5 Brave faithful and 1 runner looking for something different arrived at The Vine. Warned ahead of time that today was You vs. You, we headed out.
Thang
Moleskin
There was a time back in late 2016 when AMRAP was all the rage at The Brave. Bunker’s VQ AMRAP around Bagpipe hill including multiple run-ins with building security; Tolkien’s (in)famous AMRAP races at the deck; Fire Hazard’s triple nickel on Ben Nevis; and someone’s (can’t remember who) AMRAP that looked a lot like what we did at The Brave this Friday. Those are the days YHC fell in love with The Brave. AMRAPs suck. If you are doing them right, they hurt (a lot), they can be lonely, and they can feel never-ending. But, man does it feel good when they are over. There is no better way to start a Friday than facing down doubt in yourself and the urge to quit and kicking some butt.
We have had a number of AMRAPs this year (Champagne’s Loch Ness loops, Rachel’s death march, etc.) and today we did one more. It sucked. It was lonely for some. It didn’t even go the full hour and it felt like it would never end. It was great.
Frasier and Citgo were flying like usual. Pretty sure it was Citgo’s first non-running based boot camp and he learned all kinds of new things today (like what handslap merkins and partner derkins are). We may have lost him at the bear crawl, but hopefully he will be back to The Brave some time. Soft Pretzel was on the heels of the lead group all morning which is never a surprise. Great seeing One Niner running more regularly as he heals up and Wild Turkey is one of the most consistent and determined guys I have met. He crushed the final hill sprint on Conlan while all of us (minus Citgo) moaned and groaned our way up to the top.
If you haven’t given The Brave a try, I really encourage you to do so. It’s tough, but it’s fair, and it’s great preparation both physically and mentally for a lot of the things we do. I’ve heard some express worry of being left behind. I can promise you, as long as you show up ready to give it everything you have and leave complaints/excuses/reasons in the car, you will not get left behind and we will all be damn happy you joined us.
Frasier has the Q this Friday. Really hope to see you there.
Announcements
Was it humid again? Yes. 20 men showed up anyway to see what this week’s edition of The Maul had to offer.
Thang
Moleskin
First backblast from my phone. If you’ve seen either my thumbs or my phone screen lately, you will know that I am at an extreme handicap. Expect typos and brevity. Still, the site works great on my phone and works pretty damn great everywhere. We’ve said it before, but don’t say it enough — big t-claps to Wingman for all the behind the scenes work keeping this stuff going and getting better. T-claps as well for a few sprints up the hill today when Wingman made us all feel like we were standing still.
Cold Cuts crushed it today as well and was tough to keep up with. Deuces showed some speed too and made it back to COT in time without Cheddar, Arsenal & Kirby certain unnamed individuals getting him lost. Hard work everywhere today. Still on a Ragnar running hangover myself, the goal today was upper body work. That hill up to the playground is sneaky hard though and hurt more than intended. Oh well.
There was no music today. Probably should have been. Rock & Roll just sounded better than Rock & Run. #falseadvertising. Cobains to the female jogger who was confronted with 20 sweaty men emerging from the woods carrying (some) large(r than others) rocks. No one got maced, so our friendly “good morning” greetings must have done the trick.
Love Qing & attending workouts at Stonecrest. So much variety and stuff to choose from. Come to The Maul or Rebel Yell sometime or more often. You’ll be happy you did.
Announcements
46 PAX, including 4 FNGs and some kotters/2NGs made their way out to Bagpipe on this cool, misty morning for SOB’s latest FNG Convergence. Earlier in the morning, 2 pickup trucks (one larger than the other) had been unloaded into the fields to set the stage for what followed.
Thang
Moleskin
46 men on a rainy Tuesday morning is a pretty good showing for our SOBs. The mumble chatter was in full effect for some groups. Other groups were quiet and focused on the work at hand. Kirby was focused only on holding in the merlot.
A few observations MT and I found worth sharing….
Unfortunately, we missed out on what went down in the other groups during the stations this AM. If you were there and have an observation to share, please note it below in the comments. Thanks to MT for the majority of the gear and workout planning. Thank you to Hops for the takeout and to Bucky and Morning After for turning over Bagpipe this morning for the convergence.
Big welcome to our 4 FNGs:
Looking forward to seeing you all out again.
Announcements
5 of Area 51’s finest respects (and 17 other guys) showed up to Centurion on Friday to fit 60 minutes of pain into a 45 minute workout. The dripping mess, also known as a Ball of Man, at the end of the workout was testament to their success.
Thang
Moleskin
Someone wondered if Tony Horton had stepped in to Q when we were doing the arm circles. Admittedly, P90X is the first thing YHC did when he got off the couch about 3 years ago and, while it is cheesy, it is still a damn fine workout for guys who haven’t found F3 yet. While the Plyometrics DVD still gives me nightmares (Double Airborne Heisman at the next COP?), those shoulder warmup circles are still one of my favorites and seemed appropriate for the wheel barrows on tap this morning.
Teamwork / divide and conquer was the plan for the day. In this case it was about anticipating a big crowd at Centurion which is the standard as of late, but spending the whole workout in teams of 2 made for some great fellowship as well. Wheel barrow up a turning flight of steps definitely took a little practice to get used to. More than one smacked a shoulder, rib or hip in the corners but everyone had it together by the 4th trip. Some dismay at being separated from our newfound friends so soon after the wheel barrows. There was also some discussion as to what base was reached with our partners during that first round of wheel barrows before we broke up, but that got uncomfortable pretty quickly and was thankfully forgotten (until now).
Checkpoint was the first to complain at the sudden split from his first partner, but he quickly forgot him (what was his name again?) when he partnered with the speedy Lorax to crush everyone in the partner work by the stadium. They were so far ahead in fact that they missed 30% of the instructions on round 2 (“do the same thing as before”) and ran an extra lap of the stairs. Having to run back the way you came after meeting your partner made sure the faster guys got to run a little more. This helped keep the teams together but had the added benefit of discouraging any slacking off which would result in your partner having to pick up your slack. In every day life, I run into plenty of people who are willing to let me pick up their slack. At Centurion (and in my experience in F3 as a whole), there is none of that. Each and every man was seen pushing himself to his limit, and then pushing beyond that limit (along with some mumblechatter) when subsequent rounds were called, to make sure he carried as much of the burden as he possibly could.
Bout Time, Rachel, Checkpoint, Lorax and Brilleaux were regularly out front and calling Mary or Plank-o-rama until YHC could arrive to take back over (thanks, guys). Too many other strong efforts out there (and too much weekend fog clouding YHC’s brain) to name them all. Also typical of Centurion, we had a mean collection of Respects all tearing it up. If full-contact basketball with a height cap of 6’2″ was a thing, these guys would make an intimidating team. Can’t really think of anywhere else a team of 5 makes sense. Still, impressive stuff.
Udder, although he did not show up, got his Site Q points reaching out to me the night before and asking me to remind the PAX to bring reflective gear and lighting if we were going to be off-campus on busy streets. YHC let him know we would only leave campus briefly and would stick to the sidewalk (most of us) on our way there and back. Definitely appreciate him reaching out and think it sets a great example for what us as Site Qs and Qs need to be doing. We know from the disclaimer that we are not officially responsible for the safety of those at our workouts. However, if you are the leader of a workout or a site at which an accident occurs that may have been prevented by a simple Tweet or Slack message, I can guarantee that you are going to at least feel somewhat responsible. No one wants that. If people decide not to pay attention or to listen, that’s on them, but please remember to take that minute to send out a reminder if your weinke calls for it.
Announcements
This morning 42 men of Anvil, Death Valley and parts unknown converged at Calvary Church for 45 minutes of work, followed by 20(ish) minutes of coffee and words from Dredd under the pavilion.
Thang
Moleskin
Schedule a convergence of A51’s two finest Wednesday workouts, call it CCC, add a promised visit and words from Dredd, then throw in some free coffee and you can expect big numbers — which is exactly what we had. Luckily (or more likely by Dollywood’s design), there is no better AO in the southland to accommodate a big crew than Calvary Church.
A few quick observations (emphasis on a few). Group 4 Whoever started with Freddie Mercury (you know who you are) needs to ditch their Garmin watches, get a good ol’ Timex, and watch the hands for a little while. If you need further lessons in clockwise vs counter-clockwise, my 5-year old is available and accepts pizza or red, white & blue Skittles as payment; Passing 10 burpees in a row sucks, every time, even if it’s only to do 15; Almost everyone missed the memo on wheelbarrows coming back and instead gathered early for coffee and hot air in the hot box. Found us doing Mary a few minutes later. Please apologize to your shoulders for denying them their full potential.
Good times watching Rachel and Dollywood race it out during the rock sets. Hairball, angry at the thought of his growing biceps creating wind resistance, called YHC out for killing time with the rocks. #AnvilVirgin. Must’ve thought he saw Jack Webb creeping around somewhere. Leading the herd took up the remainder of YHC’s energy, attention, and limited vocal cord capabilities – please add additional observations below (looking at you, Hops).
Appreciate Mermaid’s advice in planning for today and his readiness to step up and help if we needed to split the group. Mermaid EHed me a little over a year ago and has been an indispensable source of support and encouragement ever since in both F3 as well as my private life. Prime example of what it means to go beyond the easy part to have a deeper impact (more on that below).
Also appreciate Dredd taking the time to speak with those who were able to stay after (and Geraldo who came over from the Donut Run). While I definitely can’t reiterate what was said (the man has a way with words), a few takeaways for YHC personally:
To be clear, I am definitely not claiming to represent Dredd or his views. This is just a little of what I came away thinking about when Dredd was done talking and I am sure every man had his own takeaways. If you missed today, I highly recommend you do your best to make the next convergence/speaker in July. Definitely a great way to spend the morning. Big thank you to Dollywood for his leadership in organizing this (stay tuned for the next one) and for the opportunity to lead today.
Finally, in the not-tough question category, what does CCC stand for? I am going with Calvary Church Convergence, but I am certain you creative types can come up with something much more interesting than that.
Announcements
Wednesday June 21 – Death Valley & Anvil will converge at Calvary Church (the Anvil AO).
Schedule:
0530: Convergence Workout Q: Thin Mint
0615: COT
0630: Coffee under the soccer pavilion (inside if it rains)
DREDD shares
0650: Pray & Leave
It has been awesome to have 30+ men out each month for our convergences. Don’t miss this one as DREDD is sure to deliver a great word!
Went through some old BBs this week to get a feel for what YHC might want to bring to the crowd at RockZero. Found one by Site Q Boerwors who mentioned the good old days at The Rock of a minimum 3 miles and no burpees so I ran with that.
Thang
Moleskin
We were originally going to take one trip up LC for everyone who did not bring rice for the Calvary Food Collection (minus the 4 extras that YHC brought thinking that would be enough to bring us back down to 3). Luckily, I forgot to ask for rice beforehand. We would probably still be running LC dodging rivers of merlot considering everyone who forgot to bring a bag. You all know who you are (all of you. No, really, it was ALL of you). Lesson learned: Twitter is dead, should’ve used Slack. Luckily, you all have another shot at this next week with Flipper on Q for his 3 Year Anniversary. This time he promises everyone will do 5 burpees after COT for each missing bag of rice. (More on RockZero’s big week next week in the announcement).
The buzz this morning was about the mashed up security truck in the next lot over. Was it sinful teenage joy-riders who took the truck for a spin last night? Perhaps some kind of alcohol fueled hit-and-run incident? An angry Hoover hurling 45lb plates like a discus? Naturally, we moseyed by to satisfy our curiosity and, nope, turns out it was a new security guard who drove into a lightpole (or at least I’m pretty sure that’s what Marlin said he found out). Someone commented he must now be the old security guard. A little bit of a let-down, but luckily we were on our way to the one thing that never lets me down — LC.
Gummy and Semi attempted a revolt as we cut left into Five Knolls. It may have succeeded, but Gummy was already out of breath from complaining so much in COP that he couldn’t put a coherent sentence together. Probably why he got his butt whooped by Marlin on the hills who, wise as he is, didn’t say one full sentence all morning and saved his lungs for the workout. Checkpoint mentioned on the way that he had never been back here before. YHC and SG were quick to tell him he would never forget it although we disagreed on whether that would be because he loved it or hated it. From the way he slayed the hill and beat us all to the finish line, I would say it was the former. Not surprisingly, Checkpoint also toasted us all during the rock/sprint set. Balls to the Wall was a total fail (that ledge on the wall would have been great for hip slappers), but it was so much fun hearing Flipper complain about being dizzy that we went a second round.
A few guys got EC today (and not because they brought rice — see above). Nemo, Flipper and Hoover did a pre-run this morning and Nemo was still tearing it up in every running portion. YHC got him on the hill, but couldn’t keep up in the rock sprints and both Nemo and Ingalls beat us all in the final sprint (although the best part of that was Hoover giving McGee a run for his money for 3rd place). Someone needs to start talking Nemo into a BRR debut. And, speaking of BRR, Teddy was there today. Must have heard it was BRR season (or gotten wind of what Tiger Rag has been saying about him behind his back). We got the hill training started right and, according to the unwritten Free Range team rules, Teddy earned himself another week on the roster.
Other than our FNG, Big Country was the only new face to me today and he killed it the whole workout. Great meeting you and hope to post with you again soon. I left a little bit of mayhem in my rearview as I hustled out of the parking lot to get to a family photo shoot. McGee was in the corner banging out burpees while Flipper scrambled around the base of Northface looking for a stone tablet on which to inscribe the Q rules of the new RockZero before he forgets them. Our FNG, Ingalls, was scratching his head and searching his phone to figure out what in the heck Ingalls actually meant #youngbuck (home-schooled — as in Laura Ingalls Wilder — yeah, took me a while to get it too but the old men seemed to like it). Nemo, ever the friend, was standing beside Ingalls helping him search flicking his ear and taunting him about how he beat him at everything this morning.
Turning the corner I drove alongside Semigloss for a minute as he checked all the locked doors on the church crying out in haiku “But I did the miles, so there should be donuts here, Bushwood has failed me”. Almost to the exit, I passed the tumbleweeds blowing through HighT and Hoover who, after running a 10K and only lifting a rock, was frantically slinging iron and mumbling to himself about soccer arms. Just a regular Saturday at RockZero.
I had a great time this morning and look forward to coming back. Don’t usually do the 7AM thing, but may have to start making an exception. Thanks to Flipper for the invite. And, in all seriousness, consider checking out HighT sometime. We could all use a little more brute strength (believe it or not, it can even make you run better) and, from what I hear, Hoover is about as good a teacher as you can ask for.
Announcements
Thang
Moleskin
Went into today unsure of what we were doing — hope it didn’t show too much. Many were even unsure of who the Q was until YHC rolled up with approximately 45 seconds to spare and dragged everyone into action. Mario had time to ask me if it would be wise to take off his weight vest. Told him it would be fine. In hindsight, probably should have encouraged the guy with the bum shoulder take the vest off for what we ended up doing today but, like I said, at the time I still didn’t know.
Had considered hitting the new rockpile today or maybe even the lightpost lake again. The one thing YHC did know was that I was going to get through a Q without calling burpees. But, then McGee showed up so 5 burpees OYO in COP and it went downhill from there. He built such a lead on us in the suicides that he had a full 2 minutes doing Mary by himself until we caught up. Beast. Hops told YHC that it was the first time in a while he felt his heart truly racing towards the end of the workout. Could take that as a compliment, but I’m pretty sure he was just getting overly excited about the bagel he was about to crush at Einstein.
Stairwells smelled more of urine than usual. I guess the summer bar game is starting to pick up. Always a popular choice running an enclosed stairwell on an already warm and ridiculously muggy day. Glad we did that.
Three birthdays this week (that I know of) with Long Haul turning the big 5-0 tomorrow. A little late notice, but head out to his birthday Q at Dromedary tomorrow (Wednesday) if you can make it and poke some fun at the old man. Market Timer creeps a little closer to the (less) big 4-0 on Thursday. Send him some birthday love if you haven’t already and please keep his family, and especially his father, in your prayers as they face some difficult times. Tagalong turns 30-something tomorrow. Had hoped he would show today so YHC could give him some crap but he was a no-show, unlike No Show (couldn’t help that one).
Best birthday news of all goes to Toolbag and the birth of his baby boy last week. YHC asked his name, but promptly and completely forgot (like a dope) so will just have to stick with my favorite suggested name I heard someone call out this morning, Lunch Box. Congratulations to Toolbag and his M and it was very impressive to see him back out already.
Always amazed by the consistent big numbers at Bagpipe / Swift on Tuesday mornings and today was no exception with 21 at Swift and 18 at Bagpipe. The Vine is definitely the place to be on Tuesday mornings if you are looking for some challenging 1F with a huge helping of 2F. Timekeeper (3F) continues to meet right afterwards as well at Einstein Bagel across the street to complete the Tuesday morning trifecta.
Announcements
Fat Camp had it’s first day of a brand new format today and 6 came out to witness the transformation. Moving forward, Fat Camp has 2 pre-run options (one at 0500, one at 0515) and the main event at 0530. The 0500 run group will circle back to pick up any 0515 arrivals. Four men arrived at 0500 this morning to get their EC and this is what followed.
Thang
Moleskin
Fat Camp hasn’t been the belle of the ball lately when it comes to attendance and is hoping to improve her popularity by transforming into a 45-minute workout (0530-0615) with some nice pre-run options. YHC personally really enjoyed the new format and think it holds great promise.
Today was a slow start numbers-wise, but we made up for it with effort. With the pre-run, we managed to get in 5+ miles and a ton of work. Hopefully, this is just the start of bigger and better things for Fat Camp. With the new format and the Fat Boy coming this summer (see Announcements below), I have a feeling that it is.
Another muggy and ridiculously sweaty day today. Nard Dog may need to invest in a biodegradable clothing company so he can just start throwing his clothes out after every workout. Appreciate Escobar making his way back to Fat Camp and Rachel making his way down to Elon Park for the first time. Farmers carrying KBs didn’t slow him down at all which made CMIYC quite interesting. Haggis arrived at 0515 but turned us down for the pre-run and opted for pull-ups instead. He was back to bar traverses and monkey bars as soon as we were done. This guy is not going to lose his white band (and will probably beat us all) at Savage Race next year.
Thanks to General_ for the invite out to Fat Camp and for the take-out.
Announcements
Some of us have started wondering lately if Bratwurst has broken up with us at Swift and is just waiting for us to finally realize it. He is 0 for 4 in the month of May, so we are starting to get the point. Bunker and Tuck were discussing having a Say Anything moment somewhere in the near future outide of Brat’s window, but they will probably just end up sharing a pint of Chunky Monkey and crying about what could have been.
Still, Brat continues to provide his leadership from afar in the form of brutally planned workouts, and we continue to listen. Today’s plan called for an infamous favorite at Swift and involved 6 intervals of 2min/1min/30sec at I-pace through the hills of BCC on very short rest. 14 were naive smart enough to answer the call and come test their mettle. 13 made it to the end; Goonie left early but on a legit excuse so he gets partial credit.
Thang
See pre-blast: http://f3nation.com/2017/05/29/preblast-swift-returns-to-bcc/
Moleskin
Smaller crowd than usual at Swift today. Possibly due to the long weekend and Murph hangovers. Perhaps too many saw the pre-blast and opted out of the I-pace hills of misery. Or maybe everyone really does come solely for Brat’s encouraging words of wisdom and impeccable B-skip form. Whatever it was, the 14 who set off into the gloom did so with determination and pushed hard through 6 rounds of nonsense. The hills of BCC are unforgiving and seem to come up at the worst time (i.e. the beginning of a 2-minute interval following a 30-second rest). In the end, every man dug deep and came out of this morning just a little bit grittier than he went into it.
While many complained opined today about this being one of Swift’s toughest/worst recurring workouts, Woodson (who is now officially a Swift regular) boldly stated that it was his favorite Swift workout so far. With the way he was pushing at the front (with TR and Haggis close by), YHC believes him. Was happy to hear a lot of encouragement all around this morning as we got into the later sets and the group managed to stick together. Even more impressive, all opted for the long route on the way home and all made it back in time (give or take 60 seconds).
I-pace is a tough thing to judge when going up and down the hills of Ballantyne Country Club. We all did our best, but mostly just ended up going at an “uncomfortably hard” pace that turned “miserable” around the 4th set and “agonizing” by the 6th. Pretty sure JD would approve.
Even being given this workout ahead of time and having all steps programmed into the Garmin, Qing Swift wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination. At the end of the 5th round of intervals, the last thing you want to do is have to yell with whatever breath you have left for everyone to stop and then start counting down the 10 seconds that are suddenly left before the next interval. It’s tough work and Bratwurst does it for us week in and week out. We hope he makes it back to Swift soon, as it really is not the same without our leader, but in the meantime he has certainly earned the break.
Thanks to Bratwurst for the opportunity to lead this morning and thank you guys for leaving it all out there.
Announcements