How Do You Combine Kettlebells And Barbells

“I’m Finished!”

At least that’s how you may feel after these types of training sessions.

5 Ways To Successfully Mix Kettlebells And Barbells – Part 3.

3. Finishers

What is a “finisher?”
It’s something you do at the end of your workout/training for a variety of reasons, such as metabolic conditioning, mental toughness, fat loss, general conditioning, or some combination of any of the aforementioned reasons.
My favorite finisher of all time, ever, involved a heavyweight wrestler, a hill, and two 100 pound plates at Rutgers during the summer of ’98.
But some of my other ones involve using kettlebells.
There are many things you can do with kettlebells at the end of your training session. Here are some ideas:

  • Swings for time or sets or reps
  • Snatches for time or sets or reps
  • Get Ups (just as brutal as Swings at the end)
  • High rep Clean and Jerks
  • Complexes or Chains
  • Carries – Farmer’s, rack or overhead
  • Let’s take a closer look.
  1. Swings for time or sets or reps. Grab a medium kettlebell and decide if you’re going to swing for a certain time period with or without rest – say 10 minutes, swinging every 30 seconds and resting for 30 seconds. Or maybe you’re going to hit 20 reps and then rest for a certain period of time. Or maybe you’re going to hit 20 sets of 10 reps. You get the idea.
  2. Snatches for time or sets for reps. Same thing as the Swings – only easier. Why? Because you get to rest at the top in the lockout position!
  3. Get Ups. Again, any combination of time, reps, sets… These are tough to do, especially for sets of 3 to 5 at the end of a session. They force you to use precise movement with fatigue already in the system. Also a good “systems check” to ensure you didn’t go so hard during your training to throw something out of whack. The good news is, if you did, the GU will usually help fix it.
  4. High Rep Clean and Jerks. One hand or two hand, but not for the “feint of heart.” Best used after a lower body day, as I like pairing finishers opposing the main focus of the training session. These are just brutal on the heart and lungs and the upper body musculature.
  5. Complexes or Chains. Easy enough. String a sequence of exercises together and repeat til done.
  6. Carries. The most under-rated and overlooked finishers ever, in my book. Take a kettlebell or a pair of kettlebells and carry them for distance or time or both. Hold them in your hands by your sides – Farmer’s carry. Hold them on your chest – Rack carries. Hold them locked out at arm’s length overhead – Overhead carries. These are phenomenal for improving conditioning, especially of the “core” musculature and the shoulder stabilizers in the lockout position.

How do you pick which one is right for you?
Don’t worry about it so much. Mix and match and see which one requires the most from your body. That’s probably the one you need more than the others. When that becomes relatively easy, try them all again and once again find the most challenging of them. Again, spend the time there. Repeat the process until you get to where you want to go or no longer have any weak links – or both.

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