Reading is Fundamental
8 men showed up to walk the talk and brave The Brave. The near freezing temps were much appreciated after several days of oppressive heat and humidity. Oppressive is a relative term, but when you sweat as much as YHC does, anything over 60 degrees is obnoxious.
Thang
Mosey to circular park / traffic circle in between the 1st two office buildings on N. Community House.
- SSH x 20 IC
- Traverse circular brick bath that runs perimeter of park using only bear crawl, crab walk or broad jump. Some pax modified w/ lunge walk.
- Backwards run around traffic circle
Mosey to traffic circle next to Wells Fargo building
- LSS x 20 IC
- Traverse border of traffic circle using same rules as previous stop
- Backwards run around traffic circle
Mosey North on Comm House, stopping at corner of Endhaven for 10 merkins IC. Continue to SpringHill Suites parking lot, stopping for 20 MC IC. Right on Johnston to McAlpine Creek Greenway parking lot, stopping for 20 flutter IC. Enter Greenway and bang a right to go under Johnston, then eventually exit left on the path that spits you out next to Pike Nurseries. 20 dolly IC in Pike parking lot. Mosey on path behind large pond just South of Pike. Find way to large traffic circle at the center of Atkins Circle apartment complex.
- LBC x 20 IC
- Traverse border of traffic circle using same rules as previous traffic circle
- Backwards run around traffic circle
3-pronged Starfish
- Run to beginning of each entrance to traffic circle and perform 10 burpees
- 20 LBC’s each time you return to circle
Cross Johnston at crosswalk and mosey all the way home on N. Comm House. In total we got in somewhere between 5.5 and 6 miles.
Moleskin
Pro tip: read backblasts. YHC had that self-righteous feeling that comes with talking a workout to new territory, only to find out after-the-fact that Frasier Q’d basically the same route once. And by once I mean three weeks ago. What are the CHANCES. Had I only read the backblast… It gets worse; Wild Turkey, YHC’s creative kindred spirit, and the only member of the PAX to post at both workouts, was surely thinking the entire time that YHC was a hack. YHC now needs to redeem himself with a future Q on new territory (an increasingly difficult task in SOB Land) with an innovative premise and questionable decision making.
Great job by all PAX. We had a tight formation and there was hardly any time spent waiting for the 6. Cobains for getting us back to launch 2 minutes late. It was a direct result of taking a wrong turn into Tagalong’s beard and spending several minutes trying to find our way out. That thing is like the wardrobe from Narnia.
TUCKOUT
The Brixham Egg
10 men laid a Brixham Egg at Stonehenge.
COP
- SSH x 20 IC
- IW x 20 IC
- LSS x 20 IC
- Merkin x 10 IC
- MC x 20 IC
- Flutter x 20 IC
Thang
Mosey to fountain in middle of Brixham Green and partner up.
- Step 1: Partners run to opposite buildings, perform 10 hip slappers and then return to fountain
- 10 hand-slap merkins
- Repeat step 1
- 10 hand-slap merkins, 10 leg throws
- Repeat step 1
- 10 hand-slap merkins, 10 leg throws, 10 partner derkins
Brixham Egg
There are six buildings situated around Brixham Green in an egg shape. Run clockwise, from building to building, stopping at each one for exercises. One full loop is 0.6 miles.
Loop 1:
- At 1st building perform 3 burpees and 6 box cutters.
- At each subsequent building add 3 burpees and 6 box cutters. Grand total is 63 burpees and and 126 box cutters.
Loop 2:
- Same as round 1, but with jumping lunges and LBC’s
Mosey to retaining wall near Tony’s Pizza.
- Set 1: 1 pull up, 2 merkins, 3 squats
- On each subsequent set, add 1 pull up, 2 merkins and 3 squats
- 5 total rounds. Grand total of 15 merkins, 30 merkins and 45 squats.
Mosey to parking lot next to Einstein’s.
- Circle up, on your 6
- 1 pax calls a mary exercise, then he bear crawls around the outside of the pax circle while everyone else performs the exercise
- Take turns until everyone has had a turn
Back to launch and plank for remaining 45 seconds until time.
Moleskin
- Kobayashi was out yet again and is getting noticeably stronger
- 9 other guys were there too and each one is special and unique
- Thank you to Wild T for the opportunity to lead, and for taking us out
Ciabatta be KIDDING Me: Holiday Jukebox Edition 4.0
12 men got blasted in the face with Christmas music while doing a tabata workout at #F3Stonehenge.
Thang
Ciabatta refers to Tabata, a form of high-intensity interval training developed a Mongolian scientist. Each exercise is performed for 8 cycles of 20 seconds of work and 10 seconds of rest; 4 minutes total for each set. Doing eight different sets this way is a full F3 Ciabatta Cycle. Add some Christmas music blasted through a guitar amp-sized blue-tooth speaker and you have the 4th annual Holiday Jukebox Edition.
Due to the rain we moseyed to the basement of the Ballantyne Village parking deck. We warmed up a little by running up the stairs to the top of the deck and then back down. When I say “we” I mean everyone but me. I stayed behind to set up Wingman’s speaker. How convenient. When everyone returned we got right down to business. Here are the 8 sets of tabata that we performed:
- Wall-o-rama: crab walls, donkey kicks, balls 2 the wall, wall sits, repeato
- Plank-o-rama: regular plank, right arm out, right arm out & left leg out, left arm out, left arm arm out and right leg out, elbow plank, left side elbow plank, right side elbow plank
- Merk-o-rama: merkins, diamond merkins, wide-armed merkins, stagger left merkins, stagger right merkins, hand release merkins, tempo merkins, merkins
- Lunge-o-rama: front lunge, back lunge, skater lunge, jumping lunges, repeato
- Mary-o-rama: 8 different mary exercises Q’d by the PAX
- Animal walk-o-rama: bear crawl, crab walk, frog leap aka broad jump, duck walk, repeato
- Jack-o-rama aka The Great Jack-off: SSH, seal jacks, smurf jacks, plank jacks, elbow plank jacks, 6-inch plank jacks, side plank jack left, side plank jack right
- Burpee-rama: 8 rounds of various kinds of burpees, Q’d by the PAX (worked around a couple refuseniks)
Moleskine
Thank you Wingman for the use of your sweet blue-tooth speaker (and convenient carrying case)!
Thanks to the PAX for putting up with this nonsense for the fourth consecutive year. I appreciate the attendance despite the rain. Merry Christmas.
Black Friday Convergence > Turkey Jam
13 PAX from Cerberus, Centurion and The Brave converged at Waverly on a blustery Black Friday morning to exorcise Thanksgiving debauchery and prove Paper Jam wrong.
Thang
Mosey across Providence Rd. to new Harris Teeter parking lot for COP:
- SSH x 20 IC
- IW x 20 IC
- LSS x 20 IC
- MC x 20 IC
- Tempo Merkins x 20 IC
- Peter Parkers x 15 IC
Mosey to Central Park and partner up. Partner 1 performs merkins on side of field while partner 2 runs to opposite side of field, performs 2 burpees and runs back. Flapjack until a cumulative 100 merkins are reached. Repeat, but with a cumulative 200 squats. Repeat, but with a cumulative 200 LBC’s
Run down field, doing a pyramid of jump squats along the way. 1 jump squat at first tree, 2 at 2nd tree, etc, up to 10 jump squats and then back down to 1.
Mosey to road that borders the park for suicides. 1 burpee at the start, then run to 1st street light and back. 2 burpees at start, then run to 2nd street light and back. Etc, up to 7 burpees / street lights.
Back to Central Park for March of the Toy Soldiers aka lunge walk approx 100 yards.
Mosey to Harris Teeter parking lot for 4 Corners / 11’s. At 1st corner perform 10 plank jacks and 1 flutter (each leg). Run to next corner for 9 plank jacks and 2 flutters (each leg). Etc, until down to 1 plank jack and up to 10 flutters.
Mosey to side of Harris Teeter. Partner 1 in people’s chair while partner 2 runs up steep hill, performs 1 jump squat and returns. Flapjack. 4 total rounds.
Return to launch for Jack Webb until time expires (got up to 7 merkins and 28 air presses).
Oatskin
- Billy Goat wore a full-on snowsuit and it was fantastic
- Thin Mint had a dude wipe stashed under his hat. The morning after Thanksgiving you can never be too careful.
- After a flurry of Slack messages on Thanksgiving, Cheese Curd figured out where and when the convergence was. If only there was a schedule online…
- Tolkien flew under the radar, a far different beast than the Tolkien of old who would have been doing karaoke and backflips as we traveled from point A to point B.
- Thin Mint almost impaled himself on a random stake on the big field. #disclaimer
- It is pretty clear that the automatic mowers (think roombas) on the big field are self-aware and don’t like us
- The 4 corners / 11’s thing made perfect sense in YHC’s head but not in the real world. Mighty Mite implemented his own interpretation and it was probably better than what was called.
- YHC pulled an audible with the people’s chair / hill climb combo. After all, you can’t just mosey past a hill like that without doing something stupid on it. There was a little friendly competition during round 4 between YHC and Doc McStuffins, with the better athlete/man reaching the wall first.
- During COT McGee made a passionate appeal for the PAX to check out WAMRAP (Wednesday AMRAP workout at Waverly). He even definitively clarified what the “W” stands for, but you had to be there.
- Overall the effort was strong by all and we stayed together nicely throughout. Great work, men.
- Fun times at Panera coffeeteria. The only thing stronger than the workout was the oatmeal that YHC enjoyed. I could feel it coursing through my veins and helping me to recover instantly. I just might scoop a helping into my back pocket before Kiawah. The highlight of the morning was when Mighty Mite pointed out that Thin Mint had egg on his face, and not the metaphorical kind.
- After Paper Jam’s #fakenews that no one would post the day after Thanksgiving, we tied his “Turkey Sham” with 13 PAX. However, if you count a Dasher sighting at coffeeteria, we actually won. Better luck next year PJ.
PreBlast: VAGABOND 2018 CSAUP Info and Shirt Order
What?
VAGABOND merges F3 Area 51’s “Southern Discomfort” and F3 Sons of Ballantyne’s “Balrog” into one epic #CSAUP (completely stupid and utterly pointless) event. PAX from all over South Charlotte and surrounding areas will run a ~13 mile loop course through the Area 51 and SOB F3 regions, stopping for six 15-minute pain stations along the way. Those looking for a modified version can start at one of the AO’s along the way (more info below). For those nursing injuries, cyclists are welcome.
When?
Saturday, November 10th. Launches @ 0630 sharp, ends by 1100.
Where?
Start/end is at Hickory Tavern on Providence Rd. in Charlotte (11504 Providence Rd.) across the street from the Waverly shopping center.
Why?
It’s free, all your friends are doing it and we have badass shirts. Plus, free beer and apps. Need I say more?
After Party / Donation:
Join us for food and drinks at Hickory Tavern immediately following the event @ 1100. 1 beer and apps provided at no cost, courtesy of Kid Rock! We only ask that you please make a donation ($5 suggested minimum) to Veteran’s Bridge Home, a non-profit that helps Charlotte-area Veterans successfully transition home after military service by identifying their education, employment and healthcare needs and connecting them to available community, state and federal resources. Link: http://veteransbridgehome.org/ (just click “Donate” in the upper right-hand corner)
What to bring:
- Shovel flags (we’ll be carrying them for the duration to show support for Veteran’s Day and F3)!
- Fuel (GU, chews, etc.) *this is important*
- Hydration will be provided at each pain station, but feel free to bring your own
- Gloves
- Blinkies, reflective vest, etc.
- Change of clothes for after party
Course
Here is the list of AO’s we’ll be stopping at for pain stations, and an estimated range of when we’ll be arriving at each one:
- Waverly: 0630
- Charlotte Latin: 0700 – 0720
- South Charlotte Middle School: 0735 – 0805
- Calvary Church: 0805 – 0845
- Stonecrest: 0845 – 0925
- Blakeney: 0920 – 1000
Shirt Pre-Order
Turkey Leg’s M designed us some killer shirts. See the design below. The prices are very reasonable: only $10 for tee, $15 for long sleeve, $12 for sleeveless. The shirts are performance fabric / moisture-wicking and athletic cut. These are shirts you’ll wear proudly to any F3 workout. Several colors are available. Place your order by midnight on Monday, November 4th to get your shirt the morning of the event. We will also place an order after the event if there is enough interest. Send funds via PayPal to joesavarese@yahoo.com
Shirt – Front Design
Shirt – Back Design
PreBlast Trailer
Premature Evacuation
23 PAX accepted the annual Ballantyne “deck run” challenge and posted at The Brave to see what it was all about.
THANG
The plan was to run to the top of 8 parking decks in Ballantyne using the deck ramps, stopping at the top of each one for 10 burpees in cadence before heading down the stairs to the next deck. With 10 burpees at the start and at the end we would have performed 100 burpees in total, ascended 33 parking deck ramps and traveled roughly 6 miles.
Everything started out great. The big group of 20 PAX managed to stay together, with Tolkien leading the way up the ramps. Burpees were getting knocked out (despite a refusenik by Frasier to call burpees in cadence for the group in deck 1). No issues crossing 521. No one ran into a pond or sand trap crossing the golf course. Made it through Room 101 (the 8-story deck) despite a security car sighting on the ground level. It was starting to look like the plan would go off without a hitch.
UNTIL…
Somewhere in the middle of the sixth parking deck we were rolled up on by Northwood security and encouraged to vacate the premises immediately. “You cannot be in this deck for liability reasons”, we were told.
“So we can’t be in THIS deck”, replied YHC, hoping to create a binding legal loophole whereby we could use all the OTHER decks at our leisure in perpetuity.
“You cannot be in ANY deck”, replied our friend, who, in the midst of this career defining moment was now drunk with power.
Quick search of empty pockets hoping that a Starbucks gift card would magically materialize. It didn’t.
“Ok then” replied YHC, deflated and annoyed.
After prematurely evacuating the deck we ran around past the remaining 2 decks, just to keep our new friend on his toes. Back to launch for one AYG around the parking lot. In total we got in 60 burpees, 25 deck ramps and 5.2 miles.
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE
Just as the crushing disappointment of a failed weinke was sinking in as we formed our COT circle, out of the ashes of defeat sprung the heroes of our story, PAPER JAM, KIRBY AND MIGHTY MITE. As it turns out, these three mavericks had left early and got through not six, but ALL EIGHT parking decks, cleverly outwitting the security guards at every turn. A subset of our group had in fact achieved the parking deck goal! And just like that, all was right with the world. Thank you, PJ, Kirby and MM for being truly Brave. T-claps to Wingman and Fire Hazard for being the only PAX to post at YHC’s deck run all three times we have done it.
POSTSCRIPT
Bunker bought Fire Hazard a t-shirt with a giant pig face on it for his birthday and gave it to him before the workout. After COT FH modeled the shirt for the PAX and it was truly a sight to behold. If you are lucky he’ll wear it to Crane Relay so that others can bask it it’s glory.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Spots are filling up for the mission trip to Peru. See Tolkien for more info on this life-changing event.
Going Rougemont
7 men skipped the BRR so they could kick ass at the The Brave.
Thang
Mosey 1.2 miles to the Rougemont neighborhood off of Endhaven.
Start at intersection of Rougemont and Endhaven. Run down hill to Rougemont and Joliette (0.2 mi). 10 burpees, then back to the start for 10 burpees. 2 rounds total. Mary for the 6.
Mosey East on Endhaven to Orchid Hill neighborhool. Start at intersection of Orchid Hill and Red Maple. Run down hill to Red Maple and Golden leaf (0.1 mi) 10 burpees, then back to the start for 10 burpees. 3 rounds total. Mary for the 6.
Mosey to new parking deck near Endhaven and Comm House. Run up stairs to top level and back down.
Mosey back to launch for 6 minutes of mary:
- Poptart: can opener
- Wild Turkey: slow flutter
- Cul de Sac: American hammer
- Tuck: windshield wiper
- Enron: Makhtar N’Diayes (Wild T wasn’t happy about this one)
- Madame T: J-low
- Mic Check: plank and 6-inch plank for 1 minute and 15 seconds
Molelsine
This was a sweaty affair. YHC got the prize for the biggest puddles. We had a strong group out there and moved around pretty quickly. Enron led the way on the hill work but the rest of the team wasn’t far behind. All in all we covered 4.5 miles with some serious hills and got in 100 burpees and lots of core work.
Congrats Cheddar! And good luck to all the BRR teams out there.
Rea Farms
11 pioneers gathered at Cerberus and explored a ginormous mixed-use development. No, not Waverly. Rea Farms bruh!
Thang
Cross Providence Rd. and mosey to road between the old Harris Teeter and the new Harris Teeter for some COP betwixt the ‘Teets.
- SSH x 20 IC
- IW x 20 IC
- MC x 20 IC
- Plank Jack x 20 IC
Mosey to a wall next to the new Harris Teeter parking lot for 10 Bulgarian split squats (each leg) and 20 hip slappers w/ feet on the wall OYO.
Mosey to what I’m just going to call Central Park… a large (easily 100 yards) rectangle-shaped plot of grass in the middle of Rea Farms, bordered by saplings and light posts. It is PERFECT for all kinds of F3 shenanigans. Such as:
- Partner up. Partner 1 bear crawls across the Park (sideline to sideline if you will) and runs backwards to the start while partner 2 performs squats. Flapjack.
- Partner 1 craw walks across the Park and runs backwards to the start while partner 2 performs American hammers. Flapjack.
- Partner 1 broad jumps across the Park and runs backwards to the start while partner 2 performs Makhtar N’Diayes. Flapjack.
- PAX line up and lunge walk roughly 50 yards to middle of Central Park.
- Suicides to 7 saplings bordering the Park, starting w/ 2 jump squats at each sapling and increasing by 2 at each subsequent tree, up to 14
Mosey to Golf Links Dr. (where Lifetime Fitness is). Head East back towards Waverly, stopping at each tree for 2 burpees. There were 32 or 33 trees, good for 64 or 66 burpees.
Cross Providence Rd. and head to the little park in Waverly behind Ted’s Montana Grill and Carolina Ale House. Grab some wall.
- 10 derkins OYO
- 10 incline merkins OYO
- 10 dips OYO
- 20 flutter IC (sitting on wall)
- 10 in-and-outs IC (sitting on wall)
Moleskine
This was my first Q in 6 months due to injury and rehab. It felt great to lead again. It was fun exploring Rea Farms for the first time. It is starting to take shape and has at least two fantastic bootcamp features: the large football field-sized patch of grass described above and the new Harris Teeter parking lot that is huge and lit up like a Christmas tree. But be warned: crossing Providence Rd. is not for the faint of heart, and not recommended until the crossing signals are up and running. It was dicey to say the least, especially on the way back when traffic had picked up. It was a strong group of PAX out there today. We stayed pretty close together throughout. Good work, men. And thanks for the invite, Argonaut.
Announcements
- Dredd is Q-ing Cerberus next week (8/17). The Brave is converging there. Don’t miss it.
- CLT Craft Course II is Sat, 8/18. 4 mile fun run in Southend, stopping at ~6 breweries. Launching from Unknown Brewing at noon. Contact Tuck for more info.
- Consider participating in the Hope Challenge. During COT, share a struggle you were able to overcome to instill hope in others that may be suffering silently. PreBlast
- Per Prohibition, keep Charlotte Robson and her family in your prayers. She is a SCLT 2-year old suffering from an incurable neurological disease There is a gofundme. Reach out to Prohibition for more information.
LT Training at Pursuit – Wk 2
7 men rendezvoused at Pursuit and lactated all over each other.
For more on this training series see the PreBlast.
The course this week was a very hilly 2.5 mile road loop. Man, there are some serious hills in Millbridge. The plan was to do at least 2 loops, but due to some unplanned off-course “exploration” we only did 1+. Regardless, we got in our 6 intervals of 5 minutes @ Lactate Threshold pace with 2 minutes of recovery, bookended by 10 minutes of warm-up/cool down. Bratwurst and Frasier got in an extra interval instead of a full cool down. As usual we got in 7-8 miles total.
The hills made it hard to maintain LT pace at times, but we pushed through. Maintaining a consistent level of effort is more important than pace when the terrain is challenging.
Major kudos to site FNG Stub Hub, who performed exceptionally well despite not doing running workouts in the past.
Great to have Doc McStuffins and Rock Thrill show up on time this week so they could join us instead of wondering which direction we went!
Brat and Frasier let the way. This is news to no one.
Hollywood killed it as usual. Looking forward to his Q of The Brave tomorrow!
Tune in next time for week 3 of the plan. We’ll do 6 minutes @ LT pace w/ 2 minutes of recovery. The route will be flatter, so that is something we can all look forward to.