Kettlebell Single-Leg Shoulder Press

Why would you do this exercise? What are the main benefits? Do you know? Is it just to look cool or is there an awesome benefit one can get from this kettlebell exercise that we don’t get with other exercises?

The answer is as follows.

The kettlebell single-leg shoulder press is great because you are:

  • taking away one leg and placing all the work on one
  • increasing instability which works on improving stability
  • improving strength and stability in the:
    • feet
    • ankles
    • hips
    • core
    • shoulders

The main reason you want to perform this exercise is for the feet, ankles, and hips. This is work that you don’t normally get from other exercises. The closest you’ll get is the reverse lunge.

As you take away one leg, the other foot needs to perform a lot of stabilization, it all starts at the bottom. From there, as you press up on the side where the knee is raised, the hip on the other side needs to do a lot of work to stabilize the pelvis and stop it from shifting.

Lots of times, people will look at an out-of-the-ordinary exercise and say that it’s just to look cool, but this is just because the benefits are unknown. The single-leg shoulder press is a press, but it’s not about the press. The press is performed to bring the weight to the highest point which increases instability and therefore requires more stabilization which in turn improves stability.

The progression to this exercise is:

  1. bodyweight single-leg knee raise
  2. bodyweight single-leg knee raise and arm overhead
  3. racked single-leg knee raise
  4. single-leg knee raise and strict shoulder press

Of course, there is also the benefit of core and shoulder stability, but there are better kettlebell exercises to do if that’s the objective. Think extremities for this one. Extremities are often overlooked in training, even though they’re just as, if not more, important than all the other objectives. Grip, wrist, foot, and ankle strength and stability take your strength to the next level and will help increase your overall mobility.

There is obviously a lot more to be said, but for now, if you’re on Instagram, check out the video here.

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