This backblast might be “better late than never”, but just barely. My apologies to the pax for being so tardy.

YHC got to the AO early to set up some cones for the main part of the workout, down in the parking lot at the bottom of the hill. While setting up, a security guard approached with flashlight in hand asking “Are you one of those workout guys?” My response in the affirmative brought his approval, and he carried on. Moments after, it occurred to me that an invite to join us sometime would have been good, and giving him an F3Nation “EH” business card would have been even better. I’m going to keep a stack of them to my car from now on, so if anyone would like a dozen or so assist with your EH’ing, let me know next time we cross paths.

At 0515, a quick disclaimer was issued to the solid group of veteran #HIMs, and off we moseyed to a nearby parking lot. A last minute text signaled CakeBoss would be coming in hot, so we stayed within visual range from the shovel flag for warm up.
COP Warmup:

– Windmills x10 (IC)
– Imperial Squats x10 (IC)
– SSH x 20 (IC) >> Lunges in/out
– Sealjacks x20 (IC) >> Lunges in/out
– Plank Jacks x15 (IC)
– Mountain Climbers x10 (IC)
– Alternating Shoulder taps x10 (IC)

The pax moseyed down to the parking lot at the bottom of the service road. Before starting the main event, I spoke briefly about Fatherhood, somewhat continuing on the discussion from the 3rdF event the Friday before.

Main Event: Ring of Fire
Not the Jekyll version (which involves cinder blocks and bear crawls), this modified version required pax to work their way around 12 cones (set up in a circle), each with a different exercise and count. Four steps to this, really.

– Perform exercise written on cone
– Run to cone on opposite side & back to middle
– In the middle, plant for 10 sec, then do 5 bomb jacks or squats
– Run to next cone and repeato

More discussions about Fatherhood, and we moseyed to a parking lot about half-way up the service road. Pax spread out about arm’s length apart and planked for Railroad Tracks, where each pax takes a turn jumping down the line, over the legs of all the pax, the dropping back down into a plank.

We moseyed further up the service road and found some wall for People’s Chair with Jack Reachers to 10. Repeato.

Mosey back to where we started for a bit of Mary
– Low slow flutters (10x)
– Hello Dollies (10x)
– Rosaletta (10x)
– Chopsticks (10x)
– LBCs (10x)

Just before COT, I wrapped up the discussion on Fatherhood with a quick review of the questions ChickenHawk provided in the 3rdF theme of the month slide for the newsletter (see below).

Naked Man Moleskin:
Just like leading workouts, I am no professional when it comes to being a father. I think most of us would admit that. But the fellowship and experience we share in F3 can help dads like me be better than I would be on my own. Studies have shown that daughters have tendency to marry a man of similar qualities to their father. Dads with daughters, how does knowing this affect the way you father your little girl? When your child is born, they are fully dependent on you and your M. By the time your girl grows up and moves out, she will be full dependent on something other than you. You have 18 years to make sure that dependency is on God, and not some knucklehead that can’t possibly fill the God-shaped hole in her heart.

While girls often grow up to marry a man like their dad, boys will often grow up to *become* their dad. It’s been said that we are each a copy of our dad, with a bunch of stuff we’ve put on top to cover up the things we don’t like about our dad. Sons model our heart’s behavior, not just what we say we are doing or what we tell them they should do. It’s ok to tell my son he should be reading his Bible. It’s better if he sees me reading it myself. But it’s best if he see me learning and living out what I read from His Word. And, for the record, I fall short of this very often.

Finally, be sure you check out these questions from ChickenHawk about fatherhood. And, for that matter, check out the entire document he put together (look in the 3rdF section of the last newsletter).
– What is your view of a Father’s role to your children?
– What mistakes, successes, lessons and/or wisdom would you share?
– How has your life experience shaped your approach to fatherhood?
– How do you approach fatherhood differently than your father?
– How has God/Jesus shaped your view of fatherhood?
– What do you think is the one, single most important attribute of a Father?
– What advice do you wish you had when you started?

An honor, as always, to lead the pax in a workout. Thanks so much to Change Order for allowing me the privilege.

AYE!
-old bay