Todays Sandbag Fitness Workout

Another deceptively simple workout today.

100 Skips
20 Press Ups
5 Heavy Sandbag Bear Hug Squats

Complete 5 rounds as quickly as possible.

Men aim for a 50kg sandbag; women aim for 30kg.

Record your time.

Train hard!

Todays Sandbag Fitness Workout - Push and Pull Pairing

This is a simple and quick workout that'll test even the best conditioned athletes.

5 Pull Ups (or variation like Body Rows)
10 Sandbag Thrusters

10 rounds as fast as you can.

Men aim for a 20kg sandbag; women aim for 12.5kg.

Record your time.

Train hard!

No Gym, No Equipment, No Worries!

It's been a little while since my last post due to the holidays but we're back today with a bang!

10 Sandbag Floor Press
5 Sandbag Get Ups (each side)
200m run

Repeat for as many rounds as possible in 15 minutes.

Men should aim for a 30kg sandbag; women aim for 15kg.

Record your score.

Train hard!

Let's Talk About Butts (Butt "on" Workouts)

To lift or not to lift, that is the question.  Despite the popular sayings, "Strong is the new Skinny" or "Strong is the New Sexy," there is still a large portion of the female population that will shy away from lifting solely due to their fear of bulking up or building too much muscle.  I'm not going to tell you that heavy weights won't help build muscle and I'm not going to deny the fact that some women can build muscle easier than others.  

Let's start with the photo below.  This is a nice example of the female backside that shows two different body types.  The woman on the left falls in the category of an ectomorph, which generally means skinny, little muscle, and a very high metabolism.  She could probably eat what she wants and stay skinny.  If she committed to a butt strengthening and enhancing program, filled with exercises such as squats, deadlifts, and kettlebell swings, developing the butt on the right would still be unlikely.  Through hard work and dedication she would, however, develop stronger, firmer glutes for HER body structure.  Thus resulting in a more shapelier rear end.  The female on the right most likely falls between a mesomorph/endomorph, which tends to be a more athletic build, a somewhat more efficient metabolism, and she can put on muscle with less effort than the woman on the left.  The woman on the right has glute muscles that are developed and most likely engage in exercises such as the ones listed above.  If she switched from lifting to solely long distance running her rear would most likely get smaller, meaning she'd lose some muscle and thus gravity would probably take over.  She could literally and figuratively end up running her ass off.  She may never end up with the "pancake" butt, but she would definitely lose some of the umph in her butt. 

Anonymous

Having a strong butt has an incredible amount of benefits.  Glutes are the strongest muscle in the body.  Other than it being aesthetically pleasing to the eye, below is just a few reasons why every woman and man should work their butt "on" rather than butt off.

Photo Courtesy of Lindsey Dunn, see her amazing abs here

Strong glutes can decrease the chances of injuring your back, knees, hamstrings and groin muscles.  Back pain often results from having weak glutes.  The back often takes over on lifting objects rather than the glutes if one doesn't know how to use them properly.  Lower incidence of back pain is enough to sell me on working hard to have strong glutes.  

Athletes with strong glutes tend to be faster, more explosive and efficient.  The exercises that develop strong glutes such as swings, squats, and deadlifts will have a tremendous carry over in most activities. Between better athletic performance, injury prevention, posture improvement and a nice shape, butt exercises should be in everyones routine.

TRAIN BASED ON YOUR GENETICS

One should follow a lifting program that works best their specific body type.  When working with a wide variety of females, using the same program could have dramatically different effects on each individual.  The same thing goes for nutrition programs.  If someone genetically has larger legs, or a bigger frame, they may be in the camp of "my legs build muscle easily."  To make it easier I'd like to refer to them as "BME" for "Builds Muscle Easily."  Let's not disregard the BME females.  I have had many females come to me that were fearful of doing squats because in the past just staring at a squat rack could cause them to no longer fit in their jeans.  For the BME females, I have found that designing a lower volume leg program and tweaking their diet generally result in their jeans fitting.  Then there are the skinny legs women that lift very heavy and can't put on muscle to save their life.  They have to do so much more volume than their BME friends to even see a slight build.  Regardless of what your body type is, can we all agree that we won't wake up one morning from lifting weights and look like the body building competitor below?  If this is your goal, more power to you.  But I can promise you one thing, it won't happen on accident.

BUTT WORKOUTS

I am enclosing two simple butt emphasis workouts.

Category 1 is the pancake to power butt workout.  This is designed for the female who wants to lift and develop nice gluteal muscles.

Category 2 is for the female who tends to carry her weight in her hips and butt and is very sensitive about adding more muscle to her butt.  She wants to have a firmer rear end, but does not want it to get any "bigger."

Pancake to Power Butt (note: your butt will be sore after this)  If you are brand new I suggest you don't start with 5 sets your first time through.  Start with 2 sets at the most, then work your way up.  You should feel like you are working at 80% of your work capacity once your form and technique are solid.  Okay now time to work your butt on with this higher volume routine.

Warm up with Glute Bridges and Bird Dogs to make sure your glutes are activating nicely.


Goblet Squat 6-8 reps
Heavy Swings 12 reps

Rest for 30-45 seconds. 5 sets total

Single Leg DeadLifts  6/6  Video below!
Double Press  5  squeeze your glutes!

Rest for 30-45 seconds. 5 sets total

Heavy Farmers Walks  30 seconds
Jump Squats  10 reps

Rest for 30-45  3 sets total

Single Leg Deadlift video

Butt Strengthener without the Bulk
Go through each exercise one after the next.  Take just enough rest to recover for the next exercise.  It's okay if your heart rate is high throughout, just don't let it take away from the quality.  Choose a challenging weight that feels like you are working at 80% of your capacity.

Warm up with Glute Bridges and Bird Dogs to make sure your glutes are activating nicely. 

DeadLifts  5 reps
Burpees    5 reps
Goblet Squats       5 reps
Swings    15 reps
Reverse Lunges or TRX Air Lunge   8/8
Snatches 10/10

Rest for one minute.  Perform this for 3 sets


Add these routines in to your regimen and let me know how it goes.  I will hopefully have a few more videos I can link these exercises to over the next few months.  Enjoy!

Me

This blog post has actually taken me some time to get the courage to share.  I wrote it a month ago! I have always been very self conscious of my own butt.  This is due to being made fun of in school about not having a butt at all.  I couldn't fill a pair of jeans to save my life.  I had a tiny nothing butt and this is actually one of the reasons why I began lifting weights.  I strived to work my butt "on".  So here it is.  After years of hard work I can safely say I now have one.   This photo was actually taken today in bad lighting with my iPhone.  It's as real as it gets and kid friendly.  ;-)

  

Okay, felt I should reveal my face so you know it's me, Lauren. A bit conservative at times so this is a STRETCH for me! Guess it's too easy to just grab any butt off the web these days.  I'm thinking in my head "here goes nothing" as I hold my breath. First time in 15 yrs of fitness showing the world this side. However, it's covered up.

Good luck working your butt on!

Much Love,

Lauren

p.s.  If you need the best DVD I've created for "butts" check out The Kettlebell Body.  Download, Stream or order your hard copy DVD It includes one of everyones favorite workouts Kettlebutts�.  More butt enhancing and firming exercises can be found on our online classes designed for all levels! Learn more about Lauren's Playground here. 

New Year's Workout and Sale

I will be sending out a New Year's workout to those who subscribe to the On The Edge Fitness newsletter.  If you have not subscribed yet, it only takes a second.  Then you will get the workout we will all be doing at On The Edge Fitness on New Years day!  Perfect way to start off 2013!

Don't forget our Holiday sale. Only going on for a few more days.  25% off the ENTIRE online store. Code: holiday25

Kettlebell Swing Updated

I filmed a kettlebell swing video about 8 years ago, when I first began my journey in to kettlebells.   I shared it on YouTube a few years later.  It helped many learn the swing who didn't have access to a live instructor.  The only issue now is I don't swing like that any more nor teach it that way.  I invited Franz Snideman from Revolution Fitness, my first kettlebell coach, to help break down the "current" swing that we practice today.  Believe it or not, the swing has evolved into something more athletic, more powerful and efficient! For those of you who have access to RKC or StrongFirst Instructors, this may just be review.  For those who don't have access to an instructor and continue to learn from videos and/or books, this is a nice breakdown taught briefly in an easily digestible format.  Apply one technique at a time and watch your kettlebell swing become stronger!  Let us know how you do!

To view video directly on YouTube click here

Happy Holidays!

How Kettlebells Have Changed My Life

(To read this where I originally posted this, which has all the comments, please click here)

"What the hell is that?" I asked as I picked up a big, heavy black ball with a handle on it.  My college and gym rat friend Joel replied, "A kettlebell.  It's a gift for a friend.  It actually costs quite a bit."  I was very intrigued, but it didn't go any further than that.  Little did I know my life was about to change.  

In 2005, I was working as a personal trainer at a gym located in Oceanside, California   (I'll refrain from disclosing the name as I didn't leave on the best of terms) when they received a flyer promoting a Russian kettlebell workshop for trainers only.  Instantly it brought me back to holding that heavy black ball that I was so curious about.  The flyer hung up on the bulletin board in the back for days and I must have walked by and read it 15 times.  For some reason I was obsessed! They wanted to send a trainer from their gym to the workshop in La Jolla to then come back and share what they had learned.  I volunteered immediately so they sent me.  This was the first time that I met Franz and Yoana.  Franz ran the workshop and did an incredible job at teaching this "new" method to a bunch of conventional trainers.  Yoana demonstrated and I was extremely inspired by her strength.  That 6 hour workshop was one of the biggest eye openers of my life.  I will never ever forget my first teachers.  I went back to the gym where I was working in Oceanside so excited to share what I'd learned.  Unfortunately, the owners dismissed it entirely and I was told not to teach it in the gym.  That's when I knew it was time to move on.

I knew in my heart that learning as much as I could about Russian Kettlebells was my calling.  I spent hours researching everything that I could get my hands on.  A few months later, I flew to Minnesota for the Russian Kettlebell Challenge Certifcation (RKC) since I wanted to learn directly from Pavel, the man himself.  That weekend I was surrounded by the most cutting edge, independent thinking group.  The Senior instructors, which are now equivalent to Masters, were Mike Mahler, Brett Jones, Steve Maxwell, Andrea Du Cane, and Jeff Martone.  I will never forget how scared shitless I was throughout the weekend, but being a part of something so different and finding myself surrounded by some of the most amazing people from all over the world was an incredible experience.  People flew to Minnesota from all parts of the globe.  It was a life changing weekend.  

Since that incredible certification, I have gone on to have a successful fitness career incorporating kettlebells and its philosophies.  In 2005, kettlebell instructors were scarce and thus I was able to use my blog, videos, and DVDs to spread the word and inspire others.  It still baffles me that I have received thousands of testimonials from people of all walks of life thanking me for changing their lives.  Is there anything more satisfying than that?  Let's not forget that since then I have married, been pregnant twice, recovered from two C-sections, and am now raising two beautiful little girls.  

As we come into 2013, I wanted to sincerely thank all the people who were responsible for introducing me to kettlebells, brilliant training methods, and who helped mold me as the coach who I am today.  It really isn't just about the kettlebell.  The kettlebell is just an avenue for a different way of thinking.  It�s a mind set.  It's a way of life.  It has opened doors to so much more.  It changed my life.  I have never been stronger, leaner, and more fit than I am now.

Special thanks to Pavel for introducing his kettlebell methods along with ground breaking material.  Pavel is one of the most gifted teachers who exudes a teaching style that stands alone.  Thank you to John Du Cane, responsible for making kettlebell education so accessible and being behind the scenes of some of the most memorable events of my life.  Huge thanks to Mike Mahler, Brett Jones, Jeff Martone, Ross Enamait, Franz Snideman, and John Brookfield for leading the way from the beginning of my career.  Thank you to my colleagues who I have also learned a great deal from Max Shank, Mark Cheng, Katie Dawers, Della Whelchel, Elise Badone, really too many to name, and ALL my RKC and StrongFirst friends (family) that have grown close with me over the years.  We have watched each other blossom and continue to grow.  It's been such a wonderful road.  May you all have an incredible 2013.

Single Leg Deadlift warming up with 106lbs  (photo courtesy of F3Nutrition)