I picked up the Q as a trade with Bing who will be taking the reigns in the April. – Watch out

It turned out to be a good trade too, as I would be Q’ing with Aquaman.
I often see people complaining about his Q’s after they post. “The Pain, the pain!”

– Sweet!

The Thing

Warm up
– SSH
– Merkins
– Imperial Walker
– Windmills

Stroll around the field discovering four markers along the way…

A little game of “Four Corners”.

Partner up

Returning to the first marker, partner one would perform an exercise as slow as possible while partner two would run a lap around the four stations as fast as possible. Partners switch positions on return.

The goal of the effort was to have as low of a count between the two as possible.
To keep things even and aid accountability at the stations, the cadence was to be managed by the pax together. We would do this for each station.

Station 1 – Merkins
Wheelbarrow to station 2
Station 2 – Squats
Slow bear crawl to station 3
Station 3 – the Burpee
Wheelbarrow (partner switch) to station 4
Station 4 – Mountain Climbers (methinks)

With the six in, we moseyed to the middle of the field.
Jack Web 10/40 (don’t forget to count)
Pax Choice ab lab – Everyone had a turn

The Q was then turned over to Aquaman

With the rising sun, we ventured out of the park…
Off to that friendly sounding Tara Tea Drive… (what a monster…)

Cones were placed along the side of the road from the bottom of the hill to the top

We were to do exercises from one cone to the next
First cone to second: burpee broad jumps
second to third: Ono’s
Third to top of hill: Bear Crawl

After we summited this the first time, Aqauman says:
“Find a good pace, we’ll be doing this for awhile…” and… we did…

Excellent effort by all men, I think everyone summited Tara Tea at least four times.

Next, Aquaman doubled the cones and we did reverse suicide ladder up that monster. (Nobody misses this.)

Then we posted at the top of the hill where we did ab work using the incline to your dis-advantage.
Goal: 50 leg raises from decline / 50 sit-ups from decline

With that we were broken! Aye!

NMM

I had a theme in mind for the workout this morning, but when it looked like the pax were all my seniors, I dropped the theme realizing that I had nothing to share but respect. Humbling experience to post with my elders as they take the DRP. #Respect

Here is what struck me as I was leaving the post that morning…

First: What is your weinke this weekend? This week? This month?

Second: Are you going to honor it?

Never give up, take your ground and press on. Aye!

On that note:
Consider Whetstone, brothers in arms, Iron Sharpening Iron.
Whetstone video…
Whetstone Sign up form…

About two years ago, I made some plans.

The plan was to drop some extra weight.  I started working out with the ferns and was off to a decent start.  Luckily I was EH’d by Pusher into F3 and not only did the extra weight come off, but then some.

The plan was to get my cholesterol to a respectable number without meds.  That happened too, and then some.

The plan was to NOT to have a heart attack. That’s where my luck ran out.

On February 13, I will be participating in the Cupid’s Cup 5K. This fundraising event supports Carolinas Medical Center’s Cardiac Rehabilitation Center. I happen to be a proud graduate of the 12 week program, having had a heart attack early last year. The work I put in with F3 helped my recovery and I am convinced it made my “event” less severe. But not everyone is so lucky. And not everyone who needs the center can afford it. So it’s important that I use my advantage of a full recovery to raise awareness of this great facility. My LAD (left artery descending) now has three stents. You can use my fundraising page (tinyurl.com/cupidcup2016) to help support this great cause.  My goal is to raise $300 per stent for a total of $900. Rock Thrill & Deacon gave me a great start last week with their generous gifts.  Whatever you can spare to help reach this goal will be greatly appreciated.

It would also be awesome to have some PAX join me at the event. It’s a great course through the Dilworth neighborhood. Here’s the link to register for the event itself.(http://tinyurl.com/CupidCupRegistration)  Use the “F3-Fort Mill” team.

As we all know, we make plans and life happens (or the Sky Q laughs).  My roadblock while scary was not a huge burden in the long run.  I’m grateful for the support of my F3 brothers, other friends & family.  Because of that support system, I was able to overcome the emotional side of my recovery easily.  And without that roadblock I would never think to raise awareness for a facility such as the Cardiac Rehab Center.  Thanks to their awesome work, I look forward to supporting them for many years to come.

No, he’s not dead. He was, however, supposed to be my co-Q for Alcatraz that day, but had to change those plans due to: life. Not a problem, very appropriately a guy that Jekyll EH’ed stepped up. T-claps to Fish Sticks.

So a couple things you should know: 1. Jekyll named me. It was after his co-Q with Pusher at WEP where I was pretty sure I was going to die afterward. 2. After the first time I posted on a Friday at Slow Burn, it was Jekyll who came up to me after and said, “what are you doing now?” I answered, “I dunno, what happens now?” And he came in to Chicken and Wisdom with me. I was a new guy, I was little confused by this new cult group I was a part of, and he helped me feel welcome. It was appreciated. Since then, he and I have posted at a two-man Black Diamond workout where he Q-ed and I’m pretty sure I’m still sore from (it was like 6 months ago), have posted dozens of other times together, served alongside one another, etc. At this point, this whole thing is starting to sound a little too… I dunno… So, enough of all that.

The reason I mention those things, though, is that I thought it would be appropriate to lead the Pax in some horrible things that I learned from Jekyll over the last year. So, as is the usual case, we disclaimed and were off.

The Thang:
First there was some talking (yes, I can help myself, I just choose not to):
In my first workout with F3, Jekyll made us do a bunch of partner work. Between that and a couple of weeks later doing a terrible number of partner pull-ups with Spiderman, I really caught what I feel is the magic of F3 for me. That bond formed by the misery of a shared, terrible experience is what won me over. It’s why I love posting in the rain, or in the 7 degree weather… But I digress…
Next, there was some moving:
Warm up lap around the park then circle up:
Squats x 20
Windmill x 15
Mountain Climbers x 20
IW x 20
SSH x 20

Partner Ring of Fire:
8 stations in a ring about 50 ft from center, as follows:

1. 25 Partner Derkins (each)
2. 15 Partner Squats (each)
3. 30 Plank Jacks
4. 25 Partner Dips (each)
5. 10 Partner Rows (each)
6. 15 Partner Press (each)
7. 10 Booyah Merkins
8. 20 Big boy situps

Partner Carry out to cone, Bear crawl back to center. In center do Cinderblock burpees x 5, then move to next station.

Repeato as many rounds as possible until the 30 minutes is up.

Then… More talking. I’ll explain more of this at the end…

Hand off to Fish Sticks:
Mosey over to what may be the worst hill in Tega Cay (and that’s saying something).
Then it was 12s for the rest of the time (as opposed to Elevens… it was his daughter’s birthday this week, and she turned 12, so there you have it)
At the bottom of the hill do 1 squat. At the top of the hill, do 11 CDDs.
Next round = 2 squats, 10 CDDs… you get the idea.
When time was up, we moseyed back to COT.
Yes, in case you were wondering, it was terrible…

NMM:
A couple things I think were worthy of note:
1. I found it helped to keep going up and down that horrible hill all those times if I closed my eyes and swore under my breath a lot. Feel free to use this technique whenever you deem appropriate.
2. Hauschka brought his 2.0s to the workout. It was cold. And a Saturday during a long school break. And I had cinderblocks to workout with. And those brats lapped us… It was awesome.
3. At one point, about 5 or 6 rounds in, Mr. Clean started running up the hill backwards. “I need to work a different part of my body for a bit, this sucks.” or something like that was the explanation. Good stuff.

Right before I handed things over to Fish Sticks, I shared one other thing. About 3 years ago, long before F3, in my not-quite-as-directed efforts to be a good dad, I would frequently take all 3 girls to breakfast on a Saturday. I thought I was checking off “Good-Dad” boxes and persisted in doing it, even though they secretly hated it. I wouldn’t find this out until later, but it stemmed from this one experience in particular (with others similar in nature). Youngest had gotten apple juice with breakfast. On the way home, I said, “let’s not take the apple juice in the car.” After the “please dad, I’ll be really careful” routine, I relented. Within two miles, the apple juice was, of course, spilled in its entirety in the backseat. I was livid. I jerked the car to the side of the road and started fuming and cleaning. It was ugly. There was crying, yelling… just a bad scene. With the apple juice more or less cleaned up, the rest of the car ride was silent. I knew I hadn’t done the right thing, but I didn’t know how to fix it either. I apologized later, and that’s fine, but that wasn’t fixing the problem, it was just cleaning up the aftermath of the problem.
Fast forward to today, and I can say with some degree of confidence that the problem is largely under control. Not perfect, but DRAMATICALLY improved. My girls like to go to breakfast with me now. I don’t lose my temper over much, and certainly not over apple juice. Oldest told me the other day that one of the main reasons she is glad that I do F3 is that I’m not “Mad Dad” anymore. That was powerful to me.
Now don’t misunderstand, I go to church. I am very active in it. I have faith in God. But all that wasn’t completely fixing the problem either. Certainly not because Christ CAN’T or won’t fix it. But I think it was like I was trying to finish making a cake but skipping some vital step. I would fill bowl after bowl with delicious batter, pour it in a pan, then stick it in the oven only to pull it out 30 minutes later as a pan full of batter. It was frustrating. I was doing nearly all the steps, but no results. The problem was, I think, that I just hadn’t turned the oven on. I think that for me, F3 has been the oven. I think it’s partly because I try to leave some amount of frustration, angst, anger, or any other negative emotion out in the gloom. Where it’s safe to leave it. I can work my body to clear my mind. I can talk it through with my brothers out there. And their shoulders are strong, not like my sweet daughters… So, thanks, men. The Helmet family appreciates you…

Helmet, out.