Although the temperature dropped, it did not discourage 4 PAX from following a new route conjured up by Bratwurst filled with sprinklers and hills. At 5:15 we launched and tackled the menacing hill of Ardrey Kell to go past the high school. A right onto Zachary Ave, right onto Pomerane Place, right onto Old Ardrey Kell Rd (where we found the sprinklers), then through some other neighborhoods (I cannot remember which ones) and we ended up on Community House Rd. A quick left onto Highgrove to complete a loop around Highgrove-Fortbridge-Summer Club, Pemswood and then back to Community House. Down to Adrey Kell and a left back to base. The broga mats and a towel came out for stretching led by Paper Jam.
MOLESKIN
As a person who is often looking at the backs of other PAX in workouts, I sometimes get discouraged because it seems like some guys never struggle. They show up to a running workout, knock out 5-6 miles at some incredible pace or they show up at a boot camp and are always in front. It can be quite intimidating. They make it look easy. So when Gumbo relayed to us this morning his latest marathon story, one that documented how he successfully fought through physical battles with his body and second thoughts about running the marathon, for me, it was not only inspiring to hear about his triumph but also encouraging to know that I am not alone in the mental and physical struggles of our F3 workouts. It makes guys like me, who may never run a marathon, feel like we belong at an F3 workout with someone who can. Thank you Gumbo for a great start to my week.
PAX will launch from the Vine Restaurant on Tuesday morning at 0515 to reach for the objective Citius, Altius, Fortius. It will be a next phase in the Swift training regiment. We have been doing Repetition Pace training intervals over the last 2 weeks in pursuit of Running Economy. We’ll now turn to Interval Pace to get back to the training intervals similar to 3 weeks ago in order to maximize Aerobic Power .
The THANG:
See you in the Gloom,
Bratwurst
AYE. The PAX gathered in the gloom and 05:30 came and went without any floors being slapped. We were about to have a Q by democracy and Da Squids was explaining something about 4 stations and then YHC decided it was time to take charge. Not because DS would have done a bad job, but because YHC remembered that I had to pay penance for missing my Kevlar Q last Friday. For good reason, by the way, but still missing it. So here’s what happened next:
THE THANG
Mosey to lower parking lot, run a lap and then COP for SSH x 10 and Imperial Walkers x 10
Enough of that shiz
Mosey to end of parking lot and partner up
Partner 1 runs a lap, Partner 2 does stated exercise
Goal is cumulative total reps per exercise
Round 1 – 200 Merkins
Round 2 – 300 Jump Squats
Round 3 – 400 LBCs
Round 4 – 500 Mountain Climbers
Round 5 – 400 Sister Mary Catherines
Round 6 – 300 Flutter Kicks
Round 7 – 200 Jump Squats wait, nevermind, 100 Burpees
Finish out with a little bit of Mary – Heels to Heaven, High Slow Flutter, Jackknife
AYG to the finish line
YE OLDE MOLESKINE
That’s it. Something about a Christmas party and a 5k as well. #horseneck OUT
The Thang
o Timed 1.5 mile
o Max push-ups in two minutes
o Max sit-ups in two minutes
o Max pull ups
Moleskin
o Applicants must be between the ages of 17 to 28 [… sorry Uncle Leo, but turns out that you and I are almost 20 years outside of the range]
o Eyesight requirements: 20/40 best eye; 20/70 worst eye; correctable to 20/25 with no color blindness. [Interesting… not sure if I have a “best eye” and “worst eye”.]
o Meet the minimum Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) score: GS+MC+EI=170 or VE+MK+MC+CS=220 or VE+AR=110 MC=50. [I have no idea what any of this means… but looks pretty impressive].
o 1.5 mile in 11:30 or less, with a stretch goal to do it in under 10 minutes
o At least 50 push ups in two minutes, with a stretch goal of 80
o At least 50 pull ups in two minutes, with a stretch goal of 100
o At least ten pull ups
9 PAX made the right choice, arose from the #FartSack on a perfect Saturday morning and posted at #Stonehenge for their #DownPAINment, and here’s how it went down.
The Thang:
Mosey over to the Ballantyne Village parking deck, stopping at each ramp for 5 merkins kicks. Stopping on the roof for COP
COP:
Head back down the parking deck ramps performing 10 squats OYO at each ramp.
Costigan Park:
Head over to Costigan Park, and partner up. Partner 1 does called exercise while Partner 2 runs a lap, then Flapjack.
Trick or Treat?
Mosey back to the start point and pick up up some rucks. Staying with your partner Catch Me If you Can to the Vein Specialists of NC parking lot. Partner 1 does called exercise with their coupon while Partner 2 runs to one end of parking lot and back. Flapjack. Move the rucks down the line each round. Repeato when complete.
Waterfall Relay Race:
Get into 2 teams, stay with your partner, at each station perform called exercise with your partner, bear crawl to the next station. The next set of partners doesn’t start the exercise until the one before has completed the called exercise.
Mary:
Return to the Vine with 5 minutes left for some Mary.
Moleskin:
Announcements:
YHC had never been to DaVinci… Its not that I didn’t have time to scout the AO, I’ve known about this Q for months, but as ever life got in the way and on Thursday when Fredo sent the reminder I realized I was hosed. As a result I scouted the AO via google maps and realized exactly where the space I need lay, but more on that later.
YHC ran into the parking lot at about 0627 to witness a solid 4 PAX waiting to get started. Having planned for 8-12 an on the spot audible was necessary, such is the joy of the Q.
THE THANG:
Mosey out of the parking lot and crossed Rea to the office complex where party favors awaited. The gear was shortly laid out per YHC direction and the circuit was defined. With classic rock blaring on the bluetooth speak we did 5X each of:
Plate Burpees (45 lbs) Chest to plate standard style arms during the merkin, press plate over head
Bumper Plate Burpees (20 KG) Chest to plate, military arms during merkins (elbows tucked), press plate over head
Ball Over Slamball Burpees (20 lbs ball) Press with right hand on ball, left hand on ball then over head slam at the top of the burpee
Military Slamball Burpees (40 lbs ball) Military style press with chest to ball, overhead slam at the top of the burpee
Sandbag Clean Burpee (60 lbs sandbag) Press chest to bag, clean bag to overhead during burpee
After the above 5 sets PAX hit the agility ladder for side-to-side directly followed by corner to corner runs (cones set in top of the lot)
Lap on the sidewalk down to Rea then around and back to the gear
Repeat above set
2 foot in and outs up and back down the agility ladder then 2x suicides on the cones
lap around the buildings
Repeat the burpee set but with two (or 4) merkins per burpee
Two foot in and outs up and down the agility ladder
Burpee suicides ran at the cones then another lap of the buildings was completed
A couple rounds of tug-o-war (cause YHC had brought the rope when anticipating a larger group but gotta use it!)
Gear Stowed in the Jeep, had a quick tour o’ blakney and an Indian run back to the BB&T lot for circle of Mary
HALT
Ye Naked Moleskin:
Being of A51, YHC doesn’t know the the Sons of Ballantyne as well as he might like, the DaVinci Q was aiming to fix that, I’ll have to give it another go! That being said Fredo, Bucky, No Show and Jerry MGuire made a SOLID showing. This was no easy workout and we covered a lot more ground than I had originally planned given the burpee heavy format. Despite the audible, we had plenty of sweat equity invested this AM. It was an honor to work with you men, I look forward to doing it again.
SYITG
Announcements:
SOB Christmas Party and Balrog II (see pre-blasts)
430 on a Saturday and yes, YHC was awake loading up Buckets, Sandbags an agility ladder and other gear into the Camry which was draggin’ tailpipe all the way down to Blackhawk. 540 arrival to the Blackhawk site, and yes this is a very strange hour on a Saturday morning for a car to be rolling up to a bunch of baseball and soccer fields and so I received a greeting from 2 of Lancaster’s finest inquiring about what I was doing unloading a bunch of buckets and sandbags out of my car at 540AM. No charges pressed and questionable looking subject test passed, I carried on setting up the gear portion on the OCR themed workout for the day. 6 on the dot as YHC was joined by Atlas, Ringer, Erector and Jingles for the Trail pre-run. Headlamps fired up and we were off.
Warm-Up
The THANG (OCR TRAIL COURSE)
In the mood to mix it up a bit, I created a circuit utilizing gear and a very dark trail, which shook out to be all and all about a 1.5mile circuit. Going through the disclaimer and different points of the circuit, YHC noted that we would be staggering the start to avoid clusterf*cks out on the course and that yes, there would likely be times where you would be alone…in the dark…by yourself…and very alone…and scared. YHC looked around to see many unnerved looking faces and at this point Cobbler opted to go try and outdo Atlas’ work on the can. Here is the course outline:
To close out, the PAX circled up on the playground and YHC awarded the freedom to lead…maybe too much freedom…as we did dealers choice around the circle, in which the instructions were “Do anything that you want.”
Moleskinny
YHC will keep this brief as it has already started to turn into a Lord of the Rings length novel. Beautiful morning for a UvU style workout utilizing the best traits of the Blackhawk site. Solid work by all of the PAX to get out there, push themselves and manage not to soil their pants whether due to their fear of the dark or the Taco Dinner and Bourbon shots the night before. Jingles, way to get after the pre-run and OCR course and make it all the way through the course before you had to peel out, appreciate you coming out and look forward to getting you on the Q schedule soon. Erector gutty performance after logging 12+ trail miles the day before and absolutely destroying the legs, YOU CAN AND WILL CONQUER THE BEAST! Ringer as always killin’ the pre-run pace and appreciate you coming back for YHC on cone pick-up duty to make sure I hadn’t been claimed by any of the wilderness creatures. Atlas & Cobbler dropped the deuce and you were both full tilt and boogie afterwards and delivered the most punishing of the dealers choice for sure.
Announcements
Check out the Pre-Blast for the SOB Holiday Party on 12/16
https://f3southcharlotte.com/2017/10/27/2018-sob-holiday-party-pre-blast/
Also, for an entrepreneurs out there I have an opportunity for you. Open up a diner in Indian Land. Yes, just a casual breakfast diner. No need to put in a fancy bar and 36 tvs. Only requirement is some sort of business acumen and maybe some experience with maintaining a bank account and/or checkbook. It would be like shooting fish in a barrel will all of the geriatrics in Sun City right in the area + a group of sweaty greaseballs on a Saturday morning…the last owner just couldn’t figure out how to pull the trigger.
Over & Out
-GENERAL
8 (then 9, back to 8, then back to 9) men woke up to a crisp 50 degree morning and decided the kick the weekend off right with another edition of heavy-flow RockZERO. With no shovel flag in sight, a minimal disclaimer given, we set off for YHC’s first Q in a while. Here’s what went down:
Warmup yog through the Calvary parking lot to somewhere near the middle.
COP:
With the AO requirements of getting in 3 miles, YHC decided to knock most of that out on the front side of the workout. Head out of Calvary down Rea to Bevington and into CVS loading area. Avoiding an 18 wheeler and waiting for the six, we did some plank work and picked up a temporary pax. Mosey to the wall behind CVS.
Out of the parking lot, right on Bevington, right on Elm. Elbow plank at corner of Elm and 51. Run to Calvary and head to rock pile on 51 side. Pick a ‘tweener rock that you can both carry for short distances and still get something out of for lifting.
Mosey back to middle parking lot, partner up, and line up A BREAST.
Circle up for some Mary:
AYG BTF (All you got back to flag – although no flag in this case)
We Done!
Ye naked moleskinny:
First off, Happy 53rd Birthday Blades of Glory! You don’t look at day over 39 and will always move much more gracefully than the rest of us no matter what your age. Great work out there today and happy to have you out.
When we started up, BOG asked since YHC was Q how many miles we were going to get in. He was concerned this had turned into a running workout and didn’t want to do 5+ miles. No worries, there is the 3 mile minimum and we try not go over that by much either. In the COP, the slow rising merkins just kinda popped in my head at the last second. It was a crowd pleaser. You’re welcome.
I knew I needed to get off campus to make sure we hit the 3 mile minimum, and my favorite wall is in the CVS loading dock area, so that’s where we went. On approach there was an 18 wheeler trying to get into the parking lot and a guy trying to guide it. So we diverted left into the small lot trying to stay out of its way, but unfortunately that was just where he was going. As some of the pax started to get a little worried, the 18 wheeler’s guide hit the ground with us and planked up (pax #9). Wish he could have stuck around as he was far less worried about getting run over than the rest of us!
The wall work is always fun…said nobody. Shaky legs, shaky arms, and then trying to do upside down merkins while B2W is always an adventure. I don’t know if anyone else actually did them as all the blood was rushing to my head and I was trying not to pass out.
Choosing a rock is always a difficult process. I told everyone to pick a rock that was good for running and lifting. As Abba stated it: a ‘tweener. You don’t want to go too small, but you always regret later choosing the bigger one (TWSS). I think Jet Fuel regretted his rock almost immediately as that one is usually reserved for Hoover. BOG grabbed the panhandle rock. Solid choice. Big League Chew grabbed a more substantial rock than last time, but quickly discarded it completely. #vetmove.
It turns out that when doing Mary/COP exercises, if you just slow them down they all of a sudden seem ridiculous. The very slow Freddie Mercuries at the end were awful. And since Flipper wasn’t there for the slow rising merkins at the beginning (and since they were a crowd pleaser) we did those to finish. Bad move.
Great work by everyone out there today. Thanks for having me lead as it has been a little while since I did the Q thing. Felt good and terrible all at the same time. Hope to get on the schedule a little more often. Thanks to Abba for the takeout.
Announcements:
So, another successful fitness experience was enjoyed by all!
After a brief discussion about the meaning of time we moved down to the lower lot in unison and warmed up with SSH X 25, then a mosey to the forest and back for IW X 20 followed by a mosey to the forest and back.
Delegated Q to McGee for 6 minutes of Mary: Rosalita, Dos Rosalita (?), Box Cutter, LBCs, and some other cool stuff, then mosey to forest and up to playground for partner merkins and pull ups 5 sets of 10 quality.
Mosey to main field for block exercises–(Our blocks have been destroyed –need to replenish) partner does triceps while other does “speed skater training” VERY DISAPPOINTING” will have to work this in during another workout…
Back to the playground to finish up the remaining sets of Pull Ups and merkins with partner.
Back to main field for 100 yd runs while partner does curls with blocks X 3.
Begin the first set of squats 20, on the way to 200. Mosey to THE WALL for Wall sits, squats, BTW, with laps around track in between.
Return to start for cool down with Lunge Walk, Merkins, LBCs, Peter Parker x 15.
All total +2.5 miles running, 200 squats, 100 pull ups, 170 merkins, plus some other stuff…pretty good stats…a modified Murph workout??
Posted by Voodoo on behalf of Sanka:
7 men showed up with bells way too heavy to do this many reps. They did them anyway. Here’s how it went down.
Warmup:
The Thang:
Round 1:
Repeat round 2 more times, increasing reps to 15 and then 20.
Round 2:
Round 3:
Round 4:
Big Finish: grab your heaviest bell and go back through all exercises, 3 reps each
Done.
Moleskin:
After kicking out way too many instructions and getting the playlist started, we fell into a quick rhythm with little chatter. The reps added up quickly and a few audibles were called, but mostly the workout was taken down without complaint. T-claps everyone – solid work.
Thanks for the opportunity to lead. Always an honor.