I completed a six week heavy swing program on 18 December 2015 that left me beat up. I was shocked that I made it to the end without injury because I had never swung a 70-pound kettlebell with one hand before starting the program. What kept me in the game was that all sets were 5 one-handed swings every minute on the minute. I often ended sessions feeling like I had been hit by a truck, but it was just 5 swings per set.

The Simple and Sinister (S&S) protocol that I have been following since late December calls for 10 sets of 10 one-handed swings each day. I know I can complete 100 swings in a day, but I figured that jumping from 5 to 10 swings in a set would kick my ass. I’ve been doing my S&S swings with the 24-kg (53-pound) bell. My swings have felt easy lately, but I have been focusing on perfecting my technique and maximizing power.

S&S calls for 5 pair of get-ups, alternating left and right. I have used the 20-kg (44-pound) bell since late December and only this week decided to try completing a pair of get-ups with the 24-kg bell. I was successful, but limited my get-ups to just one pair and completed the other 4 pair with the 20-kg bell so that I did not over-stress myself.

I had trouble sleeping Thursday night, so did not train on Friday. I had hoped to take a nap on Friday and train afterwards, but was unable to fall asleep, so made Friday a rest day.

Today I decided to begin my S&S swings with the 32-kg (70-pound) kettlebell. I swear it almost felt easy to swing the bell 10 times with my left hand and 10 times with my right hand. I took plenty of time to walk around and let my heart-rate come down between sets, but I completed all 100 swings with the 70-pound bell! Then I proceeded to complete all 5 pair of my get-ups with the 24-kg bell. I don’t think the 5th pair was any harder than the first pair. I felt good enough when done to complete 10 dead-hang pull-ups – 2 x 3 + 2 x 2 = 10. The whole thing from warm-up to 10th pull-up took 59 minutes and I completed a few minutes of landscape maintenance within that 59 minutes.

Rest is good for strength!