Suspicious Steamy Windows and Segment Hunting at Stonehenge

Suspicious Steamy Windows and Segment Hunting at Stonehenge

YHC should have seen it coming… it was all too obvious. It all started a few days earlier at HDHH (yes HDHH is still happening).

Actual Conversation…

JRR Tolkien:        “Hey Thin Mint, how you feeling? You gonna be able to Q Stonehenge this Saturday”

Thin Mint:           “I am going to try… but I dunno my calves are still not right.”

Mighty Mite:      “Are they sick? You’re talking about farm animals like the kind Madame Tousseau raises right?”

Thin Mint:           “No Mighty, btw those are chicks.  I was talking about different kind of calves… like the exercise calf raise? Not the baby cows.”

Mighty Mite:      “Oh… nevermind. That’s boring. Hey bartender, can I have a glass of milk? Eat more chikn!”

Fire Hazard:        “Hey Tolkien, if Thin Mint can’t go, I’ll co-Q with you Saturday”.

JRR Tolkien:        “Very kind of you Fire Hazard, I’ll let you know. So long as Mr. Bean doesn’t Q Stonehenge we’re all good”

Friday midday rolls around, and YHC is a bit late on Twitter marketing thanks to a busy day at work (which has been CRUSHING YHC lately). YHC calls Thin Mint and it’s a no-go for Stonehenge Q, which is all good, since my boi Thin Mint is the man… and needs to get healthier to smash Kiawah Marathon and Spartan Race Series next year #admittedmancrush.  The next call goes to Fire Hazard to pick up the Q as he volunteered at HDHH, but apparently in the span of two days has had enough of Einstein Bagel, can’t turn down Chik-Fil-A, or just flat out lied to me about wanting the Q at HDHH. YHC got some kind of excuse sounding like, “Oh sorry JRR, I’m watching the Teletubbies with my kids from 5:30am-615am so I can’t make it.” SMH! No problem… no need to cover up the personal invite to some other SOB site.  YHC gladly picks up the Q, in fact come to think of it, YHC hasn’t Q’d a workout for some time.  Blame it on Kiawah Marathon Training, blame it on MAF, blame it on One-Niner’s constant fat shaming of YHC, all of the above.  Heck YHC hasn’t even finished writing the 24HR Ragnar Trail Relay backblast yet! (at this point YHC waiting to make it preblast for next year’s event)

After giving it some thought YHC came up with the idea of Segment Hunting many of the notorious Strava segments near The Vine… Bagpipe Hill, Ben Nevis, Soul Crusher, The Bull Ring, Rushmore, and more to declare new Strava crowned champions, and take down Frazier’s records, if it were even possible.  F3HotTub Co-Site-Q Mario even hit YHC up on Slack claiming he was a HC, and might even bring his brother-in-law.  Fahvra usually shows up and would definitely be game. The plan was perfect.

Saturday Morning rolls around, and YHC pulls into the Vine Parking lot to see more than a handful of cars parked in the lot, some familiar ones, and then a white sedan with steamed up windows (more on that later).  YHC plants the F3 Hot Tubs shovel flag, still wet with bubbles, and we’re ready for Showtime! But wait, YHC looks at his wrist to see what time it is and NO GPS WATCH!  ^$%#$&^%&%^!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Forget keeping track of time, how will YHC become Segment Champ without the results put on Strava! Tears were falling from YHC face faster than when I saw the video of a panda rescue the day before.  Suddenly, Bunker, Gumbo, Tuck, Mighty Mite, Goonie, Outback all emerge from their vehicles in The Vine parking lot, and I’m like… ‘BOO YEAH!’ the power of JRR Tolkien marketing in full-effect, since YHC got some DaVinci regulars and even the co-site-q to post.  WRONG! All of those clowns were going to do a pretend obstacle course race, known as the “Tough” Mudder.  C’mon fellas… step up and do a color run or bubble run or something that’s timed!   YHC was so pissed at the headfake, that I kicked them out of The Vine Parking Lot to park somewhere else and they obliged to keep from getting their cars keyed.  I hope the electric shockers got stuck on their weenies at Tough Mudder #somuchhate.

Now, back to that white car parked in the front of the lot. At first YHC thinks it’s Mario’s… It’s not.  Mario pinged me on Slack saying he was going to HC and even EH his brother-in-law, but after a short long night with his girlfriend PALMela HANDerson playing a game of 5-on-1 pocket pool…. Mario was worn out, and a no show. YHC starts giving the lengthy disclaimer when a lady steps out of the passenger door of the white sedan, walks around the back of the car to the driver side, then seems to pull up her sagging pants before opening the driver side door. YHC is trying to figure out what to do since another A51 workout did have several women participate in the workout a few months ago. At PAX request, YHC calls for some quick Freddy Mercury followed by some slow Rosalita in the parking lot to see if we can shake them pants off… NO… WE DIDN’T DO THAT. STOP! Not sure what was going on in that car but we stayed away… on to the workout:

Thang-a-ma-bob:

• Extensive disclaimer given with FNG (Chicago native Jim “Billygoat” ) who is shaking in the lot, not from the cold, but from raw fear. YHC sees the fear in his eyes, and knows there is a high probability a law suit is in order. Head towards a surface lot do some stuff, pretend YHC cares about SSH or imperial walkers while practicing some cadence, although it’s not really done in cadence. Do some hand release merkins for fun. Enough… next.
• Race up Ben Nevis all the way to Lancaster highway, a segment called ‘Ballantyne Commons Soul Crusher Part Deux’. Apparently the Ben Nevis segment is on the South side of Ballantyne Commons. Cheese Curd takes Overall (#12^th place) after beating the snot out of the one-armed One-Niner (#19^th place) by 9 seconds. The 2:05 record by Honey Bee, who must have flown to the top, get it.. bees fly, still stands. We do some funky ab exercises at the top, and run back down, do some dips on the rail at the bottom.
• YHC finds a lighted hill by the pond, after the steep pond across the street was “too dark” to use according to One-Niner. Walking lunge up hill, walking lunge down, side shuffle squat up hill, and side shuffle squat down. BillyGoats are supposed to be expert mountain climbers, but this one was content to be grazing at the bottom in the grass. Ease into F3 buddy… it’s a marathon not a sprint.
• Run over to a surface lot close to the bull ring. Do some dumbocrats, full sit-ups while partner planks, Carolina drydocks, more funky cruncheroos… listen to Cheese Curd yap some more. Watch Loogie and One-Niner squat up and down like they were bobbing for apples… candied apples since it’s just after Halloween.
• On way back to vine, stop by another lot, do some Makhtar N’Diaye, low slow squats, sprint back to the Vine parking lot if you’re Mic Check like a Clown was chasing you, do more of those ab crunchie-munchies. Finito!

Holy Moley:

• Cheese Curd is the KING of the hand-slap merkins, he gets his chest way down touching the ground in perfect form, and, well… never comes back up. Just slaps hands with his partner Mic Check laying totally flat. He’s also KING of the mumble chatter, had more to say than the Q today. Which wasn’t hard since YHC threw out the weinke and made up the whole workout. Love me some Curd, may even join him and some beasts for the Smoky Mountain Relay… ok, no I’m not.
• Lex Luthor gets the award for the first guy YHC has seen bust out the winter beanie, in the form of a turquoise blue one with a pom-pom on top. Cmon man YHC was wearing a tank top! If Lex ever wants a renaming, YHC recommends we call him Shakira since his ‘Hips don’t lie’ when he side squat lunges up the hills.
• MarketTimer’s attempt to fool YHC into ending the workout early by a few minutes failed, and he looked surprised that a man of his stature just didn’t get whatever he wants. After all, the dude has ticket connections to see Chicago Cubs in the World Series, and flashed pictures of himself doing shots off Led Zepplin’s bellybutton… or something like that #connections.
• Loogie absolutely loved that we covered 4+ miles of running (thanks for taking care of FNG). He even told me that he was going to make it his New Years resolution to be a runner, kind of like how Voodoo did for a mid-year resolution. He confided in me that he wants to be just like another runner, Tiger Rag, by buying a new Jeep, just like him #LoogieLovesRunning.
• One Niner is useless except for his legs, and even those are useless, even if they look nice and muscle-y.
• Mic Check showed up to fine-tune his skills for the upcoming Turkey Bowl where his team is looking for a 3-peat? He displayed his elusive quarterback quickness by zipping past JRR Tolkien to The Vine on way back. Reminded me of when he sprinted back to Starbucks at DaVinci and cost YHC a coffee.
• BillyGoat (FNG) – great to have him out, just moved to Ballantyne to have more kids than Tuck. Amazingly he didn’t throw up. But he was so far back of the pack maybe he did. It was great to have you out with the fellas this morning, and hope to see you out there in the gloom soon. You’ll be crushing these workouts in no time.

Panda’s Prolific Pontification:

Maybe it’s me, but YHC sees less and less PAX out on Saturday mornings to post and thinks it’s dissapointing. YHC loved the days of ~20 person coffeeteerias where it looked like we rented Einstein Bagel out for a private party with no strippers.  If you’re a regular, then disregard and great work showing up in the gloom to make yourself and everyone else around you better, and just to hang out to do life for an hour + some coffeeteria with some Brothers.  But if you ARE one of the guys who hasn’t been posting, why is that? Saturdays there are two GREAT options in SOBland Stonehenge @ 6am & DaVinci @ 6:30am, plus a number of others in A51 / Indian Land / Union County. For you newer PAX, show up, get better, meet some new friends, and chat over a cup of joe after.  Some of YHC best friends have come from a simple hour workout and 20min cup of coffee.  YHC doesn’t care WHERE you post so long as you DO post.  Yeah it will be colder, but your nipples won’t freeze… and if they do, likely they will thaw, even if they fall off. Yeah it’s early, but you’ll be home before the rest of your family is really awake and certainly before kids sports.  Stop with the excuses, and make it a point to show up and exercise your body, mouth, mind, and soul on Saturdays. Hope to see you out there.

Announcements:

• Thanks to Mr. Bean for stepping up to Q Stonehenge this Saturday 11/12/2016 #awaitingthebackblast
• F3 Christmas Party… don’t sign up. Save your money for a decent/indecent cause. All the guys everyone really wants there are already going, so if you haven’t signed up, odds are you really weren’t in high demand to be there. <Let’s see if reverse psychology works for all you deadbeats who haven’t signed up yet>. Most of you aren’t even reading this backblast anymore. Not that I blame you….
• Joe Davis 5k/10k – take on the Tolkien Challenge…. Run your first 5k or 10k, I do 10 burpees… PR your race, I do 10 burpees, beat me in the 10k and I’ll do 10 more burpees and fork up some extra dough to the charity. Bring it on! All for a great cause… ending addiction. Addiction is real, learn from those who have fallen victim and don’t fall victim yourself.
• Best of luck to those running the Charlotte Half/Full Marathon this upcoming Saturday. Don’t lay an egg, everyone will know about it, because they’ll still kudo you ‘Great job’ on STRAVA when they really mean… ‘you really shttt the bed bro’ so leave it all on the field Saturday, and endure a little more when you think the pain just can’t be any greater. And make sure you kudo me ‘Great job Tolkien’ in my Strava comments if I don’t crack 1:30 and please insult the hell out of me on Slack if I do crack it. #callingmyshotnow

SYITG ~JRR Tolkien