What you’ll learn
This article covers kettlebell exercises for upper body and shoulders, focusing on rock climbers and ACL surgery rehab patients. I’ve ditched all rubber bands and cable machines for shoulders, and instead do these once a week. You can’t argue with a great warmup + shoulder injury prevention + awesome looking shoulders in one swoop. You’ll learn the following exercises:
- Windmill
- Bell-Up Strict Press
- Arm Bar
- Overhead Press to Squat
- Get-Up
To give you perspective on weight and progressions in the exercises below, I’m 5’4″, 120lb.
Windmill
Good for: It’s the best climbing-specific shoulder exercise, where your body is rotating under weighted arms. It also works core and obliques, glutes and hamstrings, and posterior chain loaded stretching.
When you work slowly down (lengthening your hamstring), you’re doing an eccentric motion, which builds strength via hypertrophy and promotes tendons/ligaments to lay down collagen, becoming stronger. Your obliques will get a wake-up call.
Weight: I use 12-14kg/26-31lb. Likely your shoulders will be a limiting weight factor, not your posterior; in that case, lower the weight.
How
- Feet shoulder width apart
- Point both toes 45 degrees parallel with each other. In my video, my front toe faces forward and the back toe at 90 degrees, the way I was taught–but feel out your own preference.
- Raise kettlebell above your head in same hand as your back foot
- Shove your butt back, hinge at the hip, keep your back leg straight, and touch the inside of your front foot with your low hand
- You want to stay in a single plane, ending up in an right triangle, not an equilateral triangle–your back leg stays straight
- At the bottom, your shoulders should be packed and stacked in a vertical line
- More instructions here
Reps/Sets
- 1 rep = 1 up and down movement per side
- 1 set = 6-8 reps per set per side (12-16 reps total)
- 3 sets
Bell-Up Strict Press
Good for: shoulder stability, learning to keep core engaged with shoulders.
Weight: I use 8-10kg/16-22lb. Your weight will be decreased from your max strict press weight and will also depend on the diameter of the kettlebell handles; the narrower, the harder it is to balance.
How
- Get two identical kettlebells and rack them simultaneously in your palms with the bell up, so they’re balancing in your palm
- Make sure your wrist is straight with your elbow; you don’t want your wrist cocked backward from forearm.
- Alternate pressing them above your head; as one comes down, the other goes up
Reps/Sets
- 1 rep = 1 up and down (you do both sides simultaneously)
- 1 set = 8-10 reps
- 3 sets
Arm Bar
Good for: shoulder stability, rotator cuff strength, opens tight pectoral muscles. It’s one of my favorites for stability to engage faster-twitch muscles. It quickly identifies imbalances between your left and right sides.
Weight: I use 10-12kg/22-26lb for warm-up. Don’t go too heavy too fast. You’re working on mobility and control.
How
- More detailed instructions here
- Lay on your back, raise kettlebell straight up
- Bring your opposite arm directly overhead
- Roll over on your side
- Easiest: keep your peripheral vision on the bell out of the corner of your eye
- Harder: look to the ground; let your body compensate when the bell goes off balance
- Hardest: make small, controlled O’s or 8’s with your arm
Reps/Sets
- 1 rep = 20-30sec on a single side
- 1 set = 3 reps per side (6 total reps, alternating)
- 2 sets for warm-up
Overhead Press to Squat
Good for: thoracic and shoulder mobility, plus benefits of the squat. Teaches you to keep core and posterior engaged at the same time as your shoulders, preventing lapses in stabilization.
Weight: I use 12-14kg/26-31lb. Weight greatly depends on your thoracic and shoulder mobility.
How
- Rack a kettlebell and press it overhead
- Assume a squat position, feet about shoulder width or slightly wider
- Squat, keeping your spine as straight as possible, your arm straight, and your hips parallel to the floor. The kettlebell should load your wrist, shoulders, and hips in as straight a line as possible.
- In the video, I lack some thoracic mobility, so my hips don’t stay straight. My upper body leans forward at the bottom of the squat, causing my arm holding the kettlebell to fall forward as well. I compensate by bending my elbow. It’s not ideal.
- Make it harder: balance the kettlebell bell-up
Reps/Sets
- 1 rep = 1 up and down
- 1 set = 6-8 reps
- 3 sets
Get-Up
Good for: functional movement, shoulder stability, core strength, leg strength, proprioception/balance, coordination, determining power “glitches.”
If your muscles falter even for a fraction of a second, you’ll feel the bell sway immediately; those glitches are magnified under the kettlebell weight. Finding those moments of lost tension in bracing, and then correcting them, will help your climbing. Momentary muscle lapses and then shock loading your muscles again cause climbing injuries, especially in shoulders.
Weight: I use 14-16kg/31-36lb for warm-up. To really feel muscle imbalance and instability, increase weight. Work on smooth movement, up to 1/3 and 1/2 bodyweight with proper form.
How: There’s a lot going on with the getup in all 3 planes. See this excellent article (keep scrolling to read the whole thing), and read Simple & Sinister for the decisive explanation.
Reps/Sets
- 1 rep = 1 up and down sequence per side
- 1 set = 3 reps per side (6 reps total)
- 2-3 sets for warm-up
10min Shoulder Circuit
I prefer to do my shoulder workouts at the end of a climbing session. I typically choose any 2 of the above exercises to do in a session after climbing and superset them for 3 sets.
Books and Gear
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