The Cheapest Form Of Exercise is Always The Most Effective
By Jerry Hamill

No matter how you dress it up exercise in its basic form is hard and only a small minority of us actually maintain it. The modern world seems to market the huge benefits of new fads that are actually not new. It’s just a spin on existing items or a change in name or appearance that generate our interest and motivate people to go buy it. 

Enter the humble Kettle Bell. Russian Peasants used kettle bells a few hundred years ago as a weight measure to sell grain. The peasants threw them around for a workout given the shape was adaptable with a stocky handle and variable in weight form. The discovery of their benefits was in the overall conditioning and strength of the peasants turning up for National Service in the Military. These guys had superhuman strength; they were bigger and more ripped than any of the other drafts. Once the instructors found out kettle bells were the cause of their unreal abilities, the Russian Army never looked back, adopting it as their primary training aid. 

Kettle bells are readily transportable unlike modern day weights. They are unpredictable in their ability to challenge elements of the core to tense and stabilize whilst completing designated movements. They can be transported in your car quite easily, kept at work beside your desk or just in the garage for a good old thrash out. The combinations of movements that interlink all body parts not only affects the primary muscle groups but get right into the smaller muscles often neglected when pushing conventional weights.

Throughout my time in training with KBs and training others I have yet to get feedback that someone has walked away from a session and not stated that the workout was like no other. In general most comment that they experience good muscle soreness in areas they never knew existed. After consistent usage reports come back that the user feels stronger than they ever did with conventional weights and have attained that strength at a faster rate. No tool from a physical prospective is better to naturally improve grip and works equally on anaerobic and aerobic fitness without having to actually go for a run. Using KBs accelerates the development of major and linked muscle groups, which in turn strengthens the smaller muscle groups supporting the major muscles.

A KB will set you back anything between $80- $200 depending on weight and quality. Having started with a pair of 24’s second hand I had to do it hard and gradually strengthen my body to cope with the demands of throwing 50kilos around. The average male will usually start on a 16kg and work his way up to heavier weights. Now with a collection of 16, 12, 24 and 28-kilo bells in doubles I get to perform a myriad of exercises and maintain my strength and fitness.

I don’t have to pay $1200 per year for a gym membership whether I use it or not. I have a one off payment for my KBs that have provided me with many interesting challenges and goals to achieve in order to control them or make things even harder and harder for me whilst training. My experience has grown and I’ve taken a lot of advice from people in the know on movements and watched others I train and train with make the common mistakes I did at the very beginning.

This is an inexpensive lump of metal that provides plenty of mental and physical challenges to stimulate one’s interest and certainly with discipline and determination gives you the toning and muscle definition you would find hard to get from a conventional gym. Whilst not the be all and end all of training aids it is cheap, even if you buy 2 x 16 kilo bells and spend $250 on a four-hour lesson. That’s a quarter of what you would spend on a year’s gym membership. And look at what you’ve got yourself. No queues for equipment, no Prima Donnas posing in front of mirrors. No egotistical gym junkies etc. You have go anywhere equipment that you can train anywhere with and still get maximum benefit from as opposed to conventional weights.

If you’re curious to know what the basics are with KBs have a look at the Brutal Videos to watch H half murder himself with some core crushing stuff.