“Do Not Cross”

“Do Not Cross”

Went to bed mentally prepared for a deluge of rain and a very soggy workout. Perhaps it was all that Flint rain talk that made it seem like it was going to be really wet. YHC was looking forward to a grueling hour of wet, rain in the face, soggy shoe suckage. Clock struck 4:15 and I was awakened not by my alarm, but by the internal fear of being late to a workout I promised to lead. Whatever, I’m up. After a couple AO inspection stops along the way, arrived at the Vine at 4:45, just before Gumbo arrives for an unannounced pre-run. Off he goes for an extra 1.5 miles, leaving YHC alone to wait for the only 2 hard commits for the day: FireHazard and GoldDigger. Knew the numbers would be down due to opening of College Football and rain threats (see note below), but by 5:15 we had 9, which was great for the planned pull-ups at the stations. More on that later. Here’s what went down today at the Brave.

Thang

Mosey down to the lot near the gas station. Circle up for:
– Good Morning X 15 IC
– Merkins X 15 IC
– Seal Jacks X 15 IC

Run down the path around the lake counter-clockwise to the first building.

Obstacle 1: The Walls

Zig, zag from the building, over the wall down to the water’s edge, back to the wall. 10 Box Jump Ups, over, touch the wall.

Repeat 5x

Mosey around the lake clockwise until you hit the other walls.

Obstacle 2: More Walls

Zig, zag from the building, over the wall, down to the water’s edge, back over the wall, 10 derkins, touch the wall.

Repeat 5x

Mosey around the lake counter-clockwise Down to the fit trail.

Obstacle 3: Pull-ups

Run down to the pull-up bars, 10 pull-ups, run back to the concrete
Path.Repeat 5x

Some tidy town Ballantynian that works for the corporate park got a call from Flint last night; He warned of torrential rain and the negative effects it could have on the safety of people trying to do pull-ups in the rain. This call of warning resulted in the dip bars and pull-up bars being aggressively wrapped in DO NOT CROSS tape. That or something a lot worse happened. We’ll never know (unless Flint confesses)

Mosey down the trail to the bottom of Bagpipe hill, back up a little to get a running start.

Obstacle 4: Hill Sprint

PAX instructed to run all out to the bridge. Recover and Plank for the 6.

Mosey down B-Corporate past aLoft to the Premier building. Past the parking deck (#rulefollower), to the Hell-a-pad . Pause for 20 Phelps merkins. (i.e enforced hand-release merkins). Mosey down to the Rock Ampitheatre

Obstacle 5: Partner Work

• Partner 1: 10 Box Jump on the first row of Rocks, 10 derkins on the second row. Repeat until partner returns.
• Partner 2: Run up to the Hell-a-pad for 10 diamond merkins, 10 wide arm merkins. Run back to rocks to relieve partner.
  Switch and Repeat so each does ~3 of each station

Mosey down through the Premier and Harris lots, to the Ballantyne commons entrance. Mosey down Ballantyne Commons, right on Johnston, down to the hotel, slight right and into the path that you to Ballantyne Corporate. Plank for the 6, Mosey down Bagpipe hill then right into the parking lot.

Obstacle 6: You Failed the Obstacle

30 Burpees on your own. PAX were prodded to attempt to get 30 in a straight set.

Mosey back to launch to get all PAX assembled by roughly 5:16. #cobains for the tardy.

• Count, Name, YHC with Takeout.

Bone Dry Moleskine

The goal today was to create a workout that would be helpful for both BRR and Spartan trainees and to cram it into an hour. Somewhat of a challenge. Challenge accepted. Hoped for 4 miles and got it. Tried to lead as much of the mosey today on the soggy grass to try to provide some trailish / soggy texture for our spartan folks, but didn’t enforce it as most of the BRR guys wanted road miles. Ballantyne isn’t very mountainish, but we did try to get some elevation in: Bagpipe Hill (Segment), the path between the Rocks and the Hell-a-pad, and Red Riding Hood (Segment). Overall, Strava says somewhere between 200 and 390 ft of Elevation for the 4 miles. Not a ton of time for “obstacles” with all the mosey here and there, so we stacked em all at the beginning so the running would be more laborious.

Great group today, lot of speed. You can tell that folks have been training for runs. No surprises in the individual efforts: Thin Mint killed it up Bagpipe hill on not-so-fresh legs after some obstacles, General has major ups, probably could have handled a wall twice as high, Wild Turkey is a beast and so fast during the hell-a-pad segment that his partner missed his arrival #theflash, Gumbo showed no signs of having run longer than everyone else, he is a picture of pace consistency, Fire Hazard committed, showed up early, followed instructions and beasted the workout; nothing makes a Q happier than a PAX that does those 4 things in that order. Madame T cruised through all the push-ups today (175 if you include the burpees) and led the mumblechatter. Fallout is impressive; showed freakish strength at the BlackDiamond last week, and wicked speed today at Brave. Who needs balance when you have both. Gold Digger is a 2NG who’s only other post in F3 was a well-attended 0.0 FightClub from a few weeks ago; not sure he was expecting all the running; he hung tough, performed well and got a second wind AFTER the burpees (#hatehate, #warbaby). YHC was mouth breathing pretty much the whole time.

One final note, there was some chatter on slack last night about the weather. Let me state it here if it isn’t already obvious: Weather should not be a factor on whether you post to a workout. Sometimes the conditions are ideal; sometimes they are not. It may not seem like there is a lot at stake when missing a workout for silly reasons like weather. Think on this. Just like the body, the mind is a muscle. Without “exercise” it can become a weak muscle. Posting to workouts whether the conditions are 63° and Clear, 45° and Rainy, or 9° and Icy is a great way to train your mind muscle, and get it in the habit of keeping promises, regardless of the weather or other obstacles.

Mario and MT, thanks for the opportunity to lead. Enjoyed it.

Argonaut Out.