6 of my brothers came out in the rain to get better and I appreciate the opportunity to lead such a great PAX and that they took the Red Pill and chose to come out today.

Quick Warm up…….5 burpees OYO

Mosey through QT to Founders Bank Drive thru where we camped out for majority of the time. We enjoyed the dryness of the covered space and the mini cameras in each drive thru. We figured we could give a little show to Big Brother.

COP: Squats, Imperial Walkers, Merkins, LBCs, Peter Parkers, Parker Peters, some others in there too…..

I spoke to the PAX about Zacchaeus, a man from the bible who was vertically challenged. Zacchaeus saw that crowds were forming and Jesus was coming into town. He could not see or get close to him, so he climbed a tree. His decision to climb the tree changed his life…..his decision to take a step or measure to get closer to God made all the difference in the rest of his life. Jesus saw Zacchaeus and went to his house and Zacchaeus met God and from that day forward was a different man. We too can take a step and get closer to God. Read the bible, get to church, serve, pray….whatever that next step looks like…..I promise if you do it from your heart…..it will change your life!

We wrapped up with some 6min of mary or as someone said Grilled Cheese….

Rosalitas, Diamond Merkins, Hello Dolly’s, Superman, Flutters, Merkins, Freddy Murcury’s, Wide arm Merkins, LBCs and then Mosey back to COT

Great morning and so glad Change Order had me on his reminder list. Q was not on my schedule but so grateful for the opportunity as always.

Prayers for many, including Howitzer’s M, FNG from York who lost a child this week, and Sasquatches folks dealing with some illness. Its a broken world but not God’s intent. Draw close to him to deal with all the storms and trials of this world.

Peace!
Cake Boss

Coming fresh off a marathon a couple of days ago, I contemplated 0 (see Zero) running, but hey I like pain just like the next guy. A couple of days ago the idea struck me that we could do an escalator, elevator and ladder themed workout. Seemed simple enough. Simple, not easy! It was a small group for a Tuesday but that suited me fine. No FNGs, just a bunch of veterans, so the disclaimer was omitted. With that, we moseyed.

THANG:

Mosey from Ballroom to the bottom of the hill for COP

COP (All IC)
Low Slow Squat x15
Windmills x15
SSH x30? (Close, too much heckling from DH so we moved to…)
Merkins x15
Mtn Climbers x30

Mosey a few feet to parking lot for Escalators (series of exercises that increase by 10)

10 Burpees
20 Merkins
30 Mtn Climbers
40 Squats
50 Flutter Kicks
Run a Lap and Repeat the series going down
50 Flutter Kicks
40 Squats
30 Mtn Climbers
20 Merkins
10 Burpees

Mosey to the parking lot across from Ballroom for Elevators. Each floor represents 25 reps of an exercise. Run approximately 50 yards then back and go to the next floor (100 yards between floors). Each floor you do the previous floor’s exercise and stack a new one on top. Here’s what we did:

1st: 25 CDD
2nd: 25 CDD 25 Squats
3rd: 25 CDD 25 Squats 25 LBCs
4th: 25 CDD 25 Squats 25 LBCs 25 Bombjacks (Then take the elevator down)
4th: 25 CDD 25 Squats 25 LBCs 25 Bombjacks
3rd: 25 CDD 25 Squats 25 LBCs
2nd: 25 CDD 25 Squats
1st: 25 CDD (for a whopping total of)
200 CDD 150 Squats 100 LBCs and 50 Bombjacks

Running back to COT I noticed we had time for a…

Suicide Ladder
5 Burpees and run to the end of the parking lot and back
10 Burpees and run to the end of the parking lot and back
15 Burpees and run to the end of the parking lot and back

Mosey back to COT

NMM
I enjoy a small group of Pax sometimes. Really enhances the fellowship. Great group this morning and I think we had a lot of fun in between the grunts and grimaces. Maximus and Senator T always show me that I can push harder, thanks guys. After all this up and down and back and forth, I was ready for COT but surprised everyone (even myself) with the Suicide Ladder. Brutal! Strong showing by all and I think we all got better this morning.

Prayers and Praise
Prayers for Pax and families fighting illness
Praise for those who are in good health

BOM

Honor to Serve
Zima

15 men endured the foggiest morning in memory and fortunately the five or so that went running returned safely!  The other 10 men had no excuses since the preblast was posted.  Too bad for Beacon because he got sucker punched.  Maybe he will start to troll the Twitter machine a little more often.  Word is that my post got buried among Apache’s 279 posts last night.

The Word:

This month is the month of Love and the question to the Pax was to which standard do we set our willingness to love those in our life.  The challenge is to aspire to love like Jesus loves us.  Love unconditionally, covenentaly, incarnationally and sacraficially.

The Thang.

COP
15 Windmills
15 Imperial Walkers
100 SSH
25 squats
20 Merkins
Mosey to coupons
12 min AMRAP – w/ coupon
10 thrusters
15 curls
25 dips
Run to stop sign at top of the hill and back repeat for 12 min
10min AMRAP – isometric
25 Merkins
15 jumping lunge
10 Burpees
Run half way up the hill carrying coupon over head and back repeat for 10 min
Indian run back

9 men and some nice weather at The Ballroom.  After a weekend of silliness, it was nice to see the weather cooperate and some clean pavement underfoot.

Quick disclaimer and we’re off …

The Thang:
Mosey all the way to the bottom lot past the circle, keep moving for the warm up
butt-kickers 1/2 way, jog to the other end, turn around
high knees 1/2 way, jog to the end, turn around
karaoke 1/2 way, jog to the end, turn around … you get the picture …
karaoke back, jog, windmill walkers, jog, pull knees to chest, jog, toy soldiers, jog, bear crawl, jog

circle up, SSH x 20, run to the next corner, 20 x IW, bear crawl to the third corner, 20 squats, run out past the end circle to the first light, 20 x CDD

mosey to the next light, line up with hands on the curb, sideways bear crawl along the curb, while the end runs up to the front, kind of a curb bear crawl Indian run … stand up and mosey toward Gold Hill Rd, line up for Indian run along the way. Frogger across the street, past Marco’s, Goddard and down to the blocks.

1/2 the group does block curls while the other 1/2 runs up the hill and Merkins x 10, switch
1/2 the group does chest press, other 1/2 up the hill and 15 x monkey humpers, switch
1/2 squats with blocks, 1/2 up the hill and 10 x bombjacks, switch
1/2 tricep extensions, 1/2 up the hill and 15 x CDD, switch

Mosey back, Frogger across the road, to parking lot across from our starting point
1/2 the group does Makhtar N’Diayes while the other 1/2 runs 100ft and 10 x LBCs, switch
1/2 the group does Kneetar N’Diayes while the other 1/2 runs 100ft and 10 x Freddie Mercury, switch
1/2 the group does elbow plank while the other 1/2 runs 100ft and 10 x mountain climbers, switch
1/2 the group does squats while the other 1/2 runs 100ft and 10 x Merkins, switch

Times up, back to COT (Jack Webb and Merkin clock were in the back pocket if needed)

Praise to Twister and Anchorman for keeping us up on accountability and mentoring … Change Order for taking us out

Thanks Change Order for the opportunity to lead the PAX, as time goes by and I get to try new AO’s, I keep coming back to The Ballroom … room to run, lots, hill, bricks to play with, grass, concrete, walls to climb, walls for balls and a great group of PAX, week after week, awesome place.

Looks like we made it,
Barry Manilow

Six men converged on a beautiful, cold, SC winter morning to get stronger at the Ballroom.  Here is what they did:

The Thang:

Mosey out of the lot and head down the road toward the big warehouses.  Take a couple detours up and down the grassy hills and circle up for COP at the entrance to Allied:

All in cadence:  SSH x 50, CDD x 10, Cherry Pickers x 15, Squat x 25, Diamond merks x 20, Hillbilly x 25, LBC x 25, Mountain Climber x 40, Jumping lunge x 25, Wide arm merkin x 20

Mosey up the main road and line up in front of the two tiered retaining wall for Jacob’s Wall Ladder:   Do 1 burpee, run to the first wall and climb up, climp up the second wall and run the path back to the start.  Repeat for 2-10 burpees

Extended people’s chair,  then balls to the wall, short break and another extended people’s chair.

Indian run down the main road and head back to the grass by the Roaster Oven restaurant for ABLAB:  Freddie Merc’s x 20, Rosalta x 20, American Hammer x 20

COT

Moleskin:

I am probably in the minority here, but I love the cold weather.  I’ll take 19 degrees and no humidity over the swampy 70 degree summer mornings any day.  It felt awesome today, no doubt about it. When I saw Change Order get out of his car with sweats, a hoody, and a contractor coat, I was like, ‘dude, c’mon, are you gonna workout in those clothes?  It’s not that cold and wer’e going to be running shortly.’   Jacob’s ladder was a challenge today and like last time, left me with some knee bruises and a nice chunk out of my shin.

We had a small, but motivated group and everyone worked their tails off.  Not much chatter today – just six guys getting it done in the cold.    Nice to see TPS who I haven’t seen in a long time.  Good to have you back, brother!  It’s a privilege to lead the group and as always, I  feel very lucky to be able to keep doing it.

Announcements/Prayers/Praises

3rd F Convergence this Friday, Jan 22 at Eternal Church office.  Oral Cancer 5k Run in Baxter (Feb 6), The Yeti (Feb 20) – check Twitter and the F3 site.  It’s all there.

Prayers for those recovering from sickness and those with family struggles.

10 PAX made the better choice on this cold morning to post at the Ballroom instead of some slacker lawyers AO (doesn’t he know that Truckers run over Lawyers??). I was expecting a larger crowd since most of the PAX don’t care for Clemson or Bama, but guess they were more afraid of the 27 degree weather. Glad to see Sugar Daddy post 2 times in a row! Of course CSPAN decided to fartsack since his Roll Tide won; actually I think he was afraid of dealing with either the Colosseum or the Ballroom workouts.

YHC was looking forward to Qing one of his old original AO’s and wanted to do something a little different than normal and to keep the PAX moving so we wouldn’t freeze. So I enlisted some help from Dark Helmets coupons. A quick disclaimer, and off we went on a mosey to the postal route parking lot for a little COP. All counts were in 12:
Good mornings
Moroccan night club
IW
Squats
Windmills

Mossy back to parking lot to pick up the coupons. We had 10 cinder blocks, just the right number for the PAX.
Mossy with cinder blocks to warehouse parking lot

place the cinder block on the asphalt, run the first warehouse light and do 1 merkin, run to the second light and do 2 merkins, run to third light and do 3 merkins, run to the fourth light and do 4 marking; return with squats and add 1 at each light; return to cinder block for 10 cinder block burpees

Rinse and repeat, this time start at 2 and double at each light and back an 10 cinder block burpees

Run to second light and do 10 squats and back, 5 cinder block burpees; rinse and repeat

Mossy to grass, 10 knee-tar-ninjas

Back to cinder blocks:
10 curls, 10 bent over rows, 10 shoulder presses, rinse and repeat.

Mossy back to grass, 10 knee-tar-ninjas

Back to cinder blocks:
10 curls, 10 bent over rows, 10 shoulder presses, rinse and repeat.

Mossy to wall: peoples chair with 4 count starting by touching toes, then knees, then shoulders, then extended press x 10; 10 dips from cinder block
Rinse and repeat

run to third light, 10 squats, back and 10 overhead presses

40 LBCs in honor of Clemson
45 hello dollies in honor of Bama
Sprint to 3 light and back

Mossy with cinder block back to COT

Glad to see 10 PAX fight the urge to stay warm in their cozzie beds and come out. Always an honor to Q since my opportunities are limited due to work travel. Every AO brings out the best in everyone here at the Fort. Since it is the beginning of 2016, we need to reflect on 2015 and identify our weakness(es) and be accountable for making changes in 2016. It is easy to fall back into our routine, but wit PAX like you we are reminded to be a better #HIM.

Trucker

“Hard core” would be how I described the PAX that posted to The Ballroom this very cold morning of 25 degrees.  No complaints by anyone.  Not sure that YHC would have posted if not for being on Q.  Knowing that it would be cold, the weinke was built to keep everyone on the move without being a Run-N-Tempo-Clydes-Out.  1.75 miles were logged via loop of 8 pain stations, around a parked 18-wheeler whose cab likely nested a groggy-eyed trucker.  Pax resisted the temptation of knocking on the cab door, suggesting he (or she) “come join us!”. Might as well have, as I’m sure the mumble chatter woke him away.

The Thang

Pax moseyed to each pain station for warm up as follows:

• SSH x40
• Windmills x15
• IW x20
• Merkins x15
• Peter Parkers x20
• Low Slow Squats x 20
• Monkey Humpers x10

Main Event

As a group, we ran to each pain station and performed one exercise, with the rep count equaling the station number (1 rep at station 1, 2 reps at station 2, etc.).  Once we finished the 8th station, all circled back to station 1 and planked until the 6 arrived.  Rinse and repeat for next named exercise.  The exercises were as follows (B.L.I.M.P.S.):

• Burpees
• Lunges (stationary)
• Imperial Walkers
• Merkins
• Plankjacks
• Scorpion Dry Docks

Mary

• Flutters
• Russian Twists
• Hello Dollies
• Chopsticks
• LBCs

Moleskin

Similar to TheYard workout this past Saturday, we talked about selecting a personal word/theme for 2016.  Several pax shared their word from 2015, and proposed a word for 2016.  In many ways, just the act of selecting a word can foster a level of introspection that we tend to miss all to often, going through the motions of the days/weeks/months.

Thanks for the pax encouragement and hard work on a cold morning.  And thanks to Change Order for allowing me the privilege of Qing.

AYE!

-old bay