La Almádena

La Almádena

1. Make it hard. Not FNG-friendly. Every week is a kick in the teeth.
2. Build the fastest, strongest guys possible. Use weight and other heavy things. Mix with cardio. Strength first, but not 0.0.
3. Innovate.  It’s called Skunkworks for a reason.

These are the 3 maxims of Skunkworks. Every week, the PAX expect a certain level of intensity and a certain type of workout. This is not your traditional bootcamp. F3RunningClub probably won’t like it, either. Moderate workout? Ummm, no. This workout brings out the best in everyone while sweating and beating the worst out of everyone. Even veteran Qs pause before planning the next session knowing they have to step up their game in order to meet the Standard expected.

TR waxed eloquently in last week’s backblast (http://f3nation.com/2015/05/19/history-2/) about how Skunk has evolved over the last 3 years, stealing the best/worst that other workouts had to offer and innovating some of its own atrocities. 3 years and each year brought about a new epoch, year 4 begins. Let’s start it with some style.

Warmup to get the blood pumping and the sweat flowing: jog around parking lot, SSHs, IWs, KB halo, KB around-the-world, 50 KB swings, 20 KB goblet squats, 20 KB good mornings, 20 merkins.

Event #1: Catch me if you can: pair up with a dude with a like size bell, partner 1 starts farmer carry run with both bells, partner 2 performs 10 quality merkins and sprints after P1. Flapjack and repeat around the church/school grounds, stopping at bottom of the concrete stairs. Can’t forget to mention: we ran this reverse course. Up hill the whole way. Brutal.

Event #2: KB ladder. Perform the following exercises, first 1 arm then the other: KB swing, high pull, snatch, clean, goblet squat. After set, run to top of hill, 5 burpees, run back and plank until all in. Move on to next set. Began with 2 reps of each exercise then repeat with sets of 4 reps, 6 reps, 4 reps, 2 reps. Some folks lost their shirts on this one. Others almost lost consciousness.

Event #3: Sledgehammer tire relay. Shoulder bell and run to other side of church parking lot. Pull sledgehammers and tires out of the shadows and line up for a 2-team relay race: Everyone performs various KB exercises while 1 from each team moves tire by striking it with the sledgehammer (sliding the tire flat on the ground) . Everyone gets a turn with the hammer swings, PAX performed a multitude of various KB exercises while enjoying the spectacle.

COT

Moleskine:

– No, I will not give you a weather update. We are men with more in common than most. We can do better than talking about the weather.

– I won’t give you a “wow, that workout was hard” update, either. It was Skunkworks. What do you think?

– Reverse course farmer’s carry – when I decided to go counterclockwise around the church/school rather than our normal clockwise, I was thinking only about where I wanted us to end up. Honestly didn’t think to remember how long of a hill we’d have to climb. Most of us were wiped out after that, and we still had 2 more events to conquer.

– Tough work put in by all today. Here are the ones I remember enough to note: Harley worked so hard he lost his shirt. F’man Ed did his burpee/sprint combos so fast he almost lost consciousness. Swiss Miss led the pack the entire way – that’s his MO, put his head down and got to work. Gumnut and Les Mis have stepped up to the big boy bells and swing them liked the beasts they are. Stone Cold: perhaps the ideal skunk – fast and strong. Freedom walking off holding his gorilla bell and sledgehammer over the shoulder looked like a hulking, barbarian headhunter (not bad for a worship leader!).

– I’m not sure I did anything more fun last week than swing that hammer. Something about holding a piece of hickory and swinging an iron head to remind me what men are meant to do. Even made sparks fly the couple times we grazed the asphalt. Vulcan and Thor would have been proud.

– A few of us figured out (accidentally?) how to pop the tire up and get it to roll. That took brains. But, we looked like idiots (i.e., dudes having a good time) as we tried to hit the moving tire with our 12 pound hammers.

– Cobains on the tardy backblast. Yes, this workout happened and yes it was a blast. Tardiness solely my bad.

– Comment below if you want to call me out for being a slack backblaster, or remember any other notable performances. I enjoyed Qing – thank you Harley for the opportunity, and thanks to the PAX for being willing to Follow Me as I led us through this little workout.