Category: Pantheon

The Fort pledge to help another Pax out

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Its Christmas time and the word of the month is giving so I am asking if you would take moments pray about giving to help a fellow pax. Last year Stang got the Fort and the Rock pax to donate gift cards, cash and presents for me and my family.  This was huge for me and my family, with that  being said I feel the need to help a fellow pax and give back. I have been in touch with our pax of the Fort looking for someone to help out. This morning in COT it was mentioned by Destiny that a fellow pax’s son has just been diagnosed with leukemia and his wife is pregnant with twins. Then again Ginsu and Rock thrill had a tweet about it and come to find out it is an Area51  pax named Bout time his sons name is Jennings. This hits close to home and just knew this is who we need to help this year. a few

If I have never had the pleasure of posting with you in the Gloom I would like to take a second and share my story, Dec 2015 on Christmas eve my 2.5 year old daughter was diagnosed with Leukemia ALL Type B, on Christmas day she had surgery to have a port installed and her first 3 rounds of chemo. We spent Christmas in the hospital and I broke down never cried so hard in my life. I reached out to God prayed that everything will be okay and about 10 min later after the took my daughter back for surgery he answered my pray because a peace just came over me and heard the words its going to be okay.  The last 2 years have been a hard 2 years with ups and downs but also have enlightened me, allowed me to get closer to God.  It also allowed me to become apart of F3 with out the men of this group not sure where I would be mentally and physically today. I like to thank you for the push the words of encouragement.

 

I am asking pax to give what your heart tells you. Prayers gift cards, cash etc. I have seen what awesome pax you can be when challenged to give you all always go above and beyond.

See your site Q’s for collections and or Dark helmet , Stang, Witch hunt, Royale and Cornerstone

 

2 Corinthians 9:7

Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Proverbs 18:16

A gift opens the way
and ushers the giver into the presence of the great.

Luke 6:38

Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

 

Thanks Again HIMS

Cornerstone

 

 

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Basketball drills at Pantheon

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5 Pax showed up for the workout on a crisp, cool morning.  After the disclaimer, we took a warm-up lap around the car pool lane and the school to the basketball court.  We performed the following exercises:

SSH x 20

Imperial Walker x 20

Windmill x 15

Plank stretches

Next, we ran sprints back and forth between the baselines to increase the heart rate and get the blood flowing.  To catch our breath, we sat on the wall for sixty seconds.

Next, we performed the following exercises along the basketball court, in cadence:

Bear crawl / merkins:  10 and 5 count

Sprint the baseline

Crab walk / LBCs 10 and 10 count

Sprint the baseline

Backwards bear crawl / Carolina Dry Docks

Sprint the baseline

We finished up with a slow mosey back to COT.

 

Prayers:

Individuals and families impacted by addiction

Diesel’s first Spartan race

 

 

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Let’s make it 3

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Warm up

Needed a fast warmup given the temp was dropping so headed for a quick mosey around the school. Circled up for some poor counting by the Q that included: SSH x25, Imperial Walker x10, Windmill x10, Merkin x10, Low Slow Squat x15, Moroccan night club x25, Mountain climber x20.

Headed over to in front of the school to get this thing started.  Started in front of the main entrance with 10 lunges / leg, then a quick run down to the end of the pillars for 10 hand release merkins.  Did this set 3x!

Then we found a pillar each for a wall sit.  While everyone did a wall sit, first person did 10 Carolina Dry docks, then the next PAX and so on down the line.  Next we did some Al Gore with 1 PAX doing 10 LBC, then the next PAX, etc. while everyone else held the Al Gore.  Then we went back to the wall sit and baked in 10 Flying squirrel for PAX 1, then on down the line.  So 3 sets here in total!

Last we headed over by the softball field where we did some Jacob’s Ladder up the tiered hills.  Set one (adding up to 7) included burpees and bombjacks to the top tiered hill.  Set two was seal jacks and knee to chest  jumps.  Set 3 was plank jacks and diamonds.  So another set of 3!

Last we headed over to COT for a 5 min cool down and some abs and core.  All in, 8 PAX stayed warm, not much time for mumble chatter, and we managed to stay dry for the most part!  Great time as usual.

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Pantheon-A good decision or not . . . ?

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Been sick for four days now and decided to suck it up and lead this morning no matter how I felt. Tough, tough decision. Stupid decision to go out, too, but I couldn’t leave my brothers hangin’ in the (almost) cold. Just didn’t do any fist bumping today or breathing in somebody’s face. Worked on my verbal compliments today and, boy, were there plenty to give with this group of men!  It was a blast as usual when you don’t know what you’re going to get with Straight Up!

Standard Disclosures No FNGs today

Quality over Quantity today

Topic of the Month: Victory

Shared what came to mind for me was:

1 Corinthians 15:57: But thanks be to God! He gives us the VICTORY through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Warm-up:

Ran a small lap: doing

High knees

Butt kickers

Bunny hops

Figure 8s

Toy Soliders

Continued with:

12 each person’s name SSHs

12 Ab Vigodas

15 Low slow squats

15 Peter Parkers

12 Merkins

15 Moroccan nightclubs

Rolling Crucifix – 4X each side

Table Twists – 4X each side

The Thang:

Attempted to run individually .65 miles but we cut it short at .35 miles

Moved to the field:

3 Exercises in a row:

1. Twisting Pistons until failure

2. 4 “Mancave move” (name made up by me) while others choose between X-jumps or no arms up burpees or scissor squats. 2 people did the move at a time and then 2 more rotated in. “Mancave move” is a merkin on weights, right row, merkin, left row, left row, merkin, squat press of weights up and control down, then repeat

3. 12 Alternating plank jacks or just plank jacks if you are not coordinated

20 second rest

2 Exercises in a row:

1. The Lazy Dora: Partner up;

One partner planks (Regular plank or back plank if you choose)

Other partner:

60 total Heals to the Heavens (12 each, then rotate with partner)

60 total each side Austin Ass-Kickers (12 each, then rotate with partner)

60 total cross jacks + 60 total plank jacks (12 each, then rotate with partner)

2. Tree hugger (for all of us) for 3 go-rounds: squat position hugging imaginary tree and PAX not hugging sprints around the group and taps shoulder of next person who then sprints, . . . 3X around for each person.

30 second rest

Burst Training:

2 50 yard sprints

Final Exercises:

15 Straight Calf Raises

10 Merkins

10 Squats

15 Outward Calf Raises

10 Merkins

10 Squats

Mosey to parking lot

COT

Announcements/Read your newsletter

Highlighted Praise:

Fish Sticks going to see extended family over the weekend

On the Rocks has read 94% of the Bible. Have you?

Highlighted Prayer Requests: For children in our area suffering from things such as bullying, identity issues, and self-esteem challenges. Our challenge: to encourage these preteens/teens with words of Victory listed above.

Diesel’s father’s next steps in life

Safety for Fish Sticks half marathon

Fish Sticks: thanks for the opportunity to lead some outstanding, hustle-oriented men this morning! It was fun!

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Creeping Death at Pantheaon

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Warmup:  Slow mosey with high knees, bear crawls, lunges and merkins.

The Thang:  Moseyed to TCES baseball field for a ‘low to the ground’ beatdown.  Tour of bases 3x for 20 reps each with burnout after each rotation.

Creep                1st Base                  2nd Base                 3rd Base 

  • Tour 1 – Bear Crawl         Box Cutters               Merkins                  Donkey Kicks,

Home Base Beatdown – Metallica’s ‘Creeping’ Death Song,

( Sphynx Plank up and down for intrumentals to ground roll merkin for lyrics ),

Creep                1st Base                  2nd Base                 3rd Base 

  • Tour 2 –    Crabwalk          Flutter Kicks      Diamond Merks        Thrusts,

Home Base Beatdown – Metallica’s ‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’ song,

( Kneeling Standup Squats for instrumental to Carolina Dry Docks for Lyrics )

Creep                1st Base                  2nd Base                 3rd Base 

  • Tour 3 – Sphynx low crawl, Hello Dolly’s       Wide Merks             Side Thrusts

Home Base Beatdwon – Metallica’s ‘One’

( Honeymooners to Crab dips with Jack Webbs in between ).

Discussed the topic of the month “Control” and to release things we cannot control and drive hard for the things we can and are called to do.

Prayers for all those with ailments especially local cancer survivors, patience and guidance to honor equality for women, and for Routers family as he travels.

Announcements:  FishStix 5k fundraiser, the Green Beret foundation charity.

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Pantheon – Boot Camp (Do the harder thing)

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Fish Sticks asked me to Q this one and I was pumped as this was one of my first AO’s I ever visited.  I didn’t have a long time to ponder on this one, so I knew like my RUCK workouts I wanted to make it a little “heavy”.  So I pulled up early and hid my sandbags, ammo cans, and Ruck for a fun filled workout.

I keep deciding that I must “do the harder thing” in my life.  It’s easy to slack at work, its easy to let the TV raise my children, its easy to fartsack, but I must do the harder thing.  That was the theme of this workout, and the 8 PAX fully embraced it.

The W/O

A normal mosey at Pantheon is a lap around the lot, well we chose the harder thing and lapped around the entire lot and building, stoping with some merkins to throw in there.

Circle UP

Side straddle hops

 Cherry Pickers (even though Cable Guy informed me cherries do not grow on the ground so we should use the strawberry picker term)

Moroccan Night Clubs

Windmills

Merkins – Hold Plank – Merkins – Hold Plank – Mountain Climber (That was for sure the “harder thing”)

Here we go:

So I lined up 8 different stations that we would rotate through.  One of the stations involved running, when the runner returned is when we would rotate.

Station 1 – 60lb Sandbag Toss (Lil E threw it like he was tossing someone an apple, killed it!!!)

Station 2 – Overhead Press – 30 Pound Ammo Can

Station 3 – Burpees

Station 4 – RUCK Swings – 45# plate

Station 5 – Box Cutters

Station 6 – Low Slow Squats

 Station 7 – Bomb Jacks

Station 8 – 40lb Sandbag run (trust me running is way harder with a bag)

I was super impressed with the PAX.  I had a “shorter” distance picked out for the first go around with the run, and after the first rotation through I asked lets make this longer and everyone jumped out and chose the harder thing and we looped the parking lot sprinting with a 40lb bag.

We went through this rotation twice, then I brought the PAX back to the main parking lot.  Typically in suicides we do it at the basketball court and have the prescribed lines, well the harder thing would be to do it across the long a$$ parking lot with dropping and doing 15 merkins at each stop.  Props again to cable guy for the most proper merkin I’ve seen in a while.  All PAX pushed themselves hard.

10 count then a chose the harder thing mosey back to our stations (we took the long indirect route).  Then ever PAX chose the harder thing and sprinted out the end of the mosey, even though our lungs were burning.

Back through for one last rotation on our stations, where everyone gave it all they had.

We then chose the harder thing again and made a long loop back to COT and held a on your six plank until we saw 6 hit a watch.

It was awesome and a pleasure to Q with these guys.  Everyone out there gave it there all and made me look slow on these sandbag carries!

Announcements

Ragnar

Read  your News Letter

P&P 

Expecting Mothers – PAX with sick family

Throughout the workout we talked a little bit about control.  I mentioned that we have to understand what we have control over and what we don’t.  We all have control over our mindset during this workout, and the ability to push as hard as needed.  We have the ability to show control and patience, as I mentioned my 3yo yelling at my 1yo and all I wanted to do was raise my voice in frustration and anger but a true leader shows control and mimics the desired results.  We also acknowledged how we have to relinquish control and follow the path for our life.

Half shell said something I’m going to leave you with that I will be pondering over for a long time to come, he said he was once told “calm is contagious” and that really stuck with me.

So with that I bid you farewell, and #calmiscontagious

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What? What was that?

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Intro:

A lot of fun today. Excellent hard work from the PAX. My hats off to them. They even got to experience a surprise visit from “Gunther” in the beginning.

Disclaimer mentioned. No FNGs today. Mosey 15 feet to circle up for:

“Leadership is not about titles, positions, or flowcharts. It is about one lifestyle influencing another.” – John C. Maxwell

Warm-up:

12 SSHs

8 Windmills

Around the circle hamstring raises (I can’t ever remember the F3 name of these)

Dynamic Stretching Warm-up:

3 inch worms continuing to straighten legs further on each one

Ninety Squared Stretch – 3X each side

Rolling Crucifix – 3X each side

Table Twists – 3X each side

2 Way Lunge and Reach (yoga style) – 3X each side

Hamstring Reaches – 5X 

Can Openers – 10X each side

10 Chopper Throws (throw down across body) – 10X each side

Frankenstein Shoulder Circles – 10X each side and each way

Imaginary Jump rope for 30 secs

Ran 2 gradual increase of pace warm-up laps (shorter lap)

Mixture of exercises throught the laps: high knees, karoke, shuffles, bunny hops

The Thang:

“A leader is great, not because of his power, but because of his ability to empower others.”  – John C. Maxwell

Between exercises:

  1. Round 1: One person shares a Praise/blessing/gratefulness topic for 15 seconds break before going to next exercise
  2. Round 2: Prayer request: Same as round 1 concept. The focus is on:
    1. You
    2. Family
    3. Close friend

Exercises: 16 Stations + a Surprise Station (We were aiming to get through all of them but were not in a rush. We accomplished about 13.)

We broke up into 2 groups and then rotated the grouping of stations after the 8th station.

Station #1: Surprise Exercise: Donkey Kicks into a High Knee Jump – 18

Station #9: Single Leg Burpees – 6 each side

Station #2: Superman but with arms to the side and rotate shoulders up to ski; legs go up to – 2 sets of 12

Station #10: Back Widow (use elbows) – MAX OYO

Station #3: Under the hedge (Divebombers) – MAX OYO

Station #11: Pancake Pushup, then Dive Bomber to Diamond Pushup – MAX OYO

Station #4: Jumping Lunges – 50 each leg X 2 sets

Station #12: Ninja Tuck Jumps – 12 X 2 sets

Station #5: Deep Carolina Drydocks – 30 head touching ground

Station #13: Reverse Iron Cross Pushup (Rear Delts) – MAX OYO

Station #6: V-ups with a completely straight leg – 15; break 20 seconds, then 5

Station #14: Flutters – 40 

Station #7: Dips – Set 1: 25; Set 2: 15-20 max

Station #15: Body weight tricep extensions pushups – 9 

Station #8: Full body movement: Sprint to stop sign/Run backwards back

Station #16: Sprint ladder with cones (catch the person that goes before you; 3 second delay) – 1 round for each person chased

If waiting for the other group and your group finished first, then you get to pick randomly from a SURPRISE list. The one picked today by Group 1 was:

Surprise Exercise: Squat thrust jacks (burpee then a plank jack) – 10

COT:

Announcements: Invergence, Convergence.

Challenge to take 1 prayer request /week; Can you be an everyday prayer warrior?

Final Prayer/Send off

Thanks for the opportunity today to lead these fine min, Fish Stix!

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All Eyes on You

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Pantheon (Tega Cay Elementary)

Disclaimer: No FNGs this morning

Warm-a-rama I: Mosey around the big loop, including high knees, butt kickers, side shuffles, toy soldiers

Warm-a-rama II: To ball field for some SSH, Merkins, Mountain Climbers, Imperial Walkers, Hillbilly Walkers

Thang I: Indian Run: Last man carries a 32-ct case of water to the front. That’s 37.8 lbs in case you were wondering. Once the delivery is made, the deliverer drops to the back and the deliveree does 5 merkins then becomes the next deliverer. Did this around the school, for two carries per PAX.

Thang II: Line up on baseline, each pax in sequence goes down and back the court in the manner prescribed below while the rest do isometric workout, also as prescribed below.

  • Bear Crawl half court + people chairs
  • Sprints full court + forearm planks
  • Long jumps half court + superman
  • Wheel barrows half court + body destroyers
  • Power skips full court + balls to the wall
  • Side shuffles full court + 6 inches
  • Back sprints full court + low planks
  • ran out of time here (would have finished with piggy back carries)

COT: 9 paxposted this morning, that includes Fish Sticks who went for a run in preparation for a November half.  Prayers for marriages and relationships and for those going through hardships as from hurricane damage or otherwise.

Skin: Nice work by all this morning. I think everyone was forced modify at some point this morning on account of muscle fatigue, with the possible exception of Bear Gryllz.

Fish Stix thanks for the opportunity to Q. Sputnik thanks for your help planning the workout, and then not showing up for the workout!

God calls us to listen to Him: listen to hear and listen to do. Can you hear Him and are you following His voice?

Rocks Out

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Buncho’ sprints, foul shots and a Burpee Mile

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Thanks for the reminder from Fishsticks on my Q.  Don’t Q as often as I could but I definitely need a reminder system in place.

Weinke ready to go, no sandbags, no cones, but arrived early and placed a basketball on the court behind the school and a flag in the front.  7 arrived really wanting to do a lot of Burpee Miles, or so l thought.

No FNGs but many PAX that I need to get to know better. Very quick disclaimer and we…

Jogged warmup lap around parking lot with buttkickers, high knees, side shuffles and crossovers (find a line and cross that line as you jog…left, right, left, etc.)

Circled up for: SSH, squats, merkins, ‘active’ supermans, flutter, merkins, windmills and the always funny to watch goof balls.

HIt the wall for 3 rotations of people chair/an exercise/sprint to stop sign in front of school and back. Second rotation of p.c. was one leg holds. The exercises were calf raises 3 x 10, squat jumps 10, 1 leg squats.

Back to playground with 5 stations, partnered up and rotated….  Station 1: Bench Dips, 2: Bench Derkins, 3: ground pullups using playground apparatus, 4: “L” hang for approx. 30 seconds then ran to 5: each PAX had to hit a foul shot, max 3 shots.

*** The plan unbeknownst, and not told, to PAX was to count the missed free throws and end the workout with that number of burpees. Unfortunately, we later ran out of time. ***

Approx. 10 minutes of a Burpee Mile on front ‘track’. Burpees Miles are intervals of:  timed sprint/timed jog/burpees over a designated time.  IE. sprint 30-60 secs, jog 2-4 mins, burpees (whatever  time and # burpees is desired). Today’s improvisations were: approx. :15 sprint,  :45 sec jog but with alternating exercises: burpees, in place run lunges (Iron Mikes), bomb jacks, ranger merkins.

A little core at the end. Flutters, V Ups, partner crunches at 90, 45, 0 degrees.

Circled up and discussed monthly theme of leadership. There are always opportunities within F3 to lead or assist lead. Whether it be Q’ing, helping another PAX with an initiative or taking on your own project. Just do it and PAX will follow and help.  As a leader, look for those who are demonstrating their willingness to help and ask them to become a leader in whatever it is you are doing.

Prayers for F3 Pale Rider from Augusta (per C-Span) and for hurricane victims. Donate to Colombia mission-turned Florida assistance PAX with water, diapers, etc. Senator Tressel is collecting underwear for Harvey victims: https://f3thefort.com/2017/09/04/393968/

Thanks all for posting and the opportunity to lead! And post those BB’s…apology shout out to Lake Wylie for a missed Quagmire BB!

Bolt

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Staying Upside-Down at Pantheon

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I’m heading off-grid for two to six weeks, so when the call went out from Fish Sticks on Tuesday asking for a sub Q for Pantheon, I hesitated then accepted the challenge. Seven showed up and a disclaimer heavy on “modify as needed” (we’ll be upside-down a lot) was disclaimed.

Quick mosey around the parking lot, pulling in the usual high knees, butt kickers, and toy soldiers. Circle up for some good hip and shoulder prep:

  • Windmills
  • Hillbilly walkers
  • Pseudo-planche merkins
  • Side plank
  • Reverse plank
  • Inverted mountain climbers
  • Side plank on the other side
  • Normal merkins
  • Downward dog
  • Runners lunge
  • Low lunge

Mosey around the school to the basketball court for

The Thang

Pair up (or two twos and a three). One partner does wall walks (plank, walk up to BTW, and then back down to plank) at one end of the court while other partner does break dancer merkins (demo requested) at the other. Bear crawl to center court for partner pistol squats, then duck walk to other end of the court to do the exercise you hadn’t done yet. Bear crawl to center court to meet with partner for another round of partner pistols. That’s one round.

The plan: downward ladder from 10 to 1 rep of each

Audible called after the round of 9, so it turned into 10-9-6-4-2, totaling 31 wall walks, 62 break dancer merkins (31 per side), and 62-100ish pistol squats, depending on who was counting.

All PAX duck walked to the base line (we still had one of those left to keep it even), two quick ten counts were counted, then we moseyed back around to COT for a few minutes of Mary (and some shoulder relief via the shoulder lounge).

  • 8-count V-ups
  • Heels to heaven
  • Side crunches

Announcements:

  • Senator Tressel’s underwear drive
  • Invergence (Sep 29) and Convergence (Sep 30) celebrating 5 years of F3 in The Fort
  • Mini convergence Sep 7 to send off Colombia team
  • I think we mentioned some other stuff too

Praises and prayers

  • Nobody fell on their heads this morning, but Bolt slammed his knee into the wall, which reminded us to pray for all the injured PAX…and those dealing with life and family things
  • Prayers for those affected by Harvey and in the path of Irma (and those affected by flooding in Sierra Leone, Niger, India, Bangladesh…..)

Really proud of these guys for putting up with my twisted idea of “fun,” though I’ve never seen people leave an AO so quickly following COT.

I look forward to the next inverted exercise we can come up with and the brave men who get to try it. Thanks to Fish Sticks for the opportunity.

Jedi

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