Man, tonight was my night! I reattemped Newport again. The rain was coming, so I worked out in the garage tonight. I think that being out of the sun had something to do with it. Anyway, I made it through the entire workout, INCLUDING the 5-minute snatch test (a first for me!). I used my new 8kg Lifeline KB for most of the workout. I took some short breaks during a few of the rounds, but for the most part, I followed along pretty well. The most significant break was during the Punch Matrix/plank round; I skipped the middle set of the combo and did not go back to repeat it. I did bump up the weight on the swing (12kg)/hot potato (8kg) round, snatch (12 kg)/oh lunge (8kg), and the h2h clean (12kg)/dragon lunge round. For the snatch test, I backed down to the 8kg. I was dripping sweat (of course), and I got a great conditioning workout tonight.
I went back and did some interesting analysis as I wrote this post. I was curious as to how many times I've really done Newport & Providence, especially since I felt I was the best conditioned when I trained in the summer of 2006. Interestingly enough, the answer is not that much! I've only done Newport a total of 8 times from June 2006 until the present; 11 times for Providence. Granted, I was doing KB work about 2x/week (either via a DVD workout or something on my own), working with my trainer 3x/week to get ready for a show, and dieting clean, but this is still quite interesting. My theory is that if I increase the frequency of my KB workouts to 5x/week and keep a clean diet, imagine what the result will be! I think I will try that experiment in my off-season, starting in November, with some extra cardio and stretching added in. The proof is in the pudding - kettlebell training is remarkably effective for me. If I increase my training frequency and practice more regularly, it will propel me to incredible levels of fitness, conditioning, and body composition.
Reflect, train hard, and ROCK ON! (Gosh, I'm glad that I keep detailed training journals. I have all of my workouts dated back to 2002 written down. I picked up the habit of workout journaling in college when I first learned weight lifting. Now they've invented blogging and I'm hooked :-) ).
BTW - I really liked the feel of the Lifeline kettlebell. It was similiar in construction to Dragon Door & Ader. The handles weren't as slick as either DD or Ader. I liked the size of the "bulb" of the bell, as well as the thickness and feel of the handle overall. Not to mention, I thought the 8kg was so adorable :-) Almost makes me feel like a wimp for using it as my primary tool on Newport - LOL! Seriously, Newport is meant to be executed with a lighter KB, but I would still like to graduate to doing that workout with a 12kg one day.
7 comments:
Wow i'm impressed! Hey, where did you purchase your kettlebells? My husband is partially sponsored by http://www.prowriststraps.com/ and they have kettlebells on their website. We place the order there and he emailed back that they are currently out of stock. I'm not sure if there is a better deal, we were going to be getting 6 kettlebells for 230 bucks. I thought that was a good. Oh, by the way, your home gym is awesome! I love it.
Hi Stephanie, It's great hearing from you! While the price for the KBs is a good one, just recognize that people either hate or love those handles. Also, the finish on those particular bells looks pretty slick (can be fixed though); just keep that in mind as you make your decision. Are you able to try before you buy? Price is only part of the equation, and you want to find a bell that you feel comfortable using. In a post a couple of days ago, I wrote my thoughts/experiences with different KB brands. Feel free to read and use for whatever it's worth. I really like Dragon Door, Ader, and Lifeline. I didn't care for the Perform Better bells quite as much. Again, that's just based on my personal experience. As far as purchasing, I've purchased from eBay, dragondoor.com, kettlebellinc.com, performbetter.com, power-systems.com, and lifelineusa.com.
Good luck, and let me know if you have any more questions!
Take care.
BTW - I plan to post some updated pictures of my home gym. It's evolved much more now :-)
Anthony,
I'm so proud of you for conquering that sucka as well! I thought of you while I was doing the workout and couldn't imagine how you're able to do it with such heavy weight! Moving up in weight will be my next step. You do know there's a harder version of Newport, right? I own it. Anthony remade the original version b/c Pavel said it was too hard, and he released the version that you have. The original version has 1 minute ab drills added to every round, before the 1 min rest. Let me know if you ever want to borrow it.
Keep rockin' brother!
NK
Anthony,
one more thing - thanks for the tip on the matrix. I'll give it a try when I take on Newport again on Thursday. I plan to do Newport 2 more times mixing the 8kg and 12kg and then do it exclusively with the 12kg. Since I'm getting ready for a show, I can't go much heavier than that right now (and I don't think I could do Newport with the 16kg anyway). I love that workout, though. I'll try Firepower this weekend too.
Keep in touch, and let me know when you'll be in town!
--NK
THATS THE VERSION I HAVE! HAHAHAHHAHAHAH! The min ab rounds are before the break. Its like a 3 sec pause to "hit the deck for abs".
that makes me feel better.
COOL! I remember that Anthony stopped selling the version with the abs appended. AWESOME!
by about hte second time around on hte punch matrix my shoulders start to burn and by the end of that 2nd time at it theey give out and have to only do about 10 seconds on the last time.
i think its unavoidable until you build up the endurance in your shoulders.
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