Founded by Steve Cotter, whom you all know from this year's Summit, and Stone Cold Steve Austin's long lost brother Ken Blackburn, the IKFF grew out of Steve and Ken's yearly bootcamp in Michigan.
Perhaps the best way to explain is video of last year's bootcamp:
On Saturday we started out with about 30 minutes of dynamic warmups and joint mobility, focusing alot on the hips and shoulders. In addition to mobility work most of us are familiar with some of the movements here are drawn from martial arts, and really provide some useful and fun variations.
The rest of Saturday was primarily focused on the classical kettlebell lifts of clean & jerk, and snatch. Details are everything here folks and over 5 hours we got details to spare. Aside from drilling we got some serious work in too, among which the 14 minute timed set of cleans was a crowd favorite (7 minutes each hand, no putting the bell down). And yeah we were all wringing out sweaty clothes out after that one!
If you've never experienced timed sets this is a great way to build work capacity and conditioning, as well as teaching the importance of breathing and relaxation.
We finished up with some regeneration exercises (think yoga and qi gong) and stretching.
Sunday morning Ken put us through even more joint mobility work and dynamic warmups, then we jumped right into working snatch technique, and double kb jerks. Lots of work was put in with timed sets of both - and I have the ripped callouses on both hands to prove it.
Inbetween work with the bells Sunday Steve and Ken lead a couple sessions on training business issues, programming, and other issues for fitness professionals. Practical and well thought out, and completely lacking hype, this was quite useful.
After lunch we worked on squatting and strength moves such as Turkish getup variations, getup situps, and Sotts Press, among others. And when you have a room full of trainers of course you gotta have a strength contest so many laughs were had as we all strained to outlift each other. I set a couple fun little PRs with the 32, 36 and 40kg bells - how could I not with those guys glaring at me
I've gotta say there were some damn strong women there, among them world class grappler Felicia Oh and some Krav Maga instructors. They definitely humbled alot of guys there.
We finished up the day with a mini workshop on knife techniques by a South African gentlemen who has worked security for many world leaders. So if you are looking for 30 ways to kill a man in 3 seconds he is your man - look for a future IKFF workshop on martial arts and self defense.
Everything from the instruction, the equipment, to the food (catered Whole Foods and Peet's Coffee!) was top notch, and I highly recommend taking any IKFF workshops.
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Working "hard," or the perception of working hard, doesn't really mean anything. Sweating, vomiting, and breathing hard could be a good workout or a tropical disease kicking in.-Dan John
That was a good review of what must have been an awesome weekend. I'm hopefully going to one of these in Australia later in the year. Thanks for the added excitement.
Will this certification get you a pay raise at work or allow you to charge more?
Nice sig line too.
Credit for the sig goes to Lou.
No the cert doesn't directly get me a raise (my gym doesn't give any raises past where I'm at now no matter how many certs one has) but the IKFF does have it's own trainer locator and helps it's members with business matters - so yes there is a potential financial benefit, but like anything else it depends on what you do with it.
But I'm already using techniques, mobility work, and drills I picked up with clients - so there is an immediate benefit.
Damn that was a fun weekend!!
Josh, if you can by all means go. It's really the best workshop of it's kind out there right now.
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Working "hard," or the perception of working hard, doesn't really mean anything. Sweating, vomiting, and breathing hard could be a good workout or a tropical disease kicking in.-Dan John
IKFF Seminar - Another Weekend with Steve Cotter
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