The Perfect Rep - and the role of volume with form.

This post is a reflection on one aspect that contributes to the experience of the perfect rep: high volume. It's only one part, but i'd like to unpack a bit of why that part, at least for myself, and a rather new understanding of "volume" is becoming such a key part of "perfect."

One of the first things that struck me in reading Pavel's work like Enter the Kettlebell is the emphasis on "the perfect rep." Don't go to failure; don't do so many reps that form goes to hell. Stay fresh. Make every rep perfect.

But what is the "perfect rep"? And how do we know if we have one?

This may not be your experience, but i've interpreted this "perfect rep" thing as getting the form right mechanically, and executing with the correct weight for the correct sets and moving on, eg doing the ladders for ETK's ROP. Upon reflection, though, that progression doesn't sound much like an experience of "perfection," does it? Sure one feels good after doing the workouts, and yes progress most emphatically occurs. But is it "perfection?" And why is experiencing perfection so important? would i know it if i did encounter it?

Some time ago i wrote about how seeing Will Williams doing the kettlebell front squat - in particular the breathing to go with that move - stopped me in my tracks as seeming effortless and perfect. I'd described it as what i'd understood art to be about, when a move goes from the mechanistic to the graceful.

The parts of perfection. Last week or so, looking at the kettlebell front squat, i came back to the front squat, going over how zhealth breaks down the concept of efficient movement into four parts that seems to be a recipe for the perfect rep:

1. perfect form - hitting the target
2. dynamic postural alignment.
3. synchronized respiration
4. balance tension and relaxation

These points are described more fully in that front squat post.

What's been hitting me of late as a key feature of even getting into step one - hitting the target/perfect form - is volume by repetition. In other words, tons of reps. Which means lighter weights.

What's a Rep, really? Generally speaking, i've thought of reps as simply reps within a set, and that volume is just whatever you get from the total reps x mass for a particular workout. Increasing reps, especially when focusing on strength, has seemed just the wrong way to think about it, too: loads of reps is endurance strength, not power strength, heh we want POWER to PRESS. And it seems many protocols for strength reinforce this. For instance, in Charles Staley's excellent Escalating Density Training, in your 15 min. blocks, once you get 70reps inside a set, pretty much time to up the weight. What more is there to volume than that? Over the weekend, talking with Suleiman Al-Sabah about our mutual pressing goals, Al encouraged me again to think about doing "lots of reps" and reminded me of Kenneth Jay's part of the RKC manual on building strength. So i went to have a bit of a re-read.

The rationale for volume by rep: Kenneth talks about the need to do lots and lots of reps at a weight that can be readily sustained for lots and lots of reps to build up the neurological patterns of what that move is. The caveat to this volume, of course, is that you have to know what the correct form is to be repeated. See that RKC instructor.

Assuming that instruction has taken place, the rationale here for upping volume as half the strategy to strength is that this repetition neurologically groves the pattern of performance for building up the weight. To this end, Kenneth has Low Volume and High Volume days: lost of reps at lighter weight for grooving the pattern vs fewer (perfect) reps at higher weights to develop load.

Patterning is important. I've been focusing on the importance of patterning within z health practice - in terms of healing movement patterns, and taking those patterns from the level of conscious effort to unconscious habit. Over the weekend, i'd decided to focus just on my suitcase dead-lift form with KB's, using the EDT 15 min approach: the sDL's for the first exercise; floor presses for the second. For the sDL's I used a weight about half of what i usually use for such sets, just to focus on rep quality. The main points of concern, like that front squat for hitting the target meant correct head and eye position throughout the move, correct knee position, correct hip hinge, correct butt backness, and doing all this with bone ryhthmn. That's a lot to do. The cool thing that happened was that when everything was firing together, the rep simply felt better: more effective, more efficient, like all the parts working as one thing rather than as a bunch of joints and muscles trying to achieve something. Sadly by the time i was actually finished the 15 mins, and the sets of 5 reps were starting to really connect, (a) the time was up but (b) i was just starting to feel fatigued. Good time to stop, right? And keen desire to do it again. Oh, and i felt that workout the next day, too.

It's funny how when you need to hear something, you keep hearing it over and over, eh? At least i find this. It's like the opposite of a nightmare where you keep having the same monster, only bigger, until you stop turn around and look at the monster and say "can i help you?"

An Example of Rep Volume in Action. The Sneaky sneaky Way of the RKC. It was in the afternoon, after this morning workout, that i had the meet with Al and his recommendation of "lots of reps" and a reread of Kenneth Jay. And in rereading that section, i recollected one of the most profound experiences of the RKC cert: connecting with the swing. Indeed, i had a revelation of what the hardstyle swing form was, compared to how i'd interpreted and executed previous instruction. I felt i *got it* from "firing the lats" to getting the energy down into the ground. it was ah ha, ah ha, ah ha. I left the cert feeling pretty good about that swing, and could hardly wait to share these refinements with others.



How did that happen? Repeated instruction i'd thought and such attention on form over several days, but - i see it all now - the other key ingredient: lots and lost of reps. LOTS. Sneaky sneaky. Every 20mins over three days a timer went off and we were doing swings. And those were just the regularly scheduled ones. Any opportunity for pause was filled with swings, using a bell weight that enabled a perfect rep from first to last. So combine that volume with constant supervision to tweak and correct form, yes we'd better leave with a dang good sense of the swing. The other day i was quietly delighted when i was demo'ing a swing, the trainee laughed. I asked why. He said "well it's so right - the swing - that's what it's supposed to look like." With the instruction, it's the reps, isn't it.

Putting it together: More Reps Are Alright, Jack.
It's taken me till today to put it together that it's just this type of volume with focus on form that, ya, does embed the move in the body. And more, it does provide the basis for increasing the load, just as KJ and Pavel have said. As proof positive, half way through the cert, with the encouragement of team assistant instructor Lynda Angeles, i was double swinging 24s with proper form. That effort with that load would not have been possible - it was certainly not imaginable - prior to this halfway point in the three days of swings marvelous swings.

The take away at least for this first step towards a perfect rep, of Hitting the Target, is indeed doing what it takes to get in the volume of reps. This is not using a sissy weight. Pavel would not have let us get away with this during the RKC, but as KJ says in the RKC manual talking about presses: using a weight you can do for 5-15 reps, and if you're doing 15 reps, your high volume day better be 200/side.

I used to think of light days as just a way to keep effort alive and not burn out from higher work volume. Ho hum. I now find myself energized and looking forward to these high volume lighter weight days as an opportunity to have that form *click* in those moves where i've had instruction, and can monitor myself to feel that connection.

Hope if you've had questions about the role of volume of reps, these reflections might help you too experience where the path to the perfect rep, after instruction and knowledge of proper form, is aided immensely by rep volume.

Note: do look at Mike's comments below on fascial adaptation - and the recommendation to change up trunk positions for HIGH volume (thanks Mike).

Book Plug: Kenneth Jay in the New Year.
Now if you don't have an RKC certification manual to read up on Kenneth's approach to the press, fear not. A book is coming in the new year to focus says Kenneth on, perhaps not surprisingly, the perfection of the press, the pistol and the pull up. In the meantime, happy repping.

update: the quest for the perfect strength rep through volume continues, charting the course here.