Master of Sport in 16 months!!!

I first met Scott Tighe in the early spring of 2010, he had taken the World Kettlebell fitness trainer certification with me. I heard from Scott about a month later, he told me that he wanted to try to make rank and told me that he was interested in competing. We met that weekend to work on the specific demands of using double kettlebells. We also went over how to make rank with the WKC. He made his rank video with the 16kg in biathlon... At the time he was in the 75kg weight class, so he needs 58 jerks and 55/55 snatches. He made rank 3 witht he 16kgs so that meant he could compete with the 20kgs bells...

In May of 2010 we went to a small local competiton where he lifted the 20kgs and made rank 2 in biathlon... it was at this competition that Scott got infected with the GS virus!! I started formally coaching him after the meet.

The training that we used was strictly based on the method of training that I had learned from my coach Valery Fedorenko. Scott trained 5 days per week, one set of jerks and one set of snatches every day for 5 days in a row. For assistance exercises he did one arm jerks and one arm swings... His jerks sets were between 5 to 7 minutes and his snatch sets were 6 to 8 minutes. We made sure to put quality first, volume second and load third. So basically what that means is we kept in close contact and talked daily about how he was feeling and adjusted the load based on how he was feeling that day.

With this simple program Scott made rank 1 in biathlon at the Red Barn Meet completing 83 jerks and 123 snatches with 24kg bells. (one month from his first competition with the 20kg) Scott was now working mostly with the 24kgs for the lions share of his workouts but we still kept the 16kgs and the 20kg bells in the mix... As we started to transition into the 28kg bells, progress started to slow and the big gains stopped coming... He always moved forward but this is where is usually gets sticky with male lifters... you find out who you are when you pick up the 28kgs...

The next event we had on tap was the WKC Worlds in Chicago in August... Scott was hitting his snatch number for CMS without too much trouble, but jerks were another story... Ayway in that competition Scott managed to make his jerks, but on snatches he got to 54 reps on his first hand and then lost the bell... He learned a big lesson that day... Things are different on competition day!!!

After a competition, Scott has a hard time taking things easy... I usually just have him do a "fun" training block.. For example maybe do some strongsport/ fitness protocol stuff, or long sets... anything to have fun and stay active but without any pressure on numbers... 

The Next event for us was the Denisov sports camp at the Ice Chamber. Scott had been training the same with the the 28 a couple days a week and lighter bells the rest of the time. Scott made CMS rank in front of Ivan and Fedorenko! He Did 58 jerks and 55/55 snatches with the 28kg bells.

The next meet was the WKC Long Cycle meet in the spring of this year. Scott switched over to long cycle for a couple of weeks and make rank 1 with the 24kgs with 60 reps. He also competed in strong sport long cycle with the 32kg its a 4 minute event he did 25 reps per side!

In June we drove down the the IKFF/IKSFA meet in NYC, Scott lifted the 32kgs for the first time in a real competition. He did 53 jerk and 45/50 snatch.

September was the IUKL meet in NY . He was the only American to compete with the 32kgs! The whole Russian National team was in the United States for this competition! The best of the best!! Anyway, he went 10 minutes in the jerk completing 61 jerks and 94 snatches.

The Beast of the East IKFF meet was in October.. Scott did 54 jerks and 92 snatches with the 32kgs... this meet was just another chance for Scotty to get used to being on the platform with the 32kg before he took a serious swing at officially making Master of Sport in Chicago.

World Kettlebell Championships 10/20/2001 Scott Tighe makes master of sport with Ivan Denisov as his judge! He competed in the 70kg weight class and he did 55 jerks and 50/50 snatches to become only the second North American to Achieve this very difficult goal..

Scott is now training Long cycle and again his progress is amazing! We continue to stay with the basic framework that Valery Fedorenko laid out. I know that there are critics of this system but I am not one of them and neither is Scott!

 Oh and if you want to see Videos of any of these sets, you can find them on my youtube channel.... cduffa

Nice Write up from Charlie Fornelli...

Charlie Fornelli
I think one of the biggest obstacles to many of us truly achieving our goals is our own inflated sense of pride or ability. Basically we feel we are above the basics because we have already achieved some success in another form, thus we skip those early steps which give us the foundation to build upon and truly achieve the success we desire. I will qualify this in kettlebell sport lifting.

What I mean by this is that because we have been lifting kettlebells for a while, or have a high level of strength and conditioning we feel that we should be able to start half way through the process. I know I was definitely afflicted with this mindset when I first got in to sport lifting, and I see many others are the same. I could not figure out why I could bang through the RKC Secrect Service Snatch Test and Viking Warrior conditioning programs and yet could not even come close making a 10 minute single switch sport set with the a 24 kg bell. I could do 5 x 5 clean and press sets, with little to no rest breaks, till the cows come home but could not last more than a couple minutes of double jerks without turning in to a whining baby.

Only about 18 months ago I had almost quit kettlebell sport before I even started because of this. What I realized at that point was that while I had been lifting kettlebells for years and had a pretty high level of conditioning I had never truly developed my technique to be able to handle the grueling sets involved in kettlebell sport training. I had to start over from the beginning, which meant developing all the aspects of my technique. What you realize training this way is that you have to remove as many flaws as possible as these, usually only small details in a 30 second set become massive in a longer set. Back to lighter bells with a focus on proper positioning, breathing and good lockouts/fixation.

The second part of this follows with my last comment above. Lighter bells. I see so many people lifting bells well beyond their capabilities. I would say in genera,l men much more so than women have this need to lift the heavier bells, though this does seem to be changing to some extent with the inclusion of hard wrist-guards. Here is where pride has gotten in the way of success for many. I know that my working through the ranks slowly and progressively is what has allowed me to remain relatively injury free and also to truly develop my technique as needed for each heavier bell. At the end of March I received word from the WKC that I had officially made Rank 1 at Long Cycle with the 24 kg. kettlebells; I made 70+ reps. I then decided that I was going to do a baseline test with the 28 kg bells in Long Cycle. I proceeded to get the piss beat out of me before stopping at ~7.5 minutes and making I think 35 reps. What I learned from that set was I was not ready for the 28 kg bells. Not just that my fitness was not there but I was just not ready. I was not mentally or physically prepared to deal with those bells. I see this but to a much greater extent in many kettlebell lifters. They make some decent progress with the 16 kg and 20 kg bells and then they immediately decide to jump to the 24 kg bells. Almost all of these individuals proceed to struggle lifting these bells because they are not prepared for them. In sport competition this is plain to see because they are the ones who fail to last even close to the full timed set length. I have talked to or read blogs from these individuals and their take on why they chose to lift a heavier bell or why they did not make the reps they had hoped. In general the most frequent response or comment is to a desire to challenge themselves. I find this very interesting as a response because is it really a challenge if you are not even close to meeting the desired goal (10 minutes) or continually fail to meet their own goal (a certain rep count). In my honest opinion I would much rather see a lifter make 100+ reps LC with really high quality at 16 kg then 20-30 reps at less than 5 minutes at 24 kg. I follow kettlebell lifting and sport competition pretty closely and have seen lifters suffering from the same faults each time they lift and this leads to inconsistent results and in some cases their numbers/performance have remained the same or even decreased in spite of their training.

For women I think it is easier to progress towards the upper ranks, Rank 1 and up, without having ideal quality because it is more about speed than strength, as it is is more so for men. However, once they hit the 16 kg and above this seems to be where a lot of women struggle, though some for different reasons. Reason one is the load on the body. Often time the increased weight of the kettlebell resting on the wrist leads to inflammation and the increased load of the overhead lockout leads to increased stiffness and in some cases spasms. With the focus more on speed for women there is much more opportunity for issues to arise if the weight lifted is truly above their ability, technique(movement/positioning) and strength as they have to lift faster which limits their ability to focus on each lift. This will also increase the risk of injury in the lifter. For the stronger women they are able to progress even quicker but often times this leads to a decrease in the quality of the lift. Many of these women end up performing what is a glorified push press. The previous level of strength allows them to complete the lift without having to focus on the second dip, a requirement of the Jerk lift. This in general is merely a lack of focus on the quality of the lift, weak second dip and no fixation overhead. The weak second dip takes away from the explosiveness of the lift and decreases the overhead mobility and fixation aspect of the jerk. It is the fixation and full lockout of the lift which helps to develop joint strength and active(functional) flexibility.

Kettlebell sport takes patience, toughness and commitment. When we focus on solely on the ranks we often miss out on the true benefits of the kettlebell lifting; improved health, mental well being/self-efficacy, and physical performance.

*I wanted to make a quick note on how my comfort has changed lifting the various kettlebells. When I first started lifting I was not truly comfortable lifting any kettlebell but could tough my way through it. With time and consistent effort I improved to the point where I was truly comfortable lifting the 20 kg kettlebells. It felt great, I felt strong and explosive with these bells. The 24 kg bells wore me out. After only a few reps I would slow down and begin to feel like I was fighting the bells. About 3 months ago I was training and I realized that I had than strong and explosive feeling with the 24's. This really gave me confidence that I was making real progress and not just getting better at dealing with the suffering of a sport set. I have yet to feel that way about the 28 kg bells even though I have lifted them in competition making 81 and 77 reps (jerks not Long cycle) in 10 minutes. For this reason I know I am not ready to be lifting the 32 kg bells. I know that with time and continued focus on progressive improvement I will get to that point with them as well.

I know I did not mention much about injury prevention for men. There is definitely risk for injury for male lifters who have not properly developed the technique for kettlebell lifting. As the weights increase so increases the risk for injury when technique takes a back seat to expedited progress. This also arises when we look event's like strongsport. I have dealt with some issues as a result of this. I have the ability to lift the 48 kg bell but I have dealt with wrist/forearm inflammation and also back spasms as a result of poor positioning over head and an insufficient bump from the legs and weak/slow second dip.

Black Friday Kettlebell Sale....

New Kettlebell Design these are the Kettlebells to get you lifter for Christmas!!

11/22/11

tues..
16kg snatch 6 minutes 18/20 rpms 6 minutes
3 min rest
20kg snatch 6 minutes 16 rpms

20 minute row... pretty good session..

11/21/11 training

32kg cleans 6 minutes 16 rpms
3 minutes rest
36kg cleans 4 miutes 14 rpms
3 min rest
32kg oalc press 4 minutes 10 rpms
short and sweet!

11/19/11 training

Trained with the Metcalf at the Canyon Ranch out in Lenox, Ma! Totally unreal place!!
So we did some pentathlon lifts..
28kg OAJ 16/18 rpms 6 minutes
5 min rest
24kg 1/2 snatch 15/16 rpms 6 minutes
5 minutes rest
24kg cleans 20 rpms 6 minutes...
very nice session...

11/17 training

thursday

32kg cleans 4 min 16 rpms
3 min rest
32kg oalc press 4 min 8 rpms
3 min rest
32kg oaj 4 min 18 rpms

thats it for today..

11/16 training

Wens
28kg OALC 6 min 10 rpms one switch
1 min rest
28kg OALC 4 min 10 rpms
3 min rest
26kg OALC press 6 min 9 rpms switch on the minutes

swings  16kg 20/20
              20kg 20/20
              24kg 20/20
              26kg 20/20
              28kg 20/20
              32kg 20/20    good time...

11/15 training..

No training yesterday... got home really late...
today...
Today I felt like skipping the whole thing altogether, but I put my stuff on and went into my KB room... I ended up doing this..
28kg OALC 4 minutes 8 rpms
1 min rest
28kg OALC 4 minutes 8 rpms
1 min rest
28kg OALC 4 minutes 8 rpms

then I rowed 20 minutes  
better than nothing!!

New World Record * Fedor Fuglev * Kettlebell Snatch 32 kg - 220 reps !!...

11/10 training

I have been slacking on the bells this week... I did row 30 minutes 2 times this week...

today went like this..

2x16 jerk 2 min 16 rpms

1 min rest

2x20 jerk 2 min 16 rpms

1 min rest

2x24 jerk 2 min 12 rpms

1 min rest

2x26 jerk 2 min 10 rpm

1 min rest

2x28 jerk 2 min 10 rpms   

10 min rest

16kg snatch 100/100 10 minutes   

Pentathlon day..

So today I met up with Scott Tighe to try the WKC Pentathlon.... We didnt really plan that well, after we met up we realized that we should lift at the same time and we only only brought 1 bell of each size.. so here what happened..

Scott
cleans 32kg 120 reps                 X 4.0 = 480
long cycle press 26kg 60 reps    X 3.25= 195
One arm jerk 32kg 120 reps       X 4.0 = 480
1/2 snatch 28kg 108 reps           X 3.5 = 378
Push Press 28kg 120                  X 3.5 = 420
                                                              1,953. total score

Me
cleans 28kg 120 reps                  X 3.5= 420
long cycle press 24kg 60 reps    X  3.0=180
One arm Jerk 28kg 120 reps      X 3.5= 420
1/2 Snatch 24kg 84 reps             X 3.0= 252  
Push Press 28kg 120 reps           X 3.5= 420
                                                              1,692  
this was no Joke! I think I can try some heavier bells next time, I just wanted a baseline number... here it is!!
                                                             

11/3 back to reality!!

In Chicago I did he 28kg bells, I did 80 jerks and 53/46 snatches.. enough to take second place to WIll Metcalf... I was very happy that one of us Won..
Back to training
tues I rowed for 30 minutes  and called it a day...
thursday
I did like a modified fitness protocol/ pentathlon thing... Just wanted to get a bell back in my hands...
24kg OALC-press 6 minutes 10 rpms switch every minute
1 minute rest
24kg press 6 minutes 14 rpms switch on the minute
2 min rest
24kg cleans 16 rpms 6 min switch on the minute....
thats it for now...

Ivan Denisov 1/2 snatch pentathlon

Ivan Denisov 36kg Push Press

WKC Pentathlon Ivan Denisov Long cycle press 36kg

Ivan Denisov One Arm Jerk 48kg 6 min 20 rpms

Ivan Denisov 48kg Cleans 20 rpms

WKC Worlds Chicago Chris Duffey 2x28 jerk set 80 reps

Scott Tighe Master of Sport part 1- 2x32 jerks 55 reps