Amendment to Plan

My December plan is spurred by a conversation with another RKC last week. How did I get strength PR, what did I do? After I "mined" my log book, I noticed that I did two during the spring that I haven't done this fall. 1. Turkish Get Up (TGU) and 2. Jerks.

Both the jerk and TGU have value to most athletes. The jerk is a full body power explosive exercise. The TGU is a full body grind that allows the body to build stability and link the upper body and lower body together into one unit. TGU is also valuable for rehab; either as a whole exercise or broken down into smaller movements. Of course, this is only a summary of the benefits of these exercises.

In the previous post I mentioned a plan outline. Based on results from the spring, I hypothesize performing TGU and Jerk will lead to PR in military press (MP). During the next 4-6 weeks, I need to continue some MP each week as maintenance. At the same time I need to perform both light TGU to groove the movement and heavy TGU to build stability under load. It's been suggested by Pavel and others that working TGU 1 kettbell higher than weight you are working towards.

Rough Outline for December

3 or 4 days/week - easy
a) Practice a set of core RKC lifts as part of warm up. TGU is base of this.
b) Pull up
c) Snatch
d) Jerk
e) Bike / Run

New Favorite Practice (exercise)

I think I've found a new favorite exercise. It is part of the turkish get up. I know the value of the get up but don't practice it enough. Next to the swing, it packs the most bang for the buck. I'm most certain like most people, you don't practice get ups much either. EH, they are hard and sorta suck.

My preparation work includes a portion of the get up. I'm finding that I am starting to enjoy. I was nearly embarrassed when Brett Jones asked me to do a get up a few weeks back. Because I was there to fix movement issues, every second of the exercise was critiqued...perhaps more so than the RKC. "Watch your ear, your knee moved..."

The get up told Brett exactly where I was weak. Not that he needed it, we'd already determined all the weakness. What am I working on and how can it benefit you?

I am working the get up only to the elbow. That's it. Simple right? Maybe not. Try it.

GET UP to ELBOW: (left)
Roll to the side and grip bell.
Press to pistol grip. Left arm up, left knee up.
The right arm should be in a comfortable spot,
Lift your palm off the ground. Keep your elbow down.
Raise up to elbow.

Trouble:
Don't move your raised knee inboard.
Keep left shoulder packed...shoulder away from ear.
Right shoulder away from ear too!
Expand rib cage...stretch the T Spine and open yourself up...feels good eh.

Lower your self back down slowly...

Begin with a lighter weight than you press and perform them perfectly for sets of 3-5.
Move up weight when you feel comfortable. You will progress quickly.

If you like and want/need more...check out KALOS STENOS at Dragon Door