4 Reasons To Add Double Kettlebell Swings To Your Workout

Double kettlebell swings are a great tool to add to your workout for strength and cardio benefits, depending on the number of reps and weight you use.

A lot of athletes, coaches and trainers like to use kettlebells because you can implement exercises that provide a great functional stimulus, allowing you to use multiple movement planes working various muscle groups.

Double kettlebell swings involve a kettlebell in each hand and are a great variation that forces you to focus on coordination and stability.

Here, Built for Athletes looks at four of the exercise’s main benefits.

Improve Your Grip Strength

Good grip strength will help you in almost every lift you do in the gym, and double kettlebell swings will certainly challenge your hands and wrist.

The nature of the exercise forces you to grip the kettlebells fairly tightly, and each hand has to control the weight through a complex movement. It gets more challenging as you get more tired, too.

Increased Load

By using two kettlebells rather than one, you can usually increase the total load on the body.

For example, if you normally do swings with a 20kg kettlebell, you should be able to do double kettlebell swings with 12kg in both hands, increasing your total load to 24kg.

That heavier load means you can achieve bigger results and growth in the long term.

Unilateral Exercises Reduce Imbalances

Unilateral exercises, where each arm or leg works independently, offer a lot of benefits.

When you’re doing a bilateral exercise (involving both limbs) there’s a tendency to compensate or place more emphasis on a particular side.

This can lead to strength imbalances which result in injuries.

Double kettlebell swings will help ensure each side of your body becomes more stable and able to withstand your future training.

Shoulders & Hips Work At A Higher Intensity

One of the big benefits of using two kettlebells is that you make certain areas of the body work harder.

In particular, the shoulders, hips and glutes are forced to work at a higher intensity in comparison to a conventional kettlebell swing as you’ve now got a kettlebell in each hand.

These are major muscle groups that you use in a lot of different exercises, so a greater workload could mean greater improvements are felt in many aspects of your fitness.