Showing posts with label practice. Show all posts
Showing posts with label practice. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Return of the Kettlebell check in: relax, look and breath
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In the clean and jerk sessions of Return of the Kettlebell (prelim overview here) there is a still point, it seems, that comes from double kettlebell sessions and this particular move that opens up a kind of Next Level of performance - or perhaps it's just me, so let me try to explain what i mean.
When i recently wrote about starting into RTK, i said it focuses the mind. I mean it. And i *really* like that. Nothing like moving two kb's at speed, and under control, and a lot, to get that this is a kind of serious business and staying fresh not squirrelly is critical.
But there's also more than that. Again, this could just be me, but because i'm now moving two bells in synchrony, my attention on what i'm doing is different from single bell work. Qualitatively. For instance, with a one arm press, i'm checking everything in single terms: feet, glutes, gut, lats etc and on into the press itself. Perfect rep; perfect form.
But with two bells - perhaps more so in the dynamic moves like the snatch and the clean & jerk, it seems, when moving the bells, the focus can't be equally on the two arms doing the press, nor does attention split to being a bit on this side and a bit on that side. For lack of a better term the effort becomes more about the movement systemically rather than the parts.
Somthing i'm finding is that there is more focus on executing the move well and diagnosis happens post rep rather than within rep. It's as if in the ladders there are opportunities for very fast diagnostics or post mortems after doing even early rungs, that can then be applied to the next rung. Again, at least for me, i find that diagnostic happening more post move than pre move with the C&J than i do with the single arm press.
The Spot on the Door.
Here's an example. Yesterday doing medium day C&J, i was noticing a real difference in feel between the second and third rungs. The last time i'd done this block i'd also found i was getting perhaps overly intrigued about my breathing - except that i knew it didn't feel right. I also generally find myself closing my eyes when i get into a groove, and usually that's fine, but it wasn't helping as it usually does.
Then something kinda bizarre happened yesterday mid set at this tranistion point between totally sweet rungs and less perfect feeling rung. I looked at a spot on the door in front of me (i practice in a hallway). All of a sudden i noticed the move came together. For one thing, i felt like i was able to slow the pace down a bit and get more power into the clean part of each rep. There was then a sort of "ah ha" about the breathing, and then the jerk just went all zen. Not that i didn't feel the work, but it was different. Neurological harmony.
Take aways from this double kb practice for me (your mileage may very) were generally:
Slow down to feel the force in the clean, luke. I don't mean that to sound like it's a physical speed thing. I don't think the bells moved slower; i was slower inside. And i think that slowness was also where the "relaxedness" of the title comes from - i'm still focusing on hip flexor drive, tight abs etc, but it's more wound up than tossed out. More focused, less effortful in the effort. Oh grr. hard to describe.
The spaces in between. Free the Joints. The other thing on the jerk part for me was finding that spot in the door. I don't know if that spot helped anchor better arthrokinetic responses - freeing up my shoulders & neck just that bit more out of neurological threat that the jerk felt both less effortful and less fatiguing - but the difference is stunning to me. That shift in gears between the 2'nd and 3'rd ladders really quieted right down.
So what these simple moments did for me is show that, while breathing is so key to getting that coordinated effort - there are other systems in me that need to sync with that breathing. And boy does head position and the use of the eyes seem to be a powerful part of that coordination. Now i thought i knew at least about head position, but the double kb's taught it in a whole new way.
I feel like i've learned something new that i don't think i would have found this quite so clearly, or had its benefits so inscribed without the double kb challenge, and this particular big kb move.
kettlebell as instrument?
This is gonna sound flakey but one of the things i like about picking up guitars at different folks' places is that i find every single instrument from the meanest to the most extravagant has a voice - something to say. It's probably so obvious to say so does this kind of gear. I think i may be starting to get why Pavel in his conversation with Geoff Neupert a month back in the kettlebell secrets calls said barbell or kettlebell - they're great but pick one and really get it. Only advanced folks like Adam T. Glass or Brett Jones would mix them up. For a moment the other day, i think i kinda got a bit of the rationale and benefit of that. It's not just about learning new moves; it's for lack of a better term, this neurological harmony. It feels great when it all locks in (better than 'the pump').
The cool thing i sense from this expertise practice - and again marial arts folks may say nice catching up there, sport - is that really getting it with this tool means transferable skills rather than just specific skills, too - i know what this locked in in my body feels like now when challenged with double weight. I can look to find that in other moves now as well, whether kicking a ball or doing a pull up. Perhaps. Yes no?
Anyway, i was surprised. And while i enjoy Enter the Kettlebell very much (here's why) and return to it often, RTK's demands and focus sharpening are very appealing right now. And the other day, i just had what feels like an unexpected bonus outcome, too, about integration and smooth power. Tomorrow's challenge will be how to carry this practice into Heavy Day C&J.
Time to Double KB?
Just to note, if you're curious about exploring double KB work, Georff Neupert, RKC maestro of strength, is doing a series on his blog of how to think about when and how best to ramp into double kettlebell work. His Blog's a great resource in general. Thoughtful.
Look forward to hearing about your experiences.
Related Posts
In the clean and jerk sessions of Return of the Kettlebell (prelim overview here) there is a still point, it seems, that comes from double kettlebell sessions and this particular move that opens up a kind of Next Level of performance - or perhaps it's just me, so let me try to explain what i mean.
When i recently wrote about starting into RTK, i said it focuses the mind. I mean it. And i *really* like that. Nothing like moving two kb's at speed, and under control, and a lot, to get that this is a kind of serious business and staying fresh not squirrelly is critical.
But there's also more than that. Again, this could just be me, but because i'm now moving two bells in synchrony, my attention on what i'm doing is different from single bell work. Qualitatively. For instance, with a one arm press, i'm checking everything in single terms: feet, glutes, gut, lats etc and on into the press itself. Perfect rep; perfect form.
But with two bells - perhaps more so in the dynamic moves like the snatch and the clean & jerk, it seems, when moving the bells, the focus can't be equally on the two arms doing the press, nor does attention split to being a bit on this side and a bit on that side. For lack of a better term the effort becomes more about the movement systemically rather than the parts.
Somthing i'm finding is that there is more focus on executing the move well and diagnosis happens post rep rather than within rep. It's as if in the ladders there are opportunities for very fast diagnostics or post mortems after doing even early rungs, that can then be applied to the next rung. Again, at least for me, i find that diagnostic happening more post move than pre move with the C&J than i do with the single arm press.
The Spot on the Door.
Here's an example. Yesterday doing medium day C&J, i was noticing a real difference in feel between the second and third rungs. The last time i'd done this block i'd also found i was getting perhaps overly intrigued about my breathing - except that i knew it didn't feel right. I also generally find myself closing my eyes when i get into a groove, and usually that's fine, but it wasn't helping as it usually does.
Then something kinda bizarre happened yesterday mid set at this tranistion point between totally sweet rungs and less perfect feeling rung. I looked at a spot on the door in front of me (i practice in a hallway). All of a sudden i noticed the move came together. For one thing, i felt like i was able to slow the pace down a bit and get more power into the clean part of each rep. There was then a sort of "ah ha" about the breathing, and then the jerk just went all zen. Not that i didn't feel the work, but it was different. Neurological harmony.
Take aways from this double kb practice for me (your mileage may very) were generally:
Slow down to feel the force in the clean, luke. I don't mean that to sound like it's a physical speed thing. I don't think the bells moved slower; i was slower inside. And i think that slowness was also where the "relaxedness" of the title comes from - i'm still focusing on hip flexor drive, tight abs etc, but it's more wound up than tossed out. More focused, less effortful in the effort. Oh grr. hard to describe.
The spaces in between. Free the Joints. The other thing on the jerk part for me was finding that spot in the door. I don't know if that spot helped anchor better arthrokinetic responses - freeing up my shoulders & neck just that bit more out of neurological threat that the jerk felt both less effortful and less fatiguing - but the difference is stunning to me. That shift in gears between the 2'nd and 3'rd ladders really quieted right down.
So what these simple moments did for me is show that, while breathing is so key to getting that coordinated effort - there are other systems in me that need to sync with that breathing. And boy does head position and the use of the eyes seem to be a powerful part of that coordination. Now i thought i knew at least about head position, but the double kb's taught it in a whole new way.
I feel like i've learned something new that i don't think i would have found this quite so clearly, or had its benefits so inscribed without the double kb challenge, and this particular big kb move.
kettlebell as instrument?
This is gonna sound flakey but one of the things i like about picking up guitars at different folks' places is that i find every single instrument from the meanest to the most extravagant has a voice - something to say. It's probably so obvious to say so does this kind of gear. I think i may be starting to get why Pavel in his conversation with Geoff Neupert a month back in the kettlebell secrets calls said barbell or kettlebell - they're great but pick one and really get it. Only advanced folks like Adam T. Glass or Brett Jones would mix them up. For a moment the other day, i think i kinda got a bit of the rationale and benefit of that. It's not just about learning new moves; it's for lack of a better term, this neurological harmony. It feels great when it all locks in (better than 'the pump').
The cool thing i sense from this expertise practice - and again marial arts folks may say nice catching up there, sport - is that really getting it with this tool means transferable skills rather than just specific skills, too - i know what this locked in in my body feels like now when challenged with double weight. I can look to find that in other moves now as well, whether kicking a ball or doing a pull up. Perhaps. Yes no?
Anyway, i was surprised. And while i enjoy Enter the Kettlebell very much (here's why) and return to it often, RTK's demands and focus sharpening are very appealing right now. And the other day, i just had what feels like an unexpected bonus outcome, too, about integration and smooth power. Tomorrow's challenge will be how to carry this practice into Heavy Day C&J.
Time to Double KB?
Just to note, if you're curious about exploring double KB work, Georff Neupert, RKC maestro of strength, is doing a series on his blog of how to think about when and how best to ramp into double kettlebell work. His Blog's a great resource in general. Thoughtful.
Look forward to hearing about your experiences.
Related Posts
- The Perfect Rep Quest - series
- kettlebell swing - about the lats - finding and firing
- better neurological form for sport - i-phase
- pull ups - from 1 to 101
- 10,000 reps of clean
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Wednesday, December 31, 2008
10 thousand hours, the Kettlebell Clean and Perfect Form for Strength - again
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Year End Clean Up
I'd like to talk about a nervana experience i just had, the last day of this year, working on my clean and press. As some of you know, i've been trying to improve the strength of my press by following a version of Kenneth Jay's beast pressing protocol. I've celebrated the effect of volume on form, and how that translates to strength. I've lauded strength as a skill that practice of correct form gives.
In this post i'd like to talk a bit about related insights that come from high volume (by "high volume" i mean LOTS of practice) and how this lead to an insight about the clean that might be useful to you, and how it lead to a PR for me in a C&P set, with heavy emphasis on the "personal" part of PR.
Making Connexions: the Ten Thousand Things
I've recently been listening to the audio book of Gladwell's Outliers. His mission is to show that success is not talent alone - the myth of the self-made man (sic) - but that it is a combination of talent, opportunity and context. This is all pretty much sociology 101 (at least the way it was taught 10-15 years ago): nothing is in isolation; we are all products of our context, and some of those are the context of "demographic accidents." Take sports training for hockey in canada or football (soccer) in the EU.
He Shoots and Shoots and Shoots and Shoots - and then He Shoots and Scores.
Gladwell demonstrates how, alas, the canadian hockey training system (and football/soccer) is biased towards kids born in the first few months of the year, and how statistically kids born in the last quarter might as well not apply. No really, the pure stats are overwhelming - all because the system biases towards kids at a very wee age who have a few more months maturity than their younger peers at a time when those few months makes a BIG difference.
As Gladwell argues, if the system had two or three periods - phasing in testing of kinds when they're ALL at exactly the same age - +/- a month or so, then the sporting world could double (or triple) its talent pool.
The key thing that Gladwell pulls together with this work is that these kids who are selected to play hockey in special teams get more ice time, more coaching, contact with better players etc etc etc. There's a cumulative effect that such that by the time they're leaving highschool, they are so much better than their casual hockey playing peers, there's no contest.
Practice - And a lot of it for Expertise
Indeed, in the most impressive part of the book to me, Gladwell shows that a person, to reach this kind of Expert level, needs to put in 10,000 hours of practice: effort with the intent to improve performance.
He goes over cases by other researchers looking at virtuoso musicians. Not one - not one! - of them (including, we see, Mozart) got away with less than 10k hours of practice to achieve mastery of their area. This is critical: there were no stars who rose to top on talent alone without this effort - equivalent to 3 hours a day, every day, for ten years. Gladwell shows that practice time ramps up over time, so it's not actually 3 hours a day non stop, but progressively building building building for a child, to a teen.
Aside: How to get 10,000 hours is no small thing: sometimes it's the result of so many cascading opportunities it's no wonder one has to be in the right place at the right time, over and over again with the wit to take advantage of those opportunities. The cases in the book make this stunningly clear and hard to deny. The affluent youth is certainly at an advantage over a less affluent youth, for instance, whose practice time may be more taxed because they have to hold down jobs - unless their jobs feed into what they want to practice in any case.
How does all the above story of practice relate to the Clean?
I'll come onto what i think is happening with the Clean and Practice in a moment. First a bit of background.
In the past month, i have not done 10 ooo cleans or presses. I've not cracked 1000. I've done around 700 presses and 150 cleans. It's interesting to start adding these things up. Makes me kinda go "only 700?? - you call that "high volume"? and yet that's 150+ reps a session on high days. So what have i learned from as *little* repetition as sub 1000 reps? Form, breathing, and today THE CLEAN.
Here's the deal: Good clean (seems to) equal(s) "Going Small"
The last big day i had that was supposed to be my "heavy" day doing maybe 12 complete reps with the 16k if i'd amazingly doubled on the week before turned out to be 36 reps - a 6 fold increase on the previous week. I put this down to improved attention to breathing technique.
Doing a few C&P during the week, i tried getting some sense of a ladder of C&P's: if i could do 36 singles a side, surely i could do at least 2 consecutive C&P's on the left? While i found i could do is three C&P's in a row on the right, but still stuck on singles in the left. Indeed, while i could fire off five presses in a row on the right with the 16, i could not get more than 2 presses (not C&Ps) on the left, and usually just 1.
This did not make sense to me physiologically. What was the problem?
Today, after a break from concerted heavy pressing of 9 days rather than the usual 6, i wanted to focus on consecutive C&P's after doing some partials work with a 20 (mm mm good). As before, i start with the strong/more coordinated side first. The first thing i noticed is that the clean seemed a wee bit easier - feeling more like the 12 than the 16. I also noticed that the whole breathing/form cycle was feeling more like the light day (work with the 12 and 8) than it had with the 16. That is, i was able to exhale a bit on the lowering of the arm, and definetly exhale on the drop (i'd been rereading pavel's discussion of the drop in ETK so this bit on form was fresh in my mind).
When i moved to my left side for the first attempted set of c&p's i failed just as usual when going for the second C&P. Stupid. Put the bell down, do a C&P from scratch with little recovery and there it is. Try the second; nothing. Shite.
Ok, now for the big Clean observation:
So i went back to the right. and really focused on the clean, really hearing brett from his kettlebell basics for strength coaches and personal trainers dvd (recommended) echoing pavel in ETK about the clean as so crucial for a good press. That's when i got the first sense of an ah ha. The clean was a little thing. A small move. Ya ya i know: we practice tame the arc, but in my conceptualization of the 16 as "heavy" i was reefing on this thing to get it up while still keeping a technically tamed arc.
When i tried deliberately what i'll call "going small" on the left hand side, the bell sorta landed in a slightly different place; it felt different around my wrist. Inhale. Up it went. ok. try that again for a single. good. up it went. do the drop for the repeat, go small up, there's that neat landing. UP! i just got two reps - no hip - pure and clean, literally. come down, go for the drop, go small into the clean, same landing, up it went. I got four fricking non-stop C&P's in a row on my left side. That's a personal record. Personal especially in that there's no competition where 4 C&P's in a row is a big deal, but it's a meaningful bench mark for me, i can tell ya. And it seems to be unequivocably the result, yet again, of technique technique technque. But how did i *get* that technique?
This is where i think the 10k comes into play.
If Strength is Also a Skill, where are our Ten Thousand Hours?
I have been focused on this move diligently with reps. So there's practice. I've also been teaching intensely over the past week, including teaching the clean (which i've found is way harder to get than the high pull; it's easier to teach the high pull first and then come back to the Clean as a "low pull" - first part before the stab up). Because of this effort to communicate to others, i've been thinking a lot more about it myself - wondering if it's been a lame clean that has screwed up my left side performance of consecutive C&P's over singles.
Combine these efforts today with intent to explore possibilities. Explore being less formal than experimental design; more "hacking" as it's called in software engineering. Good hackers are principled about their hacks: they narrow the set of possibilities they could try to likely candidates. I make this distinction lest the interpretation of "hacking" be read as assing around till something comes up. And in this case, quite early in the exploration, a solution was developed.
I doubt however that this combination of effects leading to a solution would have happened without all the previous rep work that had done two things: (1) improved overall technique in the press, so that the press technique, including breathing as part of that technique, could be ruled out as the problem (2) genuinely improved strength sufficiently so that the 16 was experienced as light(er) enough to enable less of a pull to get it up (really, it has been pretty ugly). Bring those things together, and inside a month i've gone from 1 press on the left to 36 singles, to now four full and consecutive C&P's on the left with more in the tank.
This to me, ok, incredible progress (some strength; mostly technique) has come with sub 1000 reps. Imagine what might be possible with 10,000? Or in terms of time, each workout being half an hour just focusing on the press, twice a week. That's one hour a week over 4-5 weeks. Hardly anywhere near 10 thousand hours, is it? It's 0.05 of a percent. A drop in the bucket or an intent-ful start?
Not just Practice But practice practice practice - with intent
What's the old joke about "how do you get to Carnegie Hall?" and the reply is "Practice, practice, practice"? Gladwell showed that the researchers looking at musicians demonstrated that those who would get to carnegie hall did indeed practice - but they practiced alot - and they practiced a lot more than the next level of proficiency down from them. Likewise with other models of 10k success he describes. Before they became field leading experts, no matter their native ability, they got in their 10k hours.
Mine is not a story of 10 thousand hours. In my case, i'm looking at reps rather than hours - the two are not entirely interchangeable, but when we look at learning, there is an argument that says for something to become automatic or effortless we need that many reps.
Perhaps the big Lesson of 2008 in terms of strength as a skill practice for me, and the one i'll take into the New Year is the incredible value of practice and of practice via high reps. I've heard it said before strength is a skill; treat your training as practice, but you know they were just really words before. Now those words have real and proven meaning to me.
So, micro lesson here: the clean - if your C&P is not getting you to where it should be, consider making the clean a smaller pull. It may take awhile to build up the strength to do that, but once you do, and can execute "going small" in the clean, you may find your C&P's start to track in line with your expectations. I'd be keen to hear if that helps you.
macro lesson: practice is good, fun, rewarding - more and more often, please.
A lot of exercise strategies stress "see results in only 15 minutes a day" with the obvious rationale that people have other things they want to do with their lives than be in the gym. That's fine. Charles Staley's EDT is based on 15 minute zones. Pavel's Program Minimum can be 15 mins a day.
I think a lot of us haven't thought of our workouts really really *as* skills we're developing. For myself, for instance, i wanted to be taught correct form and practice it in order to get strong. The end game was to lean out, get strong, show others (especially geeks) how to do likewise. In other words, learn the form, then just do it a lot. Like those mind bendingly boring scales on the piano: know how to do the finger positions, then just keep doing them and upping the tempo. Not that swinging a KB has ever been boring like scales were as a kid, but i have been known to have the TV on while doing them.
So where does the ten thousand hours equals expert come in here? What i'm getting from strength as a skill, as a practice, is that there are levels of expertise to something as simple as pressing a weight. I kinda had an inkling of that the first time i saw Will Williams do a KB front squat, but i didn't make the connection between that and that practice practice practice isn't just doing scales, it's doing each rep with *intent* to learn and do better.
Hearing the Obvious - finally: the Tao in the Ten Thousand Things is Real
Reading the above back, it all seems so basic: i'm not saying anything new. But i guess it's taken this journey of exploring the Perfect Rep to really hear this message. This is a nice conclusion to a big year of learning and practice: RKC, nsca cscs, zhealth, fms, and this past week completing the ck-fms. It's nice to wrap up with something approaching an insight or better understanding of the meeting and meaning of strength as a skill.
So for the new year, i hope for all the folks who have been kind enough to read through this and make it to the end, that you find new love and purpose in your practice of strength, and if not new, then reinvigorated. I hope for you a year filled with health and practice so engaging that you don't hit any dry patches where you lose faith, stop working out for any length of time. So i guess i hope you find a way to practice daily, to get to a love of practice that takes you to your own 10k in fitness and in health.
All the best for 2009,
mc
Rest is good!
it's a Little Thing - the little clean
Why avoid practice? Tweet Follow @begin2dig
I'd like to talk about a nervana experience i just had, the last day of this year, working on my clean and press. As some of you know, i've been trying to improve the strength of my press by following a version of Kenneth Jay's beast pressing protocol. I've celebrated the effect of volume on form, and how that translates to strength. I've lauded strength as a skill that practice of correct form gives.
In this post i'd like to talk a bit about related insights that come from high volume (by "high volume" i mean LOTS of practice) and how this lead to an insight about the clean that might be useful to you, and how it lead to a PR for me in a C&P set, with heavy emphasis on the "personal" part of PR.
Making Connexions: the Ten Thousand Things
I've recently been listening to the audio book of Gladwell's Outliers. His mission is to show that success is not talent alone - the myth of the self-made man (sic) - but that it is a combination of talent, opportunity and context. This is all pretty much sociology 101 (at least the way it was taught 10-15 years ago): nothing is in isolation; we are all products of our context, and some of those are the context of "demographic accidents." Take sports training for hockey in canada or football (soccer) in the EU.
He Shoots and Shoots and Shoots and Shoots - and then He Shoots and Scores.
Gladwell demonstrates how, alas, the canadian hockey training system (and football/soccer) is biased towards kids born in the first few months of the year, and how statistically kids born in the last quarter might as well not apply. No really, the pure stats are overwhelming - all because the system biases towards kids at a very wee age who have a few more months maturity than their younger peers at a time when those few months makes a BIG difference.As Gladwell argues, if the system had two or three periods - phasing in testing of kinds when they're ALL at exactly the same age - +/- a month or so, then the sporting world could double (or triple) its talent pool.
The key thing that Gladwell pulls together with this work is that these kids who are selected to play hockey in special teams get more ice time, more coaching, contact with better players etc etc etc. There's a cumulative effect that such that by the time they're leaving highschool, they are so much better than their casual hockey playing peers, there's no contest.
Practice - And a lot of it for Expertise
Indeed, in the most impressive part of the book to me, Gladwell shows that a person, to reach this kind of Expert level, needs to put in 10,000 hours of practice: effort with the intent to improve performance.
He goes over cases by other researchers looking at virtuoso musicians. Not one - not one! - of them (including, we see, Mozart) got away with less than 10k hours of practice to achieve mastery of their area. This is critical: there were no stars who rose to top on talent alone without this effort - equivalent to 3 hours a day, every day, for ten years. Gladwell shows that practice time ramps up over time, so it's not actually 3 hours a day non stop, but progressively building building building for a child, to a teen.
Aside: How to get 10,000 hours is no small thing: sometimes it's the result of so many cascading opportunities it's no wonder one has to be in the right place at the right time, over and over again with the wit to take advantage of those opportunities. The cases in the book make this stunningly clear and hard to deny. The affluent youth is certainly at an advantage over a less affluent youth, for instance, whose practice time may be more taxed because they have to hold down jobs - unless their jobs feed into what they want to practice in any case.
How does all the above story of practice relate to the Clean?
I'll come onto what i think is happening with the Clean and Practice in a moment. First a bit of background.
In the past month, i have not done 10 ooo cleans or presses. I've not cracked 1000. I've done around 700 presses and 150 cleans. It's interesting to start adding these things up. Makes me kinda go "only 700?? - you call that "high volume"? and yet that's 150+ reps a session on high days. So what have i learned from as *little* repetition as sub 1000 reps? Form, breathing, and today THE CLEAN.
Here's the deal: Good clean (seems to) equal(s) "Going Small"
The last big day i had that was supposed to be my "heavy" day doing maybe 12 complete reps with the 16k if i'd amazingly doubled on the week before turned out to be 36 reps - a 6 fold increase on the previous week. I put this down to improved attention to breathing technique.
Doing a few C&P during the week, i tried getting some sense of a ladder of C&P's: if i could do 36 singles a side, surely i could do at least 2 consecutive C&P's on the left? While i found i could do is three C&P's in a row on the right, but still stuck on singles in the left. Indeed, while i could fire off five presses in a row on the right with the 16, i could not get more than 2 presses (not C&Ps) on the left, and usually just 1.This did not make sense to me physiologically. What was the problem?
Today, after a break from concerted heavy pressing of 9 days rather than the usual 6, i wanted to focus on consecutive C&P's after doing some partials work with a 20 (mm mm good). As before, i start with the strong/more coordinated side first. The first thing i noticed is that the clean seemed a wee bit easier - feeling more like the 12 than the 16. I also noticed that the whole breathing/form cycle was feeling more like the light day (work with the 12 and 8) than it had with the 16. That is, i was able to exhale a bit on the lowering of the arm, and definetly exhale on the drop (i'd been rereading pavel's discussion of the drop in ETK so this bit on form was fresh in my mind).
When i moved to my left side for the first attempted set of c&p's i failed just as usual when going for the second C&P. Stupid. Put the bell down, do a C&P from scratch with little recovery and there it is. Try the second; nothing. Shite.
Ok, now for the big Clean observation:
So i went back to the right. and really focused on the clean, really hearing brett from his kettlebell basics for strength coaches and personal trainers dvd (recommended) echoing pavel in ETK about the clean as so crucial for a good press. That's when i got the first sense of an ah ha. The clean was a little thing. A small move. Ya ya i know: we practice tame the arc, but in my conceptualization of the 16 as "heavy" i was reefing on this thing to get it up while still keeping a technically tamed arc.
When i tried deliberately what i'll call "going small" on the left hand side, the bell sorta landed in a slightly different place; it felt different around my wrist. Inhale. Up it went. ok. try that again for a single. good. up it went. do the drop for the repeat, go small up, there's that neat landing. UP! i just got two reps - no hip - pure and clean, literally. come down, go for the drop, go small into the clean, same landing, up it went. I got four fricking non-stop C&P's in a row on my left side. That's a personal record. Personal especially in that there's no competition where 4 C&P's in a row is a big deal, but it's a meaningful bench mark for me, i can tell ya. And it seems to be unequivocably the result, yet again, of technique technique technque. But how did i *get* that technique?
This is where i think the 10k comes into play.
If Strength is Also a Skill, where are our Ten Thousand Hours?
I have been focused on this move diligently with reps. So there's practice. I've also been teaching intensely over the past week, including teaching the clean (which i've found is way harder to get than the high pull; it's easier to teach the high pull first and then come back to the Clean as a "low pull" - first part before the stab up). Because of this effort to communicate to others, i've been thinking a lot more about it myself - wondering if it's been a lame clean that has screwed up my left side performance of consecutive C&P's over singles.
Combine these efforts today with intent to explore possibilities. Explore being less formal than experimental design; more "hacking" as it's called in software engineering. Good hackers are principled about their hacks: they narrow the set of possibilities they could try to likely candidates. I make this distinction lest the interpretation of "hacking" be read as assing around till something comes up. And in this case, quite early in the exploration, a solution was developed.
I doubt however that this combination of effects leading to a solution would have happened without all the previous rep work that had done two things: (1) improved overall technique in the press, so that the press technique, including breathing as part of that technique, could be ruled out as the problem (2) genuinely improved strength sufficiently so that the 16 was experienced as light(er) enough to enable less of a pull to get it up (really, it has been pretty ugly). Bring those things together, and inside a month i've gone from 1 press on the left to 36 singles, to now four full and consecutive C&P's on the left with more in the tank.
This to me, ok, incredible progress (some strength; mostly technique) has come with sub 1000 reps. Imagine what might be possible with 10,000? Or in terms of time, each workout being half an hour just focusing on the press, twice a week. That's one hour a week over 4-5 weeks. Hardly anywhere near 10 thousand hours, is it? It's 0.05 of a percent. A drop in the bucket or an intent-ful start?
Not just Practice But practice practice practice - with intent
What's the old joke about "how do you get to Carnegie Hall?" and the reply is "Practice, practice, practice"? Gladwell showed that the researchers looking at musicians demonstrated that those who would get to carnegie hall did indeed practice - but they practiced alot - and they practiced a lot more than the next level of proficiency down from them. Likewise with other models of 10k success he describes. Before they became field leading experts, no matter their native ability, they got in their 10k hours.
Mine is not a story of 10 thousand hours. In my case, i'm looking at reps rather than hours - the two are not entirely interchangeable, but when we look at learning, there is an argument that says for something to become automatic or effortless we need that many reps.
Perhaps the big Lesson of 2008 in terms of strength as a skill practice for me, and the one i'll take into the New Year is the incredible value of practice and of practice via high reps. I've heard it said before strength is a skill; treat your training as practice, but you know they were just really words before. Now those words have real and proven meaning to me.
So, micro lesson here: the clean - if your C&P is not getting you to where it should be, consider making the clean a smaller pull. It may take awhile to build up the strength to do that, but once you do, and can execute "going small" in the clean, you may find your C&P's start to track in line with your expectations. I'd be keen to hear if that helps you.
macro lesson: practice is good, fun, rewarding - more and more often, please.
A lot of exercise strategies stress "see results in only 15 minutes a day" with the obvious rationale that people have other things they want to do with their lives than be in the gym. That's fine. Charles Staley's EDT is based on 15 minute zones. Pavel's Program Minimum can be 15 mins a day.
I think a lot of us haven't thought of our workouts really really *as* skills we're developing. For myself, for instance, i wanted to be taught correct form and practice it in order to get strong. The end game was to lean out, get strong, show others (especially geeks) how to do likewise. In other words, learn the form, then just do it a lot. Like those mind bendingly boring scales on the piano: know how to do the finger positions, then just keep doing them and upping the tempo. Not that swinging a KB has ever been boring like scales were as a kid, but i have been known to have the TV on while doing them.
So where does the ten thousand hours equals expert come in here? What i'm getting from strength as a skill, as a practice, is that there are levels of expertise to something as simple as pressing a weight. I kinda had an inkling of that the first time i saw Will Williams do a KB front squat, but i didn't make the connection between that and that practice practice practice isn't just doing scales, it's doing each rep with *intent* to learn and do better.
Hearing the Obvious - finally: the Tao in the Ten Thousand Things is Real
Reading the above back, it all seems so basic: i'm not saying anything new. But i guess it's taken this journey of exploring the Perfect Rep to really hear this message. This is a nice conclusion to a big year of learning and practice: RKC, nsca cscs, zhealth, fms, and this past week completing the ck-fms. It's nice to wrap up with something approaching an insight or better understanding of the meeting and meaning of strength as a skill.
So for the new year, i hope for all the folks who have been kind enough to read through this and make it to the end, that you find new love and purpose in your practice of strength, and if not new, then reinvigorated. I hope for you a year filled with health and practice so engaging that you don't hit any dry patches where you lose faith, stop working out for any length of time. So i guess i hope you find a way to practice daily, to get to a love of practice that takes you to your own 10k in fitness and in health.
All the best for 2009,
mc
Rest is good!
it's a Little Thing - the little clean
Why avoid practice? Tweet Follow @begin2dig
Friday, July 18, 2008
Balancing Focus with Diversity with Humility
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There's a great heuristic in nutrition that says to know if we're eating right, get lots of colour on the plate. If it's all monotone shades of white to yellow, then we know there's something - possibly a lot - missing. If it's vibrant in colour and texture, happy days, we're likely hitting all the bases.
In nature, we observe the same thing: we talk about rich ecosystems vs monocultures. Where diversity exists in the system, the ecosystem thrives. Monocultures on the other hand, are far more vulnerable, less able to adapt and thrive in the face of adversity.
In fitness we also apply a kind of diversity towards progress, whether this is swapping around a variety of compound exercises throughout the week, or periodizing the intensity of the day's efforts, variety is important to stave off plateaus or injuries from overuse, etc.
To go back to the nutrition analogy, it seems this same principle of diversity would apply to food for thought: lots of colour on plate means a healthy, nutritious, well balanced diet. That if our intellectual diet is monotonous, singular, lacking diversity, then we are ill nourished. As with monocultures, we are less adaptable; more vulnerable.
And yet while many folks know about nutritional diversity or diversity in their fitness programs, intellecutal diversity seems a foreign concept. I've been struck of late by the number of people who have read either just one book on a topic, or just one author on a subject and speak ex cathedra, as if because of this one book, one author, they now know the field and can proffer opinion. They will defend their corner vigorously, adamantly on the basis of this monoculture of information.
This phenomenon, it seems, is the opposite side of the coin of what sifu mark cheng recently described about RKC's who after the certification, instead of focusing on the basics themselves, and teaching them in strict form, become diversified too quickly, try to bring in too many moves. The consequence that recently manifested itself at an RKCII cert, apparently being that many instructors were not competent to perform the core curriculum.
In this case, we are seeking to master a skill in order to teach it, and so focus and practice practice practice are critical. Rannoch and i have disccused this too: the movement from the repetition of the skill so many times that it's into the bone where its expression becomes art. Will Williams performance of the kettlebell front squat, i've written about, is just so.
In the Tao is the Ten Thousand Things
How resolve on the one hand diversity is critical for health and well being and on the other a singular focus is critical for mastery?
It seems, again to go back to Mark's post, that humility is critical in each case. If we are humble before a topic, we will know that we are pretty ignorant, and need more than one book, one lecture, one web page, to come to grips with area of interest. IF we have read just one thing on a topic, we acknolwedge the source: according to x, this is what's happening, rather than stating "this is what's happening" Why? i teach my students this as basic scholarship: unless you are a recognized expert in a domain, your opinion is just that; an opinion. Why should your readers trust your opinion?
At least if all you have is one source, and you provide your readers that source, they can go check it out for themselves, where they might get more information. what will they get if they come back to you, assuming this is your knowledge, rather than the re-presentation of someone else's? But if all you have is one source, and you engage with someone else who may well have more expertise than you, know more (having read broader and deeper; practiced further and longer), then at least listen, and maybe learn something.
As Mark states in his post:
It's not just that the brown/black belts know more than the blue belt; they have greater mastery of the same things the blue belt knows. The best have worked with many teachers; have studied broadly. Not all at once, but over time.
This still feels like i'm talking about a contradiction:
on the one hand, focus on mastery which means practice on a limited set of things rather than a vast array; on the other hand i'm talking about diversity of knowledge. What keeps coming to my mind is to know when to shut up.
Progress is most often linear.
In school, we learn the basics of math, then of geometry before getting to calculus. The basics are needed before getting to more advanced forms of expression. Once those basics are mastered, conversations can begin with other mathematicians about how problems may be solved. Techniques are shared, new techniques are built upon these; innovations happen. A mathematician interested in one particular problem will read a wide range of papers related to just that one topic. There is the diversity around the singularity, and there is growing expertise.
As another example, in computation, artificial intelligence work is informed by biological systems research, complexity theory and more recently gaming theory from economics. One problem to solve, influenced by multiple perspectives/disciplines.
Likewise, a martial artist who has a devastating punch will likely have studied many techniques from many masters on the punch to distill it into one perfect practice.
In these domains, if we do not have that rich expertise, whether practical or intellectual or both, we would not presume to tell someone else who knew as little or less than ourselves either how to do something or, with confidence, how something works. Our experience is thin; our practice shallow.
What's my point?
I guess that we might do well to own our own limitations better and speak/walk with more humility about our own knowledge/accomplishments. This is perahps why many of us put our credentials on our blogs/sig files, so that people can judge our statements and practice on their merits. Not that these credentials are a guarantee of excellence - hence why most have ongoing renewal/rectification processes. And where certifications do not exist, all the more reason to acknowledge sources and walk with humility, till our work speaks for us.
Clarence Bass is an excellent example of someone who is not a certified expert in health or nutrition: he is an intelligent person who has made his reputation by carefully presenting research in plain language, and checking out findings in one source against those of another; of talking with multiple experts, and from this putting together exceptionally valuable syntheses of this material. It's based on the demonstration of his analyses and syntheses of others' work, and the demonstration of his own practice and insights that has made him a respected expert in the community. He's my hero & inspiration in this regard.
This post all started as a rant about people who seem to have read one book or article and then speak on a topic as if they were experts.
My main point was that knowledge is not so thinnly founded.
Science and Wisdom both demand repetition across diversity before asserting a General Case or Accepted Practice. Do multiple respected sources agree with this position? Where is the disagreement? What are the conditions in which this is true vs where it is not?
My secondary point is that we need to feel unsatisfied with our intellectual fodder if we're interested in a topic and stop at one source - whether that's one book, one author, one site, one monoculture. We need to challenge ourselves to be open to multiple sources on our one topic.
The gift of a good teacher of course is to help chart the progress from the one to the other. The gift of a good student is rich curiosity, with respectful, humble, delightful engagement. Tweet Follow @begin2dig
There's a great heuristic in nutrition that says to know if we're eating right, get lots of colour on the plate. If it's all monotone shades of white to yellow, then we know there's something - possibly a lot - missing. If it's vibrant in colour and texture, happy days, we're likely hitting all the bases.
In nature, we observe the same thing: we talk about rich ecosystems vs monocultures. Where diversity exists in the system, the ecosystem thrives. Monocultures on the other hand, are far more vulnerable, less able to adapt and thrive in the face of adversity.
In fitness we also apply a kind of diversity towards progress, whether this is swapping around a variety of compound exercises throughout the week, or periodizing the intensity of the day's efforts, variety is important to stave off plateaus or injuries from overuse, etc.
To go back to the nutrition analogy, it seems this same principle of diversity would apply to food for thought: lots of colour on plate means a healthy, nutritious, well balanced diet. That if our intellectual diet is monotonous, singular, lacking diversity, then we are ill nourished. As with monocultures, we are less adaptable; more vulnerable.
And yet while many folks know about nutritional diversity or diversity in their fitness programs, intellecutal diversity seems a foreign concept. I've been struck of late by the number of people who have read either just one book on a topic, or just one author on a subject and speak ex cathedra, as if because of this one book, one author, they now know the field and can proffer opinion. They will defend their corner vigorously, adamantly on the basis of this monoculture of information.
This phenomenon, it seems, is the opposite side of the coin of what sifu mark cheng recently described about RKC's who after the certification, instead of focusing on the basics themselves, and teaching them in strict form, become diversified too quickly, try to bring in too many moves. The consequence that recently manifested itself at an RKCII cert, apparently being that many instructors were not competent to perform the core curriculum.
In this case, we are seeking to master a skill in order to teach it, and so focus and practice practice practice are critical. Rannoch and i have disccused this too: the movement from the repetition of the skill so many times that it's into the bone where its expression becomes art. Will Williams performance of the kettlebell front squat, i've written about, is just so.
In the Tao is the Ten Thousand Things
How resolve on the one hand diversity is critical for health and well being and on the other a singular focus is critical for mastery?
It seems, again to go back to Mark's post, that humility is critical in each case. If we are humble before a topic, we will know that we are pretty ignorant, and need more than one book, one lecture, one web page, to come to grips with area of interest. IF we have read just one thing on a topic, we acknolwedge the source: according to x, this is what's happening, rather than stating "this is what's happening" Why? i teach my students this as basic scholarship: unless you are a recognized expert in a domain, your opinion is just that; an opinion. Why should your readers trust your opinion?
At least if all you have is one source, and you provide your readers that source, they can go check it out for themselves, where they might get more information. what will they get if they come back to you, assuming this is your knowledge, rather than the re-presentation of someone else's? But if all you have is one source, and you engage with someone else who may well have more expertise than you, know more (having read broader and deeper; practiced further and longer), then at least listen, and maybe learn something.
As Mark states in his post:
To use a martial arts analogy, it's as if a relatively new blue belt suddenly decides that his bollocks are too big for his belt and he decides to go & pick a fight with a bunch of brown and black belts. The smackdown is comin'.
It's not just that the brown/black belts know more than the blue belt; they have greater mastery of the same things the blue belt knows. The best have worked with many teachers; have studied broadly. Not all at once, but over time.
This still feels like i'm talking about a contradiction:
on the one hand, focus on mastery which means practice on a limited set of things rather than a vast array; on the other hand i'm talking about diversity of knowledge. What keeps coming to my mind is to know when to shut up.
Progress is most often linear.
In school, we learn the basics of math, then of geometry before getting to calculus. The basics are needed before getting to more advanced forms of expression. Once those basics are mastered, conversations can begin with other mathematicians about how problems may be solved. Techniques are shared, new techniques are built upon these; innovations happen. A mathematician interested in one particular problem will read a wide range of papers related to just that one topic. There is the diversity around the singularity, and there is growing expertise.
As another example, in computation, artificial intelligence work is informed by biological systems research, complexity theory and more recently gaming theory from economics. One problem to solve, influenced by multiple perspectives/disciplines.
Likewise, a martial artist who has a devastating punch will likely have studied many techniques from many masters on the punch to distill it into one perfect practice.
In these domains, if we do not have that rich expertise, whether practical or intellectual or both, we would not presume to tell someone else who knew as little or less than ourselves either how to do something or, with confidence, how something works. Our experience is thin; our practice shallow.
What's my point?
I guess that we might do well to own our own limitations better and speak/walk with more humility about our own knowledge/accomplishments. This is perahps why many of us put our credentials on our blogs/sig files, so that people can judge our statements and practice on their merits. Not that these credentials are a guarantee of excellence - hence why most have ongoing renewal/rectification processes. And where certifications do not exist, all the more reason to acknowledge sources and walk with humility, till our work speaks for us.
Clarence Bass is an excellent example of someone who is not a certified expert in health or nutrition: he is an intelligent person who has made his reputation by carefully presenting research in plain language, and checking out findings in one source against those of another; of talking with multiple experts, and from this putting together exceptionally valuable syntheses of this material. It's based on the demonstration of his analyses and syntheses of others' work, and the demonstration of his own practice and insights that has made him a respected expert in the community. He's my hero & inspiration in this regard.
This post all started as a rant about people who seem to have read one book or article and then speak on a topic as if they were experts.
My main point was that knowledge is not so thinnly founded.
Science and Wisdom both demand repetition across diversity before asserting a General Case or Accepted Practice. Do multiple respected sources agree with this position? Where is the disagreement? What are the conditions in which this is true vs where it is not?
My secondary point is that we need to feel unsatisfied with our intellectual fodder if we're interested in a topic and stop at one source - whether that's one book, one author, one site, one monoculture. We need to challenge ourselves to be open to multiple sources on our one topic.
The gift of a good teacher of course is to help chart the progress from the one to the other. The gift of a good student is rich curiosity, with respectful, humble, delightful engagement. Tweet Follow @begin2dig
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