How to clean up your kettlebell clean

The kettlebell clean  was one of the skills that never came comfortable to me. It literally took me years to get it right.

To be honest, I'm not even sure when I got it right. One day, it just clicked.

I remember doing sets of 50 on each side (with a 24kg) until I got it right...

yea...

don't do that... LOL!

In today's technique of the week video I'm going to show you the right way and the wrong way to execute the kettlebell clean.

The kettlebell clean is a very unique exercise. It contains 3 actions:

• Force production
• Force reduction
• Force redirection

Unlike the kettlebell swing where to projection of force is horizontal, the kettlebell cleans trajectory should be vertical.

One of the most common mistakes is to cast the bells out (on the way up and on the way down), instead of dropping them straight down.

The reason taming the arc is so important is because, the clean is a "transitional exercise".

Meaning...

It's the gateway to other kettlebell exercises like the Press, push-press, jerk, and squat. The "cleaner" (no pun intended) the clean is, the more effective the succeeding exercises will be.

One way you can slowly integrate the clean into your daily practice (no, not sets of 50 like I did) is to add it to a set of swings from time to time.

Example:

Lets say you are working on single or double kettlebell swings for sets of 5. You could add a 6th rep to each set, which would be the clean.

So, if your practice consists of 5 sets of 5 swings, you also getting in 5 practice cleans each set. This is really a much better approach (instead of sets of 50) to practicing your clean. 

Give that a try and let me know how it goes.

If you have a comment or question. Leave it in the comment section below.

Stay STRONG [As Hec]!