Personal best 1: floor press

Regular readers know that when I bought my 70-pound kettle bell, I almost couldn’t use it (though carrying it from the person I bought it from, used from Craigslist, to the subway, down the stairs to the subway, up and down stairs to transfer, and up more stairs home was a farmers walk).

A few months ago I reported reaching personal bests for reps for floor presses. Well, last Thursday I reached eleven reps for my first set. When I got it, I may not have been able to do one rep. I’d been doing 10, 9, 8 for my three sets on my lifting days.

Last Thursday I hit 11 for the first set. I didn’t plan to. I just felt enough left after my tenth rep to try another.

The point isn’t that I’m reaching great amounts. If I set myself to it, I could lift more. My point is that I lift not to reach personal bests. I do it as a sidcha, to structure my life. It’s part of how I make sure what I consider the three necessary legs for a life to go well are automatic. The three legs are healthy diet, regular exercise, and the right amount of sleep for you.

I think for many people, those parts of life are horror shows. They follow trends, change often, stop, and restart. By making it standard, I don’t worry about doing it wrong. I just keep refining my technique and choice of exercises. I don’t worry if I’m doing them right at the start, since I have low standards the first time.

I also develop discipline. Everyone responds by saying I must have started with discipline, which to me sounds like saying Schwarzenegger must have had big muscles to start going to the gym. They get cause and effect backward. I had no discipline, as you’d know from the amount of ice cream and chips I ate despite trying to stop myself.

I also develop awareness of ever more subtle nuances in my experience. It comes from doing something similar day after day.

Oh yeah, I also did an extra single-arm row in the first set with the 62 pound kettle bell. I’d been doing three sets of five. This time I did 6 the first set.

Personal best 2: Turkish Get-up

Yesterday, I did another 70-pound Turkish get-up, which tied my personal best. I lost count, but I think this time was my fifth. Before doing it, I told myself I wouldn’t try any more because the anticipation, which includes fearing injury, creates so much anxiety. Then I did it and even with the wobble when I did it on my right side, when the kettle bell was above my head, as soon as I finished I thought, “I have to do it again.” … not that day, but some time.

I learned a lot of kettle bell exercises from an old friend who was once a fitness trainer. By chance he texted me for the first time in a while. It was for a different reason, but I told him I did it. He wrote back:

70 pounds is an elite weight to do them with.

Russian military use 70 pounds.

Top 1% use a 106 pound kettle bell but you’re so close to it already.

I remember reading when first learning about Turkish get-ups: “Legend has it that when old-time strongmen were asked to take on an apprentice, they would send the applicant away, telling him not to return until he could perform one Turkish get-up using a 100-pound weight.” I know that in my fifties just keeping fit, I don’t expect to perform what people training to become strongmen do, even before serious training, but I still figured I was far from lifting a serious weight.

Doesn’t it feel great when an expert tells you you’re doing well on something challenging? It does to me.

Anyway, I told my I’d tell him the details, like how scary the part with the weight above my head felt. He responded:

Oh yeah. When you’re tired and shaking, the last thing you want is a huge responsibility above your head.

I wonder if I’ll ever try a heavier weight? I doubt it. I guess first I’ll see if I can do a second rep. I’ve been doing two reps on each side with the 62 pound kettle bell for a while. Maybe I’ll do a third rep with it, then work up to two reps with the 70 pound one.

That is, unless I sense my body can’t handle it. I guess there’s some chance I never do another 70 pound one.

[EDIT: Tomorrow’s post, What I love about expensive gyms, follows up this one. I recommend following up with it.]