Category: Alcatraz

The Cornerstone – Challenge ( One Year Long )

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To all the Pax of F3 Nation

Are you prepared to challenge your self for 2019? I am challenging all Pax’s to join me for 2019 we will take on one exercise for January (merkins single count) 100 reps every day. Then in February we will add another exercise which will be done every day on top of the 100 merkins and so on and so on. We will increase by adding one exercise each month.  These exercises will be above and beyond when you post. So by the end of the year there will be 12 exercises that need to be done everyday at the reps set.

Do you accept the challenge? Do you want to get better?

I will set the next month exercise and reps the week before to keep you on your toes

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300 and more at Alcatraz

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Two of the Fort Mill famous Run and Gun Musketeers led Saturday’s Alcatraz workout.  One, Mainframe, has been a solid, regular poster and another, Bolt, has been fartsacking too much and turning into a Kotter Q (only posting when Q’ing). Bolt arrived early to lay out his goodies.

Solid plan in hand from both. Mainframe led out testing everyone’s stamina.

Started with a lap around park then back to parking lot for normal starters – Windmills, Hillbilly Walkers, SSHs, Merkins, Mountain Climbers, and MNCs.

Warm-ups done, onto the “300”. Pretty simple concept, 10 exercises, 30 reps each. The focus was on legs and abs. The plan was to run suicides after every 2 exercises. 3 line suicide with 10 seal jacks at each line.

Exercises for the 300 were: Smurf Jacks, Flutters, Bomb Jacks, Tiny Os (15 each way), Plank Jacks, Big Boy Sit-ups, Jump Squats, Box Cutters, Monkey Humpers, & Hello Dollies. We had to skip the suicides between the last set in order to stay in the :30 time window. (It’s amazing how we get used to 20 reps on most exercises… so pushing past for another 10 can really bring about the mumble-chatter).

Bolt took over with sandbag mania , duct tape wonders at 4 of 6 stations. Pairs went to each station and did work during a time frame of about 2 minutes. The actual time was determined by the pair of PAX either carrying sandbags down the parking lot with burpee stops and/or the pair of PAX working and dragging the 140# Worm sandbag across the field and back. (trust me, that sucked). After each performance, met in the middle for some ab work, then broke out back to the stations.

The 6 stations were: sandbag carry with at least 3 burpee stops, sandbag American hammers, playground hang (as long as you can), 10# sandbag each hand or cinderblock burpees, Worm drag, Balls to the Wall.

Implementing individual stations, it should be noted, has it’s positives and negatives. It can offer some creativity. It allows for PAX to workout at their own pace. If paired, builds comraderie. But the Q has to be aware that he is no longer “directly leading”.  PAX may not push at the stations as much as if the Q was leading. Q’s should make sure they are mixing up their Q’s over time.

As a write this BB, I can tell you I am really sore in the thighs and lower back. Pushing up the rep count will do that and should be done periodically. Mixing in something unusual like a 140# Worm pull will definitely work new muscles.

Thanks to PAX for their effort. Had some good mumblechatter. It was highly unusual, but this Alcatraz stayed in the parking lot for the full hour. I’m pretty sure that won’t happen again. It was great meeting again some new PAX. Keep posting and Q!!! Thanks to PAX for helping Bolt cleanup.

COT –

Decibel requesting support with the breakdown of Badger’s business. This is what F3 is all about. Support your brothers, do what you can.

Cornerstone still collecting bandaids for the Children’s Home. Xmas party was same today, now happened, and looked like a very good time. Join Bolt in Paradise every Saturday 3:00 pm to workout and interact with the kids of the community. Volunteer at the afterschool tutoring and homework at Bethlehem Baptist every Monday and Wednesday 3:00 pm.

Bolt spoke of his fartsacking  and thanks Jekyl for the kind words about his involvement in the Paradise community. PAX, always speak up about your brothers and the good things they do.

Mainframe took us out. PAX met at DD for some F2.

 

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The Fort launches Q Source

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Are you ready to #accelerate your role as a leader within your home, workplace and community? Would the accountability and encouragement from other #HIMs from the Fort make a difference in your growth as a leader? If the answer is yes, then you are ready to take the Q Source journey in 2019!

 

The Thang

Launch: Saturday, January 5th

Site: Ballroom AO – Pleasant Knoll Elementary School

Time: 6:30 – 7:30 followed by Coffeeteria at the Eternal Shack

Qs: Change Order, Royale, Twister, Jedi and Pusher – Stinger, Q of the Q Source, will lead the coffeeteria

Responsibility of the Pax: Read the Q Point, Disturbance to the Status Quo, prior to posting

 

The mission of F3 nation is to plant, grow and serve small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership. Over the past 6 years of the Fort, you have led our region to impressive numbers of HIMs, increased fitness, CSAUPs, numerous 2ndF opportunities, community #Impact, increased Faith, the accountability of a fellow brother and many other great outcomes.

While the DRP offers preparedness and the Pax provide the accountability, there is still room to accelerate the growth as a leader. As many of you have read or heard on 43 Feet podcast, Dredd has written a “field manual for leadership” consisting of 54 Q Points meant to accelerate a man through his G3L (Get Right, Live Right, Lead Right, Leave Right). You can find more information at https://f3nation.com/category/q/or by listening to the weekly roundtable podcast featuring Stinger https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/f3-nation/id1218921251?mt=2&i=1000424612754

 

While our 1/5/19 discussion will be a convergence, beginning January 12th Q Source discussions will be immediately following our regular Saturday AOs. There will also be a Wednesday coffeeteria option (site TBD). The following HIMs have stepped up to lead:

The Deep – Royale

Alcatraz – Change Order

The Yard – Twister

The Fort – Pusher

Wednesday AO (site TBD) – Jedi

This concept takes the lessons learned from the Bible Challenge (accountability), Beyond (vulnerability) and Whetstone (shieldlock) and encompasses them all in one. Your commitment would be to post, Q a discussion(s) if necessary and read the weekly Q Point.

If you are committed to continuing your growth as a HIM and leader, please respond via the Google Form https://goo.gl/forms/Jzv9kmytqFJSBqiE3

 

For any questions, please contact Pusher at eddie.d.dowling@gmail.com or @Pusher_F3.

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Tick Talk

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It was a beautiful cool morning at Alcatraz. 8 men showed up for the workout, the Sale family represented half of the Pax.

After a quick disclaimer, we took a stroll around the block.  This would be the extent of the running we would do for the morning.  Next, we did the following warm up exercises:

SSH x 15

Imperial Walkers x 15

Plank Stretches

Honeymooner, downward dog

Arm/shoulder stretches

Next, we each grabbed a paver and moseyed to the basketball court.  We formed a circle like a clock.  At each number of the clock, an exercise would be performed until the person at the top of the hour (#12) finished a set of exercises (Round 1 and 2:   Squat Thrusters – set of 20, Round 3 and 4:  Burpees – set of 5).  After the completion of the exercise, the Pax would lunge walk to the next hour on the clock with or without the paver in hand.

Below are the exercises (with paver) for each hour:

  1.  Paver swing
  2. Tricep Extension
  3. Merkin
  4. Flutter
  5. Upright Row
  6. Curl
  7. Chest Press
  8. LBC
  9. Lawn Mower
  10. American Hammer
  11. Calf Raise
  12. Squat Thruster/Burpee

Great job by everyone.  Lots of good chatter and fellowship.

 

Announcements:

Read your newsletter

 

Prayers / Praises:

Bob the Builder’s recovery

Families

Work

 

 

 

 

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Charter Band-aids for Little Warriors – PreBlast

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As most of the PAX in the Fort and Rock regions knows my 5 year old daughter (Emma) is a leukemia survivor. We still make a trip every 4 weeks to get blood drawn to check her counts at Levine Children’s Hospital. We also stepped up and raised money last year (Christmas time) for a fellow brother bout-time out of Area 51 son Jennings who has leukemia also.

It has come to my attention that the budgets have been cut in some of the pediatric departments and the first thing to go is usually the character band aids. You say how important is to have these band-aids? Well as far as the cancer kids go every time the have their PORT’s (Port is a small medical appliance that is installed beneath the skin. A catheter connects the port to a vein) which for some kids is traumatic they get a band-aid over it. For others that are done with treatment such as my daughter Emma has to go back for the next 21 years to get checked (mainly blood counts). This not always easy for instance this past Wednesday she was poked 3 times. Well at the end the band aid can put a smile on a child’s face. This also goes for those kiddos that have to constantly get blood work done not just cancer kids.

So what I am challenging you to do is every week you go grocery shopping buy at least one box or more of character band-aids girls or boys. Also Spread the word in every COT. I will tweet out what AO’s I will be at and if anyone wants to step up and help me collect that would be awesome.

I also challenge others in different regions to pull together and do the same thing. My goal is to gather as much as possible and split it between Levine Children’s Hospital and Novant Health Hemby Children’s Hospital (St. Jude Affiliate Clinic) before Christmas.

Let a simple act of kindness put a smile on a little fighters face.

AYE. Lets do this.

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Fall Sunrise at Alcatraz

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Six faithful PAX removed themselves from the fartsack to post for the Fall Premier of Alcatraz.

Conditions: Temperature mid-50’s, Dew – heavy, Gloom – minimal due to maintenance crew turning on the field lights.

Work: Change Order kicked it off with a disclaimer, mosey and a warm-up COP with some stretching and 10 counts of SSH’s, Merkins, Imperial Walkers, Freddie Mercurys, and maybe some more.

2 rounds of a 4-Armed Starfish with 10 Burpees in the center (round 1) and 10 Bomb-Jacks (round 2)

  • 25 SSH’s
  • 25 Merkins
  • 25 Freddy Mercurys
  • 25 Low Slow Squats

Paver work with two cycles of 20 Curls and 20 Overhead Tricep Extensions

Handoff to YHC for a mosey around the park, including a trip down and up the hill, with a few stops for a 20 yard bear crawl, 10 pull-ups and some squats, 10 dips, and 10 merkins more bear crawls, and ending with a short plank.

Behind the dugout for 20 step-ups each leg, and another 10 dips, then to the field for a 15 minute Wheel-of-Pain.

With 10 minutes to go, we hit the small field wall for a variety of PAX called exercises with field sprints.  Wall Sits, BTTW, Merkins, SSH’s, and a mini Yoga session.

Wrap-up: Having been an aspiring Ragnarian for the last few months, (I can run, I’m just not good at it), it was good to be back at Alcatraz.  It is worth noting that choosing to focus only on running for a few months, makes Boot Camps a LOT harder than they used to be.  Review the above and note the low rep counts.

YHC realized yesterday evening that there was not a Q lined up for Alcatraz this morning.  Thank you Change Order for agreeing to step up and join me.  As always, I am thankful for the opportunity to lead.

Praises for a mother’s successful surgery, for F3, and a safe and healthy morning.

-Smuggler

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PRE BLAST F3 The Fort 6th Annual Invergence

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Men of  The Fort,

On Friday, September 21st, we will celebrate 6 years of Fitness, Fellowship, and Faith in the Fort Mill area with our annual F3 Invergence party.   Bring a beverage, some food to share, and enjoy a relaxing evening with your brothers.   We’ll have presentations from your local leadership, take a look back at the previous year, and look ahead to what’s in store for 2019  F3 The Fort and F3 Nation.     This is the premier 2nd F event of the year so mark your calendars now,  and plan on being at Rush Pavilion on Friday night, September 21st.

This is a great FNG opportunity!

This is a Pax only event.  Make it up to your M and 2.0’s next weekend.
What:  Fort Mill Invergence (6th anniversary party)
When:  Friday, September 21, 5:30pm – 10:00pm
Where:  Bruce T. Rush Pavillion at the Anne Springs Greenway
Bring:  Food, drink, chair, cash (to cover the pavillion rental/donations to the F3 Foundation)
Please use the link below to RSVP and list what food you will bring:
6th year F3 The Fort Invergence Food Sign Up:

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0F4CAFAE2FA7FD0-f3thefort

 

 

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Alcatraz “fun”

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8 HIM got better this morning at Runde Park for some Lutefisk and Bear Grylls fun.

After a quick disclaimer (no FNGs) we moseyed around the parking lot to the field where we circled up for 7 warm-up exercises:

Peter Parkers  x 15
American Hammers x 15
Carolina Dry Docks x 15
Krakken Burpees x 5 OYO
E2K’s (R ankle over L knee, L elbow to R knee like a crunch) x 15
Ranger Merkins x 15
Seal Jacks x 15

And yes, that spells PACKERS.  GO PACK GO!!  Thank goodness the NFL is back on.  I’ve been having withdrawals.

The Thang:

Start with a modified “Charles Bronson:”
Perform 50 exercises at point A, sprint 100-ish yards to point B, army crawl to point C, mosey back to point A for 50 different exercises.
1st exercise: 50 x Side Straddle Hop
2nd exercise: 50 x Merkins
3rd exercise: 50 x Jump Squats

Next a modified “Millennial:” The PAX thought I would be calling out the exercises via text, twitter, or some other form of nonverbal communication.  Perhaps  we’d just have Bear Grylls do all of the exercises for us while we sat and watched.  But no, we’re gonna earn this one.  Split PAX into 2 teams of 4.  Starting point, do 25 x of each exercise, mosey 100 yards, 25 x of exercise, mosey 100 yards back, 25 x of exercise… you get the point.  Rinse and repeat 10x for a grand team total of 2000 ‘reps’ in honor of the millennials born around the year 2000.
1-Carolina Dry Docks
2-Squats
3-Moroccan Night Clubs
4-Flutters
5-Mountain Climbers
6-LBC’s
7-Merkins
8-Lunges
9-Side Straddle Hop
10-Burpees (a crowd pleaser)

And with that Lutefisk handed the baton to Bear Grylls.  The PAX were toast, and unsure of what to expect from what we saw earlier which looked like the unloading of Myrtle Beach from his Range Rover onto the sidewalk above captured in bags.

Ten stations were set up about 10 yards apart for partner work. The pace setters on the end were either a ruck down and up the hill or carry a 100lb sand bag up and down the hill. The other stations were AMRAP and included…. a ton of sandbags.  Each bag had different weights from 30lbs to 60lbs and included: calf raise into overhead press, bear crawl bag drag, row into curl, dead lift into kettle bell swing, and a ball slam and jump from crunch position.

With that a mosey to COT where we honored CSPAN with one thing each of us is thankful for. Prayers and praises for kids, uncles, jobs.  Praises for families, F3, job anniversaries.  Bear Grylls led us out in prayer.

I feel honored, humbled, and blessed to be able to have an opportunity to lead these true HIM who come out and give it all they have to get better.

Lutefisk out.

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The mid-40’s Dynamic Duo Q

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Thanks to Smuggler for letting two crazy mid-40’s team up like never before into the Dynamic Duo. Lots of fun and wetness out there in the gloom. We focused today on encouraging one another and pushing through (the pain). Over 50% of this workout was aimed at strengthening your core with some endurance training to finish things off.  Speaking for Old Bay and myself – we had a blast (and this was no easy workout)! We hung around for some “coffeeteria” as well afterwards. I counted the total number of burpees and it was between 65-72 depending on what you went for. Special thanks to Wild Thing for making the trip to Tega Cay and demonstrating superb burpee form.

Warm-up:

DYNAMIC STRETCHING:

Jog – 1 Min

High Knees – 30 Seconds

Butt Kickers – 30 Seconds

Toy Soldiers – 30 Seconds

Lateral Shuffles – 30 Seconds (each side)

Lateral Lunges – 10 (5 each side)

Low semi-slow Squats – 12

Alternating Forward Lunges  – 10 (5 each side)- We rotated our torsos towards the side of the leg that is in front for each movement.

Low diamond Merkins – 15 single set

Single Leg Toe touches with other leg going back – 10 (5 each side)

Peter Pointers – 10

Rolling Crucifix – 5X each side

Table Twists – 5X each side

 

THE THANG:

I talked about the Nasty 7s that I had done with Sasquatch before and at an impromptu Q at The Ranch, but decided not to do them because of wetness from the night before so I gave the option. Most decided to do a jog to each corner in the basketball court and 4 burpees at each corner. Total was 20 here. I will have to formally teach the Nasty 7 at another time.

Stacked Feet/Staggered Hands Merkin (switch every 4) – 60 secs

Banana Rolls – 120 secs – Did with coupon for 60 of those secs

Leaning Crescent Lunges with coupon – 1 min with and 1 min without

Sphinx Merkin – 60 secs max reps

Bow to Boat – 120 secs – I was nice and we did not do with a coupon 

Side Lunge and raise coupon to put on the imaginary “shelf” – 45 secs each direction

Prison Cell Burpee (boy these were fun!)- 60 secs

Side Hip Raise – 30 secs each side

High Plank to 6 inches Run (this one really stunk)- 60 secs

Superman Banana – 60 secs

Yellow rope hoppers – 60 secs

Hillbilly Walkers – 30 secs

Imperial Walkers – 30 secs

300 Secs of Abs:

Upper Circle LBCs – 30 secs each direction; 5 sec rest between each

Twisting Pistons – 30 secs

Alligator Walks  (on forearms) 60 secs;

Canoe Crunch – 30 secs

Slow LBC and Twist (Crunch and Twist) – 60 secs

Regular Plank to the end – 60 secs

Immediate transition into my partner in crime’s Q, the infamous Old Bay:

1) Bent ladder with Morning Wood on the field and Burpees at the entrance to the parking lot. Run between a burpee and the field was backwards and a side shuffle left/right to a distant cone where Morning Wood (Turkish getup) occurred and repeat. This was taxing!

2) Catch-me-if-you-can on path around fields. Exercise was Merkins/Butt-kickers.

3) 7 extra burpees

4) SSH – 15

COT: Key items: Prayers for the Ms and praise for Delta’s great news.

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Hills, Arms, Suicides and Hills

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Sir Topham Hat and I were pretty excited to take on Alcatraz together. A couple or “runners” who really “enjoy” hills? What could possibly go wrong? A warning was sent on the Twitter machine that this would be hill intensive, so I was pleased to see 11 Pax show in addition to YHC and STH. It was a bit of an Alcatraz reunion of sorts with some familiar faces. We knew we needed to bring it.

STH on Q

  • Warm up jog with side shuffles, butt kickers and high knees
  • Mosey to the play area
  • Amrap pull-ups (unassisted), 20CDD – 3 Times
  • Mosey to Parking Lot
  • COP: SSHx20, cherry pickers x 10, Mountin Climbers x 20, Peter Parker’s x 10, 6” twice
  • Mosey to Upper Hill for Jacobs ladder
  • 7 burps and 1 bombjack at top.  Made it 4 rounds
  • Al Gore to squats (which prompted some colorful comments. Just do an Al Gore while doing squats and it’ll become clear immediately.
  • Mosey to Wooden wall.  7 count incline merkins in cadence, flip to dips 7 count in cadence.  Flap jack 4 times #smokefest
  • Handoff to Zima

Zima on Q

  • Mosey to Parking Lot
  • 25 SSH IC
  • 17 Something I can’t remember IC (I blame it on being light-headed)
  • Mosey to Middle of Parking Lot for Suicide Burpees (5 burpees at baseline each time running to 3 increasing suicide targets)
  • Walk 20 yards back for 10 hand release merkins at baseline with 4 suicide series targets
  • Walk 20 yards back for 7 bombjacks at baseline and 5 suicide series targets
  • Go to field for 4 corners
  • Corner 1 20 Monkey Humpers IC
  • Corner 2 20 Walking Lunges IC
  • Corner 3 20 Monkey Humpers IC
  • Corner 4 15 LS Squats IC
  • Run to short steep lower hill for 5 Min Quadzilla (insert copious amounts of complaining herre)
  • Mosey back to parking lot for 5 mins Pax Choice Mary
  • Finish with double 10 count body destroyer

All in all it was a pretty good smokefest. Everyone pushed their limits

NMM (here are our notes)

  • STH is super fit but bailed for Zima Q (cited family commitments)
  • Fish Sticks = #King #WarDaddy
  • Great mumblechatter this AM
  • Maximus is a beast and smiles through the entire workout like “Is that all you got?” Yes Max, it is.
  • Highlight of the morning was Dark Helmet’s commentary on STH’s Al Gore Squats #graphic #hilarious
  • A couple of Pax almost got laid out by a Buck (Deer) that didn’t see them and then shot off across the street
  • Quadzilla is still a crowd pleaser (esp. when you add a minute)
  • For all the comments about being out of shape, Gears seemed to be towards the head of the pack
  • Glad to see half the team of “Beauty and the Beasts” support us

Prayer, Praises, Announcements

BOM on Zima

Thanks for the opportunity to lead Smuggler! Keep me in the rotation.

Zima Out!

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