YHC had an entire football (soccer) type beatdown planned for the PAX and the rain decided to end that idea. PAX were given the option of a rain or parking deck fiesta, Mic Check decided he wanted the parking deck special, ask and you shall receive. Off we went into the gloom around Loch Ness had to stop for 15 quick step-ups as we lost Haggis. Come to find out Haggis returned to his vehicle to collect a Starbucks card he has been holding for 4 weeks thanks to Frazier. Haggis catches up with the PAX and we continue to Premier parking deck. Hold plank wait for the 6. Security guy is on us within 2 minutes, Haggis approaches car, window is lowered 10 second conversation and security detail drives off happy with his blessing to use the deck. That Starbucks card came into use after all.
COP
SSH X 30 IC
Mountain Climbers x 15 IC
Merkins x 10 IC
LBC X 15 IC
The Thang (Sprints of Pain all exercises in Cadence)
Round 1: 100 yard sprint 10 Merkins 10 LBC’s Plank when done
Round 2: 100 yard sprint 15 Merkins 15 LBC’s Plank when done
Round 3: 100 yard sprint 20 Merkins 20 LBC’S Plank when done
Round 4: 25 Donkey Kicks 100 yard spring 25 Merkins 25 LBC’s Plank When done
Round 5: 20 Donkey Kicks 100 yard sprint 30 Merkins 30 LBC’s
Included some of the new PAX in taking the cadence count, Beebo, Commish, Sky Hook and some veterans, Chippy, MT, MC
Four Corners of Pain:
Split into two teams each team hits four corners of the parking deck and at each corner completes the following, team is not finished until the 6 are finished too. Great way of encouraging everyone to stick together, losing team was given 15 count of winners choice, burpees and monkey humpers.
Merkins 10 total 50
Carolina Dry Docks 10 total 50
Burpees 10 total 50
LBC 10 total 50
wall work 25 over head head press and leg extensions, that was rough after four corners of pain. Mosey down to lower level for 3 rounds of:
Partner carry halfway up ramp 10 merkins each switch to the top x 2
Bear Crawl to halfway point (or gorilla run like Tussaud) sprint to top hold plank.
Long run back to AO at the bridge Merkins by MC & Haggis while I round up the 6, back at lot MC giving out more merkins.
Moleskin
Good veteran crew, a lot of heckling as to be expected, great work by Loogie, Philmont, Beebo, I know those guys don’t like running but they gave 110% effort. I wanted to treat the PAX to an old fashioned English soccer workout, I think the adjustment of pain was satisfying enough.
Takeout from YHC, said prayers for Lo Pair our F3 brother in Raleigh.
A stong 26 Pax showed up for a Monday beatdown. The unsuspecting awaited for what was to come and so did the Q who made some calls on the fly. No FNGs, not a pro but working on it, follow me…..
Mosey down Camilla to Carmel middle
COP
Partner wheelbarrow: up school steps and down ramp (flapjack)
Ring of Fire: vary between high plank, elbow plank and 6 inch holds (Pax holds plank in a circle while 1 Pax runs circle and returns, next Pax up….until everyone has ru)
Partner combo work:
Mosey back down Camilla to Church at CLT crosswalk
Circuit:
Sprint work
Done!
Moleskine
Big crew this morning. Great to see everyone and a special welcome back to Skywalker after the knee surgery. You looked strong brother.
Some decent heckling of the Q on some of my calls (always appreciated and welcomed) though it got substantially quieter after the ring of fire. Threw the Pax off with the HR burpees to start COP but then got back in order with the SSH to reign it back in.
The ring of fire with 26 Pax was brutal but we got better because of it. Saw some atrocious form out there so definitely an area we need to work on. Better to go to knees while keeping good form than piking the whole time. Called out my boy Agony to keep his back straight and he promptly replied, “but that hurts”.
Everyone kept up and pushed this morning. You never see any give up at DMZ. Shout out to One Eye, Hops and Gangsta Mouse as the Larry Birds on the slingshots.
Always meaningful takeout from Skywalker
Swift will launch from the Vine restaurant at the Ballantyne AO at 0515 on Tuesday morning.
The THANG – Objective – run 6 miles in 1 hour – that’s 10 minutes per mile and actually less distance than in previous weeks. No PAX will be left behind, so this is a friendly workout if you are posting to Swift for the First time or Running ridiculous miles at the Palmetto 200 this coming weekend!
The way we’ll do it is on this route – https://www.strava.com/routes/1578212
16 of Area51’s finest Pax rose to the occasion in order to submit their downpainment to the F3 overlords. Forgot to ask about FNG’s. Who has 2 thumbs and needs Q school? This guy. Away we went into the gloom. Down on the track YHC attests to not being a professional and we commence the beatdown.
COP – 2 laps on the track with 4 corners exercises in cadence.
SSH x 15, Butt Kickers, IW x 10, High Knees, Low Slow Squat x 10, Frankenstien Walk, Mtn Climbers x 10, Hurdler Walk, Seal Jack x 15, Jump Skip, Full sit up x 10, Backwards Jog, Standing Lunge x 10, Jog, Merkin x 10, 70% Stride Out
Nice and warmed up, now lets push that pulse.
Indian Fun Run. 2 laps indian run style with some variations
Lap 1 – Regular half lap, Reverse (backwards) half lap
Lap 2 – Bear Crawl 100 meters w/Indian Runners, Lunge walk 100 meters w/Indian Runners, Crab Walk 100 meters w/Indian Runners, Jog it out.
Mosey to baseball field benches – #smokefest
10 Downs – 3 exercises x 10, repeato x 9, repeato x 8, … repeato x 1 plank till all are done
Step ups or Jump ups (pick your poison)
Dips
Derkins
Little baby jog to batting cages, bear crawl to stairs, bunny hop up 4 sets of stairs, lunge walk to parking lot
Mary – 2 rounds
6″ hold, Flutter x 15, 6″ hold 10 count, Dolly x 15, 6″ hold 10 count, Protractor, 6″ hold 10 count
Russian Twist x 15, LBC x 15, Freddie Mercury x 15
#smoked
YHC was extremely encouraged with the numbers and work at Basecamp this morning. If you’re just starting, 6 months in or Lifer the Basecamp AO is a great place to put in some work. Keep coming out and killing it guys. It doesn’t get easier, you just get stronger. And bring your sad clown friends. Cause we all need a little beatdown in our lives.
Regular announcements.
– Udder out
Four men gathered on a rainy Saturday morning to gorge themselves on a heaping helping of supersets at the kettlebell buffet. The small number of the Faithful proved to be an asset since we could complete the bulk of the workout, including some gear stations, under the narrow canopy and manage to stay somewhat dry. Pop Tart and Squid were as giddy as kids on Christmas morning since the good people of Amazon and the United States Postal Service finally saw fit to deliver their new kettlebells. By the way, Pop Tart informed YHC that he found bells on Amazon for less than a dollar a pound plus free shipping, if any PAX are looking to add to their collection or take the plunge with a first kettlebell purchase. We lined up and jumped into supersets consisting of four exercises stacked on top of each other with no rest in between.
Superset 1: 20 two handed swings, 20 goblet squats, 20 clean & press (10 each side), 20 renegade rows (10 each side). After the first time all the way through, repeat the superset cutting the reps in half.
Superset 2: 20 two handed swings, 20 good mornings, 20 sumo high pulls, 20 Romanian deadlifts (10 each side). After the first time all the way through, repeat the superset cutting the reps in half.
Superset 3: 20 two handed swings, 20 floor press (10 each side), 20 weighted crunches/sit-ups, 20 flutter kicks with bell press. After the first time all the way through, repeat the superset cutting the reps in half.
After such a a display of superset gluttony we had to keep moving so as not to let the food coma set in so we transitioned to gear stations. Each man bellied up to a station and would go hard for 2-3 minutes before rotating. Stations included jump rope, sandbag clean & press, medicine ball sideways throws, sit ups and wall ball shots, dumbbell thrusters (squat into a shoulder press), battle rope, farmers walk with kettlebells, double kettlebell swings.
The finisher: 100 kettlebell swings with one free grounding of the bell per man. Additional groundings could be purchased by running to the end of the parking lot, performing 10 merkins, and running back.
The finisher redux: We had approximately two minutes left before 8:00 am when we all wrapped up our 100 swings so each man chose a core exercise. Fletch picked Dolly with kettlebell press, Pop Tart had us do some one legged bicycle with oblique crunch thing, Squid picked the Russian twist with kettlebell which was simply brutal, and YHC wrapped things up with a 20 count elbow plank.
Moleskine: Thank you to the three men who ignored the rain and joined me at Olympus. Pop Tart and Squid have dived headfirst into the realm of kettlebells which makes YHC very happy. Fletch is simply good at everything. If we could harness the energy created from his jump rope turns the oil, solar, and wind energy companies would be out of business. It sounds like the Day Zero crew tackled some sandbag work which is music to YHC’s ears. The Rock boys will get the full Olympus experience later this spring as well. Kettlebell and gear workouts are spreading far and wide to society’s benefit. Lifting heavy things up and putting them down again is good for the mind, body, and soul. That’s just science.
Stumphugger has a wounded wheel, as some know. But he just can’t live without his brothers, nor the work they do in the gloom So we planned to start early, do some pain-in-place intervals at Commitment to give him some work in fellowship, and then do some running beginning at 7am while he went home to make pancakes. More about that later.
6am Pre-Work (Kettlebells). The 6am-6:30am work was something close to the below. We did about 5 or 6 sets. (Snowflake will know).
6:30 Official Start (Pain in Place). For the 6:30 crowd, I broke out a version of “20s,” which has been seen a couple times before at Worm, Shark Tank, and a Convergence, though usually with merkins, dry docks, supine pulls, and knee-ups. Since we didn’t have a supine bar, I substituted dips and more ab work, which I think made it easier since there was more “rest” between the merkins and dry docks. It also took longer.
We warmed up with 100 or so SSH (jumping jacks), half of them in double time.
We then did descending sets of 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, 15 (so on), finishing with 20 reps of:
This took us until almost 7:15, and then it just seemed wrong to leave Stumphugger behind. (I had planned on 400s at the track with a chase twist.) Plus it was raining. And we were dry. But the track was wet.
7:15(ish) (Improvisation) —
COT. Great takeout by Snowflake — also one of the greatest men in F3.
Moleskin
Out. See y’all next Saturday, if not before.
The Thang
Teddy’s Q
Jog around fields and circle up:
SSH 25x
Imperial Walker 10x
Slow squat 10x
Merkin 10x
Carolina Dry Dock 10x
Mountain Climber 10x
Strength Training
Mosey over to front of school
Burpees 10x
Merkins 10x
Dips 10x
Derkins 10x
Plank Han-ups on curb 10x
Jog around parking lot
Repeat 2 more times
Mosey to back of the school
Burpees 10x
Curls with rock 20x
Shoulder Raises 20x
Tricep Extension 20x
Plank with leg ups 10x
Repeat 2 more times
Mosey to basketball court and partner up
Wheelbarrow length of court. Both partners move to playground for hanging knee up’s 10x. Rotate partner wheelbarrow back to other end of court
Repeat with lunges and duck walk back.
Radar Q
Mosey over to the rose
Sand bag runs around the block 20 Merkins each corner
Suicides with out bags
50 Carolina dry docs
Suicides with bags
50 overhead press
All you got 50 yards
30 curls
All you got 50 yards
30 tricep extenstions
Mosey bag to the school with bags and circle up
1 person runs with the bag 20 yards and back and switches out with the next guy. every else does excersise until the full circle is complete
Excersises
Merkins, Curls, Peter parkers
Moleskin
6 Strong hit the pavement at Area 51s finest AO. This is the only site that can be the focus of a clean up day and by the time you get back to your car it is covered in trash again. Seriously, is there any other site that would have a pile of toe nail clippings under your nose as you do merkins. Most likely not. I am not sure an office building is suited to be placed here. I am thinking more of something like a low security prison or farm animal zoo. Make sure you vote on the proposed zoning coming up. Lets keep this AO the way it is. The men seemed sluggish and under the weather today. Me, with my full bodied poison ivy peel and Hairballs Bells Two Hearted Flu made for a rough morning. When I say sluggish I mean by our standards. We still kept it way superior to our little baby sister work out down the road. I wander if anyone showed there today. I heard discussion of bussing people in from Greenville. #backwardleap. Teddy’s q is somewhat Mermaid esc. Quite, Polite and Painful. Nice work. No one likes the sand bags. I don’t like them. But I would not run from them. Like Prohibition did. He said he had to leave early because his bottom was wet. I don’t buy it. I think he didn’t want to have to handle my bags. Thanks for letting us lead.
Seven pax (including one FNG: Tim G or Flinstone) decided to post to the best AO A51 has to offer and also posted up once the action began (key reference: posting up is a basketball term for those of you who decided to go to Day ZZZZZero and lift sand bags instead of playing a game revered by most everyone….well, at least men). Here is what this Magnificant 7 got into:
Warm Up: Jog to the front courtyard of Calvary with basketball in hand for:
The Thang: Mosey to the bball courts for:
21 (well, it started as 21, but YHC audibled to 11….we didn’t shoot very well, frankly)
Partner up. Partner #1 takes a shot from the foul line. If he makes it he goes for the lay-up and continues shooting while Partner #2 does 5 burpees for every shot Partner #1 makes. If Partner #1 misses, he does 5 burpees and forfeits the ball to Partner #2.
Either Dear Abby or Boutique got to 11 first so the whistle blew on that drill and we moseyed to the front lot of the church.
Basketball ain’t basketball without suicide runs so we ran ’em to each island in the parking lot and back. Flipper and Dear Abby took the lead on the suicides.
Plank Up and then two rounds of partner sit-ups with ankles locked trading the bball back and forth upon each crest (reps of 25).
Let’s go back to the courts!
It’s time for P-I-G, but we modified it to F-F-F. If you miss, you drop for 5 merkins and earn a “F”. Word to the wise….Runstopper has a mean “back to the net, throw the ball over his head shot”. It was NBN! Flipper, on the other hand, built a whole new Family Life Center for Calvary with all of the bricks he threw up. Anyway, winner only has to run to the front entrance of Calvary on 51. Looser runs to the further away back entrance (#4) on Rea Rd. Plank up to wait for the six.
Mosey to back lot of Calvary for zig zag running drills from one light post to another then run backwards to the starting point (rinse and repeat). Plank exercises.
Mosey back to the court for some mary:
With one minute left, we all took one last, long shot at one of the hoops, but to no avail…we were all too burnt.
That’s a wrap!
Moleskin:
YHC changed up the typical Rock format today. We ran less distance and did our fair share of burpees. That’s mainly because I had a race last weekend and don’t want to think about running for a little while. Nevertheless, we had a great morning. There was great mumble chatter, based mainly upon each guy’s basketball prowess. Lots of “balls” jokes, too….who could have guessed that??? Thanks for putting up with my game plan this morning, boys….I had a lot of fun!
Welcome FNG Flinstone. He sells rock for a living, so the naming felt more than right today!
Announcements:
Pretty much the norms:
Thanks for a great takeout Flipper!
Hopper
It was 11pm last night when it suddenly came to me that I had to lead a workout this morning. Earlier that evening I had already had visions of a lazy Saturday morning, enjoying the fartsack until about 8pm…but I came to the realization that something even better was in store. So a small group of men gathered in the OP parking lot, we planted the virtual shovel flag, and off we went…
Ze Ting
Mosey to opposite side of school and run around the parking lot a bit…backwards, high knees, butt-kicks, karaoke, etc. then circle up:
Mosey back to the other side of the school to the track, where we did four corners…sort of. 10 burpees at the start, 20 squats at 1/4 lap, 20 CCDx at 1/2 lap, 20 lunges at 3/4 lap, plank while the group finishes. Rinse and repeat two more times.
Jog to the church across the street, partner up, and grab a nice size stone. Partner 1 does called exercise while partner 2 jogs to entrance on other side of church and back, then flapjack. Exercises called:
Put stones back and jog back to the school.
Finish with a little jog around the parking lot to pick up trash. Deposit into dumpster. Nice job men!
Moleskin:
So I printed up an old workout last night since I had completely forgotten I was scheduled to Q. But as I drove through the rain to the workout I started recalling the recent convergence workout at OP that took place in the rain. Memories of sloshing through rain-soaked fields in the mud and doing LBCs in 2 inches of water didn’t inspire me. I had even planned for some tunnel of love, but I thought better of it. We can get a good workout without the sillyness of rolling around in the muck, so we stuck to the blacktop today.
It was great to see Skywalker back in the gloom this morning…his first workout since his knee surgery several months ago #Kotters. He looked great out there, and while we did do some running today it was only for short distances. There was a little rust, but only on following directions. Apparently “run to the other entrance and back” sounds just like “run around the block”… the four guys hanging back doing the stonework got in several extra reps. I think Skywalker was just savoring the fellowship time. Great to see Low Tide back out there too. He was flying this morning during the running portions of the workout. High Tide looked equally strong doing work with the rocks. T-claps to Strange Brew for running into the workout this morning…enjoyed your stories of long airplane trips and doing squats in the galley for all to see. Pele and Fireman Ed looked great this morning. Enjoyed stories of #lunkheads at Planet Fitness. As always, it was an honor to lead this morning!
I’m pretty sure the last four times I’ve led workouts it has rained, so I apologize in advance to the men of The Charge next week…make sure you bring your rain ponchos.
Announcements: