11 men checked the weather the night before and posted anyway at DaVinci this morning. Not that it was that cold but something about having 2 weeks + of spring and then having to get the gloves and hats back out is a kick in the teeth. But enough complaining, lets get to it.
The Thang: 25 SSH IC in the lot to wait for One Star and FNG Room Service to join us. Read disclaimer and set off. Mosey to other side of Rea and finish warm up with: 15 low slow squats, 10 burpees (6 count IC; these could also be re-named the “low slow burpee” of if you prefer, “Actual Burpee” because if you go slow and in cadence, people actually do them.)
Mosey to the fountains for one set of elevens and one of sevens. 11’s = dips and jump ups, 7s = derkins and hip slappers (so stay in plank the whole time). One lap around parking lot after each.
Mosey to the bank parking lot and pay homage to the NFL Scouting Combine: Shuttle Run. Two groups running an ~20 yard shuttle run. Move quickly so that everyone goes 4-5 times and PAX that are waiting do the called exercise: merkins, squats, CDDs, diamond merkins. Next, Mary: 20 American Hammers, 20 flutters IC, then OYO 20 backward lunges with arms overhead and a side bend at the bottom of the move (good for the core). Sidenote: espn.com ran an entire feature yesterday where Todd McShay breaks down every exercise in the Combine – description, why its used, what to “watch for” this week… seriously. Only in America.
Mosey to the long running hill outside the shopping center. Stops along the way for merkins, planks, Mary, conversation, planks, etc. Stop when we get to the rock pile. Partner up and select one rock per team. P1 runs to the bottom of the hill and back while P2 does the sequence of 10 curls, 10 presses, 10 triceps extensions and repeat until repeat until your partner comes back without putting the rock down. Flapjack.
Long journey home with many stops. Finally, we discover that on the sidewalk opposite the bank and 121 Main, there are various exercises written along the way: lunges, pushups, planks, etc. So of course we do each one for the helluvit. Finish in the BB&T lot with some merkins and Mary while the 6 arrives and that’s all folks.
Moleskin: Really enjoyed the group today and was a privilege to lead. One FNG, 2 R-E-S-P-E-C-Ts, some newer guys and some vets. Perfect mix for an F3 workout and 2nd F after. Thanks all for turning out.
Announcements: April 22 = Bro-Lympics. Check web site for Pre-Blast and contact Tuck or Wild Turkey with questions. 6-8 a.m. at Community House Middle. DaVinci and Stonehenge will converge. April 29 = Richard Shelter 10k in the morning then… Bucky announced what sounds like a great 2nd F opportunity to support a good cause. Takes place in his neighborhood and multiple local breweries and food trucks will be out. Also live music. Reach out to Bucky if you are interested and listen for further details after workouts.
After a quick Ballantyne lap with Fire Howard and the Palmetto Boys (Thin Mint, Frasier, Bunker & Bratwurst), I panted the disclaimer and headed to familiar territory.
Courtyard by Marriot Lot Warm-up
Side straddle hop x 20
Imperial walkers x 15
Mountain climbers x 10
Low, slow squat x 10
Peter Parkers x 10
Arm circles x 10
Mountain climbers (Right arm up/left arm up) x 10
Loch Ness Lap – Triple 7 Tribute
7 Bulgarian split squats (each leg), 7 squats at patio 1, patio 2 & picnic tables
Fitness trail – Savage Race circuit
Shimmy across low parralell bars, swing across high paralell bars run across bridge to pull-up bars for five good ones. Repeat three times.
Bagpipe Hill
Partner-up for Catch Me If You Can. P1 runs, P2 does five hand-release merkins and tags P1. Switch and repeat up the hill and across the bridge.
John J. Delaney Burpee & Bear crawls
5 burpees at five parking lot islands
5 bear crawls at next set of islands
Ballantyne Village Deck Ascent
Burpees at each ramp with escalating merkins from 1 to 8 at top of the deck.
Fast finish
Down the steps and jail break the last 100 yards home
Merkins & Mary fin
Moleskine
Today was cold, especially if you didn’t wear gloves. We covered more than 3.5 mi and handily fulfilled the merkins/pull-up challege challenge. I’m proud of this group of vets and newer folks. Despite the higher milage, we mostly stayed toghether (unless you Gumbo at left your hat at Bagpipe Hill). Frehley called me out for recyling the mountclimber-centric warm-up. (I will retire it.) Special thanks to Brat for arranging the pre-run to circle back to the Vine. After three Qs and three BBs, I’m out.
Announcements
Providence Presby Wall Project March 18
Brolympics April 22
10 PAX ignored the freezing temperature to get swole at my guest Q in the Valley of the Sun. Since Madison, Scalper and Champagne ran me into the ground this week, I was concerned about becoming a runner and developing soccer arms, so it was time to focus on arms and abs.
After a quick disclaimer it was a short mosey to the baseball diamond (spring training has begun) for the:
COP: SSH x 15, IW x 15, arm circles x 15, toe tap crunch x 15 and 5 merkins OYO in between each of the exercises.
The Thang:
Mosey across the street to the Goddard School parking lot and grab a lifting rock: 3 rounds of 20 reps: curls, shoulder press and triceps extension, triple lindy between rounds.
Mosey back to the middle school and find the tennis courts for ab escalators. At each corner perform the given exercise: flutter (10), heels to heaven (20), toe tap crunch (30), LBC (40)
Mosey to the benches near the yellow buses. Round 1: Dips (25), incline merkins (20), Round 2: Dips (25), incline merkins (20), diamond merkins (10). Round 3: flutter (20), heals to heaven (15), TTC (15).
Mosey to the playground in between the elementary schools for pull ups and decline merkins. Three rounds: 5 pull ups, 10 decline merkins. Then circle up for some abs:protractor (chosen by Smokey) then back scratchers (chosen by Double E).
Mosey to the practice football field for Field of Plank. Jog to a line, perform the called plank. Elbow plank, regular plank, elbow plank, right arm high, left arm high, elbow plank, reverse plank and finish with 10 reps of Makhtar N’Diaye (some trivia: his middle name is Vincent).
Return to the launch site with some time left for 3 Rounds of supline pull ups and merkins 10 of each and finish up with LBCs. (Forgot to mention: on the way back found a small hill for 10 more incline merkins)
Moleskin:
When Madison reached out to me for a guest Q slot he told me that this was a fun AO. He was not kidding, I felt like I only scratched the surface of all the fun that a Q could have at this site. This location rivals Hugh McRea Park in Wilmington as one of the best sites that I have visited.
I appreciate Madison and Double E taking me for a “tour” of the grounds right before we launched, I had performed a drive through and looked on google maps, but there is nothing like running around the site to make sure what you had planned would work.
I discovered some interesting things in Union County (1) Madison likes to wear running tights but no shorts, (2) Woody wears a scarf to an F3 workout, (3) Shake & Bake doesn’t follow me on Twitter or he wouldn’t have showed up with a Boston Red Sox license plate (10 burpees for that), (4) Bullwinkle likes to make an entrance, showing up late and triggering a UC tradition of a 5 burpees penalty for everyone (I am an SOB so I respectfully declined), (5) Manziel is a proud Browns fan (maybe he should go see Fraizer for that issue).
For those involved in the pull-up merkin challenge, the final numbers are 135 merkins and 45 pull ups.
One of the blessings of Qing outside of your area is meeting other great F3 PAX and realizing we are all part of one big community.
Thank you Smokey for taking us out and I am always humbled and honored to serve the men of F3.
As Abacus mentioned, old man winter returned just when we thought it was time to put away the cold gear. 9 men gathered including an FNG and we were off.
Mosey to lower parking lot for COP
SSHx25, IWx20, LSSx20, Mt Climberx20, Merkinsx10, Peter Parkerx20
Mosey to blocks, grab a lifting block and mosey to the center light pole in the field for a 5 legged starfish.
At the center pole – 10xcurls, 10xpresses, 10xsquat with the block
Merkins at each of the five legs x20 – regular, wide arm, diamond, hand release and staggered hand
At center pole – incline merkins
Now a round of block exercises – Triceps, One Arm row, John Cusak (Block over head), and Block straight out
Rinse and Repeat
Mosey back to put the blocks away
Bear Crawl to center of the field, lunge walk the rest
Mosey to bus parking lot for suicides.
First set – regular suicides
Second and third sets – added exercises at 5x, 10x, 15x – Carolina Dry Dock and LBCs
Mosey to woods for cross country laps and exercises at the end – first set dips, second set derkins
Mosey to front parking lot – 10 pull ups
Circle up for some Mary – LBCs, Flutter, and Russian Twist
Time called
Excellent turnout for the cold. Lobsta Roll attempted to Q-jack with some initial burpees called in the COT. Pop Tart got his 10 pull ups. Great to see Iron Sheik getting into F3. Lex Luthor brought out FNG Foley. We had to go to Google do find Foley’s name – there was some confusion (Pop Tart) as to whether that was permitted – YHC made a decision to allow. Great to see Cold Cuts as he only has to jog a short distance from his house. Great to see Joker (the original) at A51. Thanks to OT for taking us out (we had also debated bringing in Squid on the phone to take us out). Great workout – I always find leading causes you to work out harder. Iron sharpens Iron x2.
We are always looking for Q’s at Area51 – contact YHC or Abacus if interested. If not, we will contact you…
Have a great weekend
A small team of tough men for this morning’s Brave. A good thing too – it was physically and mentally unsavory from start to finish.
The thang:
Run hard to the first lake. Do 30 6-count burpees. Run hard to the next lake. Do elbow plank for 70 seconds (10 second count per man). Repeat until we have visited every lake. Total 4 miles or so.
Bonus pull up session: The pax elbow plank while each of us in turn performs three real pull ups. Here’s what a real pull up looks / sounds like: Hang on the bar, fully extended. Pull your body up until your chest touches the bar. Hold for 1 second. Let yourself down gently, and hang fully extended for 1 second. It’s difficult to do three of these. We did three sets each.
Moleskin:
The workout was set up to keep a group of different paces together with faster guys doing a full 30 burpees and others joining in at each lake whenever they arrived. In the event, it was a fast group all around, and everyone got a full share of burpees.
Easy to forget how unpleasant it is to run hard, do 30 burpees, then run hard again. Need to practice the Spartan spear throw – you don’t want the penalty.
With the announcement of the Brolympics, the pull up session was timely. Pre blast mentions full lockout. Will they hold us to it? Pull ups are hard to do right, and pretty pointless if you cheat. Kinda like life, brothers.
A strong group today, and an honor to lead. Thanks to the men of F3 and the SOBs for all that you do.
16 PAX gathered in the [hopefully] final chilly morning for a much anticipated installment of 5-5-4-4-3-3 intervals. After disclaiming… I think… we headed to Strawberry for the following:
Done! Finished 5-5.5 miles!
Moleskine
Always a pleasure to spend my Friday with this group! It is great to have Retread on as co-Q, and it is such an honor that you guys have made this workout your priority for Fridays. Truly an honor!
Great to have Mr. Brady join us as part of his recovery regimen. He will be back to his fleet ways in no time at all. Please keep coming back!
Same for JRR Tolkien. He has been out a few times as he has been recovering… always welcome! And thanks to JRR T, I now know the only thing you need to say if you own a Chinese Buffet… “You stay too long! You pay NOW!” Hilarious!
Retread, Marlin and Goonie were all leading the pack today. Excellent job by each of you! And Nomad was never far behind!
Sensei allowed me to lead him this morning, despite the “incident” from yesterday… (ask Nomad). Let’s just say it was not something I’m proud of… old-self was on display!!
Great to have Sensei and Freedom starting to come regularly, all thanks to Freedom providing the transportation… although Sensei has indicated he may start driving himself… more to come!
Sony made a long-awaited appearance! Great to have you… all of the other AO’s that you post to on Fridays are a bunch of losers… you need to keep coming back to Mtn Goat!!
Drano, Gullah, Beaver, Kilowatt, Tweetsie and Lois… solid as always! You guys get stronger every week! Kilowatt only comes because I guilt him… but whatever it takes!!
Again, excellent job! I do encourage each of you to find an app, a device, or a combination of both to track your mileage. Can even be a pencil and paper! But it is important to document how many miles you are running as this will both be an encouragement as you see what you are achieving, and also show how much you need to achieve before the end of the week.
If you are interested, ping me, text me, grab me after a workout and I can share some methods I’ve used in the past pre- having a GPS watch.
Announcements:
Thanks to Mr. Brady for the send-off prayer. Retread on Q next week!
Years ago, men stripped down, smeared themselves in olive oil and ran, jumped and wrestled for gold and glory. No, this is not the origin story of #f3hottubs, it’s an invitation to the F3 Brolympics. Brought to you by the Site Qs of Saturday’s finest AOs , Stonehenge and Da Vinci, we invite you to an epic convergence. Points will be awarding for placing in individual events.
When: Saturday, April 22, 2017, 0600 – 0800.
Where: Community House Middle School Track, 9500 Community House Rd, Charlotte, NC 28277
Who: All men of F3, all regions invited
What: 10 individual events developed to test speed, strength and mental toughness
How: No registration, just show up. Participants may choose to compete in as few or as many events in the allotted time. Points will accumulated by rank in completed events. To be eligible to be crowned champion, one must compete in at least eight events including the 1-mile and Phlegethon.
Why: How dare you?!
Tentative Agenda and Event List
Warmup/COP
• 100m
• 200m
• 1 mile
• Max arm-lock pull-ups in a row
• Max burpees in two minutes (w/ overhead hand clap)
• Max KB snatch in 2 min
• Tire flip
• Max reps bench press
• Football throw for distance
• The Phlegethon*: a 7-part individual medley that combines speed, agility, cardio & strength (2 min plank / 100m sprint on track / 25 burpees / bear crawl sideline to sideline to opposite side of track / 50 LBCs / 50 single-arm KB swings / 200m fireman’s carry w/ KB to finish).
Awards/COT
* A river of boiling blood and fire” in the 7th circle of hell in Dante’s Inferno.
35 degrees. In early March? What happened to the balmy 60 degree days of February?
14 men showed up to start the workout this morning. Joker and Floor Slapper showed up around 5:45 claiming something about how the “pre-run” went too long. My guess is Joker suckered Floor Slapper into some off the books partner exercises.
If it wasn’t quite obvious I made this up on the fly. I thought about the Hairburners, but the rest was up for grabs.
Mosey around Church and end up in the new circle between a couple of the lower school buildings for COP.
SSH, CDD, IW, Rotating Merkins, Maybe something else.
Partner up.
P1 runs to steps and back while P2 does exercise – 2 rounds, per partner, per exercise. We did squat jumps, single leg squats, and dips on the bench.
Mosey over to parking lot and each team grab a plate. A perfect 8 teams for 8 plates.
P1 – Hairburner to other set of parking spots and back. P2 Merkins. Flapjack and repeat to 100 merkins.
Do that again except 150 Monkey Humpers – that combo was awful.
P1 Grip walk to sidewalk, switch hands and come back (grip walk = grab plate one handed by the edge, not the middle hole). P2 – Squats. Flapjack for 2 rounds.
Do that again except flutters.
Now Hgirburner CMIYC – 10 merkins and chase. Hairburner up to the road.
Now Grip walk CMIYC to cars – 3 burpees and chase.
7 minutes left – circle up in field for mary. One at a time get up and hit pull up bars for 10 pull-ups to cover off on challenge requirement. We sort of did, Flutters, Dolly, LBC, Bicycle, Russian Twist, CCV, Protractor, but mostly just laid back and chatted like 5th grade girls. #FunFriday
Moleskine:
Right off the bat Horsehead is all worried I am doing the Merkin/Pull-up challenge and that would be what the workout was all about. Well, I am not, and wasn’t planning on it. But its never hard to knock out 150 merkins and 10 pull-ups at a bootcamp. So we got close to it.
Lex Luthor came in at 5:30 on two wheels, then proceeded to take his sweet old time getting the ruck out of the car and installing it. He caught up. But I made him do CDD in COP as punishment. Everyone knows CDD’s with a ruck on is awesome. I mean, if you like getting hit in the back of the head with a back pack full of bricks.
Bulldog was impressed with the Q’s spin moves during COP. Challenged him to do so during Merkins. It was pretty.
Lots of ninja rolls over the Hairburners today. Sorry fellas, the smooth parts of that pavement are nice and smooth, but that tar strips gums up the plate pretty quick. Glad no major injuries.
Aye! 27 HIMs leapt into the gloom at Peak 51 on Thursday. We had a mix of newbies, veterans and those, like YHC coming out of a period of extended fartsacking. The first couple of “phases” of this workout were inspitred by my 16yo 2.0s volleyball coach, hence the name. And it goes a little something like this…
The Thang
Little baby job from launch to parking lot behind FBC Matthews.
COP
-10 Merkins
– 15 SSH
– 8 Merkins
– 15 Squats
-6 Merkins
– 15 LBCs
– 4 Merkins
– 15 Imperial Walker
– 10 Merkins
Mosey across the way to the BB&T lot.
Lucky 7
Count off in 1s and 2s for a set of “sevens” – two exercises where reps always add to 7.
Supine pull ups on bar behind BB&T; Merkins at other end of lot; jog in between
– 6 and 1, 5 and 2,…..
Mosey to parking lot behind Matthews Elementary School
Suicide Shuffle
Stay in groups and gather for suicide shuffle
Group 1: Suicides to each of the three light poles
Group 2: Exercises: Round 1 – Squats, Round 2- Merkins, Round 3 – LBCs
Flapjack after each round
Mosey to softball field
Bases of Death
Start to Home Plate
Bear crawl to 1B, 10 Squats
Lunge walk to 2B, 15 LBCs
Backwards job to 3B, 10 Burpees
Run to Home, 15 Merkins
Run back to launch spot and finish off with merkins and LBCs.
COT
Moleskin:
– Great work by all the pax. It was an honor to lead #Peak 51 and thanks to Booyah for getting me on the Q schedule. Hope everyone enjoyed the workout and got what they were looking for.
– Welcome to Matoke, our FNG. He is from Uganda and apparently Matoke is a fantastic banana dish. T-claps to Strikeout for bringing him out.
– After having been away from F3 for a while, it is great to be back. I realize how important F3 is overall to me and really missed the 2nd F.
All I got.
Dolphin
18 men stepped into the probably typical but seemingly cold Friday AM gloom with the promise on the Twitter of some #FunFriday. This is how it went down:
Mosey to the near end of the track for quick circle and 20xSSH
Mosey to the far end of the track for a quick circle and 20xIW
Mosey to the near end of the track for a quick circle and 20xMtn Climbers (no one saw the forshadowing in that one)
Mosey to the far end of the track, next to Grandma Mountain for something new. Not 7s or 11s but 14s. Burpees at the bottom and squats at the top.
After that little bit of work we moseyed up Grandma one more time for some gym work. Partner up where P1 does AMRAP pullups while P2 does 30 LBCs and flapjack 3x.
Mosey to the far end of the field for a little push-a-rama – Merkins x10, Wide Merkins-10 and Diamond x5
Finally on to #FunFriday with relay races. 4 man teams for 25 yard sprints. In the Total Request Live segment, we did one round with bear crawls rather than sprints
Mosey back to cars for 10 burpees OYO
COT.
Moleskin:
1) Interesting how where you were yesterday influences what you think today. Stone Cold was in Tampa and this fine 35 degree morning felt cold. YHC had been in Pittsburgh this week where it was snowing with 23 wind chill yesterday this 35 felt great.
2) Yeti thinks we had a strong turnout due to a “magnetic” Q. YHC thinks it was the #FunFriday in the tweet
3) Why 14s up Grandma? Simple answer is that 1+2+3+…+14=105 so it’s another way to get to 100 burpees and a lot of trips up the hill
4) Amazing how fast you feel running on the flat track after all those trips up Grandma
5) Doesn’t appear the PAX watch many track or swimming relays. Somehow the 4 man relay had about 12 legs. Might have something to do with all the BRR training the PAX does. Relays don’t have to be 200+ miles…
6) Good to have Les Mis back for a time from South Africa for a bit