While attending the IKFF Kettlebell Instructor course this weekend, I got to play around with the competition KB's made by Pro-Grade. As a long time user of the Muscle Driver bells, I was skeptical about using these seemingly one size for all weight bells and truly wondered if there was a difference between the two.
Boy was I shocked.
To give a little background, I had learned second hand on how to use these tools from my JKD instructor as he had a little time using them at the Inosanto Academy in Marina Del Ray Ca. I had perfected what I though was correct technique, but as I found out at my buddies gym in Tucson where the seminar was held, I was off by small degrees on a couple of the lifts. These degrees of error are extremely amplified when you start doing lifts over 3 minutes in length.
The correct idea of bone stacking for GS competition lifts and what I call the general fitness form many learn by watching videos is way off: the latter uses more muscle power where the former uses the skeletal system during appropriate rest periods.
Example: When snatching, the correct GS position at the top of the lift is hand of bell across palm pad of hand, stacking the hand, elbow, shoulder and foot so the force is straight down while the arm is close to the head.
When beginners tend to snatch, they put the bell higher up in the hand bending the wrist and putting all stress on the arm flexors while the bell is leaning.
Also I noticed how the Pro Grade bells seemed to all fit the same way in the hand during all lifts no matter the weight. This is helpful when you train for competition because all the bells are the same size, just like a professional basketball in the NBA is the same size for all games.
Muscle Driver
Pro Grade
I can say learning on the MD bells was a great experience though, and much cheaper than if I wold have bought all Pro-Grade bells. There is a line though that most KB enthusiasts will cross if they train long enough, the Pro-Grade bells do make a huge difference for experienced lifters. You will want the same feel in the hand, the same rest places the bell touches during the clean and snatch. You know where it lands in the rack and you know how much space it takes up between your legs during the swing.
I cant say much for the Dragon Door, Ive only used them once over a weekend as well.
Jordan examines the diff between Dragon Door and Pro Grade, worth a read.
http://averagetoelite.blogspot.com/2007/12/pro-grade-vs-dragondoor.html
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Good post Nick. That wrist hyper-extension is a killer, good to weed it out. :)
I'm not sure I ever reported back on the pro-grade bells. Problem I ran into: zero quality control. I ordered one and it looked great. Ordered another and it was trash. Prepping the handles takes fricking forever. If you plan on ordering the pro-grades, wait. They're coming out with a next gen that will have the handles properly prepared, which they should have been doing all along. One thing I found that put the DD bells back on top for me, was sanding the handles down to get rid of that coating. So I have to say for now stick with the DD bells. If you want to do GS specific stuff look at a pro-grade bell, after they fix them. Powerseekers is making high quality GS bells, but we can't get them in the US. http://www.powerseekers.com/Home.html
I've heard that the AKC guys went to the Chinese manufacturer powerseekers had ditched, which explains the poor quality.
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