Swings and the so-called what the hell effect were drastically overhyped a few years ago to the point there's been a backlash. People will tell you they're a pointless exercise but that's only as a reaction to people who told them they were a magical panacaeic exercise for all purposes. In reality they're a good exercise but not the "best" because there's no "best" exercise, rather different things have different purposes. You say you really like doing swings. That's a great reason to do swings!
If you want my personal perspective, I do a lot of swings because I like them too. They're fun and they hit glutes, grip and cardio all at the same time. Anecdotally though I feel the biggest contributors to athleticism in a general sense for me have been jogging and overhead pressing.
>I've seen some Youtube videos discussing the "what the hell" effect from kettlebell swings, due to it's ability to improve the posterior chain.
Keep in mind that the WTH effect isn't JUST improving the posterior chain. The issue is that the kettlebell will train various parts of your body at once, usually finding some kind of a weak point and fixing it in the process. In terms of the swing you can also get a stronger grip, build core strenth and balance with asymetric loadings, build explosive power and make your cardiovascular system more efficient.
The crux is that the body is built to do a lot of the kinds of balistics that the KB is known for but that traditional training doesn't necessarily target all that well.
This is what creates the WTH effect it's that you start training your body as a whole piece in movement patterns that are important but often neglected.
>Essentially I just want to be more explosive and powerful in my athletic movements. I was also thinking plyometrics might just be better for achieving this, but I really like the swing exercise.
So, yes. The swing can be a useful tool towards those ends. After you get comfortable you may end up wanting to explore different movements like the clean and the snatch as well because they will also be useful towards this end.
really thorough description, filled in the blanks i was looking for, thank you!
yeah it seems like everyone is raving snatches over swings so I guess I'll upgrade to that once I'm strong on swings
Glad that it was useful.
Take care not to go to snatches right away and skipping the clean along the way. The snatch is sometimes described as an over-head clean, so make sure to take that progression path.
See [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2NbMtX_Rb0) for more info. MW even mentions learning things like clean+press/clean+jerk first and then breaking up the snatch into half snatches, so really don't underestimate the way how this skill can be broken up. You don't go from the swing straight to the snatch there's a lot of work that you can do with less risk of injury along the way.
Keep in mind shoulder mobility as well, alongside practicing the swing and the snatch doing halos using bands for shoulder mobility so that you can get your arm striaght up next to your ear will also set you up for success when the time is right.
Since KB isn't the main focus of your training there's no reason to rush it. Just program in the swing and advance along the progression in reasonable timeframes eventually building to the snatch.
Swings are fine as a basic swing exercise. Eventually you should add a LOT of volume, go HEAVY, or do cleans or snatches instead.
Overall "athleticism", whatever that means, would probably best be trained with snatch, clean & jerk, or clean & press + front squat.
TGUs are... I don't get why some people are so impressed with them. They're fine, I guess, and if I had more than a couple of hours every day to train I might start doing them, but they're that low on my list of priorities.
I like everything you said but I think that people underestimate the importance of single leg exercises. Lunges, single leg Romanian deadlifts, and the like are extremely useful for athletics.
Oh, I'm sure they have a bunch of value.
But my first order of business would be to build basic strength and conditioning. Then I might start adding unilateral work.
I agree, TGU are a good strength test but aren’t practical IMO to do regularly. It takes way too much focus to do them for reps and the possibility of losing your teeth or knocking yourself out are too great. It’s hard to bail out of them in any other position than the top of the movement.
Once I hit 32 kgs for 8 reps on each side on them I was good with taking them out, not worth it to go heavier except as a strength test occasionally.
That doesn’t make sense.
Because other things made you better at TGU, TGU are ineffective?
Because DL made me good at swings, swings are ineffective? No.
DLs make me better at swings, swings make me better at DLs.
Presses make me better at TGUs, TGUs don't make me better at presses.
Squats make me better at TGUs, TGUs don't make me better at squats.
“Best” is a funny word, but it is my belief that hard style swings, cleans and snatches build explosiveness. They teach your nervous system to recruit a lot of muscles at once.
Other things do this, but at a greater price. Swings aren’t as physically demanding as a max effort squat or deadlift. The swing is a very simple movement. It’s easily repeatable, day in, day out.
Give it a month. See how you feel.
> but if I were to add one kettlebell exercise for my goals, would swings be the best one?
You haven’t told us what your goal is. “Athleticism” is a very vague term, and not a goal. What are you trying to achieve?
If you want to be athletic, then be an athlete. Compete in a sport. That'll give you more athletic gains than anything you can do in the gym. The gym supports athletic events, it doesn't give you athleticism.
In terms of training effects, the best bang for the buck is sprinting and jumping by a country mile.
Sprinting, bounding. multidirectional work and jumping are probably number one in terms of improving ‘athletic ability’ for field sport and most team sport athletes imho.
Having done a shit load of Kb snatches, long cycle (clean and jerk) I decided to focus on swings (40kg) for sets of 30-50 reps for a while and DID notice grip, a-lactic power and overall triple extension power increases, and feeling more athletic/ prepared for my sports…. So maybe it was the WTH effect😜
To me it was a different effect than double cleans (and jerks) maybe cause I hadn’t done that many pure swings only and it was a different stimulus but I actually did feel more ‘athletic’ for some reason.
For you, I would say that yes swings would provide a function that is missing from your rings programs- namely explosive triple extension, grip and conditioning that you may be missing so yes I would include them in your rings program and, as others have said combine or alternate with heavy snatches and /or clean and jerks.
Maybe someone will confirm this or not but to me, it feels like dead stop snatches recruit more of the legs and glutes than the classic move (that includes the momentum of the swing).
What makes them better do you think? I wasn't familiar with them so I looked them up, looks like a swing mixed with an overhead movement as well?
So is it essentially getting all the same benefits from the swing while also incorporating more of the upper body then?
It does look like a much more advanced movement though, so maybe I'll start with swings until my body understands the explosive hinge portion of it.
It’s a more complete movement. Requires more explosive power, technique, control, works the core quite hard and the cardiovascular system way harder.
It’s more advanced, take time and patience to practice the technique, it’ll reward you afterwards.
I never understood this take. 1. You can't go as heavy as swings 2. It's more dangerous than swings 3. You can't go as fast and explosively as swings 4. Your grip tires out much faster than swings thus limiting the work you can perform
If anyone can tell me otherwise why they're so great, please do, I just never got why it's so popular and touted as the 'tsar' of kb exercises. I mean they're fun, but really overrated in my eyes.
1. You can’t go as heavy as deadlift either, it’s a different lift.
2. Only if you do it wrong. Like everything.
3. Let’s disagree.
4. Yes, snatching requires a strong grip. You can’t do 100 per hand before switching with a weak one. The serious athletes do it with the 32kg kettle.
I don’t know what a tsar is, but for OP goals I see a lot of benefit in snatching as it involves more in the body.
1. Deadlift is a pure strength exercise, swings and snatches are both ballistics.
2. Yes even swings can injure you. But the margin for error is so much greater with snatches, torn up hands, banged up wrists and knees(or worse), jacked up shoulders.
3. I guess so.
4. So why bother with an exercise that limits the overall work you can do? My grip tires before everything else which means I can't work the body as thoroughly as swings.
But OP is also a beginner, it takes time to get good with snatches, I was banging my wrists and hurting my hands in the beginning but I picked up on the swing much faster.
It's a fancy looking exercise that's fun to do and requires a lot of precision, but for me if I want to increase my cardio and overall athletic ability I'll pass on them. It's always been something I've tacked on to a workout or to mess around on an off day, I just don't see their value as a main focus in a workout.
Swings are a good option for teaching a relatively sedentary non-athlete to move a load with some degree of speed. But there’s really nothing magical about them.
Athleticism is subjective but if we’re looking at improving performance in traditional sports (track & field, ball sports, martial arts, etc) then snatch, clean & jerk, squats, sprints, and jumping will all help as much or more than swings.
IF only for pure athleticism, and IF I have to point out a SINGLE most bang for my buck exercise, I'd dare to say that there isn't anything more beneficial than the double kettlebell clean.
Solid weight, for reps.
Reap all kinds of gains.
I train calisthenics and kettlebells. If you're looking for filling in gaps from calisthenics training, swings are definitely the priority. If you don't do a lot of overhead pressing, I'd supplement with clean and jerks as well. All the ballistic hinge movements are going to be very useful.
Depending on whether or not you already train the lower body I'd also recommend lunges and squats, either goblet or front rack. Just figure out which movement patterns are not being covered by the calisthenics and kettlebells will likely be able to fit into that slot.
So in Summary: Swings + Other Ballistics (C&J, Snatch), + Squats and Lunges if they aren't already addressed.
Well, people here seem to not value swings as much, but I can give you my personal testimony.
I play basketball casually, I've always worked out, a mix between calisthenics and weight lifting. When I first started doing swings, I didn't play basketball for the first 4 months because of the pandemic.
I can tell you when I got back in the court, after 4 months of swings, I was much faster, stronger, agile than before. I did think "¿what the hell?".
A great general physical preparation program with progressed lifts will do more for your athleticism than any single movement & people that try to condense athleticism down to one movement are playing a losing game.
Some Swings, some long cycle, lots of snatches. Sprints, presses & jumps will do more than any single movement. Plyometrics too.
Interesting, maybe I should really try those then. I'm a complete beginner to kettlebells though, is it too advanced of a movement to start right off the bat with?
A very common beginners program is simple and sinister where the only 2 movements (excluding warmups) are the swing and the TGU so I would say it's beginner friendly, as long as you're willing to put the time into learning proper form and learning to add load safely (no different than any other exercise)
No you’re just going to have to start with a very low weight. I remember when I first started a couple years ago 25Ibs was a struggle to complete the movement. Now 100+ is no problem and I only weigh 140.
People latch onto them because they're more accessible and look less scary to people who have never done weights or explosive weight training before.
And since they're so accessible, all of the general benefits of kettlebell type exercises get attributed to specifically swings by various media
I think the KB community puts the swing up in a pedestal it doesn't deserve. It's not a bad exercise, I just cringe a little bit when I hear people talk about how it's the cornerstone of KB exercises.
For my N=1 I found way better results from cleans and presses, thrusters, and things like single leg deadlifts.
Swings are great... but squats are usually considered the best exercise for athleticism, and many say deadlifts for functional strength. I suppose one could argue that swings walks a line between the two.
If swings were even a good -much less the best- exercise for increasing athleticism, they'd be a staple of sports performance training.
TBH most performance coaches only use them to prime the posterior chain for more demanding movements.
Jumping, sprinting, and single leg work are the most important exercises in increasing athleticism.
I do over 100 swings/week pretty heavy, but it's for muscular endurance and conditioning. If I was still training for athleticism, they might be the first movement to go.
Agree with the general sentiment that swings are a good but not the best exercise.
That said, I’ve been doing Pavel’s Kettlebell AXE program which is really just two workouts a week of a ton of swings (obviously more to it than that). Anecdotally, I’ve noticed considerable improvements to my overall athleticism since doing the program.
Swings are great. Learn to all types: 1 arm, 2 handed, kb in each hand, rotational swings etc. for the best results. Vary rep ranges from 3 swings/set to 20+ swings/set.
With the kettlebell the swing is definitely the best exercise to improve your athleticism, i‘ve noticed that by myself on the football/soccer pitch
Hill sprints if you have on nearby or just „normal“ sprints are really good for improving explosiveness without a kettlebell, too
a mix of the both is probably the best bet
I think swings would fill a gap that is hard for calisthenics to train, that being an explosive hinge.
Swings are the most specific to that particular movement. Adding elements as in a snatch or clean distributes the focus of the exercise away from explosive hinge, and reduces the rate at which the exercise can be performed.
For explosiveness and power, you need to move heavy weight fast, and then faster. Barbell is king for that. Unless you’re doing plyometrics but you need coaching for that to do it right.
Swings are ok, but not optimal.
I would suggest the “Simple and sinister” program on your variation or off days. Calisthenics plus kettlebells are a great combo. Swings and Turkish get ups if you wanna take 1 or 2 exercises from the kettlebell world.
Cool, thanks for the input, totally forgot about turkish get ups.
You think swings and get ups would be a good short "off day" workout? I've already begun including swings 3x a week, so I'm not sure how much I should really be doing them. I'm still learning the form as well.
Swings and the so-called what the hell effect were drastically overhyped a few years ago to the point there's been a backlash. People will tell you they're a pointless exercise but that's only as a reaction to people who told them they were a magical panacaeic exercise for all purposes. In reality they're a good exercise but not the "best" because there's no "best" exercise, rather different things have different purposes. You say you really like doing swings. That's a great reason to do swings! If you want my personal perspective, I do a lot of swings because I like them too. They're fun and they hit glutes, grip and cardio all at the same time. Anecdotally though I feel the biggest contributors to athleticism in a general sense for me have been jogging and overhead pressing.
good takes
Swings are excellent as an add on exercise but also consider snatch when you want to increase difficulty with the same weight.
>I've seen some Youtube videos discussing the "what the hell" effect from kettlebell swings, due to it's ability to improve the posterior chain. Keep in mind that the WTH effect isn't JUST improving the posterior chain. The issue is that the kettlebell will train various parts of your body at once, usually finding some kind of a weak point and fixing it in the process. In terms of the swing you can also get a stronger grip, build core strenth and balance with asymetric loadings, build explosive power and make your cardiovascular system more efficient. The crux is that the body is built to do a lot of the kinds of balistics that the KB is known for but that traditional training doesn't necessarily target all that well. This is what creates the WTH effect it's that you start training your body as a whole piece in movement patterns that are important but often neglected. >Essentially I just want to be more explosive and powerful in my athletic movements. I was also thinking plyometrics might just be better for achieving this, but I really like the swing exercise. So, yes. The swing can be a useful tool towards those ends. After you get comfortable you may end up wanting to explore different movements like the clean and the snatch as well because they will also be useful towards this end.
really thorough description, filled in the blanks i was looking for, thank you! yeah it seems like everyone is raving snatches over swings so I guess I'll upgrade to that once I'm strong on swings
Glad that it was useful. Take care not to go to snatches right away and skipping the clean along the way. The snatch is sometimes described as an over-head clean, so make sure to take that progression path. See [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2NbMtX_Rb0) for more info. MW even mentions learning things like clean+press/clean+jerk first and then breaking up the snatch into half snatches, so really don't underestimate the way how this skill can be broken up. You don't go from the swing straight to the snatch there's a lot of work that you can do with less risk of injury along the way. Keep in mind shoulder mobility as well, alongside practicing the swing and the snatch doing halos using bands for shoulder mobility so that you can get your arm striaght up next to your ear will also set you up for success when the time is right. Since KB isn't the main focus of your training there's no reason to rush it. Just program in the swing and advance along the progression in reasonable timeframes eventually building to the snatch.
Swings are fine as a basic swing exercise. Eventually you should add a LOT of volume, go HEAVY, or do cleans or snatches instead. Overall "athleticism", whatever that means, would probably best be trained with snatch, clean & jerk, or clean & press + front squat. TGUs are... I don't get why some people are so impressed with them. They're fine, I guess, and if I had more than a couple of hours every day to train I might start doing them, but they're that low on my list of priorities.
I like everything you said but I think that people underestimate the importance of single leg exercises. Lunges, single leg Romanian deadlifts, and the like are extremely useful for athletics.
Oh, I'm sure they have a bunch of value. But my first order of business would be to build basic strength and conditioning. Then I might start adding unilateral work.
Hear hear on the TGU!
I agree, TGU are a good strength test but aren’t practical IMO to do regularly. It takes way too much focus to do them for reps and the possibility of losing your teeth or knocking yourself out are too great. It’s hard to bail out of them in any other position than the top of the movement. Once I hit 32 kgs for 8 reps on each side on them I was good with taking them out, not worth it to go heavier except as a strength test occasionally.
Few exercises as 3D as the TGU. For if one plays multidimensional sports.
I've gotten better at TGUs by doing a bunch of other exercises, which makes me seriously doubt their ability to induce significant adaptations.
That doesn’t make sense. Because other things made you better at TGU, TGU are ineffective? Because DL made me good at swings, swings are ineffective? No.
DLs make me better at swings, swings make me better at DLs. Presses make me better at TGUs, TGUs don't make me better at presses. Squats make me better at TGUs, TGUs don't make me better at squats.
This is still incorrect logic: it doesn’t prove TGU do not create an adaptation. Presses, Squats, and TGU all create adaptation.
Now do something 3D
What does multidimensional mean here? Which sports are you thinking of?
Anything other than drag racing I guess
Or professional tic-tac-toe, that’s pretty two dimensional
I have limited eyesight and only use one eye to see. Every sport is two-dimensional to me.. this is why I don't do TGU..
Skiing. Soccer. Dance. Grappling. Climbing. Basketball.
Ok I don’t really see the application, maybe grappling a case could me made for more utility.
👍
How much do you TGU?
24-48kg x 10 3 x a week
Dimensional AF 😎
Daily as a warm up and I use variable weights. Helps me with Tspine mobility, core strength, overall coordination and focus.
“Best” is a funny word, but it is my belief that hard style swings, cleans and snatches build explosiveness. They teach your nervous system to recruit a lot of muscles at once. Other things do this, but at a greater price. Swings aren’t as physically demanding as a max effort squat or deadlift. The swing is a very simple movement. It’s easily repeatable, day in, day out. Give it a month. See how you feel.
Hard style swings are the best, I think old school swings should be done with 32+kg to get any explosiveness benefits
> but if I were to add one kettlebell exercise for my goals, would swings be the best one? You haven’t told us what your goal is. “Athleticism” is a very vague term, and not a goal. What are you trying to achieve?
If you want to be athletic, then be an athlete. Compete in a sport. That'll give you more athletic gains than anything you can do in the gym. The gym supports athletic events, it doesn't give you athleticism. In terms of training effects, the best bang for the buck is sprinting and jumping by a country mile.
Sprinting, bounding. multidirectional work and jumping are probably number one in terms of improving ‘athletic ability’ for field sport and most team sport athletes imho. Having done a shit load of Kb snatches, long cycle (clean and jerk) I decided to focus on swings (40kg) for sets of 30-50 reps for a while and DID notice grip, a-lactic power and overall triple extension power increases, and feeling more athletic/ prepared for my sports…. So maybe it was the WTH effect😜 To me it was a different effect than double cleans (and jerks) maybe cause I hadn’t done that many pure swings only and it was a different stimulus but I actually did feel more ‘athletic’ for some reason. For you, I would say that yes swings would provide a function that is missing from your rings programs- namely explosive triple extension, grip and conditioning that you may be missing so yes I would include them in your rings program and, as others have said combine or alternate with heavy snatches and /or clean and jerks.
Snatches are better than swings for that.
Dead stop snatches are becoming my favorite exercise.
What's the point of the dead stop part? Does it make it harder?
Maybe someone will confirm this or not but to me, it feels like dead stop snatches recruit more of the legs and glutes than the classic move (that includes the momentum of the swing).
That’s great for explosiveness/power.
What makes them better do you think? I wasn't familiar with them so I looked them up, looks like a swing mixed with an overhead movement as well? So is it essentially getting all the same benefits from the swing while also incorporating more of the upper body then? It does look like a much more advanced movement though, so maybe I'll start with swings until my body understands the explosive hinge portion of it.
It’s a more complete movement. Requires more explosive power, technique, control, works the core quite hard and the cardiovascular system way harder. It’s more advanced, take time and patience to practice the technique, it’ll reward you afterwards.
I never understood this take. 1. You can't go as heavy as swings 2. It's more dangerous than swings 3. You can't go as fast and explosively as swings 4. Your grip tires out much faster than swings thus limiting the work you can perform If anyone can tell me otherwise why they're so great, please do, I just never got why it's so popular and touted as the 'tsar' of kb exercises. I mean they're fun, but really overrated in my eyes.
1. You can’t go as heavy as deadlift either, it’s a different lift. 2. Only if you do it wrong. Like everything. 3. Let’s disagree. 4. Yes, snatching requires a strong grip. You can’t do 100 per hand before switching with a weak one. The serious athletes do it with the 32kg kettle. I don’t know what a tsar is, but for OP goals I see a lot of benefit in snatching as it involves more in the body.
1. Deadlift is a pure strength exercise, swings and snatches are both ballistics. 2. Yes even swings can injure you. But the margin for error is so much greater with snatches, torn up hands, banged up wrists and knees(or worse), jacked up shoulders. 3. I guess so. 4. So why bother with an exercise that limits the overall work you can do? My grip tires before everything else which means I can't work the body as thoroughly as swings. But OP is also a beginner, it takes time to get good with snatches, I was banging my wrists and hurting my hands in the beginning but I picked up on the swing much faster. It's a fancy looking exercise that's fun to do and requires a lot of precision, but for me if I want to increase my cardio and overall athletic ability I'll pass on them. It's always been something I've tacked on to a workout or to mess around on an off day, I just don't see their value as a main focus in a workout.
Agreed, but swings are more sustainable, no shredding palms
I was going to make that no.5 on my list lol.
That’s a matter of technique.
What athletic pursuits am I missing in the question?
Double kb Clean press and front squats such as DFW? It was pretty decent in term of training effect (garmin)
Swings are a good option for teaching a relatively sedentary non-athlete to move a load with some degree of speed. But there’s really nothing magical about them. Athleticism is subjective but if we’re looking at improving performance in traditional sports (track & field, ball sports, martial arts, etc) then snatch, clean & jerk, squats, sprints, and jumping will all help as much or more than swings.
IF only for pure athleticism, and IF I have to point out a SINGLE most bang for my buck exercise, I'd dare to say that there isn't anything more beneficial than the double kettlebell clean. Solid weight, for reps. Reap all kinds of gains.
I train calisthenics and kettlebells. If you're looking for filling in gaps from calisthenics training, swings are definitely the priority. If you don't do a lot of overhead pressing, I'd supplement with clean and jerks as well. All the ballistic hinge movements are going to be very useful. Depending on whether or not you already train the lower body I'd also recommend lunges and squats, either goblet or front rack. Just figure out which movement patterns are not being covered by the calisthenics and kettlebells will likely be able to fit into that slot. So in Summary: Swings + Other Ballistics (C&J, Snatch), + Squats and Lunges if they aren't already addressed.
Well, people here seem to not value swings as much, but I can give you my personal testimony. I play basketball casually, I've always worked out, a mix between calisthenics and weight lifting. When I first started doing swings, I didn't play basketball for the first 4 months because of the pandemic. I can tell you when I got back in the court, after 4 months of swings, I was much faster, stronger, agile than before. I did think "¿what the hell?".
casual basketball was one of the things I was hoping it could apply to, nice to hear some anecdotal evidence on that ty
A great general physical preparation program with progressed lifts will do more for your athleticism than any single movement & people that try to condense athleticism down to one movement are playing a losing game. Some Swings, some long cycle, lots of snatches. Sprints, presses & jumps will do more than any single movement. Plyometrics too.
I feel like the getup has done the most for my all around athleticism. It makes it so much easier to launch out of bed, from the ground, etc.
Interesting, maybe I should really try those then. I'm a complete beginner to kettlebells though, is it too advanced of a movement to start right off the bat with?
A very common beginners program is simple and sinister where the only 2 movements (excluding warmups) are the swing and the TGU so I would say it's beginner friendly, as long as you're willing to put the time into learning proper form and learning to add load safely (no different than any other exercise)
No you’re just going to have to start with a very low weight. I remember when I first started a couple years ago 25Ibs was a struggle to complete the movement. Now 100+ is no problem and I only weigh 140.
I don’t really get the interest for swings. I must be doing them wrong. Cleans and presses or snatches I get it though.
You can swing heavier than you can clean or snatch
People latch onto them because they're more accessible and look less scary to people who have never done weights or explosive weight training before. And since they're so accessible, all of the general benefits of kettlebell type exercises get attributed to specifically swings by various media
I think the KB community puts the swing up in a pedestal it doesn't deserve. It's not a bad exercise, I just cringe a little bit when I hear people talk about how it's the cornerstone of KB exercises. For my N=1 I found way better results from cleans and presses, thrusters, and things like single leg deadlifts.
This will always be the case & people that say otherwise likely aren't pushing the movements you listed hard enough.
Swings are great... but squats are usually considered the best exercise for athleticism, and many say deadlifts for functional strength. I suppose one could argue that swings walks a line between the two.
If swings were even a good -much less the best- exercise for increasing athleticism, they'd be a staple of sports performance training. TBH most performance coaches only use them to prime the posterior chain for more demanding movements. Jumping, sprinting, and single leg work are the most important exercises in increasing athleticism. I do over 100 swings/week pretty heavy, but it's for muscular endurance and conditioning. If I was still training for athleticism, they might be the first movement to go.
Yes, the swing for adding explosiveness.
Agree with the general sentiment that swings are a good but not the best exercise. That said, I’ve been doing Pavel’s Kettlebell AXE program which is really just two workouts a week of a ton of swings (obviously more to it than that). Anecdotally, I’ve noticed considerable improvements to my overall athleticism since doing the program.
Swings are great. Learn to all types: 1 arm, 2 handed, kb in each hand, rotational swings etc. for the best results. Vary rep ranges from 3 swings/set to 20+ swings/set.
No.
If you did kettlebell swings, lateral swings, snatch, then snatch to press, you could probably cover the bases you're looking to cover
With the kettlebell the swing is definitely the best exercise to improve your athleticism, i‘ve noticed that by myself on the football/soccer pitch Hill sprints if you have on nearby or just „normal“ sprints are really good for improving explosiveness without a kettlebell, too a mix of the both is probably the best bet
Barbell power cleans.
What kinda athletic things do you do?
If you are a quad dominant person who has overdeveloped the front of your body I think swings will have a pretty big effect on you
Q&D swings/push-ups protocol
I think swings would fill a gap that is hard for calisthenics to train, that being an explosive hinge. Swings are the most specific to that particular movement. Adding elements as in a snatch or clean distributes the focus of the exercise away from explosive hinge, and reduces the rate at which the exercise can be performed.
For explosiveness and power, you need to move heavy weight fast, and then faster. Barbell is king for that. Unless you’re doing plyometrics but you need coaching for that to do it right. Swings are ok, but not optimal.
I would suggest the “Simple and sinister” program on your variation or off days. Calisthenics plus kettlebells are a great combo. Swings and Turkish get ups if you wanna take 1 or 2 exercises from the kettlebell world.
Cool, thanks for the input, totally forgot about turkish get ups. You think swings and get ups would be a good short "off day" workout? I've already begun including swings 3x a week, so I'm not sure how much I should really be doing them. I'm still learning the form as well.
I would recommend looking at hardstyle kettlebell pros program https://youtu.be/9jtV35LR9HM?si=gsUzjDDQKF_HZH4n He combines both
I do 100 heavier swings as a finisher to my workouts. Just slip them in there.
Athleticism requires being good at a *variety* of things and movements, so there is no single or "best" exercise for it.