Kettlebells and cycling

Due to the family situation, it hasn't been practical to get to the gym these days. To compensate for this, I have been using kettlebells. These are essentially cannonballs with handles. You can do a wide range of exercises with these simple tools and they are great for conditioning

I'm also interested in general fitness, so I'm not so concerned if some of the movements aren't directly useful for cycling. Interestingly, Lance himself uses them for his conditioning workouts and John Claxton seemed to favour them.

They generally come in multiples of 4kg. Males generally start with a 16kg bell and women a 12kg. The most common sizes for males are a pair of 16kg and a pair of 24kg bells.

The current program I am on is a conditioning workout, which doesn't take very long, maybe 22min, but is very taxing nonetheless. I modified the program from this article.

The workout consists of two different workouts. I am doing 3 a week alternating workout A, workout B, workout A so that I am doing two of the opposite workout each week. The workouts are:

1) Double-KB clean and military press, 6 reps
2) Alternating renegade row, 6 reps (each side)
3) KB pushup (8 reps)
4) Turkish get-up, 3 reps (each side)
5) One-arm front squat, 8 reps (each side)
6) One-arm KB swing, 15 reps (each side)

Here's the second:

1) Double-KB clean and push press, 7 reps
2) Double-KB bent-over row, 8 reps
3) KB pushup (8 reps)
4) One-arm windmill, 5 reps (each side)
5) Double-KB front squat, 5 reps
6) Hand-to-hand KB swing, 12 reps (each side)

The exercises are done with just 30 seconds between exercises and 90 seconds between rounds. The idea is to do a total of 3 rounds. It has taken me 2 weeks to do the full workouts twice, so next week I will go for the entire 3 rounds.

It doesn't seem like a lot of work, but it gets harder each round and the swings at the end really have you gasping for air.

The KB's really work your core and back chain of muscles (lower back, glutes, hamstrings) all of which are essential in riding. Throw in a few upper body exercises and you have a great overall workout.

A word of warning: Kettlebells can be quite brutal if you let your form slip. I've injured my shoulder and back before with them and so have others. Interestingly, advocates say that kb's are great for back rehabilitation. I dunno about that, but I enjoy using them even with the risks.

The absolute cheapest place to buy them in Brisbane is Southside Fitness.