt the fat without the dishonor of aerobics, develop hard-driving hip power for unstoppable tackles and hard hits, and make other men take notice when you shake hands.

The heavy kettlebell press builds an upper body ready to take and dish out punishment. In some parts of Russia, pressing a two-pood is a rite of passage from boy to man. As it should be.

Here is what Comrades ladies should shoot for:

The USSS 10-minute snatch with a 12-kilogram kettlebell—200 reps.

The C&P with the kettlebell closest to a quarter of your bodyweight—1 rep with each arm.

It may take you a year, two, or more to bring your strength and conditioning up to this level; take your time. When you make these goals, your brute strength, explosive power, and conditioning will impress, you will have muscles in all the right places and no body fat to speak of. You will be strong enough to be accepted as a man among men.

The clean draws its name from the requirement to bring the weight from the ground to your shoulders in one “clean” movement. In the RKC system of training, single kettlebell cleans are not used on their own—too easy—but in a pair with presses. Except when you are learning to clean.

George “the Russian Lion” Hackenschmidt

The kettlebell clean technique is very different from the one employed by Olympic lifters. The biggest differences are not shrugging the shoulders, keeping the elbows in, and not puffing out the chest.

Note that while the clean is one of the easiest exercises one can do with a given size of kettlebell, it is one of the more difficult ones to do right—without banging your forearm or yanking your elbow. So take your time practicing, just a few reps every day rather than a lot in one shot. The cleaner your clean, the bigger your press.

TASK: CLEAN

Condition:

Pick up a kettlebell, swing it back between your legs as if for a swing, and bring it to the rack in one smooth movement. Then drop the kettlebell back between your legs and repeat the drill for reps.

The clean.

Standard:

1. All of the points that apply to the swing, minus the straight-arm requirement on the top.

2. Don’t dip your knees when racking the kettlebell.

3. The kettlebell, the elbow, and the torso must “become one” on the top of the clean. The shoulders must be pressed down.

4. The arms must stay loose, and the hips must do all the work.

5. The kettlebell must travel the shortest distance possible.

6. Unacceptable: scooping; banging the forearms; stressing the back, elbows, wrists, or shoulders. Ladies should not hit their breasts with their arms or the kettlebells for health reasons.

CLEAN MASTERY STEP #1: THE GRIP

Having studied boxing greats, Bruce Lee once commented, “There are no wrists in boxing. . . . The forearm and the fist should be used as one solid piece, like a club with a knot on the end of it. The fist should be kept on a straight line with the forearm and there should be no bending of the wrist in any direction.” Ditto with the kettlebell lifts. A limp wrist bent back is a guarantee of weakness and injuries.

There is a difference between the grip for the get-up and other slow lifts or “grinds”—and the grip for the clean and the quick lifts. The ballistics do not require you to crush the handle; you can even keep your hand open and wiggle the fingers. Just don’t let your wrist cave in.

Pick your kettlebell up with two hands. Spear one hand through the handle while holding up the ball with the other. Push deeper. Wiggle your hand around to find a comfortable spot. Keep adjusting until the handle rests on the very heel of your palm, almost sliding down onto your forearm.

Pick up the kettlebell with two hands, then let go with one.

Let go with the supporting hand and let the ball rest on the outside of your forearm. Wiggle your fingers some more to relieve the pressure on the forearm and to become “one with the kettlebell.” You should feel more weight on your forearm than on your palm.

When the kettlebell is in motion don’t grip it, just hook the handle with your fingers.

CLEAN MASTERY STEP #2: THE RACK

Senior RKC Rob Lawrence has dramatically accelerated our students’ clean mastery by proposing to study the clean in reverse: the rack, the drop, the clean proper. If your weightlifting is not up to snuff, “the rack” refers to holding a weight on your chest.

Cheat curl a kettlebell with two hands. Adjust your grip and let go with the assisting hand. Move around to find the sweet spot where you become “one with the kettlebell.”

The rack.

A girevik’s posture is the opposite of a strutting bodybuilder’s. The shoulders are stretched down, the chest is not puffed out, the shoulder blades are spread out like a fighter’s, the elbows are tightly pressed against the body (no imaginary lats, Comrade!), and the hips are slightly pushed forward. Ori Hofmekler, Israeli spec ops vet and the author of The Warrior Diet, calls this alignment “the warrior posture.”

How not to rack your cleans.

Do not support the kettlebell by shrugging your shoulder or pushing up with your arm. Relax your shoulder girdle and let the weight of the kettlebell pass directly to your rib cage, stomach, and hips. Your elbow must go as low as possible.

Wrong.

It is important to keep some tension in your glutes—pinch a coin—to protect your back. Also keep some braced tension in your abs.

Wrong.

Unlike a dumbbell, a kettlebell must be racked close to your centerline. Imagine that you are using your elbow to protect your liver or spleen from a punch. Press your arm against your ribs. An arm “disconnected” from the body punishes the shoulder.

The last point does not apply to ladies. For health reasons, it is not advisable that women apply pressure to their breasts with kettlebells, upper arms, or forearms. Which is why they must resort to a more awkward, wider position with the forearm and the kettlebell outside their breasts. Be careful not to end up in what arm-wrestlers call “the broken-arm position”—the fist heading sideways or backward while the elbow is staying in. A mental experiment should convince you that this will do the inside of your elbow no good.

Comrades ladies must finish their cleans more to the side.

Regardless of your gender, the kettlebell should fit comfortably into the “triangle” of your elbow. If it does not, the top of your forearm will experience a lot of pressure from the ball.

Once you have become one with the kettlebell, hold the rack until fatigue forces you to put the kettlebell down—with two hands, please. Keep your glutes slightly tensed, and don’t forget to breathe. Standing or walking with a kettlebell racked will force your traps to relax—it is “forced relaxation”—and help you find a comfortable rack.

Don’t proceed to the next step until your rack is perfect!

CLEAN MASTERY STEP #3: THE DROP

When the kettlebell is dropped from the rack back between the legs, it must be literally dropped with a totally loose arm. The arm must stay relaxed and straighten out completely on the bottom of the drop. The shock is then absorbed by the hips.

The drop.

Negative curling the bell invites elbow problems. Arm tension is a sign of fear. You are afraid of getting injured by the momentum of the kettlebell. But, as often is the case, fear is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Here is how to build your confidence and a relaxed drop:

Practice on a surface where you can safely throw the kettlebell. Start with the kettlebell in the rack. Push your butt back, relax your arm, and turn your thumb slightly down as if you are pouring vodka. The kettlebell will roll off your forearm.

Don’t throw the kettlebell forward; keep it as close to your body as possible!

Don’t grip the handle; hook it loosely with your fingers.

Don’t let your elbow flare; it must move toward the centerline.

Throw the kettlebell behind you between your legs—not straight down. Just like the hike pass from football. The closer your forearm is to your groin, the better. The tighter the arc, the better. Taming the arc is a very important concept in kettlebell quick lifts.

Your fist keeps turning more and more until your thumb is pointing almost straight down at the very bottom. Note that the turn of the fist must be seamless, like a kung fu block. A jerky transition is not welcomed by your elbow.

Your arm should completely—and loosely!—straighten out at the time the kettlebell is behind you. Now you should look like a witch riding a broomstick—your forearm. Your weight must be on your heels, and you must look straight ahead. You should feel your hips loading but not your back. This is the moment to release your kettlebell. Yes, just let it rip behind you.

Don’t drop this way.

Keep practicing, and don’t attempt cleans until your drop is loose as a whip.

CLEAN MASTERY STEP #4: THE CLEAN PROPER

When you have achieved a relaxed drop, don’t release the kettlebell on the bottom of the drop, but snap your hips and let the kettlebell come up, retracing its drop trajectory.

As simple as that. If you give it any more thought, you are likely to make a series of mistakes: pulling with the arm rather than the hips, banging your forearm, and so on. Just retrace the drop.

Spear your hand through the handle as the bell is coming home, to make sure the weight will rest as low on your palm as possible.

Let the kettlebell roll around your forearm rather than flip over your fist.

The clean.

Senior RKC Mike Mahler compares the final stage of the clean to an uppercut: “Focus on getting your hand around the bell rather than letting the bell flip over and smack you. As the bell passes waist level, imagine that you are doing an uppercut and get your hand around the bell. Make a fist at the top to get the bell in line with you.”

Catch the kettlebell as low as possible; it helps to visualize that you are cleaning to your waist rather than your shoulder.

Tense your glutes and brace your abs—don’t suck them in, but wall them up as you would for a punch—to absorb the impact. Don’t rebend your knees.

“Focus on getting your hand around the bell rather than letting the bell flip over and smack you. As the bell passes waist level, imagine that you are doing an uppercut and get your hand around the bell. Make a fist at the top to get the bell in line with you.”

Not clean.

Not clean.

As with the squat, the wall will help you with your clean technique. Do a few cleans with the side of your foot, on the working side, touching or almost touching a wall. This will force you not to clean to the “broken-arm position.” Keep your other hand up to block the kettlebell should it bounce off the wall!

The wall will force you to tame the arc.

Likewise, facing the wall and cleaning will teach you to tame the arc. Keep your guard up!

You must realize now that the clean, although a basic move, is not so simple to master. I will say it again: take your time with it and never make many attempts per session. It is boring, but tell someone who cares.

Eugene Sandow displays the definitive classic torso.

It is no coincidence that since overhead presses have fallen out of favor, manly Farnese Hercules torsos with powerful shoulders and midsections have given way to small, feminine waists and large pecs. What a shame, because if you work your overhead presses hard, you will hardly need to do anything else for your upper body.

TASK: CLEAN AND MILITARY PRESS

Condition:

Clean a kettlebell and press it strictly overhead to lockout.

Standard:

1. Pause motionless, with the kettlebell racked long enough to make sure you will not be using the momentum generated by the clean, for the press.

2. Press with your knees locked and with a minimal back and/or side bend.

3. Keep your whole body tight, especially the midsection, glutes, and quads.

4. Keep your pressing shoulder down.

5. Lock out your elbow completely and pause motionless.

Caution: The following high-tension and power-breathing techniques are not appropriate for Comrades with heart problems or high blood pressure!

PRESS MASTERY STEP #1: THE LOADED CLEAN

Your press is only as good as your clean. Watch a newbie clean and press a kettlebell. The clean will rock him off balance, almost making him stagger backward. He will then put up a shaky press, his feet and waist wiggling all over the place.

The loaded clean.

Now watch an expert do the same thing. The kettlebell pro is the indisputable master of the forces he generates. The heavy kettlebell will not push him around. Instead, the kinetic energy will do something very cool. It will not dissipate back over his shoulder but rather go straight down his body into his feet. Every muscle will tense, and his whole body will compress like a spring. After a legal pause, the stored energy will rebound explosively from the feet in a crisp display of strength as he presses the kettlebell.

An experienced girevik is playing a game of “force pool,” expertly rebounding the force generated by the clean from the ground. When—or if—you master this skill you will wield awesome pressing power.

As you rack your clean, maximally tighten your whole body on impact: your feet, your quads, your glutes, your abs, your lats. It is not just about shock absorption; bracing for the weight will make the kettlebell feel like a toy in your hand, and your muscles will be powerfully loaded for action.

According to Russian sports scientist Professor Yuri Verkhoshansky, isometrically tensing your muscles before a dynamic contraction can improve your performance by up to 20 percent! A good arm-wrestler loads all his muscles with high-strung tension before the ref yells “Go!” A great arm-wrestler will load even before he grips up with his opponent. And an amateur who waits for the referee’s command to pull before turning on his biceps finds himself pinned without knowing what has hit him. So brace yourself while the bell is still in the air, not when it hits you. Houdini could take anyone’s punch if he was prepared for it. He died after he got struck without warning.

Don’t dip your knees when racking your clean! If you have read The Russian Kettlebell Challenge, you must remember that I used to recommend dipping your knees. Not any more. I have found that gireviks who dip lose the tightness required for a heavy press. I never stop polishing my training system, which is why you will find a few inconsistencies between The Russian Kettlebell Challenge and Enter the Kettlebell! The latter book takes precedence. At the RKC we never rest.

Note that although your presses will not be at their strongest without a strong clean, you can start practicing presses before total clean mastery. Clean the kettlebell with the two-handed pistol grip, then release one hand for the press. Following the press, you may drop the kettlebell from the chest with two hands as well.

PRESS MASTERY STEP #2: PUSH YOURSELF AWAY FROM THE KETTLEBELL

To get the most out of your press while putting the least amount of stress on your shoulder, you must start the lift with your shoulder maximally pressed down—the opposite of a shrug—and your elbow pushed as low as it can go. At the same time, pull the elbow slightly inward toward your belly button. It will feel like you are stretching the “bow” of your deltoid.

Keeping that shoulder down throughout the press will make the press stronger and safer, but it is not an easy skill to develop. Here is cool drill that will help you master it and teach you to stay tight too.

Stand inside a doorway, raise both arms overhead, and place your hands on the supporting beam as if you are military pressing it. Ideally, your hands should be slightly above your head. Unless you play for the NBA, you will need a sturdy box to stand on.

Grip the ground with your toes. Flex your quads and pull up your kneecaps. Cramp your glutes. Brace your abs for a punch (don’t suck them in). Breathe shallowly throughout the exercise, but without relaxing your abs. As some karatekas say, “Breathe behind the shield.”

Pushing up is weak.

Now push up against the top of the doorway with moderate effort. Note what it feels like. Relax. After a brief rest, gather the tension in your body from your feet up, and this time, instead of pushing up, focus on pushing yourself away from the doorway down into the ground. Try to leave foot imprints in the carpet. Note that your knees must remain locked, and your back must be braced with a muscular corset.

Something curious will happen: You will feel that your tense body has compacted and gotten shorter. Your shoulders have been sucked into their sockets and feel great. And your pressing power has gone way up!

Remember this feeling of tightness and pushing yourself away when you are pressing a live weight. Greater strength and shoulder resilience will be your rewards.

Note that you must stay cool for this to work. When you doubt your strength and panic, you can’t help thinking of lifting the kettlebell instead of pushing yourself away from it. Your shoulder will come up, and the kettlebell with it. But only for a couple of inches. And then it will die. Patience and confidence are prerequisites to great strength.

Pushing yourself away is strong.

Now try the same isometric press with one arm. You will notice that you need to tense your obliques more. You will also observe that you will have to play with your body position to find a strong connection between your hand and your feet.

Scan your body for any slack areas that Steve Baccari, RKC, appropriately calls “leakages.” Plug them with tension. Wedge yourself between the top of the doorway and the floor. Locked. Rooted. Remember that feeling for your kettlebell press.

PRESS MASTERY STEP #3: THE GROOVE

Do not press the bell straight up; your delts will have no leverage. The groove of the kettlebell military press is similar to that of the Arnold press: Start with your palm in the semicurl position, and turn it forward as you press. Press the bell somewhat outward rather than straight up, and be sure to keep your forearm vertical at all times. Unlike the Arnold press, the Russian military press demands that you lock your elbow at the top.

The press groove.

Push your forearm against the ball for better leverage.

Visualize pushing outward with your elbow—sort of a “lateral raise meets the reverse pec deck”—while keeping your forearm vertical rather than angled toward your head. It is elementary mechanics, Watson: you will never press a heavy weight overhead unless you keep the forearm vertical. Consider almost overdoing it the other way: push the weight away from your body almost to the point where it falls sideways. You will recruit more muscles in the effort—even your biceps. The kettlebell’s unique design enables you to push out with your forearm against the “ball” of the kettlebell. This effectively “shortens” your forearm, improving your leverage.

Squeeze the girya as you press it, and remember to keep your wrist tight. Make sure that the bell’s handle rests on the meaty spot at the very base of your palm on the little finger side.

Keep your shoulder pressed down as much as possible throughout the press. Remember to visualize that you are pushing yourself away from the weight rather than pressing it up.

Finish the lift slow and tight, and lock out the elbow firmly. Do not even bother listening to the big sissies who tell you never to lock your joints. The joints need strengthening as much as the muscles do, and locking out is the way to do it. Flexibility is another issue. Look at the photos and observe that the hip is kicked over to the side slightly in order to get positioned straight under the bell. It is all about physics. A heavy kettlebell’s plumb line must be projected over your feet if you do not feel like toppling over.

“Heavy” is relative, of course—relative to your body weight rather than your strength. RKCs Bud Jeffries and Donnie Thompson, who weigh a good deal over 300, have no problem pressing the 106-pound Beast standing at attention. On the other hand, 170-pound Senior RKC Steve Cotter has plenty of strength to strictly press the Beast, but not enough body mass to anchor himself to do it standing ramrod straight. Newton’s fault.

Realize that displacing the hips sideways does not give you an excuse to lean back, which could be bad news for some backs. An intense ab and glute contraction will help you to avoid leaning back, no matter how heavy the weight is.

Look straight ahead when pressing. Looking up, while making your triceps and chest stronger, tempts you to lean back. Also, as Russian weight lifters used to say, pressing overhead while looking up may “bite the neck,” in other words, kink it. So save this trick until you are one bad hombre.

PRESS MASTERY STEP #4: USE THE BREATH TO MAINTAIN TENSION

You should have taken a normal breath before you even cleaned the weight. When you are pressing, hold your breath or breathe shallowly while keeping your abs hard. As Uechi-ryu karate practitioners say, “Breathe behind the shield”—a great expression to describe this type of breathing.

If you are a student of Power to the People! or The Naked Warrior, you may employ various “power breathing” techniques. The important thing about your breathing is that it does not make you lose tension! When you lose tension you are weak and vulnerable.

Save your energy when testing your C&P. Relax the arm and dip the knees when lowering the kettlebell to your chest.

PRESS MASTERY STEP #5: LOWER THE KETTLEBELL

When you test your press every month or two, you don’t have to fight the kettlebell on the way down at all. Lower it to your chest with a relaxed arm, brace your abs, tense your glutes, and dip your knees to absorb the shock. You need to save your energy for more presses.

In training you will be doing it differently: Lower the kettlebell under control, and focus on pulling your elbow down and across your body using your lats and obliques, as in a downward elbow strike or a one-arm chin. (Eventually, once you become aware of your lat, try using it when pressing the kettlebell, a subtle advanced technique.)

In training lower the kettlebell to your chest with strength and tension. Pretend that you are doing a one-arm chin.

“A golden exercise worth practicing, perfecting, and framing.”

Once the girya is in the rack, drop it and clean and press it again.

There are two ways to press for reps. One is recleaning the kettlebell before each press. We call this the “clean-and-press” (C&P). The other is cleaning the kettlebell once and then pressing it multiple times from the shoulder. We call this the “military press” (MP).

The former loads more spring into your pressing muscles, helps you stay tight, and enables you to use more weight. The latter keeps the muscle under tension longer and builds more mass. In the future, once you have great technique, you may replace C&Ps with MPs on your light day. For now, clean before each press.

Iron legend Dave Draper has praised the clean-and-press with a dumbbell as “a most significant and productive exercise,” and his comments apply doubly for the kettlebell: “This gutsy original exercise is regaining its popularity (trendy lifters find it tough) due to its systemic action; the entire body is involved in its execution resulting in the development of a network of muscle, practical strength, cardio-respiratory efficiency and functional skill. A golden exercise worth practicing, perfecting, and framing. Tough is good.”

1. Your press is only as good as your clean.

a. Make the kinetic energy of the clean go straight down to your feet.

b. Brace your full body before the impact.

c. Store the energy of the clean like a spring.

2. Stay tight.

a. Brace (don’t suck in) your abs

b. "Breathe behind the shield," while keeping your abs "braced for a punch."

c. Cramp your glutes.

d. Tense your quads and pull up your kneecaps.

e. Crush the kettlebell handle.

3. Use solid shoulder mechanics.

a. Keep your shoulder down.

b. Press and lower from the lat.

c. Don’t press the kettlebell; push yourself away from it.

d. Press in an arc rather than straight up. Push out against the body of the kettlebell with your forearm.

Fast and vicious, the one-arm snatch is the Tsar of kettlebell lifts. The Russian armed forces test the snatch instead of push-ups, and it is quickly catching on in elite U.S. units. You can find kettlebells in Iraq and Afghanistan, where they have deployed with Recon Marines, PJs, SEALs, and other SOF guys. The U.S. Secret Service Counter Assault Team tests total snatches with a 24 kg kettlebell in 10 minutes. The CAT operator may switch hands as many times as he wants; the sum of both arms is the total. 200 gets respect and the record is in the high 200s.

The snatch forges iron backs, hips, and fingers; develops outstanding cardio-respiratory endurance; and has a tremendous carryover to running, jumping, rucking, fighting, and myriad other physical endeavors. Last but not least, the high-rep kettlebell snatch builds willpower and pain tolerance. Bill Fox, RKC, has suggested that within a couple of years this test will find its way into the NFL. A whole lot more telling than repping out on the bench press.

TASK: KETTLEBELL SNATCH

Condition:

Snatch a kettlebell for repetitions with one arm and then the other.

Standard:

1. All of the points that apply to the swing, (see pages 44-45) minus the requirement to keep a straight arm.

2. Pick up the kettlebell, swing it back between your legs, and snatch it overhead in one uninterrupted motion to a straight-arm lockout.

The snatch.

At the lockout, the arm must be level with the head or behind the head.

3. Catch the kettlebell softly without banging your forearm or jarring your elbow and shoulder.

4. At the lockout, the arm must be level with the head or behind the head.

5. Maintain the fixation for a second with the arm and legs straight and the feet and body stationary.

6. Lower the kettlebell between your legs in one loose, uninterrupted motion without touching the chest or the shoulder, and snatch again.

SNATCH MASTERY STEP #1: THE HIGH PULL

Anthony Diluglio, RKC, has significantly accelerated the time it takes to teach a victim the kettlebell snatch by introducing the high pull as an intermediate drill.

Swing the kettlebell back between your legs as if you are about swing or clean it. Drive the hips through, and yank your elbow back above your shoulder. Use your upper back rather than your biceps. Visualize an elbow strike, not a curl. Powerfully synchronize the hip and back action.

The high pull.

Wrong!

On the top of the pull, the kettlebell should form an extension of your forearm rather than droop or flip up. The whole works are parallel to the deck.

Aggressively lean into the kettlebell the moment you are finishing the pull, drive your hips through, meet the kettlebell halfway. You will get a more powerful upper back contraction, you will be better balanced, and you will learn another important snatch subtlety.

Aim for making the kettlebell weightless momentarily; if you wanted to, you could release the handle and grab it again without missing a beat.

Hike pass the kettlebell back between your legs and carry on.

The high pull is not just a remedial drill but a powerful exercise in its own right. Your traps will be hurting units the day after.

SNATCH MASTERY STEP #2: THE LOCKOUT

The snatch is powered by the hips; the arm just guides the kettlebell home. You can think of the snatch as a three-stage rocket.

The most powerful stage, the first, is the hips. They drive until the kettlebell reaches your chest level.

The second stage is the muscles of your upper back that yank your shoulder back as if you are starting a lawn mower. Remember the high pull? This stage is faster than the first but less powerful.

By the time the third stage, your arm, kicks in the kettlebell must be weightless. As with launching a spacecraft, the last stage is very fast but not at all powerful. A jab, not a cross. Your arm is not supposed to lift the kettlebell but just steer it into orbit. Quickly punch up with your fist, and the kettlebell will come home.

Remember to lean into the kettlebell. Until you are flexible enough to comfortably lean against the locked-out kettlebell, you will not be good at snatches. Work those get-ups.

SNATCH MASTERY STEP #3: DON’T BANG YOUR FOREARM

Some guys pointedly smack their forearms with the kettlebell and sport bumps and bruises on their forearms to show off how tough they are. Which reminds me of a scene from one of my favorite movies, The Magnificent Seven. It was a hit in the USSR when it came out on the big screen in 1960; my father still talks about seeing it when he was at the military academy. Curiously, it kept showing in Soviet movie theatres for decades. Would you believe they showed it to my unit in the 1980s? Consider that one movie a week was all we got for entertainment. But I digress. When one of the Mexican peasants wants to hire a scarred man to protect the village, another comments that he would rather hire the man who had left him those scars. Being able to gut out a lot of clean snatches with a heavy kettlebell is a badge of toughness. Bruised forearms are not.

Conduct a mental experiment. Swing a kettlebell all the way overhead like a torch, until it is upside down. If you keep a loose grip on the handle—as you should—the kettlebell will fall on top of the forearm. You don’t want that.

Again, the secret is “taming the arc” or closing the distance between your forearm and the kettlebell as quickly as possible. Think of the snatch as a high pull followed by a snappy punch-up. When the kettlebell is reaching the lockout, don’t allow it to spin around the handle and travel a long way to hit your forearm hard. Instead, quickly punch up with the heel of your palm so the handle outruns the kettlebell and you catch the latter softly with your forearm rather than allowing it to hit you. Punch up sooner than you think you should—at head level. Spear your hand through the handle as if putting on a glove. Spin your hand around the kettlebell rather than the other way around. You might find that the kettlebell does not go straight over your fist but rolls around your forearm. Either way is fine, as is anything in between. Develop your own style.

Bad news, Comrade!

Pull back and punch up.

Like cracking a whip!

Don’t do many snatches until you have mastered the soft catch. Practice a few every day, and get your conditioning from swings and other drills.

SNATCH MASTERY STEP #4: DON’T STRAIN YOUR SHOULDER OR ELBOW

Not pulling with your biceps will go a long way. So will sucking your shoulder into its socket and locking the elbow the instant before the lockout. Otherwise your elbow and shoulder will get jarred every rep.

Revisit this imagery from the get-up: a “power source” in the locked elbow. It sends “energy” up the forearm and down into the shoulder. Simultaneously, the arm is “growing longer” toward the kettlebell and pressing hard into the shoulder socket. This is exactly what you should do at the moment the kettlebell is about to come in for a soft landing in the snatch.

Relax your arm once it has sunk into the shoulder. Open your fingers and even wiggle them to get some blood flowing, and down you go. Just don’t let your wrist cave in.

SNATCH MASTERY STEP #5: THE DROP

The drop is no joking matter. Doing it right sets you up for another great rep; doing it wrong can get ugly for the elbow or the back.

The drop.

Remember to tame the arc.

There is nothing new for you here. Hips first. Hinge and hike pass the kettlebell behind you with a straight arm. Drop it close to your body. It is too risky to practice this in front of a wall, but imagining a wall will do you good. Finish on your heels.

You may swing your free hand back sharply in sync with the falling kettlebell. If you do, swing the arm up into the “guard” position on the way up. (The same technique may be used in one-arm swings.)

THE USSS COUNTER ASSAULT TEAM 10-MINUTE SNATCH TEST

Albert Einstein once said that “everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.” We have come to view kettlebell training in this way. I’ve always loved the simplicity of the training . . . one man, one bell (sometimes two) and a field of green grass. However, while simple, I also feel that the training can be incredibly difficult, in fact, sinister would be a better description. The history of our ten-minute snatch test comes from this philosophy. We do not need incredible amounts of gear or elaborate venues, just one bell, one man and a lot of green grass.

When we developed the test, we were actually looking for something that would push the operators past their physical pain threshold while forcing them to maintain their situational awareness. In our opinion, kettlebell snatches were the perfect fit, as they tested the strength, anaerobic conditioning and intestinal fortitude that every special operator must possess. It’s a well-known fact that it’s most difficult to concentrate when we are extremely exhausted. Therefore, it becomes vitally important to remain focused on the small details (i.e. sink the hips, breathe through the nose, powerfully thrust the hips, stabilize the spine, stabilize the shoulder) while we are performing this test or the results could be catastrophic. We originally believed that snatches for five minutes would do the trick, but quickly realized that this wasn’t going to be enough. When an operator performs this test, we find that many look fairly comfortable at the five-minute mark. It is at this point that we tell them not to worry, as they will quickly get over it. At approximately seven minutes, the looks of extreme horror begin to come over their faces and we let them know that it will only hurt up until this point, and then it really doesn’t get any worse. At nine minutes, it is no longer about who’s bigger or stronger, but rather about who has the most guts. At ten minutes, we have the buckets ready!

The test has been a real success and we have not had an injury to date. In addition to all operators regardless of their size using the same 24 kg kettlebell, all that is required are boots, BDU’s and a stopwatch. Oh, and I almost forgot, remember to bring the bucket!

Name withheld

United States Secret Service

Counter Assault Team Instructor

1. Hips first.

a. On the way down, crease through the hinges and pull with the hip flexors.

b. On the way up, drive your hips through without letting your knees scoop forward.

2. Tame the arc.

a. On the way down, use the "hike-pass maneuver."

b. On the way up, use the "lawn mower maneuver."

c. Snatches and high pulls only: lean into the kettlebell at the top.

d. Cleans only: pretend that you are cleaning to your waist rather than to your shoulder.

3. Power breathe.

a. Sharply breathe into your stomach through the nose on the way down, when the kettlebell is about to hit its lowest point.

b. Partially exhale with a sharp grunt on the top.

c. "Breathe behind the shield"—keep your abs braced for a punch—whenever your spine is vulnerable

4. Stay loose.

a. Keep your arm loose.

b. Hook the handle rather than gripping it.

5. Use solid shoulder mechanics (snatches only).

a. Retract the shoulder when the elbow is about to lock out.

b. Lock the elbow out completely.