Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Steve Cotter Seminar- Part 2


The seminar was essentially 8 hours of one handed swings, snatches, long cycle, overhead presses, and some squat progressions.
For those of you unfamiliar with GS (Girevoy Sport) it is the Russian Sport version of kettlebell lifting. It is emphasized by more relaxed movements, performance or anatomical breathing versus paradox or power breathing, and running on a 10 minute clock with no breaks.
Let that set in for a minute. You are doing one handed swings, snatches, or clean and jerk for 10 minutes with no breaks. I've been interested in Fluid Style (GS) for a while now and have done much studying on the subject, but this was my first physical exposure to it.
Steve's presentation was excellent, and I definitely saw a lot of value in this other form of kettlebell lifting.
Does this mean we throw the RKC and Hard Style under the bus? Of course not. Different tools for different jobs. The snatch for instance. If I want to burn calories or build explosive power I will favor Hard Style snatches. If I want to build raw work capacity I will favor Fluid Style snatches. What about Max VO2 vs. a 10 minute snatch set? Which is better for forging raw endurance? I asked Steve this question and he definitely favors the 10 minute set. It makes sense, as each minute is compounding the workload. Use of a break starts bringing your system back down from it's elevated level. One thing I liked about Steve was he said right off the bat, don't just believe everything you're told, find out for yourself. In the spirit of this I'll be getting Kenneth Jay's DVD on the 36/36 Max VO2 so that I have an ironclad understanding of it. I also want to do some research and really compare numbers in a 10 minute span from comparable athletes performing GS and 10 Minute USSS Snatch Test. In theory the latter should put up higher numbers due to the more lax nature of the test in comparison to a 10 minute GS bout, but we'll see. I would also like to see seom hard evidence on which builds more work capacity in the combat athlete and tactical operator.

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