New Kettlebell Skills

Working on new skills during my assistance work at the end of my leg session.

Tactical clean & squat.

I'm a pretty basic, vanilla lifter. So, while I've trained with kettlebells, on and off, since 2015, I've rarely explored the more hip, post-2020 exercises.

I've historically stuck with 2 hand swings, 1 hand swings, dead stop swings, cleans, snatches, clean & press variations, snatches, goblet squats, front squats, lunges, Bulgarian split squats, Turkish getups, rows, single leg RDLs, and other simple, boring, but effective, basic exercises.

However, I've been exploring some newer (to me) movements lately that I'm enjoying. Staggered stance squats and staggered swings are cool, very muscularly stimulating, and make relatively lighter weights FEEL heavier by offering a more challenging variation.

That's good.

I've played around with clean & squats for years now, but today was really the first time I've tried "tactical" clean & front squats as part of a workout.

Tactical cleans are difficult! They're not anymore difficult than standard cleans from a strength perspective, but they're much more technically challenging – which is fun for me.

The good about tactical cleans:

It saves time from having to do the classic, "clean + hand to hand swing + clean" to switch hands. It saves a lot of energy, time, and heavy breathing there.

Secondly, it's pretty slick and feels cool once you get a nice, "clean" (pun intended) tactical clean hand switch.

Tactical clean & squats – or any clean & squat variation, for that matter – are a super efficient exercise!

Each rep gives you a hinge + an upper body ballistic pull + a squat + the core and coordination demands that come from holding a weight in the front rack position on one side of your body.

If you don't believe me, give it a shot.

If you don't want to give it a shot, ask someone else who does lots of clean & squats or tactical clean & squats about why they do it, how it feels, and what the benefits are.

I did 2 sets of 8 reps per side at the end of today's session as part of my "accessory circuit" that included:

Kettlebell snatch

Tactical clean & squat

Offset calf raise.

I'll drop the full workout, as per yooj, as part of my ongoing "Garage Gym Chronicles" series.