Keg Tricks

Coach Chuck
Coach Chuck

KEGS!!! I bet you thought they were only good for pouring you solo cups full of bad decisions! Ever think of using Kegs to get JACK DEEZED!!! YOU HAVEN’T?!?!  Oooohhhh Baby! I’m not talking about twelve ounce curls, either. I am talking about picking that steel barrel off the ground and hoisting it up over your dome piece, son!!!! I’m talking about building prehistoric strength! KEGS and DINOSAUR STRENGTH!!!!

For realz Kegs are a great tool for strength training.  There are all sorts of different things you can use them for. Clean and jerks, snatching, push pressing, overhead walking lunges and squats, just to name a few.  You really are only limited by your own imagination.  “But TJ-Rex, why use kegs?  Can’t I just stick to my nice comfortable barbell?” You ask.  Well allow me to retort…..

At Crossfit we preach “functional fitness” as one of the cornerstones of our philosophy. However, although a barbell loaded up with weight is AWESOME, outside of the box/gym it isn’t all THAT practical.  Rarely, in our daily life, do we ever come across a load where the weight is equally distributed and as compact as a barbell. However, a keg filled with sand is much more comparable to objects we come across outside of Crossfit Southie. Getting familiar with lifting a heavy, awkward object off the ground and putting it overhead is something that translates over into our day to day living.  We have to pick a bag of dog food off the floor and get it in our car.  Or somehow put our tool box on the top shelve in the garage. There are hundreds of examples of items we need to pick up outside the gym that are much more comparable to a keg rather then to a barbell.
“Moving large loads, long distances, quickly.” Anyone who is Level 1 certified is probably familiar with this quote. Now there are lots of different ways in which you can do this.  Carrying a yoke, pushing a sled, running with a sandbag on your back.  A keg is just another example of this.  Snatching, cleaning and jerking, are all fantastic movements to help us get stronger.   However,  as we all know it can be difficult to nail down all the mechanics of these movements.  Especially if we are trying to move fast in a WOD.  With a keg everything can be simplified.  Sometimes a strength session just consist of moving a heavy load from point A to point B.  With moving a keg there is nothing super complicated about it. Its just pick the damn thing up and carry it from here to there.  The Keg also provides us with yet another tool to shake things up and make our WODs “constantly varied”.
So there you have it… in a nut shell… or should I say… keg shell.  Come ready to get jacked with some heavy-ass steel barrels Wednesday!!!  If nothing else I hope we will provide you with another way to show off in front of all your friends at the next Kegger you attend!

Skill
Kegs!

WOD
3 Rounds
800 run
20 Pull-ups
30 Wallballs
Rest 3 minutes

Level 2-(15 pull-ups, 20 wallballs)
Level 1- (400m run, 15 pull-ups, 20 wallballs)