Learning from one of the best...

I just spent a couple days in Philadelphia being hosted by one of the top physical culturists of our time and the first trainer to bring kettlebells into the mainstream in America. Steve Maxwell has been training people in functional conditioning and martial arts for 35 years. He is a world class martial artist and athlete, and at 55 years old he is in better shape than many elite athletes in their 20's. It was a privilege to hang out with him for a couple days to have him alternately kick my ass in the gym and then teach me what he's learned over the years and the best way to bring it back home to my clients.

We had been working out the details of my visit for about a month, since he's pretty much on tour non-stop giving kettlebell and functional conditioning seminars and certifications around the world. He promised to "slap it on me" when I got to Philly so I best be prepared. He definitely lived up to his promise on Day 1 giving me a 30 minute double kettlebell workout with simple and complex kettlebell movements with 2 20kg kettlebells, 60% of my bodyweight... He had me doing double snatches, cleans, swings, squat thrusters and then started combining the moves in all kinds of creative, tortuous ways. The last exercise in the workout was double racked turkish get-ups for 6 reps. I probably had one of those "you want me to do what with 88lbs?" looks on my face. But I would never say "I can't" and I just went for it one rep at a time.. What an amazing full body workout.

Day 2 I woke up feeling a little sore so I wanted to stretch out with a short run around Philadelphia.. So I went down to the desk and asked where the "Rocky steps" were.. Only about 2 miles away, perfect.. So I went out to the Philadelphia Art Museum, home of Rocky's famous run up the steps.. Didn't it seem like it was about a mile of steps in the movie? I don't know, it was a long time ago. I counted them and it turned out to be 70 steps.. So I figured, OK, so we do stair repeats.. I had Zeppelin blaring on the iPod and I decided to do stair sprints for 2 full songs which turned out to be about 8 minutes.. I made it 9 times in 2 songs but had to do a tenth sprint because it doesn't make sense to stop at 9 does it? 

Got a good breakfast in me and off to my second session with Steve.. Today Steve had an endurance workout planned for me.. He put a single 16kg kettlebell on the mat for me, which seemed pretty easy considering the day before he had me working with double 20's.. Once I picked it up he let me know that I wouldn't be allowing the bell to touch the mat again for over 30 minutes... So much for the 16k being easy.. He ran me through a series of full body movements for 30 minutes, alternating from one arm to the other with no breaks.. The last set in the workout was 20 reps of no momentum deck squats. By the end of this workout the 16kg kettlebell felt like about 1600kg. It was awesome! Another simple, yet amazing workout made up entirely of full body moves with a kettlebell.

The trip was a great experience for me. I learned a ton from one of the top physical trainers in the world who really "gets it".. No gimmicks, no machines, no hype.. Just hard work, functional movements, and incredible results.. Exactly what I'm looking to bring to all my clients.

All the best,

Kevin