Author Archive Fuse Box

One Star Earned His Rating Today

With a no show Q in One Star the pax were left staring at each other until 5:15 hoping he would show.  Loafer started DiCCS right at 5:15 and with still no one star he asked if anyone wanted to split the workout with him.  Sure.  A quick Night at the Roxbury moment:

saturday night live 90s GIF

And we’re off with me leading the first half of the workout.

 

WARM UP

Mosey towards the neighborhood.  At the last second I decided perhaps Loafer didn’t want to be deep in the ‘hood when I threw him the torch and thought it best to stay close to the shopping center to allow for better last minute Q Planning.  Quick left turn behind Pet Smart.  Flanders catches up and says he had visions of Q school again with my opening mosey.  “Oh, am I running fast?  I guess I am”.  Pulled back the reins for the remaining mosey as we circled pets smart parking lot and met in the middle.   Jimmy Duggans with all the rights, lefts, and leans in there.   15 Merkins on my up and down (Asylum Pax can apparently count better than Homecoming pax – Sorry Honeycomb who was there for both).  Calf Stretch with Ackbar once again channeling his inner Damascus with groans, thank you’s, and Patriots praise.  5 T Merkins to finish us out because – well why not.

 

THE THANG

Mosey to the front of the Pet Smart (while acting like I had a plan).  Partner up.  P1 runs to end of parking lot for 2 burpees and back while P2 does quick feet on the curb.  Repeat 3 times.  (Heart rate much higher than expected.  Quick feet that long is no joke).

Mosey Never mind, heart rate still high.  Same Partners.  P1 Runs parking lot loop.  P2 does exercise.  Exercises were 100 In/Outs, 150 Supines, and 200 LBC’s.

Pass the torch to Loafer.

Pass The Torch Olympics GIF - PassTheTorch Olympics Olympics1984 GIFs

Mosey to Wesley Chapel Town Hall.  Stopping to collect the 6 along the way with backwards runs and 10 squats.

Arrive at the Rock Pile (which needs to be restocked as we have 6 big rocks and the rest are the size of bricks).  Partner up for the following excercises while the other partner runs:

  • 100 chest press
  • 100 tricep extension
  • 100 Military Press
  • 100 Curls
  • 100 _____ I forget, but I know we did something.  It sucked so bad that I’ve pushed it out of my memory.

Collect pax together for 10 staggered rock merkins right and then 10 left.  Rocks up.

Mosey to Novant health for 10 squats waiting on the 6.   Jailbreak to end of road.

Backward Run (dodging incoming car).  Gather 6 with 10 squats.   Jailbreak to Brooklyn Pizza.

Partners again.  split 100 dips while 1 partner runs.

Mosey (crawl, roll, wistfully walk), 10 feet back to COT and do 1 burpee in honor of 1 star not showing.

 

MOLESKIN

  • Great job by Loafer stepping up and having a contingency plan in place.
    • He apparently went to Last Call last week to replace Flanders who said – and I quote “Hell no once I saw lightning”.  Apparently 1 star was a no show on Friday as well (as were the rest of the Last Call Pax as Loafer was there by himself.
  • CRS back for his first full week as a pax where it all started – Asylum.  It was today that I realized Ackbar was Q last week and ultimately gave the thumbs up for CRS which is short for Can’t Remember Shit (in CRS’ defense when he explained the name he subbed in “Stuff”).  I find it quite amusing that our preacher named him CRS.
    • He’s had such an impactful week that he was voluntold to lead next weeks Asylum.  Yes probably a smidge early, but after beating both site Q’s in the runs today, I have full confidence he will deliver a beat down.
  • Honeycomb for a rare Asylum visit.  I think he was there for my last Q.  He must have missed me – since Saturday.
  • Flanders attempted to commiserate about NC State Women’s basketball with me.  Either my grunt of disgust scared him off or my mosey pace was too much for him to keep up as he quickly retreated from the front.
  • Madison continues to join us at Asylum and watch his EH bloom.  Looks like we will see him for one more week with CRS on his VQ next week.
  • Great to have Swimmers back out.  It feels more like a rarity lately to see him at Aylum – for whatever reason.  Still kicks my butt in the runs though so the lack of attendance hasn’t slowed him down.
  • Beltway back in action two weeks in a row.  The warmer weather (though not today) appears to be dragging a few winter fartsackers out of their caves.  Great to see you this morning.  Wish we had more time pre or post workout to catch up.  You appear to be killing it on LinkedIn.
  • Ackbar with the shop dawg esque post covid coughing heaves today.  I got excited that my lame last minute Q might of had him spilling merlot but then I remembered Covid hit him hard earlier this year and he was likely just stretching the lungs back out.
  • I didn’t catch what the Masher’s did today, but they all met up with us at COT drenched in sweat so it appears they worked hard.  Shout out to Mayhem, Penalty Box, and Ditka.  Light crowd today for the Mashers.  They were all applause seeing one of their own out of the nest and off running with us (beltway).

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • CPR Class TONIGHT.  Five Stones Church at 6:00 pm.  Spots are open so sign up.  $15.
  • April 1 Q Challenge
  • Christ Closet looking for help in pulling summer clothes down and putting winter gear up higher on the shelves.
  • WTF

 

A quick last back blast for Extreme Ownership.  

2.5 of us for the last chapter Discipline Equals Freedom.  I really enjoyed going through this book with yall these last three months.  As happens with Q source as well, the numbers start strong and eventually dwindle towards the end of the book.  I will leave you with the last big point of this chapter.

 

The Dichotomy of Leadership

A good leader must be:

  • confident but not cocky;
  • courageous but not foolhardy;
  • competitive but a gracious loser;
  • attentive to details but not obsessed by them;
  • strong but have endurance;
  • a leader and follower;
  • humble not passive;
  • aggressive not overbearing;
  • quiet not silent;
  • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions;
  • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge;
  • able to execute Extreme Ownership, while exercising Decentralized Command.

A good leader has nothing to prove, but everything to prove.

 

 

Again, I enjoyed it guys.  No future book has been picked to take off on next.  I’m open for suggestions for the next book (or if there is no interest we can shut down the leadership Q Source on Mondays).   It has been mentioned in the finance channel about getting a weekly finance discussion going either Friday’s after the workout or Saturday’s during coffeteria.  If we keep the Monday post Asylum leadership discussion going, I’d like someone to step up and take lead (other than me).

F3 Mental Battle

In the past F3 Waxhaw has done a good job of highlighting mental battle month in March, but not this year.  In years past we have pushed it on Group Me, asked pax to share something if they felt led during COT, but not this year.  In all honestly, March just about slipped right past me without me realizing it.  It was a twitter post by I think F3 The Fort and a back blast by Midriff in SOB that brought mental battle month back to my mind (See, back blasts ARE important).

So with that, today’s goal was to get a good workout in, while also highlighting guys tend to struggle with sharing their feelings and the demon’s they are battling.

6:29 DiCCS –  Wait, I’m the only CPR certified guy here.  Oh boy.  Ok guys, CPR class is THIS monday night.  Five Stones Church from 6:00 to 8:00.  Sign up on Group me by clicking the picture in the upper right corner, click on calendar and there is a link to sign up.  Go sign up or see Surge if your Shop Dawg’s age or older.

Lets Go.

 

WARM UP

A lap around the school.  Ending where we started.  Quick talk about how some times we spin our wheels and feel like we go no where or we are just running circles and develop a rut in life much like the movie Groundhog Day.

15 Merkins on both my up and down holding the down a little longer than some (Eli) would like.

Stretches while we took turns sharing our biggest fear.   I clarified that it is your biggest fear, not something that scares you.  In other words, snakes, spiders, bears are all out.  As promised I will not share what other shared, but will share mine.  Its two.  The first one has past but still lingers somewhat today and that’s loneliness.  I took a new job in Columbia, SC in 2007 where I knew no one.  My closest friend was 2.5 hours away.  I had never knew true loneliness up until that point and I still think back on those months in my life as some of the darkest.  I looked forward to going to work where I would have interaction with people vs the weekend which would be met with 3 nights and two days of nothing.  My second fear is not being able to provide for my family – mostly from a financial standpoint but also from a physical protection one as well.   Stretches were Jimmy Duggan, calf, and downward dog.

 

THE THANG

Mosey to rock pile and grab a lifting rock.  50 curls then run the elementary loop with the rock on your shoulder.  Overhead rock hold while waiting on the 6.   Once everyone returned, we talked about how heavy that rock was on your shoulder and how we as guys don’t tend to want to share that load.  From here on out, there would be not OYO (on your own).  We would do all exercises with partners.

Partner up for 200 Curls and 200 tricep extensions.  P1 lifted with P2 ran the loop.  When you finish, rocks over your head waiting on the 6.

Rocks up and mosey to the elementary school parking lot.   Find a parking place line.  1 Merkin on the line, bear craw to the next line for 2 merkins, bear crawl to next line for 3 merkins.  Go until you cant do a push up, take a break and continue again until you burn out the second time.   Pax ranged from 12 to 8 merkins when I called a recover.  (I’m sure there is some mental battle story I could have told but I didn’t have one).

Mosey to the swing set.  In non pandemic times I would actually have partners pick each other up off the ground for the obvious symbol of helping a brother.  But with Covid I pivoted to P1 20 Swing Rows (on the swings) while P2 does Fence jump squats.   Go 3 rounds.

Mosey to basketball court.  Sprint to the other side and back.  It took us 12 seconds.  We spoke about the mental battle at workouts (by far one of my biggest struggles) and how we always have more to give.  I then told the pax that if they didn’t run that same sprint faster (less than 12 seconds) we would all do 20 burpees.   Amazingly (sarcasm) they ran it in 10 seconds – a full 2 seconds faster.

Mosey to the back of the middle school where we collected the six and caught our breath by doing dips.  Von Trapp said that he and my idea of catching our breath was way different.  I was then called out by Eli for not sprinting with the group earlier (I was the timer) so while they dipped, I sprinted (along with questions of if that was my fastest and I could have gone faster having just lectured everyone to do the same).

Mosey back past COT to the dreaded hill.  At the bottom I called P1 to run to the top of the hill and back while P2 did inch worm merkins.  I waited for the groans and then advised of a potential audible.  If you and your partner both share something that is weighing heavy on you (stress), you may skip ahead 20 Trees (roughly cutting 100 yards up hill down to 50).  It seems that everyone decided they better share some stress.  Interesting to hear the different stresses of guys just in our small group today.  For me lately its been work.  Sales has Ebbs and Flows and currently I’m in the middle of a fairly big stress at work.  We are trying to renegoiate (thanks to the rising costs of wood, steel, core steel, and oil) a transformer contract.  The cherry on top was finding out last night at 5:30 that our primary cable plant is going through labor negotiations with the union and the union intends to strike as of 5:00 pm yesterday.   Needless to say my stress level spiked this week and next week isn’t looking much better.  I struggle sharing work things at home (even the good news).  The wife gets on me about sharing more but I deal with work enough, I don’t want it to seep into the home life.  I’ve gotten better sharing somethings with her – and last night she got to hear me bitch for 10 minutes after getting the call from my boss at 5:30 on a Friday (which is never good).

We finally all collect halfway up the hill and start doing inch worm merkins and I see guys struggling.  Hell I’m struggling.  We laid it all out there during the bear crawl merkins so I graciously audible to lunges.  We gather everyone at the top of the hill and then repeat with P1 lunging backwards while P2 runs down hill and back.  I allowed them this time to share something different at the halfway point instead of start to end it.  But because of time, we never got to the halfway point.

Called a recover in the middle and asked everyone to run back to the top of the hill as a group.  1 minute left, give it all you got to COT.   Eli ran by me which pissed me off made me dig deeper to catch him.  He then taunted me as I got closer and turned up the jets.  Nice job.   Got to COT to see we were three short.  Two guys turned around early for the 6.  So the three of us at COT would do the same.   Got everyone back to COT just a hair (hare?) late.

 

MOLESKINE

  • As stated in COT, today’s workout wasn’t designed to be preachy.  It was designed to get guys to open up.  To share feelings, share struggles, share pain.  To often men keep emotions bottled in and it never works out well.  Either they come exploding out or worse,  if the despair is strong enough, they make the decision to do something that cannot be reversed.  In F3 Waxhaw we are lucky to not have had to deal with a brother committing suicide.  Other regions have not been as lucky.  Toby in Wilmington is the most recently example I can think of.  I don’t want that to happen here.  If you are struggling with something, find someone to talk to.  After a workout, over a beer, somewhere.  Lets talk.
  • Great work by Eli today.  Love having him back out.
  • Honeycomb pushing hard the second time around on the sprints.
  • CRS killing it his first week in F3.  Out front all day in both the exercises and the runs.
  • Legal Zoom scared the hell out of me when the sun rose I thought I saw blood gushing out of his neck on to his shirt.  Turns out it was mud from the rock run earlier.  Thank God.
  • Von Trapp back after an extended absence and tweaked his IT band again.  Hopefully it wont cause another extended absence.
  • Thanks to Honeycomb for the invite and thanks to the group today who allowed me to do something a little different.  I think we still got a good workout in (over 3 miles and lots of reps), but hopefully the exercise was the least of what you took away from todays workout.

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • CPR Monday at Five Stones.  6:00 pm until 8:00.  $15 and all proceeds go towards buying AED’s for the community.  Take five minutes to watch a video from the lady putting on our training to fully appreciate why she does this:  https://youtu.be/1XOBOTiDz20
    • There are 3 spots left.  Go sign up and save a life.
  • WTF sign up on GroupMe.
  • April 1 Q challenge.

 

40 Burpees at Asylum

Two weeks ago, I let the Asylum pax know during announcements that I was Q’ing (in two weeks) and I was going to give them the ability to change the wienkie.  There were going to be 100 burpees on that Wienkie.  If we had at least 1 FNG – 30 burpees gone.  1 Kotters – 30 burpees gone.  1 – Site FNG – 30 burpees gone.  And if Posse showed up on time – 10 burpees gone.  As you see from the title, we did 40 burpees.

 

I arrive about 4 minutes ahead of launch and to my gleeful shock, I see a lot more bodies than normal.  I get out of the car and Mayhem makes a v line towards me….except its not Mayhem.  The guy has on a bandana (do rag?), and eye patch, and a fake mustache and proceeds to introduce himself as Panama Jack – an FNG.   Sorry Mayhem, doesn’t count.  But good, no, great try.

Brutus introduces me to My Space.  His second workout.  Not an FNG but will count towards the site fng so 30 burpees gone.

I see Honeycomb.  He says he has been to Asylum before but not in a long time.  Some pax try to get him to count towards a kotters but I just saw him in pictures last week so nope!

I’m about to start DiCCS when we see Ditka rolling up on two wheels.  “Hey Ditka, when was the last time you posted”.   Ditka: “October?”.   There’s our kotters.  30 more burpees down.  (Scuba was also a site FNG).

I start DiCCS and still no Posse.  Chastain asks for clarification if it was that he had to be here at launch, pre DiCCS, what?   Technically I told him before I started DiCCS, but at this point I’d take launch.

Burpee Recap

30 for no FNGS

30 for no Kotters

30 for no Site FNG’s

10 for no Posse on time.

So we have 40 burpees to do.

5:15.  Lets go.

 

WARM UP

10 burpees a minute for 3 minutes.  This shut everyone up pretty quick – me included.

Mosey to Target Parking Lot.

 

THE THANG

Teams of 3.   P1 splitting 100 Turkish get ups.  Partner 2 at the other end of Target parking lot splitting 300 crab dips.  P3 runner.

Team up (2).  P1 does supines.  P2 runs to retaining wall, climb up it, mosey around and down and back to the shopping cart corral.  We did this twice.  Some chose taller portions of the wall than others, but most everyone was eye level or higher.

Mosey to the corner of the lot for some square sprints.  Go 50% down one stretch, make a turn for 70% run, make a turn for all you got, then walk or slow mosey back to start to complete the square.  We did this 4 times.  Flanders attempted to fool me after our third time running saying we had already one four.  Chastain and I wondering where Posse might be.  Chastain said he bet Posse went to another workout location 30 minutes away just to spite us.  Posse must have heard us talking about him because he came wallowing up in despair running up using the ole AM/PM excuse.

Mosey to another corner of Target and grab teams of 3 again.  P1: Merkins.  P2 Squats.  P3: inch worms towards squats and bear crawl towards Merkins.  We did three rounds.

Short mosey to the gate near pet smart (the gate is still on the old day light savings time).  Jail break to COT.

About a minute and a half left.  Time to knock out Posse’s 10 burpees.  For those who finished early, squats until time was called.

 

MOLESKIN

  • Chatter Box dropped a joke on Sugar Daddy that had me rolling.  It wasn’t that great of a joke, but more about Chatter coming out of the box to drop it.  As we chop it down from the last jail break, Chatter Box comes over to sugar daddy and says “Hey Sugar, your loosing your sugar.  You left some Gummy Bears back there”.  Apparently there was a pack of Gummy Bears that we ran by.
  • Still laughing about Mayhem coming dressed up trying to pass himself off as an FNG.  Panama Jack at that.  Great job.
    • The Original Panama Jack, Redwood City, CA logo
  • Brutus pulling a site FNG out on only his second post.  Nice work.
  • None of my guys I was EH’ing showed.  I was trying to pull in two Kotters and a site FNG.
  • I didn’t think of this but should have added a Site Kotters.  Some new faces back out to Asylum that had been before.  Welcome back Honeycomb, Sugar Daddy, Chatter Box, Schnitzel, Chastain, and Radar.
  • The mileage was higher than I expected considering we didn’t really leave Target (we got 2.7 miles).  Several guys were overheard stating they were at their upper level of exertion measurements according to their watch – those four square sprints were the culprit.
  • Thanks to everyone that supported this Q.  My goal was do something a little different to help drive the winter regulars to get the winter fartsacker’s out of the bed.  In addition, I wanted to drive more people towards Asylum since the Cuthbertson workouts tend to attract 90% of the pax – to the point that we are going to soon launch a 4th site now on Mondays in yet another attempt to break up the numbers there.
    • While there were no FNG’s today, there were plenty of guys that were reached out to.  I also appreciate the effort and EH’ing that went into trying to get these guys out.  They likely need this more than they realize and its often a month or so in before they realize what they were missing.  The weather is getting warmer.  Lets all make it a point to EH some kotters and FNG’s.

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • March 29th CPR Class.  Five Stones.  6:00 – 8:00.  Get with Surge to sign up.  Cost is $15.
  • Christ Closet furniture give away this Saturday.  Spread the word.

 

Q SOURCE EXTREME OWNERSHIP

  • Mayhem led 6 other guys (Posse, Honeycomb, SCUBA, Sledge, Sugar Daddy, and myself) through the 9th chapter – Leading up and Down the chain of command.
  • Mayhem brought SCUBA out specifically to assist with this chapter.  SCUBA a formal Seal (though I’ve been told once a seal, always a seal), sprinkled in some additional stories from his time with the Seals.  A 26 year veteran, there were a lot of stories and I feel we only scratched the surface.  I appreciate SCUBA’s willingness to come out and share with us some lessons learned and how they applied to this weeks chapter on leading up and down.  I’m hoping we can talk him into coming back out.  SCUBA did some training with Jocko but did not personally know Lief – the second author of Extreme Ownership.
  • Next week Shop leads Chapter 10 – Decisiveness and Uncertainty.

Walking and Talking

6 7 guys came out to get 3.5 miles in while cracking jokes for an hour.

Radar came in on two wheels.

Rudy caught up with us halfway through holding a bag of poop.  Jury is still out as to if it was his or his dogs.

Turn Buckle desperately wants to Q a Wrestling themed Diesel – complete with costume.  Yes – speedo and all.  We are wondering if he will go full Lucha Libre mask and where that mask might come from (S&M mask???).

Sledge arrived back to COT with two leaches on his leg (they were only earth worms).  Still not sure how that happened.

After much coaxing, Posse and I monkey humped Finches house.  Unlike the Boitana hump, Finch was not spotted and did not join us.

Posse and Radar then monkey humped my house.  Radar thought he was safe since he had never met my wife, but little did he know she watches a lot of Army porn and according to her “definitely recognized the butt”.

Yes you saw Halfback tagged but its not THAT halfback.  This halfback comes to us by way of Davidson F3.  Recently moved to Lawson and works for the YMCA (so perhaps a name change to spy?).  I did make a connection between him and my wife though – its a small world.  Hopefully she still has a job after he overhead me telling Radar my wife was into Army Porn (she’s not, that’s a joke – but the fact that Radar was in one is not – maybe).

Longhorn was mentioned as part of a group of guys we haven’t seen in awhile and then shortly there after he does a flyby running which freaked us out.

 

Ran out of time to hit the trails but did cover every inch of the wide Champion Forest roads.  Thanks for the second F gentleman.  Lots of laughs were had.

 

Hills Suck (And So Does Your Mother)

17 for a hill heavy workout.   Yesterday I semi pre ran with Turn Buckle before Diesel.  I overheard him say “I hate hills” which is exactly the wrong thing to allow me to hear the day before I Q.  So I proceeded to plan a winkie that was hill heavy.

Arrived early to find Deadwood and Dasher doing some cuddle stretching in the parking lot before running the thread trail.  They would meet back up with us for the last 10 minutes of commitment.

DiCCS – lets go.

WARM UP

Mosey to Rock Pile and grab a lifting rock.

Use the rock to assist with Jimmy Duggans middle, right, left, and back to middle.

Shoulder ladder.  10 presses and 1 hold down to 1 press and 10 hold.

Staggered hand Merkins on the Rock

21’s Curls

 

THE THANG

Partner up in 3’s.  1 partner to stay at the rock pile for rock work, 1 Partner up at the corner of Kensington Drive/BayBrooke Drive (Basically the main road) for leg work, and a runner in between.   Rock work was 200 curls, 200 presses, and 200 tricep extensions.  Leg work was 200 squats, 200 speed skaters, and 200 lunges.

Rocks up and Mosey to the covered bridge.  If your early, do step ups until the 6 arrives.

Mosey again to the trail.

Merkins to exhaustion (because some can do 35 with no issue while other struggle to get to 20).  Roll over for 50 LBC’s.  Roll back over for another round of Merkins until exhaustion.  Then run to the round a bout.  If you have to stop to rest before reaching round a bout, then do 20 crab dips.  Once you reach round a bout, do crab dips until the 6 arrives.  High Hat tried to Q jack me.  Tried being the key word (NOT THIS TIME High Hat).  Once Elmers and Haka arrived we continued crab dips until they reached 30.  Then asked everyone to sprint back to trail.  If TB beat you back, you owed burpees.  Everyone finished in time so as a reward I only asked for Aussie Burpees until the 6 arrived.  Picked up Dasher and Deadwood here.  Apparently they met Hollywood somewhere on the trail which would explain Deadwoods look of pain and brokenness on his face as we arrived.

Merkins ’til exhaustion again.  50 LBC’s.  Merkins ’til exhaustion.  Run back up to the round about.  (Checks watch, not enough time, audible).  LBC’s until the 6 finished Merkins.

YoYo mosey towards COT via the trail.  Turn around at the bridge and come back to the 6.  Continue the “yoyo” until 6 arrives to the bridge.  YoYo mosey again to nesbit cul de sac. (yes JWoww I realize I’m running out of time but if given two options of ending on time or ending with everyone together I choose the latter).   Collect everyone at Cul De Sac for one final push.  All you got to COT.  7:31.  Finito.

 

MOLESKIN

  • Good work by everyone today.  The 6 pushed hard.
  • Chainsaw attempted to give me a complement pre name-o-rama and I did my best to deflect it.  I’ve got to get better about accepting compliments.
  • We found our newest doubleganger couple today.  Move over Twinkle Toes and Flanders,  Kirby and Dough Boy, Sugar Daddy and Mr. Clean, Nails and Tommy Lee,  Jingles and Posse ;).  I give you Haka and Popeye.   We really need side by sides to do it justice but they are basically the same guy.
  • Popeye’s hard work at express is showing.  Not only was he not the 6 today, but he was challenging me towards the front of the Clydesdales.  Nice work.
  • Was great to hear Haka reached out to Posse to give Posse some of his own medicine with regards to disappointed dad eyes.  Well played Haka (though I suspect Posse with the last laugh since you showed up to Commitment today?).
  • Rudy reached out earlier asking to split this Q, then decided not to show at all.  I cant figure that out, but I’m sure alcohol was involved – and a toilet.
  • It was good to see some non regular commitment guys out there today.  Twinkle, Das Boot, Haka, High Hat, and Elmers just to name a few.
  • Time to go coach some girls Softball (Let’s go Waxhaw…Beat Mara!).

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • Champion Forest tomorrow for Neighborhood Watch (You roosters may need a walk to get the soreness out).  Meet at the clubhouse on Dobson Drive for a walk through the neighborhood with the widest streets (in my best Trump boastful impression).   Planning to add in some trails as well.
  • Asylum on Monday has 100 burpees planned.   Bring an FNG, a site FNG, or a Kotters to help us reduce that burpee count down to 10.
  • March 29 Lycan launches at Waxhaw Elementary
  • Also March 29th is another CPR class.  Five Stones Church from 6:00 to 8:00.   Get with Surge to sign up as space is limited to 10 people.  2.0’s and wives welcome.  Watch this video to have your heart strings tugged by the instructor who leads it for us.  https://youtu.be/1XOBOTiDz20

Simple Yet Effective?

14 guys snuck in to join me before mother nature unleashed yet more rain (Is this how Noah felt?).  I had two sneaky plans for today.  A longer than normal opening mosey, and an abundance of chest and abs.  Some people may argue the title since I kept making this simple workout more and more complicated as we went.   DiCCS, lets go.

 

WARM UP

Mosey to the High School front doors.  When I first started F3 and through my fat months years, I hated Q’s that would start with this far of a run (Yes, I’m talking about you Dasher and Hollywood).  Lots of internal cuss words hurled their way when they would run that far.   I would arrive often last and so far out of breath I couldn’t jump into the exercise (because of course they had already started SSH’s).  Now thanks to Express (and a little bit of weight loss), that doesn’t seem like that far of a mosey anymore.  I had attempted to bait some Clydesdales in marking that it would be an easy Clydesdale trot today – apparently none took the bait as Doughboy and myself were the biggest of the ‘dales.

Circle up for stretching for which Recalculating offered his unwanted feedback.  I’ve saved the complaint card just in case there’s another run on toilet paper.

  • Jimmy Duggan with some rights and lefts thrown in there.
  • Calf Stretch (thanks for the Damascus impression Ackbar).
  • Downward Dog
  • Glydah/Runners/Can Opener/Pants Splitter stretch.

OYO at the benches, 3 rounds of 20 dips, 20 step ups, and 20 Dirkins.  (This quieted Recalculating down for half a second).  When your finished, run the small loop until everyone is done.

 

THE THANG

Mosey towards the HS entrance road and form teams of 3.  Two guys on the ends (speed bumps) with a runner in between.  The speed bumps are approximately 50 yards apart though I’m sure those that ran it this morning may dispute that distance.

  • Bottom speed bump: As a team split 150 ranger merkins, 150 wide arm merkins, and 200 chest fly’s (chest fly’s just to give you a break from merkins in case you reach muscle fatigue before you partner arrives back).
  • Top Speed bump: as a team split 300 LBC’s and 200 Gas pumpers

After one time through the ab speed bump many groups were already blowing through the LBC’s, so I graciously pivoted and doubled the LBC’s to 600 reps.  I quickly became enemy number 1.  Because I doubled the LBC, the Merkins were on pace to finish too soon, so I added 50 each.  For those counting along we finished with:

  • 200 Rangers
  • 200 Wide Arm
  • 200 Fly’s
  • 600 LBC’s
  • 200 Gas Pumpers.

 

Mosey back to the high school.  Time a little tighter than I had hoped so will have to shorten the wienkie a bit.   Groups of three again with exercises in the HS cutouts (No clue what they are called – cutouts seem good appropriate).   Donkey kicks in one and reverse fly’s (chest on ground, arms out, and pinch shoulders together) on the other with a runner in between.   We got through almost 2 rounds before I called it for time (Winkie had us going for three rounds).

Paula Abdul the light poles with a jail break forward for 2 and a slow recovering mosey back for 1.   Again, time was not on my side so I regrouped us at the bus entrance for a jailbreak back to the middle school LED sign.  Regroup again for a slow mosey back to COT.   Aussie burpees while we waited on bread bowl.  (Intentionally called the group Flash but former site Q Recalc didn’t take the bait).   Done.

 

MOLESKIN

  • I knew the merkins/Ab section would eat up some time.  Even expecting that it ate more time than originally anticipated.
  • Goal was to completely burn out the chest and abs today and I’m pretty sure that was accomplished.
  • Deflated with a couple good one liners today but no one heard them.
  • Good to see Smithers back out consistently.  Maybe one of these days he will actually bring the fart sacking sign for us to go put on a new Pax’ mailbox.
  • Legal Zoom also a refreshing sight to see regularly this week.  I think he posted at least three times this week and told me no longer had an excuse since covid cases were going down.
  • Dough Boy is a beast at Merkins.  Since teams were uneven I made sure to put myself on his team as their 4th.  LRC – Foundation + Mad Dog tried hard to recruit me to their team but I knew better.  When doing lots of Merkins, don’t get on the skinny guys team.
  • Speaking of LRC – I can’t wait until Foundation gets back out on a regular basis.  By far my favorite back blasts to read are from him.  Apparently he’s off remotely working on an executive MBA which for any of you MBA’ers really translates to an accelerated MBA with more in person school, but executive sounds fancier.  Once you produce that diploma I will invite you to the super secretive F3 Waxhaw MBA channel.
  • Bread Bowl gets a text during the workout and whips his phone out from his pocket.  Apparently bringing his phone with him to get that one last sext in before school.  (I hear lighting is key to adding an optical inch – the gloom probably not the best place to find that optical inch though).
    • Well Maybe GIFs | Tenor
  • Shop busting through and out in front way further than I have mentally have him in my mind.  He continues to amaze with his dedication and push.
  • Chainsaw continues to the be quiet assassin.  Dough and I run up to him asking how many reps.  I’m expecting to hear like 70-90.  Chainsaw goes “147 LBC’s”.   Whoa.  Yall can thank Chainsaw for those extra 300 LBC’s.
  • Mad Dog is another one that just gets after it with no feedback or complaints.  While others are questioning the count, he is already down doing merkins.  Just to be clear – I fall on the complaining/questioning side of that fence.
  • Thank you Ackbar for allowing me to lead today (Where’s the rest of your site Q’s Chatter and Transporter?).  Also thanks for allowing a last minute switch last week with Sledge to allow extra time for my foot to heal.  (My devious plan of not having to Q in the ran worked!).
  • We all somehow were able to keep the form police at bay today.  He must have left his badge at the house.  Good work today Recalc.
  • I think I’ve mentioned everyone by name so far except Ricky Bobby and HoneyComb…..so…way to go guys!   Haha, sorry.  I guess yall will have to step up your mumble chatter next time.  What I will say is yall both beasted the run and never complained (Well I think Honeycomb gave me an extra long stare when I added merkins).

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • Q School March 6th
  • Rooster March 13th
  • Keep Surge’s Niece Lauren in your prayers.
  • Shop’s mom with a positive diagnosis.
  • My co-workers husband goes in for prostate cancer surgery today.  Prayers for Butch.

School Yard Games

25 for a Tuesday Night?!  Awesome!

Arrived early to see if this AO that I’ve seen at morning darkness had some extra fun when seen in the light.  I was able to find a little something extra to add to the back half of the winkie.  (Great Job to Rae View Elementary for adding some fun paintings on the parking lot).

The weather was here and I wish the pax were beautiful (shout out to Jimmy Buffett).  Getting close to launch so quick DiCCS.  Lets Go.

 

WARM UP

Mosey around the parking lot.  Threw in some butt kickers, skips, karaoke and toy soldiers.  Circle up.

  • 15 Side Straddle Hops
  • 10 Merkins on my down and up.  Changed up the cadence a couple times to allow for more of a downward hold than the pax are used to.
  • Jimmy Duggan’s (with some mumble chatter from the SOB’ers as to what that was).  Thanks site Q’s for stepping in and helping explain.  Since kids were in attendance I was biting my tongue on the full explanation (AVOID THE CLAP!   ((Pour one our for Moneyball))).
  • 15 Mountain Climbers

THE THANG

short Mosey to the front entrance of the school where I divided us up Dad’s vs kids.  Sorry to the older kids who tried to sneak in with us adults….if  your under 18 your a kid (Deuces barely missing it).  Time for a Scavenger/Trivia Contest.  I would yell out an object.  First group to find it didn’t have to do burpees.  I would then alternate questions to the groups and if you got it wrong…burpees.

  • Find Alaska!  Rocky was out quick on the trail.   High Hat on his tail.  I believe the adults found it first so 2 burpees to the kids.
    • Adults: Capital of Alaska.  Some conferring amongst the Dads.  Juneau and Anchorage were going back and forth.  Final Answer: Juneau.  Correct!  No Burpees.
  • Find California!   Kids find it.
    • Capital of California: (with some help from Banjo – you damn cheater) Sacramento!   Kids got it right.
  • Find New York!   Dads find it.
    • Capital of New York: (I thought this may trip some up but apparently we have plenty of northerners who moved south)  Albany it is.
  • Too many right answers and not enough burpees – everyone do 2 burpees.
  • Find a map of the world!  Adults find it first.
    • Name all seven continents.  (Never have Wrigley on your team.  I believe he gave niner as an answer here).  Dad’s get close but repeat South America twice and no Australia.  Dads do 5 burpees!
  • Kids: Find Italy.  Got it (no burpees)
  • Kids: Find China.  Got it.
  • Dads: Find Lebanon.  Got it (Dang It).
  • Ok, Dads….Find Uzbekistan.  The Geopolitical/Geography major started zeroing in a little too close (and truth be told I didn’t know exactly which one it was) so before it could be pointed out (and I had no idea where it was right or wrong), I called time and Dad’s owed 5 burpees!

Circle up for Simon Says. I call an exercise.  If you do the exercise without me saying Simon Says first, you owe 2 burpees.  I honestly don’t remember all the exercises called and what was and wasn’t Simon says, but lets just say I’m pretty sure at one point or another I had everyone doing burpees.  The last one I said Ok, lets run over here for something else.  Half the group runs with me and Twinkle Toes looks at me a goes “Wait, we are done with Simon Says right?”.  I smile and say “Nope”.  Twinkle did his best Will Farrell mad at Norway impression.    Now “Simon Says run over here against the curb”.  Simon says game over.

 

Red Light/Green Light bear crawls.  If I catch you moving – 5 Merkins and 5 crawl bears.  I crawl bear’ed with a head start and the pax had to catch me as I yelled green light/red light.  (Note to self, there are some fast bear crawlers).  Twinkle took an early lead so I intentially called a quick red light to catch him moving and slow him down.   I forget who won – Trickle maybe?

 

Mosey to the Rock pile.  Keep teams split for adults vs kids relay race.   One person at a time runs.  Adults run a big loop (about .25 miles) while kids run a smaller loop (about .17 miles).  I had hoped to give the kids a slight advantage to keep it fair but apparently I underestimated their speed.  While there was one runner, pax alternated between the following:

20 curls, 2o triceps, 20 presses for runner 1

20 Merkins and 20 Squats for runner 2

Back to Curls, triceps, and presses for runner 3…..and keep alternating.

 

Kids took an early lead, but quickly lost it when Cat Nip arrived on two wheels.   1 Adult added to our team and 3 kids added to their team (Yes!!!).  Don’t get too excited….the kids still smoked us.   So bad that I made them run 3 extra segments….and they still smoked us.

Rocks up.  Spread the kids and Dads out again.  Gave the Dads a 20 foot advantage (that neither knew about).  Find 4 squares with Dots painted inside…..Great job by Trickle…kids do 2 burpees.

TWISTER

I found this on my scout.  4 squares with the exact order of 6 dots in each one.   Hmmmm, that kinda looks like a twister board (light bulb).   We took turns putting 2 kids vs 2 adults while the rest cheered on while doing exercises.  Exercises were plank, LBC’s, gas pumpers, mountain climbers, and Merkins.   I think the Dads did most of the burpees as we were not as flexible as the kids.  I even cheated and gave some of the older kids harder positions….still no falls.

Couple minutes left.  Partner up with someone you are not related to.    It can be kids with kids or adults with kids, but you can’t be related.   Partner 1 starts crawl bearing (backwards) up the hill to the fence.  Partner 2 runs to curb and back and swaps with P1.  Keep going until you are at the fence.  Gather the 6 and then Repeat except for bear crawl down the hill.

30 seconds left.  Burpees.  We got through 5 before it was time.

 

MOLESKIN

  • What a wonderful night.  Weather was perfect.  Great group showed up and I think everyone had fun.
  • I’ve got to get my daughter out there more.  She loved it.  Thursday Softball practice kills Clyent Dinner but the Appetizer is squarely in our schedule.
  • Shout out to Magi who I met for the first time tonight.  Apparently the F3 Lawson marketing team is working overtime as he learned about F3 Sanctuary from a sign at Lawson.
    • His son an FNG was named Deuce as he is a tennis player (Bottle Cap getting excited).   Since he was 17, we tried to keep it tame but I really wanted to go Sharapova (maybe a name change when he turns 18).
  • Great Job by Cat Nip finding us and then jumping right in to be our final runner for the relay.  He had a lot of ground to make up for us and…..sorry this isn’t a happy ending…he didn’t come through.   But we didn’t lose any ground either!
  • Great leadership out of the older 2.o’s tonight leading the kids group.
  • My daughter was expecially preturbed at the lack of trivia questions for the younger kids.  “Dad, we haven’t even covered states yet, much less capitals or countries!”.  Dually noted babe.  I’ll do better next time.
  • Always love working out with Rubbermaid.  Great to see him and his 2.0 roll up.
  • The Pack is on and its getting to be bed time for the little ones so I will leave it there.  Thanks again to High Hat for Q swapping with me and dragging me out to Appetizer.  I really enjoyed tonight.

Where’s Slidah?

I picked a nail up in the tire on the way to this mornings workout so I was too deep into trying to find it in the darkness that I didn’t realize that 1) 6:30 had jumped up on us and 2) that the scheduled Q, Slidah, was not in attendance.   Being the seasoned site Q that he is, Cat Fish jumped right in and started DiCCS and off we go.

WARM UP

Mosey around the tennis courts and end up in the concrete circle.  Cat Fish took us through a typical warm up routine of:

  • SSH
  • Merkins
  • Mountain Climbers
  • Downward Dog
  • Upward Dog

It was around this time I hollered at him and asked if he wanted help.  Without batting an eye Cat Fish throws the imaginary torch to me and off we go.

THE THANG

Mosey to the short wall between the tennis courts.   Partner up.  P1: short lap around tennis courts while P2 does up and overs the short wall.   Repeato 3 times.   Dips while we wait on the 6.  Dips felt so good I decided two more rounds with one partner running at the other doing dips.

It was hear that Glidah started getting the ticks.  Apparently there wasn’t enough running for him (or not enough burpees) so he tells me he got a peak at Slidah’s Winkie (gross) and could bail me out if I needed it.  Sure.  Torch thrown to Glidah.

4 corner Build-A-Burpees.   (Very similar to deconstructed burpees except you build three parts of the burpee then the 4th is an actual burpee while deconstructed burpees deconstructs the burpee into 4 individual movements….ok enough lexicon talk).  Used the larger tennis court loop which is approximately 1/4 mile.

Corner 1: 20 Merkins

Corner 2: 20 In/Outs

Corner 3: 20 Jump Squats/Bobby Hurleys

Corner 4: 20 Burpess (Really??, I mean really!)

Option was given to continue burpees or circle for the 6.  Much to my amazement, last week’s FNG Draino said he would rather continue burpees (Really?) so I stayed there with him.

Everyone in, Glidah grinning from ear to ear.  In my mind ” Don’t do it…..Don’t, yup He’s going to do it”.  Glidah: “Repeato!”.    Me (this time audibly): “Damn it!”

Glidah was gracious enough to cut the reps to 10.   As we gathered at the burpee station for the 6 (and Draino once again kept doing more burpees) Glidah got that $H!t eating grin again.   Glidah: “If you don’t want to continue doing burpees someone bet…”   Me: “Lets Mosey!”

Its all I needed.  He cracked the door and I busted through.  In my mind other pax were appreciative, probably not.

Mosey to bollard lights were we collected the 6 by doing way to many LBC’s.  Mosey again to the front of the middle school (I think) where we once again collected the 6 with Gas Pumpers and then American Hammers.

Different partners this time for incline burpee jumps while the other partner ran.

Followed up by 50 (yes Change Order FIFTY – his hearing aid apparently can’t hear reps over 20) foot release squats.   It was around here that Cat Fish and Glidah both claimed they needed to leave early.  Pax mumble chatter heated up wondering where they were going.  The leading theory that they were under the bleachers together was soon squashed when Cat Fish came ridding by us blowing the horn.

Short Mosey and Al Gore’d while waiting for the 6.   5 Turkish Get Ups on the curb, bear crawl to other curb for 10 Carolina Dry Docks, Crawl Bear back.  Repeated that twice.

Short mosey to bollard lights were we alternated 5 each leg one legged Romanian Dead Lift.  Merkins waiting on the 6.

Gave the pax an opportunity to take over.  No one took it.  Warned them we would run the final 6 minutes if they didn’t take it….no one took it.   Off we go.  Moseyed about 50 yards, stopped for SSH’s collecting the 6.  Repeated that about 6 more times until we ended up at COT right on time.

MOLE SKIN

  • Big shout out to Cat Fish who was ready to lead the entire workout.  I felt bad for him and offered to help.  Big up’s to Glidah as well for jumping in and adding some suck.
  • Seeing big improvements out of the FNG’s who have been coming out.  Crayola has been getting faster with his Mosey’s.   Draino freaking killed it today.  (Who picks burpees over a short mosey to grab the 6?).
  • There’s nothing like getting passed by a double respect…and Cage does it every time I see him at Clean Slate.  I made a point to not let him beat me last week and stayed in front of him about half the time….but guess who was first to COT – him.   Good push today Cage.
  • Bulwinkle joined us at the 6:35 mark.  A good push out of him today.  I may have called him a sandbagger at Chiseled this week and apparently sandbagger is the right word to piss Bulwinkle off just enough to help him find that extra gear.  Good work today.
  • Redistrict continues to try to push through a nagging plantar fasciitis injury which through the workout ends up creating a cramping injury on the other leg due to overcompensation.  That leaves the pax guessing what else is he overcompensating for…..(only kidding).    I can’t wait to see your speed once your healthy.  You look like a chained up dog ready to get after it.
  • Gave Change Order a hard time about his accent today telling him I always thought he was from Boston.  (If you know Change Order then you will get the joke and being a native North Carolinian myself I felt like I had free reign to give him a hard time).  The dude pushes hard and circles back for the 6 which is near and dear to my heart.   Site Q’s at clean slate have done a great job of instilling F3 culture at this new location.  No man left behind, but no man left where you found him.  Great job guys.  Keep it up.
  • If you haven’t checked out Clean Slate yet, you should.  A great AO.  Three campuses (High school, middle school, and elementary).  Short walls, benches, play ground equipment (for pull ups).  The only thing I haven’t found there yet is a rock pile.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • Good luck to the Waxhawians running today’s CSAUP.
  • Change Order on Q next Saturday at Clean Slate.
  • Don’t forget there is another AO at Porter Ridge on Monday’s.
  • Bring an FNG!

Extreme Ownership – Check The Ego

After doing F3 Q Source for 2 years on Mondays, the Monday post Asylum crew decided we still wanted to hang around for some fellowship with some learning sprinkled in.  We decided to venture out to a different leadership books with Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin being our first one to tackle.  So why a 2nd F backblast about it?  Because Shop Dawg challenged us a few weeks go to create more FOMO to help draw some guys in.  He said “Guys need this, whether they realize it or not, and it is our job to help them realize it”.  So without further ado….Check the Ego.

 

For those unfamiliar with Extreme Ownership, the book’s chapters are basically broken down into three parts.  A War Story that tee’s up a principle, then the principle is explained, and then a business example where that principle wasn’t used.   The war stories are great – and I cringe saying that.  But the writing is phenomenal and it really puts you right there in the middle of the battle field.  Whether its a tank ready to unload on what they thought was an enemy position only to find out they were friendlies, or its a mission to capture high level targets in the middle of one of the highest casualty cities during the Iraq War.  The book really does a good job of putting you in the battle field and setting the table for the lesson that is about to be taught.

The book also has several familiar Q Source principles as well.  Mainly pass praise and take the blame, but today we also covered the need to be accelerating and why staying stagnant is bad (decelerating).  Any way, here are my notes from leading today along with some of the examples given.

 

  • What is Ego? (Examples given by the group)
    • Cocky.
    • You think you’re better than everyone
    • Can’t take constructive criticism
    • Your too good to fail or slip up
  • The war example dealt with an special forces unit tasked with training new Iraqi soldiers.  They arrived to the joint army/marine base with an ego and cockyness that quickly went south.  They didn’t conform to base culture.  They talked down to other soldiers.  They wouldn’t share battle plans or positions.   In short, their ego’s were in the way.  And eventually it cost them their jobs.  They were sent packing by the base commander as they were doing more harm than good.  Task Force Bruiser (Jocko’s Navy Seals) did the opposite.  They cut their hair, made sure uniforms were pressed and neat, and intentionally built comradery with fellow soldiers.   The result was an elite base, a better trained Iraqi unit, and an eventual turning of the war.
  • A quote from Jocko that I found impactful “But I tried to temper that confidence by instilling a culture to never be satisfied”.  I tied this in with F3’s always be accelerating point from Q Source.
  • Traits of those who check their ego:
    • Continuous Improvement
    • Humility and Mutual Respect
      • I gave my personal example of having to call on folks from the warehouse level all the way up to the Senior VP level and how the Warehouse guy can cost me just as much business as the Senior VP can give me.
        • Further discussions involved Walt Disney and how he connected with his employees and was willing to do it all around the park – including helping to clean toilets.
  • Don’t let your ego take precedent over doing what is best to accomplish the mission.
    • Lots of discussion around this.  Sometimes as men we let our pride or our own goals get in the way of the greater team mission.
      • Loafer with a couple Kohls examples.
  • The business example given in the book centered around a mid level manager and a supervisor who worked for him on an oil rig.  The supervisor made a spur of the moment decision to change the process which cost about 2 days of work.  In the oil industry 2 days equals hundreds of thousands of dollars.   The manager was dreading the confrontation that was going to happen when he went to this supervisor.  But Extreme Ownership reverses the roles.  The supervisor is not to blame.  It is you as the manager that did not equip him with enough information to make the right decision.  When you go to the supervisor and explain how you failed, how you will be better about giving him the right information and tools to make the right decision, it changes the conversation.   It is a conversation instead of a screaming match.
  • Summary: Extreme Ownership requires checking ego, admitting mistakes, and having humility.
    • Confident not cocky, never too good to fail, and never complacent.

 

Want to see who your friends are? Call Burpees post COT

Spoiler, I was the only one who did burpees.  Details in the Moleskin.

18 Pax came out for a beautiful morning (any time its above 40 and not raining its perfect weather in my book).  DiCCS provided and a couple pax with nervous laughter when I told them we would not be crossing the railroad tracks or Providence Rd.

THE WARM UP

Mosey to the other church – not sure the name but its about a .2 mile mosey away.

15 SSH’s.

Attempted to do the active stretching I hinted about in Monday’s BB.  Trying to figure out ways to stretch with out the heart rate plummeting.  Jury’s still out as I wasn’t thrilled with how it went…any who…

Calf Stretch Right over left with Merkins.  Flap Jack for more Merkins.  I believe we did 12.

Downward Dog with Dry docks mixed in… I think we did 10.

I got bored and knew time was of the essence so ended the warm up early.

 

THE THANG

Mosey back to launch for Progressive 4 5 corners.   Stop to do exercises on the out, run without stopping on the way back.  For purposes of this BB, I will break it up into the “rounds” we did.

  • 5 Turkish Get Ups, Run to Corner 2 for 10 Merkins, Run back to Corner 1.
  • 5 Turkish Get Ups, 10 Merkins, 15 Jumping Lunges.  Zinfandel confirming 2 = 1…Yes, why would we do an odd number?  Apparently Chastain wasn’t on the same page and attempted 1 is 1 until being corrected.    Run back to Corner 1.
  • 5 Turks, 10 Merkins, 15 J Lunges, and on to Corner 4 for 20 Dry docks.  Run back.
  • 5 Turks, 10 Merkins, 15 J Lunges, 20 Dry Docks, and 25 Curb Shoulder Up Up Down Downs (???  no clue what to call them).   Run back.

I scouted the distance before and this got us 1.3 miles.  I wasn’t intending on the jumping lunges to hurt that much and I expected the shoulder curb things to hurt more.  Lessons learned.  Moving on.

Mosey to the bottom of Keith Jong Hill and partner up with someone your same ability.

  • P1 does 100 reps as follows: 25 LBC’s, 25 T Claps, 20 Jump Squats, 15 Merkins, 10 In/Outs, 5 Burpees
  • P2 Does light pole suicides up the hill (three light poles on the right).  If the runner finishes before P1 does – everyone stops there, no matter what rep they are on.  If P1 finishes the 100 reps before the runner gets in, the team must do a 5 burpee penalty together.

I specifically picked out some easier exercises for the 100 reps as I intended it to be more of an active recovery from the hill run and I wanted to make the runners work to make it in on time.  I also didn’t see many people doing penalty burpees (my partner didn’t seem too keen on doing them) so I let it slide.

2 Rounds of this.  As we finish up we hear the train coming.

Backwards run up the hill.  Short recover to regroup everyone and then jailbreak to the stop sign.   Look over to Ice 9 and ask him for a 10 count, he then proceeds to attempt to have us do burpees….NOPE.  Jail break to COT.  As we are collecting at COT, we have reached 6:15, but we still hear that train whistle in the distance.  Quick Count, Name-O-Rama, and Announcements.  Train is getting closer.   I took us out with a prayer and the train was on us.  Burpees!  I look up after burpee number 1 to see the backs of everyone.   Some gentle coaxing and name calling and no one is turning around (Really?  Not even one “I don’t agree with you but I won’t make you do them alone” guy?).  Picture is taken and I’m still doing burpees.  I think I got to burpee number 11 by the time the train had “passed” (who knows).  I’m not mad.  I’m not even disappointed.  I’m more surprised.  It wasn’t the reaction I suspected from this group.  Sure I figured pax wouldn’t like it.  But I figured one or two would fall in with me and the pressure would get to the rest.  Instead, 17 guys took the easy way out from a group that typically prides itself on going beyond.

 

MOLESKIN

  • Apparently the burpee train rules need to be revisited and clearly stated at this AO.  A couple weeks ago we had a Pax attempting to claim if  you cant see the train you don’t do burpees (that’s never been a thing).  I’ve been there before where we have done burpees before 5:30.   So if we will do them before the workout, why not after?
  • Chastain towards the front of the group most of the day, though after hearing he attempted 1 = 1 jumping lunges, we now know why.
  • Ice 9 Dry heaving as he was running towards me might be the scariest thing that’s happened to me in 2021.
  • Easy Button stepping up to chat up the new Pax Hot Tub and make him feel welcomed.  Nice job.
  • Zinfandel on point all morning being the Anti Damascus.   Correcting counts, helping pax remember what exercises to do, and reminding guys of the penalty burpees.   Thank you.
  • I wish I had High Hat’s energy this early in the morning.  He almost scared away hot tub talking about a time he played in a reggae band and why one of the guys had the nick name bone.  I did a double take when he told me he was in a reggae band.
  • Zinfandel pointing out that Banjo and I had matching Rocky Suites on.   Banjo and Hot Tub also commiserating on the West Virginia connections.   Discussions included what holler they were from and which cousin they married.
  • Thanks for Carb Load for the invite.
  • Some end of workout watch comparisons had mileage from 2.9 to 3.5.  With mine being the highest at 3.5 miles, many pax were skeptical…as am I.
  • I didn’t get a no out of Shake this morning (that I heard at least).  Much like “Oh Yeah’s” from Loafer, I look forward to making shake say “No”.  I guess its back to the drawing board for increasingly more difficult or stupid stuff for the next Floater Q.

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

  • Blood Drive Jan 30th at Five Stones.    Sign up and get people signed up.   Additional slots recently added.
  • CSAUP Waxtravaganza Feb 6th.  13 Miles of First F and beers at the Tap House afterwards for 2nd F.
  • Centerfold organizing a group for next Wednesday for Rice and Beans in uptown.

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