Kinda fun, kinda tough.

Danish Olympic wrestler Mark O. Madsen and his coach the Dane of Pain Kenneth Jay have upped the ante with VO2 max snatch protocol. Mark recently completed 80 set of 8 reps per side in the 15 second version, using 24kg.

The previous "standard" was 50 sets. I haven't done much 24kg VO2 max training of late, mostly using the 16kg at the end of my workouts, after heavier interval work of :30-1:00 with 1-2:00 medium effort recovery. Example: last week I did 2x32kg long cyle sets (getting 7-8 reps per set) for 1:00, 16 kg snatches for 20/20 (which took about 1:30-1:40) and began my next set of LC. After 6 rounds of this and a 3:00 break I moved on to 16kg VO2 :15/:15 for 20:00.

So with this 80 sets thing is bugging my mind yesterday, I took a 16kg and set about going the distance. 15 seconds work, 15 seconds rest, switch hands every set, 8 snatches per set. I also decided that for the first 30 minutes, I would not let the KB touch the ground.

The first 10:00 were deceptively easy. I would call it a warmup.

The next 10:00 were still quite easy, and fun, I am groovin' along.

From the 20:00 mark to the 25:00 mark it started to catch up with me a little, just systemic fatigue.

At about 26:00 I settled into that elusive mind state, the rest of the world kinda got quiet, it was just me and the snatches, with a heighten sense of awareness of the smell of the wood from the shed, the breeze cooling my back where the sweat ran down.

At 34:00, I began dropping the KB between sets.

I finished the 80 sets at the 39:45 mark, feeling hit pretty hard, but good. I decided to keep going for a couple more minutes, finished up with a total of 84 sets of 8 reps per side. 672 snatches with 16kg.

Being the sharp young man that I am I realize that it will take a few weeks to work up to doing this with 24kg. I think the next step will be go the same distance, but introduce the 24kg into the mix for 10-20 sets, then over time gradually increase the number of 24kg sets & decrease the sets with the 16.