In this month’s issue of Women’s Health, Ashley Greene spills that she worked out with kettlebells, did squats, and pushed a big box of weights across the floor (I’m guess that’s a prowler).
If you haven’t noticed yet, what works for getting a lean hot moviestar vampire body is doing cardio-strength intervals.
You can skip the long slow cardio workouts and get twice the results in half the time by doing intervals.
Then, bring the interval workout off the treadmill and swap in strength movements like squats and kettlebell swings.
Ashley’s Diet
Taking a quick look at Ashley’s body paint photo shoot for Sobe Beverages, you get the idea that you’d have to eat pretty clean if you want that body.
Not surprisingly, Ashley eats cave-girl style.
Cave girl is just my way of saying that you eat things you could hunt or gather… on the outside edge of the supermaket.
While she says she doesn’t “diet”, she feeds herself good nutrition like “halibut, tuna, sushi chicken, egg whites, and veggies.”
Where most people tend to drastically over-complicate diet, Ashley actually eats… food. I mean, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that if you eat protein, fruit and veggies, you’re going to be wicked lean.
Ashley throws in a free meal once in a while and has some wine or some brownies.
As we know from past articles – having a free meal once in a while (planned) goes a lot better than trying to deprive yourself of “bad” foods forever.
Eat awesome 90% of the time. Plan to have free meals 10% of the time. Don’t feel guilty about the free meals – it works really well to plan them in.
What’s So Amazing About Kettlebells?
The same thing that’s so awesome about pushups, pullups, and squats. It’s full body strength endurance, and that just works for fat loss.
Kettlebell swings kick fat loss workouts up a notch in three powerful ways:
1.) They’re a hip extension move – they hit your butt and hamstrings. Where most people do lots of squats and lunges (lots of quads, a little butt and hamstrings) most people aren’t getting near enough work on their backside.
2.) Kettlebell work is, by nature, completely full body. Big moves = more work = more fat loss.
3.) Explosive movements cause explosive results. The turnover is faster, meaning you’re doing more work in less time. If you’ve ever done repetition box jumps, you know what I mean.
3.5) You have to pay attention. When you’re swinging a essentially a big iron cannonball around, you have to do be aware of what you’re doing. It requires skill and it requires mindfulness. Anecdotally, it seems like people who are paying attention during their workouts get better results than people who mindlessly bang out reps..
Essentially, I think that this is what people like about Yoga – people would rather do something that requires them to be there, to work towards a mastery of movement, than to try and distract themselves from movement (like running on a treadmill while watching TV).
Photo: buzzfuss / 123RF Stock Photo
What’s So Killer About Squats and Lunges?
Pretty much everything that’s awesome about kettlebell swings could be applied to squats and lunges. In fact, they’re two sides of the same coin. They should balance.
The same way that you want to balance out all of your pushing and pulling exercises (like making sure you do dumbbell rows after doing dumbbell presses, or doing TRX rows after doing pushups) you need to balance out your squats and lunges with kettlebell swings.
You need to fill your fat loss workouts with big intense movements like kettlebell swings, squats, lunges, pushups, rows, overhead presses, and pullups. Pretty much anything else is a waste of time.
out of breath” -Ashley Greene on the Today Show
Scarlett Johansson’s workout included Kettlebell swings, lunges, jump lunges, and pushups.
Ashley Greene’s workout included kettlebell swings, squats, weight pushes, and planks.
Given how wicked vampire superhero movie starlet rocking they look, don’t you think your workout should include kettlebell swings and either a squats or a lunges?
By Josh Hillis, Level 2 RKC Kettlebell Instructor, CPT, PES, ZMIS
again, big thanks to http://twitter.com/Sunnybranste for dropping me a line on that Women’s Health article!
“Here is what a kettlebell strength-cardio fat loss circuit could look like:”
???
help, I can’t put my KB down until I know what comes next….
Thank You, Josh…
I recently started exercising to workout routines that I found at
http://www.fitclick.com/workout_routine. They helped me lose weight fast. I think I will try this workout with kettlebells to gain some muscle. Thanks for this post.