Adding Variety to Your Conditioning with Kettlebells

Resistance bands, medicine balls, and balance balls are all tools most of us are familiar with for changing up your conditioning program.  Now you can add one more to the mix – Kettlebells. Kettlebells are best described as a weighted ball with a handle. They are unique in the sense that kettlebells engage multiple muscles at a time.

Mary Lee Tracy, coach of numerous National Team members and Olympic gymnasts Amanda Border, Jaycie Phelps and Morgan White, uses Kettlebells in the conditioning of her gymnasts. At the most recent USA Gymnastics Congress she demonstrated a variety of Kettlebell exercises and drills. In this GymSmarts Gymnastics Minute video, Mary Lee shows how her gymnasts use Kettlebell training to improve their standing salto techniques.

How do you get started with Kettlebells and using them to add variety to your own or your athletes’ training? Kettleworx offers a series of video workouts that will give you a good foundation to work with. Start with the 5 lb. Kettlebell – especially for your youth athletes – and build from there. The KettleWorx Essentials video series includes 3 20-minute workout DVDs – the Core, Cardio and Resistance workouts, plus the 10 Min. Fast Abs workouts and 10. Min. Fast Fat Burn Workouts. Each of the 20 minute videos contain 6 different workouts (meant to be used over 6 weeks) and the 10 min. fast burn workouts have 3 different workouts per DVD. The Fast Abs workout is my favorite (although I really like all of them).

The KettleWorx workouts are a great way to keep your athletes’ workouts varied, interesting and more fun.