Daivd Keohan | Mobility Expert & Irish Kettlebell Sport Athlete

Welcome to the platform podcast. I'm your host Jordan Kunde-Wright, founder and head coach of the Twin Cities Kettlebell Club And I'm on a mission to help others build sustainable healthy habits I know how hard that can be because I've struggled and succeeded to varying degrees throughout my life But I've lost over a hundred pounds and kept it off for over a decade now the key for me was discovering my passion for lifting weights in Kettlebell Sport on this podcast we'll talk to athletes coaches experts and everyday people about Kettlebell's fitness programming Nutrition, mindset, making an impact and generally striving to grow and leave legacy of positive change Please join me. Thank you and welcome into the platform podcast. Today's guest keeping up with the international flavor of late is Daivd Keohan He is an Irish Kettlebell sport athlete and yogi. He is the founder of Kettle yoga and I believe he is also a master of sport in Kettlebell Sport. Is that right Daivd? That's true. That's true. Very proud to say a master of sport in Kettlebell's sports as well. So very very happy with that. It took a long time but eventually got there Well, welcome in. Thank you very much for joining me. I really appreciate it. Deloitte to be here, man. I'm humbled and honored. Thank you very much. Yeah, I appreciate it. So tell us a little bit about yourself. You're obviously your Irish. So tell us, you know, where did you grow up and then how did you come up, man? Wait, okay. I grew up in a place called Waterford, which is down to South East of Ireland. And as a kid, I suppose they talked about sport and then and all that. I was never really a sporty kid. I'm never into sport at all really. More into music and art growing up. So it's a good place for music and art. I was playing music away, playing gigging from the age of 16. And all the way through my 20s and everything that goes and I suppose we're playing like in a rock band and rock covers band. You get all the late nights and the drinking and everything else that goes with it. So I didn't really start sport of any kind and our fitness of any kind until I was about 32. And that was when I started doing and I got into a very bad place. Wow. And how old are you now? If you don't, if you don't, I'm telling everybody. I'm 41 years old now. So when you start to do anything, I mean literally any any sport at all as just to the end of 31. So when there's in 2012 and it ended in 2011, I started running and believe me, when I say I started, it was in operance 16 app almost 17 stone weight. Very, very overweight, very bad physically. Are you going to have to translate that for the American, for the American audience? How heavy is a stone? Stone to about 14, 14 pounds. Okay, 14, 15 pounds. So I was, I was over the 100 KGC. And for my height, I'd be relatively short, I'd be about 48. So I was, I was pretty overweight and I was in just in a bad place, high blood pressure. I was diagnosed as being asthmatic. I was totally at that stage. My kids were young, so I was told, look, you better search yourself out. You won't be around in 10 years for your kids. You know, you're heading on a bad path. The family suffered a high blood pressure. So I said, you got a search yourself out. So I bought a pair of runners the next day. And first day around the top of the road, but 100 meters in Toronto, I came home because I couldn't go any further. I was really, really, really bad. But when we did every morning, and eventually after about four to six weeks, I was running my 5K, which we then went up to 10K and six months later, I booked an around a marathon. So it was a pretty quick, wow, yeah, that's a fast from 100, from 100 meters to a marathon in six months. I started in November in, in 2011, and the marathon was in June in 2012. So I was a pretty, pretty quick. But I realized I said, look, get some, get a goal to aim for. It was a pretty big goal. But once you had something to aim for, you can go and do it. And I found quickly that I had a good mental strength. If I set myself a task, I pretty much stick with it and do it, bring to the pain threshold, all that kind of stuff. Like I ran that marathon, and probably a big epiphany in my life, it was kind of like, if you really want to do something, you train yourself to do it, you can do whatever you like. Because there's always going to be tell you you can't, you know, there's always going to be people say you can't do something. Like people are through concern, but there's family or friends or people just who envy you just don't like it. They're going to try and knock you down or hardly are tell you you can't do something or you know what I mean, try and break your spirit, but as long as you believe in yourself, you can pretty much do what you like. You can put yourself in here, but so I'm kind of rambling a big one. No, it's great. This is one of the things that I love to talk to people about mindset is a huge, I feel like a huge component of sport in general, but also just in life that doesn't get talked nearly enough about it. And you can only train three things. You can train your body. You can hone your craft and you can train your mind, you know, and we usually focus on the first one. We don't really talk about the third very much. So have you always been a really determined person, you know, throughout your life, or was this something that you just discovered that you have? Something I discovered that you had to work in to develop. This was like an epiphany moment for me because I was always like when it came to the music, I went to an ad app. If I wanted to learn something, I learned it. I'm saying with the arts and stuff like that. So I always kind of knew I enjoy to challenge and enjoy doing something, but I was never the physical individual. I never, I never done anything with that before. So just to get over that line to say, I in six months, you know, I've come this far. That really really gave me a lift and to say, okay, I can try and do new things. I can. I'm not too old. I mean, I don't see. I was 30, 31, 32, and I'm. Generally people, like in clubs, or self-accompanied retirement age, at that stage, you know what I mean, but it was kind of. It was a real eye-opening moment for me to say, look, you can, you can kick on from this, you know. And that's when I kind of got into kettlebell sport. That's pretty much after that. And I found that there was. How did you discover this for it? Yeah, it was, um, I finished a marathon, but the last. I see eight months in a marathon. I twisted my knee. It hurt me. It came down off a car. I'm wrong. I taught my knee. And I literally kind of hobbled walked the last eight miles. I said, no, I'm stopping. I'm going to finish. So, like, for about two to three weeks after that, my knee was pretty sore, pretty bound up. So I was like, at that stage, sport and running, it becomes such a part of my life was like, I need to do something. And just through, through blind looked, it was a guy came into the shop where I work. And he got a kettlebell sport t-shirt on him. And he was a gym owner, only opening a gym. At the time, a reopening in gym, kind of making it bigger. And we just got the chap and as he do, and being a shop person to chat to everybody. And he said, I saw my kettlebells and I was, I was fascinated what they were. So he said, come out and try a class, come out and try a, like a circle class. So I came out and tried my first circle class then the end of 2012. And absolutely, my ass totally kicked my ass. I mean, I was sitting at the kettlebell and I was sore for about four days afterwards. My hamstrings and my glutes. And, but I was like, I was hooked. I was like, oh, this is awesome. I'm doing all these different moves, getting stronger, because if that was something I wanted to do, I'd lost a lot of weight at that stage. I was down to about 12 and a half stone. And, say, roughly, maybe 85 or 86 kg, roughly. But I was kind of very skinny. I didn't have much muscle to it. I wanted to get a bit bigger. So I started doing these, these interval classes. And I'd great fun using doors for about three to four months. And then he was the only guy in my whole county of Ottawa, where I live, who had a kettlebell sport team. So he said, look, I mean, you're simply really trying to get this. Do you want to try to go with the kettlebell sports? Come up and show you what it's like. The other time he was a different choir. And he was in 24's and by Atalan. And I was watching, there's three guys training on 24's. They would joke, minute on, minute off. It was like, oh, man, that is absolutely awesome. 24 kilos each arm. And they're just playing in these reps, up 10, 14 reps a minute. You know, I was like, how do you do that? You know, I was fascinated by the sport. It was like, that's a, that's a pretty decent weight. And they didn't look over the bread or they didn't look too tired. So I got hooked on the kettlebell sport from there. And started off on 16's. Like everybody else was opposed. And I had my first comp on 16's at a very, very end of of 2012. Nice. And so now you've nice been at it for, you know, eight years. When did you hit, when did you hit master sport? When, when did that happen? How long did that, did that take? That took a while. I mean, I'm, and it's a bit of a bit of a story. If you don't make me talk about it. And I got in my. That's why you're here, man. And I got my first of all, I wanted to, I set myself goals at the very start when I was doing this training. I set myself goals that I wanted to get. First of all, my first 10 minutes said on 24's. I wanted to get on to the Irish team, which would have been, which was a massive massive thing for me in 2014. I finally got there. And my first 10 minutes said was. And far the national. So I had to get six or eight long cycle. I remember being getting to about 60 reps and I thought my arms were actually going to fall off. And I got the last four reps. I don't know. I don't know how it just pictures of me online or these absolutely. I got at the end of his end of his rope looking through the gates of hell. The eyes and everything just just, but I got that, that wrap up. And oh, my God, man, I can honestly say it was the hardest thing I have ever done before or since. Someone says, have you ever given anything 100% when I was at a 100% effort? If someone said even do one more clean, I would actually died. My technique was poor. My mobility was bad. The wheel was there. You know, so that got me over the line. Fourth rep locked out. I got a four rep. And I think I pushed press the last three or four reps. And got that last rep up though. I don't know how I got. Oh, my gosh. It was totally illegal. But look at the counter. I was going to say he had a kind judge. Could you imagine I had a feeling if the judge would have no counted that 64. I think I would have never done the sport again. That's it. Just broken. But no, I'm out of got that wrap up. I don't know how. And then. Caron, the other team was told, look. That was a really. I'm told I've never seen anybody fight that hard. Someone said after us. And to get those last few reps of said you're a fighter. You're going to go pretty far in the sport if you want to. So I got then I got confirmation was on the Irish team. To go to St Petersburg for the Europeans and to go to Hamburg. For the words are you okay? Yeah, the 2014. So that was an absolutely massive moment for me. I mean, to go from being this big overweight guy to be representing your country in a sport. And was such a turnaround. I mean, I couldn't believe myself. And. To stand there, which are tracks you don't. And I'm in a tournament day. It was a massive moment. Absolutely, massive. So I went over to which over to Russia and looking up his own up against one or the rally over in Russia. And put it and he was American, B.J. Clifford. And me and B.J. Were against computer in the end, I managed to win tank out on the day and then I became like a European champion and was like, how did that happen. You know what I mean? That was the same. You know. Because. From planet from playing the pubs smoking and drinking. in a short period of time. That's it in Russia. I was like, this is just what I'm talking about, you know? So yeah, so that was great. And came home and then represented in Hamburg in 2014 and came four plays by one rep over there. So that really spurred me on to it. I knew then what was wrong with me over there. I was like, my cleans are really bad at that time. I was wasting a lot of time using my cleans and re-racking every single time, just wasting time, you know? So yeah, I spent the next year being not my cleans and then won the World's in 2015, which was huge. That was great. Now, when did you have the, oh, sorry, sorry. I didn't mean to enter up there. No, no, sorry, man. I'd run belong. Sorry, excuse me, man. I'd run belong all day. It's got an explicit warning tag on it. Don't worry. You can swear as much as you want, man. There's no worries. No worries. It's just kind of the way you stick it, sorry. I know from knowing your journey a little bit, I know that mobility was a big part of your journey to master a sport. So when did you have the epiphany that you really needed to work on mobility if you wanted to get in master a sport? 100%. So yeah, I went when I was doing 24s. Like, what you get away with on 24s, you're not going to get away with on 28s and you haven't got an op on 32s. I nearly classed it as a different sport to 24s because lack of mobility, you will get away with it to a certain degree under the lighter weights. But when you start pumping up the weights, or moving out the times, they're going to do like half marathon sets. That's when you really got to work mobility more than anything. And I saw that when I was competing professionally, I suppose, over in Kazakhstan in 2016. And I was competing for my CMS. And I was looking at CMS in the year before that. But especially in Kazakhstan, I was watching. I was hoping it's the best athletes in the world, which was a massive team for me. I was delighted to be there. They represent my country, a professional level. This was fantastic. But then I was watching the guys in the warm up area, the top Russians, the top cadets, the Ukrainians, you know, all of these Eastern black countries. And I was just looking at the mobility hat. I mean, guys doing like full pancake, pancake splits. They were doing like full back bridges, front splits, just warming up, you know. Here was me, this guy, you know what I mean? I was pretty mobile. It was okay at that stage, of course. I was like, that's what we're missing over here. That's what everybody over in Ireland and England, you know, we're not concentrating enough on our mobility. These guys are as flexible as ropes. But I budgeted their draws incredibly strong, you know, and of great engines. But that's the power to deposit that we're not really dealing with over here. You know, we're not, it's not being spoken about in terms of kettlebell sport. There's not being, it's not being torched by coaching. A lot, I mean, I'm generalizing here. I'm sure there are there is coaches who are doing it. And it likes to be a machine and a couple of guys are going to mention, but generally it wasn't being spoken about. So that's when it really opened my eyes what I needed to do to progress again and try and kick onto the next level, you know. So it was at the age that I wrote the yoga book the next year. Because I practiced for myself about six months on myself of just mobility work, started off with yoga, but then I ended up pushing them kind of more weighted mobility working stuff. The more I was more mobile, I was getting what you were doing that were you were you also were you also lifting at the same time or were you or were you I was I was, I mean, I think I got like 44 reps over in in Kazakhstan. And I don't about four to six months of mobility and I went on a me master sports of 48 reps. And I got my 48 reps six months later in Ireland and pretty easily. And that's 48 reps on the 32 on the 32s. Yeah. 48 reps on 42 on the second. Yeah. So yeah, that was that was it was great. And it felt I was told by even by the coaches at the time that he looks so comfortable doing it. You know, I said, I said, this has been training mobility. You know, I'm training mobility a lot more. And the more I went to Kams and the more I saw guys, especially men, and like struggle really, really struggle even with later weights for 24s and 20s because they're like their hip mobility and their thoracic shoulder mobility was very, very poor. It was then I said, so many needs to be talking about this a bit more over here. You know, and I'm not qualified in any in any respect. And I've always said that people look, I'm not physio. I'm not qualified in this at all. I'm just a concerned athlete who has seen a problem and wants to address it. And if you know, if the best I can do is just get people talking about mobility, then I'm happy with that because at least they're talking about it now. You know, some people say you're. Yeah, I got to give you. I got to give you a shout out and, you know, I can say that of the products that I've tried, which is a lot of them, you know, I bought your book. I got about a year, year and a half ago, I think. And the thing I loved about it is it is accessible for anybody that, you know, for anybody that is interested in just general mobility. It doesn't even have to be for kettlebell sport. It's a very easy to consume. Yeah, you know, and it's easy to follow and it works. I mean, it's a very good, it's a very good program. So I would, I would definitely recommend it's just called kettlebell, definitely, for anybody that wants to pick it up. It's an ebook, so you just download it, you know, and it's a fantastic, it's a fantastic book. It's a good, it's a good, it's all more traction program to get started for mobility. Exactly. And the way I see it with, with everything is, I mean, if you can't explain as, you know, if you're trying to use like, you know, scientific terminology and powerful people with, you know, if you can talk to something simply to somebody, and if they can understand it, and they can, they can then go off and do that. I was like, that's what you want to be doing, you know what I mean, I've always been like that with, with everything of, I don't know, if it's true art or from music or anything. If you need to explain yourself too much, then you're trying to hurt you, you know, you know, if you understand what I'm saying, you need to be able to do it. Absolutely. Well, on their own level, and say, look, we do this, and you do this, and you do this, you improve. And thankfully, a lot of people that have bought the book are of implemented a program have improved. And they've said, look, that's the reason we've got a lot more mobility and it's like, it's certainly the toy rises are, you know, the way we think of the chain of these strengths. I mean, I'm just really happy I can give something back to the school because it's given me so much. It's given me my life back when we, over these last eight to ten years, you know? Well, I know you, I mean, you put some, you put some awesome, I won't call them feats of strength necessarily because they're not simply strength, but it's, you put some awesome stuff on social media that you do that are, I mean, just, just yesterday, I think you were doing shinbox pistol squat. I don't know, I don't know what the hell the column. But, you know, I don't know, I'm going down to the ground with one, with one leg, and then folding in and then folding, you know, folding to the other leg and standing up to the other leg, you know, just some really cool, fun, interesting, you know, yoga and strength and body control, and body control things. And, you know, when you come up with those, they just, they just, is it just playing around or be pure play time? That's just pure play time for me. And what I'm doing is I'm just trying to push myself a little bit more and more because, I mean, I was never, I mean, just going back to, I was never a mobile person. I mean, I was like the family joke, like they used to call me the plank. Maybe they just didn't like me, but I was, you know, I was so immobile. So they did, I couldn't even touch my pocket knees, not to mention my toes, you know what I mean? And from there to certainly becoming generally the most flexible person in a room, again, is a bit of a mind twist. I mean, because I was always so, so remote, but this is just, I mean, when you, when you posted your, when you posted your video from, I think it was from 2013 or 2014, I saw a video that you posted on Facebook. I clearly believe how immobile you were because, because, since I've known you, you've been, you've been the bendy head of that guy, right? You know, to see you, to see you back is, there's like a lump. I can't exactly, that was the one, that wasn't said in Russia, yeah. And just to show people, like, and what I want to do to people is, like, oh, I want to just say this, everybody, but I'm not coming from any kind of a background of sports, our mobility, our martial arts, our, no training. I mean, so look, if all you can do is, and I'm a man and as far as he's now, if I can get to this level of mobility and strength by just paying around, maybe 50 minutes to 30 minutes a day, absolutely anybody can do it. What do I mean? Because I start from zero. Is that, is that, is that, is that all the more time it is, really? Is it, is it, you do 15 to 30 minutes a day of, of, of strict mobility work? That's, that's what it is. Yeah, obviously, and then that's about it really. You know, but I will say, like, I will go out and, and I, I left that big rock at the back, all right? I do some head-about work and so far, just in strength mobility work. Yeah, I mean, I, I really do in the morning, I wake up in the morning, and I'll go down, I'll do probably about a half an hour of, um, just on strength and mobility work, like that business, business class, and that is, in terms, especially in terms of the hip mobility work, I really help me in my, in my catalyst work career. And the likes of, um, yoga, I just play around, I kind of, I mix it up every day, keep it fresh for myself, but about 20 minutes a day, yeah? And I've, literally gone from nothing to being a pretty decent level of mobility at this stage, you know? Yeah, I will say when, one benefit that you had to, to not starting until your 30s is you didn't have any old injuries from, from years yourself, up as, as a young, as a young man, and, you know, Daivd was really helpful with me when I, when I started doing his program, you know, I have, I'm, I'm a collection of old American football and rugby injuries, so, you know, there was a few times I had to reach out to him because I was like, I can't, I can't achieve that position without having any feel like it's going to crack it has. You gave me the, you gave me the, you gave me the, the very simple advice of, I mean, if, if it hurts, don't fucking do it. Do, do, do, do something else, you know, that's right, just, you know, the simple, the simplest possible explanation, but it was still like the mind blowing to me like, oh, oh, so you're saying I don't hate this number or the program, if the, if the back then is hurting me, don't do the back then. Oh, oh, yeah, you, you're so good. We are known for kind of being if it's straight up or right over here. What I mean, I know it says I was then, I'm training a lot of guys online now with, with their mobility and did, I don't put it out there, but go use a reach out to me. I'm trying to help them as much as I possibly can. And then like the tagline is if it's pain, if it's pain, that's not a good thing. Discompany, pain is never a good thing. So we can, we can always try to do that. Yeah, but what I tell my athletes is very similar. I said, if it sucks, I don't care. If it hurts, I care very much. If it sucks, suck it up, put it up and keep lifting. Yes, exactly. What are we look like? I got those 48 reps in on the 32s and then I got into maritime lifting in it in a big way. And I must say, this is really, I'm so happy that I'm doing maritime work. I love it. You say, we did sick faster. I love, I am. There's a one to me somewhere. I think I'm a bit of a focus massacres. What I do love these extreme events, you know, that's pushing your body out to its limit. But what I wanted to show, tell people what I want to show people, I've always asked a couple of years of, if you work on your mobility, and if you work on your breathing, the two most important things you get to the sport are relaxation and breathing. That's not just coming from me. It's coming from any top Russian athlete or Russian coach, you know. Once you get your relaxation and your breathing, you can just keep lifting. So I wanted to take that to the end degree and I've done some crazy long sets over the last couple of years, just to show people that once you get your technique and your breathing correct, you can just keep lifting. So like I said, doing like 30 minutes on the 22s and 68s. You just posted a double 24 long cycle 20 minutes set and made it look like a walk in the second part. I mean, it was, it was a walk in the park. And if you're on a subject, that's what it should be. That's what lifting should be, you know, it shouldn't be brace-faced and totally under pressure in pain, you know, full of lactic acids, horribly uncomfortable. It should be relaxation and just the ability just to flow. And that's what long cycle should be. That's what like my lift is something of practice and I started, but long cycle should be just this rhythmic, beautiful, like rolling, like Olympic rolling, funger breathing, funger ability to relax your muscles and just keep going. And that's what it should be. And that's what I'm trying to teach people over here now. It's not about grabbing your cat legs. I just fucking pracing and lifting it hard as you can. The muscles oiling under pressure and just screaming and agony. It should be, it should be a beautiful thing to watch, you know, it should be just with them. And the first rip in the last rip should be the same, you know, and that's what I wanted to make it look, you make it look like ballet at times. So it's that's what it should be. I mean, it should be this beautiful ballet ballet relaxed with movement. And a lot of people, you know, just want to make it as tough on themselves as possible. And I'm saying, look, the reason you're finding this hard is you can't relax. And I didn't even say, watch me relax. I can relax. I got two, four, and 20, four, two, three, four seconds. You need to be able to switch your muscles off when you're switching muscles off to get a chance to relax. And then you can get on to your next lift. And the way I just throw it with the people at work shops is let's say for the world you want to do six reps, long cycle, right? In that stubbing side, it sits 10 second or 10 second or every single rep is 10 seconds. In that 10 seconds, if you can relax your legs in in in in my position for two to three, maybe four seconds. And you can, you can relax your legs overhead for like a second and a half, two seconds. Like that's anything between four to six seconds out of 10 seconds that your muscles are totally relaxed. Because you're stacking yourself correctly onto the kettlebells. You're like your main drivers, the main movers, your legs, your quads are switched off for four, five, six seconds out of 10. So I mean, that means that that breaks down to four, five, six minutes out of 10 minutes. You know, that your legs are totally relaxed. So I want to say, boy, nobody teach this. Boy, wouldn't you try to achieve this, you know? Boy, you're just having two kettlebells and just going balls out and falling a cylinder at a minute, six minutes, seven because you're you're screaming fatigue and you're your lactic asses has gone through the roof. You know that Americans got introduced to kettlebells through hard style, right? I mean, hard style is really the big thing here. Is it a big thing in your hard style? Do you guys have any other make-and-holds there? Hard style is, it's, it's all G.S. here in Ireland. It does a massive G.S. community, you know? There's a huge kettlebells community and there's not a lot of hard style being taught here, to be honest with you. And of course in gyms, like people who teach more the hard style, I suppose they teach the hard style, but I mean it's kettlebells for is pretty pretty big over here. So, and as opposed, if you're coming into it, I think that's part, I think that's part of the struggle with American whiskers. It's race, it's liberty. It's, as much as reaching lift as possible, is that kind of an attitude as opposed to it's all about, it's all, it's all about maximal strength and force, and rate of force production, you know, power power production, you know? So it works really well in the application of martial arts or football or, you know, those types of, then it translates over really well. So it, so it generally works well for that, and it's a very good way to get strong fast. If you were weak, you know, if you focus on making every rep as challenging as possible and maximal engagement and force application to the implement with every single rep, you're going to get faster or you're going to get stronger a lot faster. No, I mean, it makes sense. That's the whole thing behind it. Yeah, I mean, it makes sense for, like you said, for martial arts, for exclusivity, you know, it makes, it makes a lot of sense. But I mean, far, it's actually the antithesis of what we need to be teaching for kettlebells for, because kettlebells for it is, it's all about relaxation. You can see how you'd have it hard if you're coming from a hairstyle background into, because I did teach a guy actually, I'm in England when I was doing one of my workshops and he was coming from a hairstyle background. And he just couldn't understand the breathing and the relaxation end of what I was doing, you know? He couldn't completely opposite breathing style. Totally opposite, because everything with them is with, with, with her side is brace, get as much out of each lift as possible. When I was like, what I was like, you were doing beast mode. I want you to do least mode. He was like, what do you mean? I'm totally stealing that. I am totally stealing that. I'm telling you right now. Copyright Daivd killed what I'm was like, that's what I kind of said is least mode. You want to do the least amount of energy possibly per rep. So you can just even want the next rep and the next rep and the next rep when we're doing, when we're doing a long cycle. So like I said, I'm so, I'm just not to be kind of, I think I was pulling the wool over the Roy's are feeding them feeding the manual automation. I wanted to take that because it's at the end degrees. So doing all these extremely long sets and especially accumulating at the two sixteenths. And for two hours, that was probably the proudest moment of my head of my sport career, I think, was to get it to. And then you saw, then you saw some big, heavy racks and said, fuck it, I'll pick those up. When did the storm lift start? Stormed if it started really too quarantine. Well, only recently. So I was just there at home and me and my wife met in our college. And she has this proud rock that she'd done in our college. You know, this beautiful piece of art. That's a nice looking rock. I don't know more start ways. So I just got a scale and I put it on. It's like, yeah, about 62 62 and I have KG. Fuck, that'll be interesting. So then I started picking it up and hopping off the ground. And she wasn't happy with catching songs. She still is. The backyard. I love your sculpture. I mean, but it's awesome, but it's great for my workouts. It's a great, it's a beautiful piece of art. Yeah, yeah. But the way to fuck you thrown it up the ground and everything. And you're after making shit at the garden as well. It's just full of holes. So no, she's not too happy with me. I love my breathing. Are you playing an adless stone with any pointers? It's just, it started roughly just as a way of training because I didn't have access to a gym. So I didn't have access to a lot of equipment. I have a few kettlebells at home. And I was doing a lot of kind of a strength work and kind of circus strength kind of all-time strongman work with it. But I was getting great fun out of that. But then at this, I just, I make another heavy weight to be between lifting around. But then I was like looking at some rogue documentaries on them, all-time strongmen and from Iceland, from Scotland, from the past country, stone lifters. And I just found out my imagination. It's a way of kind of getting into the way people have been doing strength for thousands and thousands of years, you know? So it was like, yeah, absolutely. I think there's, I think that's how most, that's how most of these athletic endeavors start, right? It's like, oh, you see that big mountain over there? Yeah, fuck it. Let's climb it. Oh, you see that big rock? Yeah, fuck it. Let's pick it up. That's it. I'm going to go from there. I'm going to, I'm going to try and throw a tree. Those crazy scouts. I love the bits. And this is something I'm going to go on for the next year, or there's not like the Manhood Stones over in Scotland, you know, anything from maybe 80 kg to October to 150 kg. I'll then just be able to lift these things up and put them maybe on a pedestal or on a rock over there. And if you do, would you get your name in the book and you're part of history? So it's like that kind of spinal imagination. So I'm kind of among this for the time being, but I'm going to definitely go back and do a couple of kettlebell sports and competitions when they open up again, especially the world's IKMF from in to be here in Ireland this year, the Liga Council went. That was disappointing because I was really looking forward to doing that in November and to end crack. Because the last each I want to scratch and get my sport is to win a world professional goal. I want to work professional, see what I have in a world professional goal. So that's the last thing I want to do. And then I can just wait. That's what you don't want to get in the sport. Because I've hit every other thing I wanted. I've hit it and I've happily moved on from that now. I'm trying to give something back with the workshops and what's with training on the people. But that's the last thing I want to achieve. You're an artistic guy and you've talked a bit about your music career. And I know yoga in itself is not just an athletic endeavor. Obviously it's a spiritual expression. It's a religion in countries. How is your connection to the spiritual component of yoga? To be honest with you, it's not something that I practice. And I will say that to people as well that I was just using really as a way of getting more mobile at the start. And I think I'm kind of starting to move away from just strict yoga now. And that's kind of a honey part towards yoga at the start because for me that was always with people talking about mobility with yoga, of course, and I thought about it. So I did start doing yoga and the yoga poses. But the more I start doing other stuff since then, like like giant mobility and strengthening work and weighted mobility work, that's been a really mids and great gains over the last six months. I mean I put up a picture there of my overhead squat six months ago to what it is now. And I mean it's the difference is crazy in six months. Pretty incredible. I'm very much a fan of the general philosophy of you use mobility and activation techniques to get the joint open and to extend the window within which you can improve range of motion. And then if you can then load that movement in that pattern. Once you have, once you've opened up the right way to move, you can then load that movement. You actually make gains a lot quicker in your mobility. Exactly. When 100% when 100% accurate jargon and that's what I was kind of lacking at the start, it was just it was just doing yoga poses. But then I was like, okay, when I start opening the joint up, I'm working my, like say, internal external deportation, that kind of thing. And then loading it with a little bit of weight. That's when I start making some gains. And then you keep working on the mobility end of it, open up, strengthen it, open it up, and strengthen it. And the more I was doing that, the more the quicker my gains were. So I'm kind of more moving into that end now. And the workshops are kind of moving towards more towards that. There's all, there is still a yoga element. So is there a new book? Is there a new book for what's coming? Is there any, is there any? Definitely a new book on the way. What's the, do you have a work, do you have a working title? Not yet. Not yet. I'm not yet. I was thinking about sport, just kidding about sport mobility, KSM or something like that. But I come up, I come up with a catchy title if I can. And I would call it bend you fucker, bend you fucker. Then don't break bitches. But yeah, definitely new book coming and like I said, I've kind of grown in my knowledge of mobility over the last, especially with the last 12 or 18 months, a hell of a lot more than what I began with. So I'd like to kind of show people how far I've come since then. And I help as many people as I can, you know, because I believe that if more people just work in that mobility for the kettlebells for career, it'll just, it'll make your career longer, hopefully more injury proof for, you know, and get your lift in longer and faster and safer, you know. So that's what I want to do. Yeah, I got to reconnect with you then, because I definitely need, I want to specifically focus more on my mobility and strengthening my mobility patterns. I've made a lot of progress, but I still have a long way to go. So I think I'm going to, I think I'm going to hit you up. You can, you can get any pig on me and you can, you can have two examples of look, if an old out of shape guy can get bend you and you can say, hey, if I can take this broke ass old American football player who's fat in the out of shape too and turn him bend you've got, you've got two different use cases from opposite ends of this thing. Oh, and I loved them. I mean, it helped me out in any way I can and at the moment, I'm helping out one to go in the British, British, uh, well, I'm Marines. We hit me up there last week and Gary Rotland. Gary also gets Ketbells, Gary's a fantastically free, the world champion. He bet me actually at the end, the world's last year, and I was training. I was going to be my athlete for six months, and the folk one evened off and bet me at the world's, but I was, the one said I was happy you did, because he never turned 20 minutes up before in his life, and I got him from, from a 10 minute set to a 30 minutes set six months, and I managed to get him like master sports, so he was, he was pretty pleased with that, and he reconnected with me there last two weeks ago. He was like, Daivd, look, I've had a couple of bits on this year of Latteroni, and I feel like I'm getting injured a lot in my hamstrings and so forth. So I just ran into a battery attest and got him working on his internal external exploitation, his glute strengthening work, and he was there today. He said, I ran a 12 minute PB and a 15, my course, 12 minutes PB on the 15. Wow, a 12 minute person of that. Wow, minutes. I mean, I was like, 40 seconds is like I said, Daivd, I ran a 12 minute PB, and my glutes were working. He said, you know, but no issues in my hamstrings. He said, I actually can't believe it. It's like someone just kind of took a handbrake off me, you know, and I said, that's the power of actually working mobility and unworking the right areas of your body, being through running or through in kettlebell sports. If you, you know, if you take the shackles off, because that's what pretty much it is, like, if you're in kettlebell sports, the bowel mobility is like you're lifting with a hambrake off. Take that hambrake off and your results will flow. Yeah. Yeah, it's great to be able to have toys. You know, you've got my, you've got my head spinning right now, because I'm thinking, I'm thinking about the, I'm thinking about my, my own personal capability, one of my strengths is, is, is literally strength. And like, yeah, being able to put up total tonnage is never a problem for me. You know, I can, you know, you give me enough rest and I can, I can lift, you know, 15,000 kilos in a session without, you know, but it's, it's the, it's the, it's the accumulation and, you know, uh, oh man, I'm into it. Can you be able to do it in seven, seven, seven, eight minutes that? And I'm like, ah, I mean, like an, I've been on both sides of this, Jordan, I've been on both sides of this. I mean, oh, he was the guy who got there in 2014 because his mobility was poor. And I was the guy who then won the year after that because his mobility was better than the other athletes, you know, and that's the reason I won in 2015, because I was up against the guy who was actually a fitter guy to me, guy called Didier Buick. I was up against the eight older guys, but like Didier was my main, um, competition. And really, really fit guy, really, really strong guy, but his mobility wasn't 100%. You know, and he was ahead of me the whole time, but he started to die at minute nine, I think, eight minute eight and a half minute. I matched his past. I'm out on the line because I have more left in the time because my mobility was a little bit better, you know, and the opposite of me, like I said, in 2014, I got fed by a rep because my mobility was poor and I'm starting to die at the end. So I'm kind of, I've come from a from both sides. And I'm like, this is what we need to be teaching people. You know what I mean? Once you can relax, you can just keep lifting your, your energy reserve, you know, and so you can really get that sprint out of it. The challenge and maybe maybe I'm the only one, but maybe this was your experience to the, I feel like for me mobility work is not as intrinsically rewarding. A, it hurts a lot of times. It actually hurts. And it's in its sectional, in its sectional way that is very different than lifting. I don't get the same endorphin rush at the end. Like, you know, you get to that really quiet place in a kettlebell sports that where, where you're mind it, your mind just has to focus only on the next rep. And I love that, but I can never get there in mobility. I only think about this. What's going on with that joint that hurts or that muscle hurts? Was that your experience or is it different for you? It was at the start. Oh yeah, 100% at the start, it was like trained to a, try to get a length of two by four timber trying to, try to get that fucking mobile. But I mean, at the start it was, but as I got into it more, I started to do it to enjoy it more, you know. And as I'm now doing this joint mobility work and this weighted work, it's, it's actually great fun. And I'm really, really enjoying the process, they, you know, and I think that's half the battle. Once you enjoy it, once you find an element of it that you really enjoy doing, it doesn't become hassled or something like that. I didn't do that in the over half of my life. Now it's like, I can't wait to do it. You know what? I can't wait to go out. That wasn't it. That wasn't the soundtrack. That wasn't the soundtrack in my head for at least the first month. I can't wait to, I can't wait until it's kettlebells tomorrow. But God, I gotta do all the, I gotta do this mobility. Oh my God. But now it's like, I'm actually gone the opposite. I'm like, I can't wait to do the mobility work. And like kettlebell work sometimes feels like a bit of a chore. I mean, with the sport end of it because like a bit of a chore at the moment, you know, but it may be just, that's because there's no comms or I haven't got something to aim for. But I'm really, really enjoying it. Like this, there's so many different things you can do. I mean, I've talked to students of ballet, I've talked to students of all-time strumming. I've talked to yogis, I've talked to, like, physiotherapists. I've talked to all kinds of guys. And like, talked everybody and pick what's what's what's work for you and try it. You know what I mean? It doesn't have to be just one thing. Yeah. As long as you're getting results, like just and you're enjoying that process, keep going with it. You know, there's just so many different avenues, there's so many different things you can explore. And that's kind of the way I've been over the last couple of years. Like, I feel like I've got no. I think you found, sorry, I think you found that you found the key to the key to expression of athletic ability, regardless of what it is, is mobility. No matter whether it's powerlifting or ballet or karate or kettlebell sport, the thing that all of the high-level performers have in common is their mobile. And they can express their athleticism throughout their entire range of motion. And once you unlock that mobility, you can then transition between different expressions of athleticism. And you can easily pivot from being a kettlebell sport athlete to picking up your wife's stone sculpture in your back. Yeah, I heard the beat. And you can just express yourself to the powerlifting. You can do that. Yeah, I mean, I'm like having great fun with the gymnastics rings at the moment. You know, front-leavers, back-leavers, you know, all this kind of stuff. And like, most loves and all that kind of stuff that I could only dream of doing a few years ago. But once your mobility is there and your strength is there, like you said, you can transition from different things and just have a bit of fun. I mean, I love swinging maces and lifting clubs. And just like I said, there's so much stuff out there, you know, there's so much things you can try and so much things you can do, once you unlock the chains that are kind of binding it, you know, once you've took that handbrake off, like I said, you can just do anything you want to, you know, with a little bit of training. And you can have a bit of fun with it, like you said, and express yourself through it. And that's what I've been doing more this last, especially this last two, three years. I've never had so much fun on my life to be on literature. I mean, I train maybe three times a day now. But what I don't call it training. I just call it playing, you know, that's at the back plane again. You're playing with the stone. That's swinging that big fucking lump of mace that I made myself at a concrete and a short landing, you know what I mean? I'll take things from my head and stuff. And just pushing your body, but then you're pushing yourself, but having fun doing it, you know? Yeah, and you hope you hope through a shirt yesterday. I saw. Yeah, I had this old shirt that I had worn for a while and I suppose it's maybe two or three years old. And I put it on, it was just so tight because my back is having to get pretty big. I suppose more years along cycle and stone lifting and mace is not going to stop. So I just put it on and I said, this should be fun. I just broke through the back of the jet. That was great. I felt like alcohol. Different kind of experience to put on a shirt and hand to be, have it be too tight for a good reason. That's exactly what I was talking about. Worst reason before that. I think we forwarded down on the belly before that, yeah, popping buttons. Yeah, I've done both of those. I've been on both of them. That's right. And how have you got one? How was your trip? It's going well. To the same point that you had, I think the struggle for a lot of people right now is there isn't a competition. We were hoping there was going to be one in August and it got canceled. And so now I'm just talking with my team and I'm like, all right, well, the next competition probably isn't until October. So that's good and bad because I'm like, hey, I can design a full three month cycle for everyone and we can start after the July 4th holiday. And we've got a full three months to really work on a full cycle. But that also means we're at least three months out from having a full expansion of our competition. Yeah. And that's challenging because we all miss that camaraderie and we miss that time together. We miss that competitive outlet. It's a camaraderie's thing. I mean, that's not really having that finish line. Yeah, having the finish line, having that little bit of extra motivation to get you there, you know, that makes all the difference because I mean, it is a mentally demanding sport. So look, at least if you have something ahead of you, it makes it that way easier. But like I said, when things are that far out and especially when I said, like, you know, I don't think I'll be competing. It does know we're going to be open over here. I know for this year. And maybe not even the start of next year. So it does make a difference with the training, the training for a comp, you know, when a friend is not one in soy. And like I'm talking about camaraderie, you miss your team and you miss your friends. For me, that's what kettlebells for competitions are all about, you know, because I mean, I've hit every competitive goal I wanted to hit. Like I've hit absolutely every competitive goal I wanted to hit. I set my target. So hit all those. So now for me, kettlebell comps is going out, meeting people, like meeting like so it's having fun with them. It's going to be competing as hard as you can. And like when there's a draw just having a bit of formature which are made afterwards. You know, I'm catching up with friends from around the world. And that's what competition is for me at the moment, because like I said, the competitive edge is kind of gone for me because I've hit things that I wanted to hit, you know. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's I think the for me it's been a saving grace that I have the team that I have. I have a group of people I've been doing. We do Zoom trainings three times a week. It's been and I've got everybody doing the same workout. I used to do, you know, customized program for everybody every member of the team because everybody was at different points in their in their journey. But now I instead of instead of doing that because because everybody's everybody's remote. So that everybody is training together we might do a, you know, one minute on one minute off times 10 levels. But but we have different different weights and different different different pacing based on capability. But everybody's doing the same thing and we get we get some form of camaraderie and that that has been a godsend. I mean that's for me. No, it has and you got we have, you know, I think I'll be of access to that because like I said, it's just it does keep the team together, you know, and in between those like those 60 seconds, I know that they tend to go faster as the rapes go on. But as the sets go on, I should say, but they keep kind of a bit of a chat and how are you? You know, it does make a big difference to keep that team team eat us there. And are we doing a few Zoom sessions myself? I don't know. Have you done the woman with Kiseña? She's doing one online. People from all over the world. I have not. I've seen I've seen it. It's why we're the goal. It's just get a crowd of lightbell and it's like literally like one hour of different movements. And I don't have any light, though. Like I went out all of my light cells. I have all those there. The lightest the lightest I have now is this 22 and I went from 18 to 22 because my brother asked if he could eat a bar of some bells and start coming to the class as I was like, well, sure. But, you know, I'm like, shit, I just had a 20% increase in volume without without planning for it because I just went up. I went up four kilos overnight on my on my weights, but, you know, I'm okay with that. It's a decrease in my name. It decreased the pace. Oh, Jesus, decreased the pace. Definitely because I was there like she was doing the main at the heaviest like user 16 kilo bell and like ladies at the heaviest user 12 kilo bell because we're doing like movements nonstop for one hour. And I was like, I look on average 20, but I'll try it anyway. I thought I was absolutely, I thought I was going to fucking pass it. I thought I was going to do it. I was on zoom. You know, it was, oh, fuck, just keep going. Oh, man, I think I've been doing some, I've been doing some Instagram live streams as well. And I forgot, you know, I forgot how much more oxygen you need to be able to instruct while you're doing a while you're doing a circuit. I was doing a 30 minute circuit live stream on Instagram. And I was in my, I was in my in my basement next to my furnace and the thing got so my room guys, my room got so fucking hot that by the third, by the third interval, and I'm, you know, I'm talking by the third interval. I'm like, I was about ready to third up. I'm like, I gotta get off this. I gotta get off this Instagram because I didn't, I didn't, I didn't pick the right weight and my heart rate was so high. I was just dying by the third rep. I just just, excuse me, I go one minute. I know, man, I know, but I mean, like I said, it is fun and it's a good tool, you know, and I've been training with the Canadian guys, I've been training with Chris Gale over in England, training with the big cat. He's doing yoga every morning. He's, he's after embracing the yoga. He's loving it. And he's teaching his team every morning. So I dip into that every now and again, when I can as well. So I'm like, the zoom is great. It brings, it's keeping people together, I suppose, in these crazy days. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be respectful with your time. I know we, we blocked an hour, but I want, I do have to ask since you're a musician and I'm a musician, I have to ask, who's your favorite rock band of all time? Oh, now you're putting me on the spot. And well, I suppose my favorite bands that I've listened to and I've constantly go back to, and I love Chris Carnell and all his different forms. I love, ranging as a machine. And I love Led Zeppner. So they are, I suppose, will be my, my three favorites. Oh, man, yeah. You just, you just, you just hit several of my favorite bands. Awesome. Right. I just love, I love everything they do. Everything like a specialty Chris Carnell. I mean, it's a cool six stuff. And like you four in the morning, all that kind of stuff. And then like obviously, uh, sound garden, we're gonna see sound garden a couple of times when they were over here. And I'm going to see audio slave because like that was like, oh my god, it's Chris Carnell. And very good machine makes this is just like the best thing ever. So when the people see them. And yeah, he was, he's on my short, there was only a handful of people I would, I would change. Yeah, he, there's only a handful of people, I would trade singing voices with. Chris, Chris Carnell was one of them for sure. He was the guy I just, I was like, man, he's, if I could have a voice like that, that, that guy, it's insane. Insane man. I absolutely love it. And yourself, who be your top three? So, you hit, you know, Led Zeppelin is, Led Zeppelin is definitely number one for me. That, that, that they changed my life. Uh, Rage Against The Machine. I, I saw Rage Against The Machine here in in Minneapolis in 2006. And there's the last live concert I have ever seen. They were phenomenal. And then the Red Hat Chili Feppers. On the chilies. I love the chilies, man. Yeah. Big fan of the Chili Peppers as well. And a completed base. So I've always loved flea. And, um, pretty guitar as well. So, uh, fresh Yanti's amazing, you know, so, um, yeah, chilies are pretty awesome as well. Yeah, 100%. We, we, we saw them, we saw them, uh, in Chicago at the all-state arena, back when they were on the stadium, our stadium tour. And, and, and my, my wife, uh, my wife said, coming out of that show because they, they did so many just jam sessions and stuff, but they were also, they were so tight and they were so good. And she was like, God, that was like watching a musical orgy. That was, that was how she described it. It was great. And it was, and it was perfect. And she was so right. That's, that's exactly what it was. It was, it was phenomenal. It was, it was absolutely great. So, uh, love me. Love me. Get a chance to meet it, meet in person. You don't have to bust out the guitar world. I'll sing some songs, man. Caterbells, guitars, and, uh, lots and lots of things. Oh, yeah, whiskey and Guinness. That sounds like a plan. Irish yoga. Fall over in a corner. There we go. Well, Daivd, thank you so much, man. It's, it's great to chat with you. I really appreciate you coming on. And I am, I am going to hit you up for some, for some mobility, uh, some ability coaching. No problem at all. I'm on whatever you need. I need somebody to kick my ass. So it's, it's, uh, I can do that. You need to do this. You're, you're, you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna thank me later. Exactly. Look, anyway, I can help you with it, man. And thank you so much for having me on really, really happy and nice to, nice to talk to you, Jordan. Thank you, Daivd. I'll talk to you soon, man. Appreciate it. Take care, man. It's long. Bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of the platform podcast. I'm Jordan Kunde-Wright, right. If you have a question, please email me at Twin Cities Caterbell Club at gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at Twin Cities Caterbell Club on Twitter at TCKB Club. Online at Twin Cities Caterbell Club.com. And please help us grow our reach and give us a review on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. Until next time.