PRE-BLAST: The Brotherhood of the Traveling Pants (AKA: #BTP)

Willpower is only the trigger to get a person started on a positive habit (#Brick). In order to maintain and continue #Bricklaying, a person needs to change the mental and physical environment in which they live, so that the habit can develop the “muscle memory” needed to go the distance. My #DRP list is lengthening, as is my ability to have #IMPACT in the men around me, and the following is intended to continue to put me on the right trajectory.

For the year of 2020, my word is “GO”.  In an effort to continue to #Accelerate my 1stF, and beginning on 1/6/20, I am instituting (for myself and anyone who wants to join me) an EC (Extra Credit) 15 minutes (of Boot Camp or running, or maybe even Broga) prior to every 45 minute workout. I will tweet and Slack the location with the hashtag #BTP the day before for those who wish to join me. (It’s a way to “trap” myself into an accelerating habit…)

For example, Monday I usually hit Honey Badger which is an hour workout. There would not necessarily be an EC prior to this (though there could be). Tuesday, I will be at Golden Corral. At 0500, I will begin an EC portion of the workout for those that want to join. It will launch from the same AO, and will be back at the AO in time for the 0515 normal start of the Post.

Clear as mud? Good. Ask me your questions. Otherwise, check your Twitter/Slack and #Accelerate with me.

Helmet, out.

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Be A Helper

Had a total of 7 men show up to end the year. I originally thought I wanted to do a partner workout till I reflected on the sermon of this past Sunday. It was set around looking for “The Helpers.” With that in mind I decided to do a workout that made everyone better together and focused on a no OYO.

So we all set out to four stations around Golden Corral and conducted a warm up at these 4 locations for a visual. We did one round of warm ups at each location with Side Straddle hops, Wind mills, Mericans, Cherry Pickers, Imperial/Hillbilly Walkers, and stuff.

So once the guys knew of the locations there was an exercise written at each Station. Between each station the mode of transportation was a brisk mosey. Station 1 exercise was a 50 double count of Flutter Kicks. Station 2 was a double count of Dying Cockroaches. Station 3 was a 50 count of LBC’s. Station 4 was a 25 count of The Claw (BRUTAL!!!).

We hit each station twice and then I gave the men a message/challenge for the new year. With all the challenges that we face we a lot of times only look at the bad things in life and push aside the positives. I opened up a little about my past of abuse, running away, and other struggles I faced growing up and informed them of “The Helpers” I had on my side to assist me in becoming a better person. To guide me away from the hardships of life to lift me up rather than leaving me in the gutter. I explained to them I don’t look at my past as something bad but something good, because of “The Helpers”. There was a lot more verbiage but the challenge I left the guys with was look out there and rather than bypassing it be That Helper. Be someone that gets into that Shield Lock. Or lifts someone up from the gutter.

After that we hit the Stations one more time. We were able to put in about 2.2 miles and about 500 reps of nothing but ab workout. These guys killed it and we did it together.

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Olaf coupon buffet at Golden corral

My knee was still recovering so minimal running was on the buffet. Luckily I have more than enough coupons to entertain the PAX crammed into my garage so the couponmobile was loaded down and sitting low rolling into the coral.

Short mosey after disclaim was disclaimed over to a warmup a Rama. It’s been too long since the actual workout so I’m going to list some of the staples I usually go for along with a few I remember.
Lots of SSH to start. I remember a comment about my knee must not hurt to do SSH so I made sure to add a couple 20-30 once the mumble chatter started for good measure.
Then a magnificent Peter Parker followed by Parker Peter screw up by YHC.
Then it wouldn’t be a snowman Q without a full circle of hump.
A little longer mosey to the church parking lot across the street where the coupons were organized into a painful sequence starting with picking up something awful and awkward and ending with battle rope AKA hose tug.

Oh and don’t forget the timer to rotate obstacles being the pull-up dead hang as the center attraction.

Everyone got better except DoaH and Spiderman who chatted the whole time like two schoolgirls at summer camp. Anyways it’s always an “interesting” time and muscles you don’t normally use were sore for days following.

Thanks for the opportunity to lead Lutefisk.

Until next time stay frosty my friends.

OLAF

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The Force To Bring Us Back In

**PRE-BLAST**

WHO: All PAX (Rucks Required)

WHAT: Burnout recovery workout

WHERE: FireAnt (same location as Golden Corral): Tega Cay Harris Teeter

WHEN: 0515 New Years Eve (Tuesday, December 31)

WHY: This one is simple. Read the below.

Why?

Sometimes we need some difficult, smack-you-in-the-face, force to get us out of the rut we’ve been living in.

Sometimes we need some difficult, smack-you-in-the-face, force to bring us back into something we’ve walked away from. Are you spent or burned out? Life has a gift for loading us up and ultimately, weighing us down. As men, it can cause retreat. It’s time to break free from that on our last day of 2019.

Come join your brothers for that difficult, smack-you-in-the-face, 45min workout at FireAnt on New Years Eve (Tues, Dec 31) at 0515 and I’ll make a run at freeing you from the burnout.

This world NEEDS YOU ENGAGED. The rings of you concentrica need you engaged. Work, community, friends, family, shorties, wife, GOD…it’s time to bring you back in.

Make no mistake, I AM NOT A PROFESSIONAL and you are doing this entirely at your own risk. My words are only ideas of things to do and I recommend you take the necessary precautions which start by reading F3’s disclaimer found on the following web site.

F3 disclaimer & notice found here…https://f3nation.com/disclaimer-and-notice/

What to bring:

  1. Yourself
  2. EH a buddy or Kotter, someone who could be in this stage right now.
  3. Ruck with GoRuck minimum weight requirements: 30lbs of weight in your ruck if you weigh 150lbs or more. 20lbs of weight in your ruck if you weigh 149lbs or less.
  4. Sandbags of any weight. (No other coupons needed)
  5. Gloves
  6. A determination to get some work done and a desire to reengage.

See you then.

Maximus

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Site vs Site

Well the Site vs Site was CRAZY good thanks to some excellent leadership on both sides of the workout. 0500 launch, 6 Q’s (3 from fire ant, 3 from golden corral) took 10 minutes each. Lutefisk forgot how to flip a coin but managed to have it land in favor of fire ant going first.  The first fire ant Q was Router who took us through a ruck run/pain station. Next up was golden corral’s first Q Mile High who took us on a sprint-fest in the back of HT with some wall work on the legs. Fire ant Q #2 was Cha Ching who put us through some nasty ruck reps.  Golden corral put Bones in charge of some repeating leg work by the green olive – some funky squat jumps that didn’t feel good.  Spiderman finished the fire ant lineup with a terrible idea of bear crawl/crawl bear for what seemed like eternity while the partner did reps with the ruck.  Lutefisk finished it up with the final golden corral Q by starting, and staying, in the plank position for the duration of his 10 minutes.  Dark Helmet notable threw in the towel and to make himself feel better he poked the Q.  I will not forget.  Welcome FNG Thigh Master (not Jane Fonda) but he’s from New York so evidently it’s OK to drop F-bombs whenever and wherever.  All in all 30 PAX came out for a nasty beatdown that was surely a crowd pleaser.  It was an honor to be a part of it and special thank you to the Q’s for stepping up and all of you ruckers for bringing us some extra gear to use.

Final tally of the votes: Fire Ant 15, Golden Corral 11, Tie 3, Bonsai = disqualified for his answer

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8 Extra Pounds

Twelve of Fort Mill’s finest met at the Harris Teeter on a perfect late fall morning.  While two set off for a ruck workout, the other 10 joined YHC and here is what they did:

Take a big loop around the HT parking lot and meet up at the white VW near the back of the lot.  Everyone pick up two bricks and mosey to the Green Olive Grille for COP:

Circle up and drop your bricks for SSH x 25 and 10 windmills.  Pick up your bricks and everyone in cadence for:  merkin x 10, squat x 15, imperial walker x 20, jump squat x 10, LBC x 20, hello dolly x 20, American hammer x 20 , diamond merkin x 10, Morrocan nightclub x 20.

Mosey to the back of the main parking lot, put your bricks into a pile, and then mosey to the front of Harris Teeter (about 50 yds).   Form two groups of 5.   The first group runs to the pile, picks up a brick, and runs back to the start point.  The second group does the same.  Rinse and repeat and until all the bricks are moved.   Once all the bricks are moved, repeat with two bricks per person and move the bricks to the start point (full disclosure – this was not how this was supposed to go!)

Mosey back to Green Olive grille and circle up for Jack Webb  (1:4).   We got to 7 merkins and 28 overheads with bricks before YHC’s form started to fail.

ABLAB with bricks:

Flying flutter x 20, V-up x 10, Superman hold x 3, X’s and O’s x 10.  Close with the body destroyer.

COT

I’ve been away from this AO for a while and it was good to see many new faces this morning.  What perfect weather for a boot camp!  Dark Helmut and Olaf provided the usual chatter  – thank you, gentlemen.    It was a pleasure to lead the Pax today and I hope you enjoyed the workout.

Announcements, Prayers, Praises:

Read your newsletter:   Saturday convergence at The Fort, Thanksgiving convergence, Xmas party all coming up.

Prayers for:  Kenyan and his family, a family member with recurring cancer, Olaf on his Spartan race.

 

 

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Keep It Together

15 PAX checked the weather report this morning and found that the pending rain storm was fiction.

The Thang

Mosey around the HT lot to the back side of the auto supply store for COP.

  • IW
  • Windmills
  • Potato Pickers
  • Monkey Humpers
  • Hillbilly Walkers

Mosey up to lot beside Walgreens for “The Rollercoaster”.  Simple routine for the PAX:

  • 30 Second Exercise
  • Lap Around the Lot (Walgreens and Jersey Mike’s)
  • 60 Second Exercise
  • Lap Around the Lot
  • 90 Second Exercise
  • Lap Around the Lot
  • 60 Second Exercise
  • Lap Around the Lot

Then we repeat… basically so it looks something like this:

90   #   #   #   #
60  # # # # # # # #
30 #   #   #   #   #
Exercise Duration
BTTW 00:00:30
Flutter 00:01:00
LBC 00:01:30
Squats 00:01:00
Burpees 00:00:30
American Hammer 00:01:00
SSH 00:01:30
Merkins 00:01:00
Bombjacks 00:00:30
Peter Parker 00:01:00
MNC 00:01:30
Parker Peter 00:01:00
Mountain Climber 00:00:30

Mosey back to COT for around 2 minutes of Mary.

NMM

The goal of today’s workout was to have all the PAX pushing together.  Often when we get into “routines”, we have some pax finish and others who do not.  Today’s goal was to keep it all together, so instead of reps, we essentially did AMRAP for time.

 

Announcements:

  • Nessie next weekend
  • Sometime in November will be a convergence with a panel about life lessons from the recent HTL.
  • Read your Newsletter

Prayers up for Marriages, Kids, and Sickness and Suffering.

 

Honor To Serve.

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Garbage Crawl

We had a strong group of 18 men that did a Garbage Crawl and took in the scent at the best smelling AO in the nation.  We embraced the suck and crushed the workout!

A quick Disclaimer was given and we were off.  However the Q forgot to ask about FNGs.  There were 3 and they dominated the workout today.

Mosey between dumpster one and two and circle up.

IW x20, CDD x15, Cherry Pickers x20, Merkins x12, Windmill x20, LSS x20-

Split into two groups

Group 1 BTW Group 2 Lunge Walk Halfway and sprint rest of way, run back- then switch.

Wall Sit, Crab Walk half way, backward run then back to wall and switch

BTW- Caveman Walk Halfway- sprint run back- switch

Wall Sit- Bear Crawl half way- backward sprint, run back- Switch

Mosey to half wall behind oil change place (finally away from the stench):  Partner up for some Dora

100 Irkens, 200 step ups, 300 squats- other partner runs in front of Napa- er O’Reilly or whatever that place is.

Do LBC x50, Freddy Mercury x50 and Hello Dolly x50

Finish off with some tens: 1 Derkin to 9 dips, 2 to 8 and so on.

Mosey to COT.

It was  a great mix of vets and rookies.  This is the first time in a long time I was able to welcome 3 FNGs.  Pretty awesome keep them coming.  My bad for not identifying them earlier.

Thank you for the chance to lead the AO I was previously site Q at.  What a blast!

 

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The Terrible Awful

Where is the weather break ,man?  91% humidity at 0515.  Dang, son.  While sweating through their shirts, everyone at least kept them on.  Confident we would have at least 1 invisible shirt guy had he posted at GC today…(Looking at you @ChangeOrder)

Mighty 11 today with 1 @Fishsticks just running.  Odd.  Bit of a #ForestGump situation if you ask me.  We ran- but ran and did stuff.

The #TerribleAwful

  • Start at Bank. Run to bottom of Hill.  5 X 3-Merkin Burpees.
  • Run up Hill. 5 Bombjacks.
  • Run to Wall- Lunges then 10 CDD
  • Run to Bank- Bear Crawl then 20 LBC
  • 1 lap includes 1/2 mile run
  • Shoot for 4 laps.  If you’re not first, you’re last.

Results:

The Pax crushed between 4 and 6 laps.  5 laps=   2.5 miles, 25 3-merk burpees, 25 bombjacks, 200 lunges, 50 CDD, 200 Bear Crawls, 100 LBC.

 

Naked Man Moleskin

Well, well, well.  Look at Lutefisk just killin’ out there.  Holmes took off like a bat outta hell and never gave up the lead.  AND takes the #VirtualTrophy for today, tying Sir Topham Hat with 6 laps.  So dog gone proud of that man.  Mile High showed up at the work out from a 3 mile pre-run with what has to be a city issued, professional construction grade, flood light on his forehead. I’m still seeing streamers.  Maybe that’s why he was in front of me all morning- because I was blinded… nope.  My man, MH, is feeling it and got in 6 with Lutes.  Slapshot pushed YHC to complete our 5.  Kept saying something about Iron PAX leg beatdown and running on stumps.  Probably would have given Lutes and MH a challenge and left me for dead if he was 100%.  With Darkest hot on our heels, would he have stopped for roadside assistance?  One can only speculate.  38, LJ, Davinci, Pothole, Cheddah, and Uber showed particular grit.  Bit of 0-60 kind of morning.

Studying a devotional this week within our #shieldlock: “Uncommen: Words from Husbands Dads and Leaders.”  How does your language impact others around you. Are the choices you are making influencing others for good?  Lifting up or tearing down.

“With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness”- James 3:9

“Wise men store up knowledge, but with the mouth of the foolish, ruin is at hand”- Proverbs 10:14

Your words matter.  Choose wisely.

Aye!

https://www.bible.com/reading-plans/4419/day/2?segment=0

 

 

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VQ-O-RAMA

September is VQ month at Golden Corral.  Except last minute VQ decided he wasn’t ready.  Push a brother, but not too much.  It’s ok, Lutefisk can ad-lib!  Normal disclaimer plus let PAX know we all would be on Q today.  Something they did from their VQ.  Started off with a mosey around the Teeter, circle up for a COP:
-10 windmills IC
-10 DC merkins IC
-15 imperial walkers IC
-10 tempo merkins IC
-15 morrocan NC’s IC
-10 diamond merkins IC
-line up for a modified indian run; hold plank, rear PAX bear crawl to front

Lutefisk’s Thang: SSH during the song “Tubthumping” by Chumbawumba, every “I GET KNOCKED DOWN” = burpee

Mile High’s Thang: Wall sit and one at a time sprint about 50 yards and back, various arm work whilst wall sitting

Fish Stick’s Thang: tight circle arms on shoulders, one at a time 10 count heel raises (9 PAX = 90 heal raises!)

Corn Hole’s Thang: 12 count merkin (4 down, 4 hold 6″, 4 up) x 10

Uber’s Thang: wall work behind oil change place – 10 right leg step ups, 10 left leg step ups, 10 derkins, 20 dips

38 Special’s Thang: Some kung fu stuff that was awkward and used muscles I didn’t know existed.  noice

Deacon’s Thang: high knees in place, and whenever he felt like it, yelled “DOWN” for a burpee. over and over and over and over and over

Change Order’s Thang: 2 groups, one does pull-ups on the cart rack until the other gets back. flapjack

Crab Cake’s Thang: various ground work followed by a sprint up and back

Just enough time for 9 double count crunchy frogs to end it.  COT.

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