Kettlebell Around the World: How to Do It, Muscles Worked and Benefits

The kettlebell around the world (also called the around the body or kettlebell slingshot) is a drill where you stand tall and pass a kettlebell around your waist, swapping it from one hand to the other in front of and behind you. It trains your core to resist twisting, builds grip and makes a quick, useful warm-up before swings or presses. It's a light accessory move, though, and it won't make you much stronger on its own; treat it as a primer and a grip drill and it'll earn its two or three minutes in your session.

Don't confuse it with the kettlebell halo. The halo circles an upside-down bell around your head with both hands and is mostly about shoulder mobility, while around the world stays at hip height and leans much harder on your core and grip.

How to do the kettlebell around the world

You need one kettlebell and enough space to stand with your feet planted. Pick a light bell for your first few sessions; if you're unsure, our guide on what weight kettlebell to use has starting points by experience level.

1. Set up. Stand with your feet hip to shoulder-width apart, knees soft, and hold the kettlebell by the handle in your right hand, arm hanging straight in front of your right hip.
2. Brace. Squeeze your glutes, pull your ribs down and tighten your abs as if you're about to take a light punch. This position shouldn't change at any point in the set.
3. Pass in front. Bring the bell across the front of your body and hand it to your left hand at roughly belly-button height. Grip the handle firmly before the right hand lets go.
4. Carry it round. Let your left arm take the bell round your left hip and behind your back, keeping it close to your body.
5. Pass behind. Meet the bell with your right hand behind your lower back, swap hands, and bring it back round your right hip to the front. That's one rep.
6. Repeat, then switch. Do your reps clockwise, pause, then reverse the direction for the same number.

Move at a steady, controlled pace. Speed comes later, once the hand-offs feel automatic and your hips no longer drift.

Muscles worked

Around the world looks like an arm exercise, but most of the effort goes into stopping the rest of your body from following the bell.

• Core (anti-rotation). As the weight travels round you, its momentum tries to twist your trunk. Your obliques, transverse abdominis and the deep muscles around your spine work to keep your ribs and pelvis facing forward, which is the same job they do when you carry shopping in one hand or brace during a lift. Our guide to oblique exercises covers more ways to train that.
• Grip and forearms. Every pass is a moment where one hand has to catch and hold a moving weight. With a 12kg or 16kg bell and a steady pace, your forearms will be burning well before your core gives up.
• Shoulders and upper back. Your deltoids hold the arm in position as the bell moves, and your rotator cuff and upper back stabilise the shoulder through the slight internal rotation behind your back.
• Glutes and hips. Squeezing your glutes is what keeps your pelvis square, so they work isometrically for the whole set.

Benefits

It's a fast, effective warm-up. Two sets in each direction raise your heart rate slightly, wake up your grip and get your trunk braced, which is exactly what you want before kettlebell swings, cleans or snatches. It takes about two minutes and needs no extra equipment.

It trains your grip. The repeated hand-to-hand catch is a genuine grip challenge, and grip matters beyond the gym. In the PURE study of almost 140,000 adults across 17 countries, each 5kg lower grip strength was associated with a 16% higher risk of death from any cause over a median four years of follow-up. That's an association rather than proof that training grip extends your life, but it's a good reason not to neglect it.

It teaches your core to resist rotation. Most people train their abs by flexing (crunches) or holding still (planks). Around the world adds a moving load that pulls you off centre, which is closer to how your trunk works in real life and in heavier lifts.

It's low risk. You're not lifting anything overhead or loading your spine heavily, so it's a sensible option when you're coming back to training or want a light day.

Honest limits

This drill won't build much strength or muscle. The weights are light, the range of motion is small and there's no meaningful eccentric (lowering) phase, so it doesn't provide the kind of load that grows muscle. It's also worth knowing that kettlebell research as a whole is thinner than the marketing suggests: a scoping review of kettlebell training in clinical practice screened 99 publications and found effect sizes that were typically trivial to small, with mostly underpowered, low-quality studies behind them. No trial has looked at around the world specifically.

So use it for what it does well: priming, grip and core control. For real progress, build your sessions around the bigger lifts in our list of the best kettlebell exercises.

Common mistakes

Hips swaying with the bell. This is the big one. If your pelvis shifts side to side as the kettlebell travels, the momentum is moving you instead of you controlling it, and your core is doing almost nothing. Squeeze your glutes harder, slow down and keep your belt buckle pointing forward.

Rounding your back. Some people hunch forward to make the behind-the-back pass easier. Stand tall with your chest up and shoulders down; if you can't reach the bell behind you without folding over, bring it a little closer to your body.

Going too heavy. A heavy bell turns every pass into a scramble, and a dropped kettlebell behind your heels is a good way to hurt a foot or your floor. If you've fumbled even one hand-off, the weight is too heavy for now.

Rushing the hand-off. Make sure the receiving hand has a firm grip before the other lets go. Speed is fine once you're consistent, but a clean pass beats a fast one.

Only going one way. It's easy to favour your comfortable direction. Do equal reps clockwise and anticlockwise every set.

Variations

Once the standard version feels smooth, these change the challenge.

Variation	How it differs	Best for
Reverse direction	Same drill, anticlockwise	Balancing both sides; always include it
Figure-8 between the legs	Pass the bell through your legs in a figure-8 from a slight hinge	Grip, hinge posture and coordination
Half-kneeling around the world	One knee down, passing the bell around your torso	Stopping you cheating with your hips
Around the leg	Stand on one leg and pass the bell around the raised thigh, or around one leg in a staggered stance	Balance and single-leg stability
Tall-kneeling	Both knees down, hips extended	Beginners learning to keep the trunk still
Speed slingshot	Faster passes with the bell a little further out	Conditioning finishers, once technique is solid

The figure-8 deserves a special mention: you hinge forward with soft knees and pass the bell between your legs from front to back, so it overlaps with the kettlebell deadlift position and builds a little hamstring and back endurance too.

How heavy should your kettlebell be?

For most people, 8kg to 16kg covers it. As a rough guide:

• New to kettlebells: 6kg to 8kg for women, 8kg to 12kg for men.
• Some experience: 8kg to 12kg for women, 12kg to 16kg for men.
• Strong and well practised: 16kg to 20kg, mostly for grip work.

The right weight lets you complete every pass with your hips still and without any fumbling. Since you'll use a heavier bell for swings and squats, many people simply use their lightest kettlebell for this. If you're buying one, our pick of the best kettlebells in the UK covers cast-iron and vinyl options, and if you want several weights in one footprint an adjustable kettlebell is worth a look. A vinyl bell like the Phoenix Fitness is a sensible, floor-friendly choice if you're training on carpet or laminate.

Check Phoenix Fitness kettlebell prices on Amazon

How to programme it

As a warm-up: 2 sets of 8 to 10 passes in each direction before kettlebell or upper-body work. Pair it with halos for a complete shoulder and trunk primer.

As a grip and core finisher: 3 sets of 30 to 45 seconds in each direction with a slightly heavier bell, resting 45 to 60 seconds. You'll feel it in your forearms the next morning.

In a circuit: Slot it between bigger moves, for example 10 swings, 5 goblet squats and 5 around the world passes each way, repeated for 4 to 5 rounds.

Two to four times a week is plenty, and because the load is low it rarely interferes with recovery. You'll find more ideas for structuring sessions in our workouts hub.

Recommended reads

1. Kettlebell halo: how to do it and muscles worked
2. What weight kettlebell should I use?
3. The best kettlebell exercises
4. The best kettlebells in the UK
5. Adjustable kettlebells: are they worth it?