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KETTLE BELLS IN OUR SCHOOLS

KETTLEBELL COMPETITION 2005

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Trinity School Kettlebell Training Investigation

Before explaining what the study involved, it is important to understand its context and why it was undertaken in the first place. I shall start, briefly, with a little bit about myself and my interest in kettlebells. I have taught Physical Education at Trinity school (a large 11 to 18 comprehensive school) for the last 12 years. Having been a gymnast in my youth and a rugby player for twenty years, I had always had an interest in strength training. When I retired from playing rugby in my early 30’s, I took up the challenge of powerlifting. However, after 2 years of training and competing, I injured my shoulder and stopped training. Although my shoulder healed, I only trained on a very infrequent basis thereafter. Inevitably, I lost strength and muscle mass and gained considerable body fat.
Which brings me to June 2005, when I inadvertently stumbled upon ‘kettlebell training’ on the Internet. After 3 months of training with kettlebells, I lost 36lbs in weight and regained a strong, toned physique. Following my own experience with kettlebells, I was curious to see whether I could generate interest in kettlebell training amongst sixth form students at my school. Stan Pike at ‘Intensefitness’ kindly agreed to lend me some 16kg kettlebells to carry out a small-scale study to meet this end.Initially, therefore, my aim was to stimulate interest and, possibly, persuade the school to invest in a set of kettlebells. Because of this, the study was put together very quickly and kept purposefully simplistic. It needed to be realistic within the school setting and this meant sacrificing scientific validity to a certain extent. The results, therefore, should be viewed as ‘interesting’ rather than conclusive.

Implementation

I decided on a sample size of 5 male, sixth form (16 to 18 years old) students, each involved in sports that require good ‘core strength’: 3 rugby players (Ben, Duncan and James), 1 gymnast (Nick), and 1 rower (Matthew). Each subject was required to commit to two sessions per week for six weeks. Three times per week would have been ideal, but finding two time slots in the week proved extremely difficult, three would have been impossible! Wednesday lunchtime (12.20 – 1.15) and Friday after school (3.20 – 4.30) were agreed upon and the subjects were all able to fulfil their commitment to two sessions per week for the six weeks.

Before beginning to work with the kettlebells, I needed to conduct a very basic assessment of strength/fitness levels of each of the subjects so that any improvements would be measurable at the end of the programme. Again, a simplistic approach was adopted through necessity due to logistical constraints. I decided on the following:

Bench press machine maximum lift
Shoulder press machine maximum lift
Chin ups (supinated grip, full hang, strict) maximum reps
Multi stage fitness test (cardio-vascular endurance)

Although a very simple format, the tests looked at upper body strength in terms of pushing in two planes of movement (bench and shoulder press) and a traditional body weight exercise (chin ups) in terms of pulling strength. Cardio-vascular endurance was assessed using the National Coaching Foundation’s Multi-stage fitness test. I would like to have looked at leg power via a standing vertical jump test but circumstances prevented this.

We conducted the strength tests on Wednesday 2nd November and the Multi-stage fitness test on Thursday 3rd November, both in the school lunch hour. Having completed the tests, the subjects needed to be introduced to the kettlebells and the skills they would need to develop. For this reason, the first Friday session (4th Nov) was based on familiarising themselves with the basic techniques of swings, cleans, jerks, snatches and windmills using 16kg kettlebells.

During the following weeks, training sessions were based on a circuit training format where the subjects would stay on each exercise for three minutes before changing to the next station. Using two handed swings as an example, during the first minute, they would perform 20 repetitions of the exercise and rest for the remainder of the minute. They would begin their second set of 20 repetitions as soon as the second minute started, resting for the remainder of the minute and so on.

Ben – Double kettlebell rack position

They would therefore perform three sets of each exercise in each three minute period, before moving to a new exercise. I chose this method of ‘distributed’ training so that the techniques would become ‘grooved’ in the performer’s long term memory. It also allowed me to use positive reinforcement and make corrections in technique if needed.

James – completing a snatch Nick – performing a clean

Obviously, it was important that each subject could adjust the intensity of the exercise according to individual needs. Various combinations of exercises were used during the six weeks (using 16kg kettlebells unless stated), including:Two handed swings

One handed swings
Cleans / Double KB cleans
Jerks / Double KB jerks
Clean and jerks
Snatches
Presses / Double KB presses
Windmills
Turkish get ups
Farmers walk (2 x 24kg kettlebells)
Squats (24 or 32kg kettlebell)
*Freestyle (juggling station)

As the subjects become more competent and confident with the techniques, the workouts became more intense. I was impressed with how quickly they became very proficient with the skills and started to incorporate ‘juggling’ techniques (from Jeff Martone’s H2H drills) into the sessions (this sometimes involved going outside to work on grass). The subjects chosen were extremely well motivated and I was amazed to see how quickly they took to the training.

Duncan performing a snatch

*The freestyle station involved putting together a routine involving combinations of exercises listed above along with H2H exercises and other strength exercises eg. Curls, crucifix etc.

Matthew performing figure 8’s

Results

On completion of the programme, the assessment tests were carried out in exactly the same way as the initial assessments. They were carried out on Wednesday 14th Dec and Thursday 15th Dec respectively. One of the subjects, Duncan, was absent for the multi-stage fitness test due to illness.

As I have stressed earlier, although the results certainly make interesting reading, they are not borne of ‘scientific’ procedure and the study falls short of being a ‘fair test’ on many levels. However, viewed in this context, the ‘before/after’ comparisons certainly appear to endorse the effectiveness of even such a short programme of training with the kettlebell. Below is a summary of the results in each assessment.

Bench Press results

Name	Before (kg)	After (kg)
Ben	50	55
Duncan	75 x 2reps	75 x 6reps
James	65	75
Matthew	65	70
Nick	50	55

The maximum weight on the machine used was 75kg. The plates were arranged in 5kg increments. Although it appears, from the graph, that Duncan did not make an improvement, it is because he could already lift the full stack (75kg) so he went for maximum reps instead:

Shoulder Press results

Name	Before (kg)	After (kg)
Ben	50	60
Duncan	45	50
James	40	55
Matthew	60	65
Nick	40	45

The weight stack on the shoulder press machine used went up in 5kg increments.

Pull up results

Name	Before (kg)	After (kg)
Ben	12	16
Duncan	5	7
James	9	injured
Matthew	13	15
Nick	8	10

Although it appears that James made no progress in the chin ups, he was unable to take part in the second assessment due to an injury, incurred in a fall, which prevented him from being able to perform a pull up.

Multi stage fitness test results

Name	Before (kg)	After (kg)
Ben	14	14
Duncan	12.3	absent
James	10.7	11.2
Matthew	12	12.5
Nick	10	11.1

As mentioned earlier, Duncan was absent (through illness) for this test. It can also be pointed out that Ben was not feeling in the best of health when he did the second assessment and did extremely well to reach level 14. I feel it is important to note that all of the subjects continued training for their respective sports. It is interesting to note that the gymnast (Nick), who would have placed less emphasis on aerobic training than the others, recorded the best improvement.

In Conclusion Because this is not a scientific study, in its true sense, I shall leave it up to you, the reader, to draw your own conclusions. It is interesting to note that gains were made by all subjects in all of the strength tests barring James in the pull up test, in which he was unable to take part due to an unrelated injury. Suffice to say that my goal of generating interest in kettlebell training within the school has been successful. I am also pleased to report that I have persuaded the school to invest in a set of kettlebells (6 x 11kg and 6 x 16kg) so that I can introduce kettlebell training to key stage 4 pupils (14 to 16) as well as sixth form students. I am looking forward to helping to foster and develop interest in this fantastic training medium, as well as raising my own training to a new level, in the New Year.

I would like to thank the boys, Ben, Duncan, James, Matthew and Nick for their enthusiasm and commitment throughout the seven weeks (including assessments). I would also like to thank Stan Pike of ‘Intensefitness’ for supplying me with kettlebells in good faith, as well as inspiring me with my own personal training.

Wayne Phillips December 2005.

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