In this blog, I will share my experience developing strength endurance from my perspective and reflect on how my athletes have responded. I have tried a wide range of methods, often using myself as a bit of an experiment before trying them on people I train.
The most significant take-home message: The most important thing is using a training methodology that you can recover from physically and mentally!
Extra takeaways: Your best results will come from targeting the weakest links or whatever is holding performance back. Typically, you improve your performance by practising the skill, so spend most of your time there.
What is the best shotgun method for GS strength endurance training?
In most cases, a low dosage of resistance training is the best for most people during a competition period. Ideally, we want to do the minimum work to get the desired training effect. You want a stimulus that will improve performance and allow you to recover adequately.
What does this look like?
I like to start a session with a heavier version of your competition lift for low reps (avoiding failure). Then, I will finish the session with 1-3 sets of 3-15 repetitions for general strength exercises, usually a lower body exercise, an upper body pushing exercise, and an upper body pulling exercise.
How often should these be performed?
One to three times per week, depending on the person.
What velocity should I train with?
If you’re trying to build speed, power, or strength, it’s typically best to train with the intention of moving the load as quickly as possible. However, in some cases, it’s best to work on applying the appropriate amount of force, particularly when you have a higher repetition goal, or you need to practice using just enough force (the kettlebell mindset).
Should you train to failure?
It depends. Typically, avoiding failure is better when trying to develop speed, strength, and power, or if recovery is an issue. However, if your focus is strength endurance with general exercises, this might be fine, assuming you are using an appropriate exercise. I typically prefer more isolation exercises for this type of training (i.e. not a squat). Also, if you’re trying to move up a weight category or are at the bottom end of a weight category, training to failure may help you build your muscle mass and fatigue resistance, provided you can recover sufficiently.
Should I do very high reps sets?
You can if you can recover from them (staying on message), and it does not reduce your sport training volume. Some of the training the world champions perform, such as five minutes of squats, may be useful for improving performance. However, often, the physical and mental energy required might be better spent performing a five-minute set of jerks, particularly if you have not mastered the jerk technique or cannot tolerate high volumes.
The above examples come from my experience as a coach. Below are some different methods and interesting sets I’ve tried in my training and a few comments.
I’ve used a wide range of approaches in my kettlebell sport career from light high rep to very low heavy rep and isometric contractions or a combination.
One arm deadlifts 160 kg
VF talks about doing a one-arm deadlift for testing, so I thought I’d give it a go. I was pretty happy to get to just about twice my body weight. I did this after a 24 kg biathlon competition.
Rhythm squats
My biggest influence early on was the World Kettlebell Club, and this was one of their staple strength exercises. See blog one.
100 pistol squats
I worked on this while recovering from a shoulder injury. My old coach, Sergei Rudnev, is known for doing a very high-rep pistol squat, so I thought I’d give it a try.
Isometric 240 kg hold
Isometric training is a great way to build joint angle-specific strength. Holding a barbell in this way is referred to as a yielding isometric versus pressing against an immovable bar, which is called an overcoming isometric.
Cluster combination
This is an example of when I was stronger, doing more squat-specific strength and endurance training for kettlebells in the off season. I worked up to a heavy set of 2, then a back-off set, followed by an auto-regulated set based on my heart rate.
Squat drop set – 140 kg x 2 + 110 kg x 5, 25 mins of squats with 110 kg (using HR for autoregulation)
Cluster high box squats
I would do this in combination with the above workout on different days. This was 100 kg, 10 reps every minute for 10 minutes. I thought it replicated the demands of a jerk set.
Barbell complex
It requires both skill strength and metabolic power to complete. Typically, I would do timed barbell complexes with a lighter load than in this video. I couldn’t find the best video, so I just went with this one.
Clean cluster
Performing a rep every 20 to 30 seconds allows me to get much higher volume with a heavier load. In 30 seconds, you can restore 50% of your chemical energy. This might be one of the best methods of developing both strength and strength endurance.
39 reps 100 kg!
I was inspired to see how many reps I could do after doing a course with Sergei Rachinski. We had a good chat about his squatting and records that I posted on the first blog of this series. The main thing that I remember is being disappointed that I didn’t do 40 reps and how tired my lower back was (not my legs).
Farmers walks
I enjoyed incorporating both strong man and weightlifting into my training previously. I still use the farmers walk today admittedly with lighter loads. I think the farmers walk is a great whole body exercise particularly for your grip and traps.
It has been interesting looking at some of these previous workouts that I’ve done. At the end of the day, I’m actually probably weaker than I was in many of these videos, but I have better kettlebell sports performance. Currently, I would say my flexibility, specific strength, and endurance are better. This again reinforces that if you want to improve kettlebell sport performance, you need to focus more on the bell exercises and use strength training as a supplementary exercise. In some coming blogs, I will cover fatigue and building a physical buffer, which should offer more insight into how strong is strong enough.
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