The Doubles 500

Recently I've been trying to increase my capacity for doing doubles with the jump rope so I worked an interval session into my workout yesterday that I really liked.. It was 500 doubles (250 forwards and 250 backwards) done in 10 sets of 50 with 30 second breaks between intervals.. I warmed up skipping rope until my heart rate was up and I was feeling limber enough for extended periods of doubles. Then I started into the workout. When doing a workout with the jump rope you're going to miss every once in a while so you need to make sure you start jumping again immediately and continue until you've achieved the goal of the interval. With doubles I was able to get t0 50, both forwards and backwards, half the time without missing, but the other half I would miss once and then just start right back up again. This is a very intense metabolic workout where you're working very hard for short bursts and then taking a short rest which isn't nearly long enough for a recovery. This type of workout is phenomenal for increasing strength, endurance, and cardio. I completed the 500 doubles in just over 10 minutes, it was taking me about 30 seconds to complete the 50 doubles followed by 30 seconds of rest. It felt great!!

I followed this up with 10 minutes of 16kg kettlebell snatches without putting the kettlebell down, alternating hands every 60 seconds.. I got 210 snatches in 10 minutes. Sometimes I like to figure out how much work that is by multiplying the number of reps by the weight of the kettlebell.. In this case I moved 7392 lbs in 10 minutes.. I'm working my way up to where I can do this exercise with a 24kg kettlebell. This is actually known as the Secret Service Snatch Test.

After the snatch test, I did two sets of 5 Turkish Get-Ups on each side with a 24kg and followed that up with a set of an exercise I call a Back Press with Shoulder Opener that would be difficult to explain so I added a video of it.. Make sure if you're trying this exercise you start with low weights. You really work the range of motion in your shoulders and it puts the kettlebell in a precarious position above your head where you definitely need to be able to control the weight.

All in all, it was a fantastic workout and it was completed in about 45 minutes. To re-cap:

- 10x50 jump rope doubles (5x fwrd and 5x bkwrd) with 30 secs rest between intervals

- 10 min 1 arm snatch with 16kg for 210 reps

- 2x10 Turkish Get Up with 24kg (2x5 on each side)

- 1x10 Back Press with Shoulder Opener with 16kg