Capture the Coupons

My bad just realized that this backblast never got posted. I only looked bc @funhouse is keeping track now.

Garage/ junkyard wars with a little capture the flag and kick the can inspired what for now we will refer to as “capture the coupon”.

Rules are simple:

Capture the Coupons according to objective for each round.

Coupons must be completely within home base to count for or against your team depending on objective when time runs out.

Separate all the Coupons, AKA all the random heavy stuff in my garage,  into two groups of equal weight.  See picture of randomness that filled my truck bed.

PAX split into two teams.  Note YHC can’t count to three.

Objective for round 1: capture the most weight as a team.

Time limit for round 1: 4 minutes

Objective for round 2: have least amount of weight within team base when round ends.

Time limit for round 2: 3 minutes

Objective for round 3: have most number of coupons, weight doesn’t matter.

Time limit for round 3:  4 minutes.

Thanks to Wild Thing for the opportunity to lead such a great bunch of guys.

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What’s The Plan?

We had 11 strong for a beat down at the  Abyss.  The pax was unsure if I knew what the plan was until we approached the workout written in chalk……then they knew.

The Thang:

Mosey in the parking lot with a sudden turn to make the last 1st and the 1st last.  Mosey some more and do some toy soldiers and karaoke.  Then mosey behind the school and circle up.

Imperial Walker x15, Cherry Pickers with a chain break at the top x 15, slow windmills culminating in a stretch, plank to mountain climbers x10, plank to peter parkers x11, plank to parker peters x11 and plank to mountain climber x1.

Mosey near the playground for a choose your own approach work out written in chalk:

100 merkins, 100 squats, 100 dips, 50 pull ups , 30 hanging knee lifts, run up the hill backwards 3x and run around track 3x.   Complete in any increments you would like.

When completed do 25 LBC, 25 Freddy Mercury, 25 Hello Dollies and 25 heels to heaven.

Mosey to grass hill and Jacobs ladder with alternating lunges (1 up to 7) on top and burpees (7 down to 1) on bottom.

Thank you for the opportunity to lead.  It was fun!

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Burpees, Bearcrawls, and Barf!

A great crowd this morning at The Abyss.  We had a bunch of runners and a bunch of bootcampers and 1 FNG.  Those that stayed for the bootcamp probably wish the would have joined the runners, I know I did.  This workout was hard and we didn’t complete it, but there is always next time…

We started with the typical mosey to get the blood flowing a bit, we circled around the parking lot and did some shuffle steps, NUR, and back to mosey before circling up for warm-a-rama around the basketball hoops.  I decided prior that the warm-up was going to set the precedence for the workout (hard) and warm-up the muscles we’d be using a lot (shoulders, core, arms).

Warm-a-Rama

  • 10 Windmills
  • Elbow plank (called on random PAX for 10 counts, at least 2 rounds)
  • Back to regular plank – 10 Merkins
  • 9 Diamond Merkins (Q-Shame, I didn’t have one more in me)
  • Recover with 25 SSH IC
  • Back to Plank – 10 Peter Parkers
  • 10 Parker Peters
  • 6″ hold – Called on Random Pax for 10 counts (at least 2 rounds)
  • 25 Moroccan Nightclubs IC

We then moseyed to the grass hill for the next exercise.

For the first routine we paired up and started at the bottom of the hill on the sidewalk.  PAX A was to do Burpees while PAX B went backwards up the hill (NUR) and forwards down the hill x4.  After 4, we switched and PAX B continued the Burpees while PAX A ran backwards up/forwards down x4.  We did this until we reached 120 Burpees… a few of the PAX finished, most were over a 100 when I called it for time (I had another routine I wanted to get to).  Our Friendly New Guy thought this was a great time to splash merlot, so he did, but he kept on trucking right after.  He definitely brought the GRIT!

Congratulations and welcome Doubtfire! No better way to start F3, it’s all uphill from here!

We then took the short mosey to the paved hill the leads up to the rear gate to the school.  For the 2nd routine I brought back Paula Abduls, I’ve never done them on a hill so I thought that would be a nice (painful) new twist.  Paula’s aren’t really an exercise, its just a movement, 2 forward, 1 back, which is a nice metaphor on life.  Life isn’t a consistent line straight up, we all have setbacks, we all get knocked down, but it is how we respond to those set backs that contribute to our success.  We all know that through failure we become better, this is a nice way to build an exercise around that idea.  I didn’t have the energy to hammer that point home during the workout so I thought I would take the opportunity to point that out here.  In any case, back to the routine…

6 Cones were placed up the hill about 25 paces (50ft. or so) apart. We would always move in this order, 2 (cones) forward, 1 back until we reached the 6th cone and then we would work our way back. If you ever plan do this keep in mind cones will be hit multiple times depending on where they are placed, so plan accordingly.  Each cone had an exercise on it:

  1. True Americans x10 (hand release merkin & a plank jack =1)
  2. Donkey Kicks x10
  3. Squats x25 (this was meant to be a break)
  4. Crab Jacks (think plank jack, but in crab position) x10
  5. Diamond Merkins x10
  6. Absolution x10 – I haven’t done these before, but they will be back.  They were awesome and it was also a bit humorous watching the PAX get the coordination down for these.  It’s an 8-count exercise that goes a little something like this:
    • Start in plank position and perform a single Groiner (cadence “1” jump feet forward, “2” jump feet back), then Mahktar N’ Diayes to Chillcut position (cadence “3” & “4” with drop to each elbow), then Chilly Jack (cadence “5” feet out, “6” feet together), and finally Mahktar N’ Diayes to plank starting position (cadence “7” and “ONE, TWO, etc.” with rise on each hand).

Oh and I almost forgot to mention… we always went forward 2 by way of the Bear Crawl and backwards 1 by way of the Crawl Bear.  Brutal.

None of us made it back down, but we did all make it to the top, so I called it with about 5 minutes to spare to head back to CoT.

With only about 2 minutes left we did a couple of Ab exercises, I called LBC’s x 25 IC and called on Bones who did another 20-25 Flutters IC until we hit 6:00AM.

Announcements, praises, prayers

Read your newsletter!

Prayers for school teachers and our children as they head back to school.  Prayers for injured PAX and those with nagging injuries.

See ya’ll Monday at the Quagmire 🙂

-Flux

 

 

 

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Anniversary Q & Lake Wylie Pub Tour

One year ago I posted for the first time at F3. Unlike most men in F3 I was not EH’d by a friend, coworker, or relative. I was EH’d by a podcast. I listened to the episode (link below) while I was at work, and by the end I knew I had to see what this F3 thing was all about. I posted the next day. Not because I was excited to wake up early, or to walk up and hang out in a group where I knew no one (fellow introverts, you know what I’m talking about). I posted the next day because I knew if I didn’t post right away I never would. At the time, I was not even sure I could do 10 pushups. But I was a textbook example of a Sad Clown, and I thought “Well, if this is a dumpster fire I just won’t come back.” I got smoked at that first workout, and it was great. I went to 2nd F drinks that night, posted again the next morning, and posted to CNW2 right after. All 3 Fs in the first 26 hours of showing up – I was hooked.

Podcast #324: How Fitness, Fellowship, and Faith Are the Cure for Sad Clown Syndrome

Today marked the anniversary of my first post. So I did a reprise of that first workout, which was originally Q’d by Kenyan.

The Thang
Disclaimer disclaimed. We found out that Witch Hunt had stepped on a piece of glass during a pre-run and that a policeman had given him hand sanitizer (foot sanitizer?) for the wound. He still did the full workout with a bleeding foot #ManPoints

Run to Copper Pub – Big boy sit-ups until 6
* The PAX saw what appeared to be Respectable Olaf getting a ticket by the Foot Sanitizing Policeman. Sources later confirmed that the offender was not Olaf but a similarly dressed doppelganger who also drives a red pickup. What are the odds?

COP
• SSH
• Merkins
• Mountain climbers
• Plank jacks

* 10 monkey humpers between each exercise. Apparently 4 count monkey humpers was a bit zealous for some, but YHC went for it with gusto which resulted in a fair deal of mumble chatter.

Run to Sweetwater – Plank until 6

Lazy Doras
• 100 Merkins +  plank
• 200 LBCs + 6” leg hold
• 300 squats + Al Gore
Switch with partner every 25 reps

Run back to COT. Total we ran about 2.5 miles.

Thank you to all the PAX who have been a part of my first year at F3. Whether we’ve sweated together, shared a beer together, prayed together, or done a CSAUP together I have been blessed to share a bit of the good life with you. This is definitely more than a workout.

Thank you Peg for the opportunity to lead.

Stay Classy,
Homebrew

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Still in Abyssness

I seem to keep having my last Q in the Carolinas at least once a week now. Gonna need to stop calling it that until I got a final date for when I leave. Bones gave me the Q for abyss at sea legs, came up with something on the spot that went more or less like this today-

Mosey to basketball court, COP

Mosey to the back road. At top of back road, tried having us do rugby sprints, learned its kinda hard to do it coming downhill, didn’t realize the angle was as steep as it was when trying to stop suddenly for six inches. Did this all the back to basketball courts

WIth a partner, each man does 30 pullups  altogether, switching off to run to give breaks between sets. I love my pullups, and 30 is ambitious I think for most people.

After this went on to main event. Tried explaining the whole routine before starting, but learned it was alot easier to just go round by round and have the PAX follow along till the habit picked up.

ISLAND HOPPING

4 islands nearest us in parking lot, do a set of an exercise and run to next. then,Far away islands, run to each and do 15 LBCs.  last island near middle by COT, 10 burpees before moving on to next round. rounds were as follows:

1.10 merkins

2.20 squats

3.20 monkey humpers

after going through one cycle of this, PAX had it down pat. 10 minutes, left, started over with intention that everyone do as much as they could before time. Pax in lead got to monkey humpers again before COT called.  As usual, Jedi was beast mode and in the lead and never looks like he’s dying haha.

Had lunch with Qbert today who was present, I asked him what the general impression was of ” a whopper Q”, if it had any general characteristics . He answered that it was that nobody ever knew what it was going to be or what to expect. Really, Really glad to hear that because honestly, my biggest thing that I want to avoid at all costs, is to be too predictable or cliche when I lead the beatdown. So its good to know.

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Gym Jones and a little DORA

It’s been a while since I’ve been back to my old stomping grounds at The Deep and thought this would be a great way to warm up for BEYOND coming on Monday. 9 PAX answered the call in The Gloom. Here’s what went down:

Quick Disclaimer and Mosey over to the parking lot in front of The Office (slight location adjustment was needed due some leftover splashed merlot).

A brief warm up followed.

THE THANG
A while back Facebook into me to Bobby Maximus and some of his Gym Jones challenges. It goes like this: Set a timer for one minute. Starting at one increase by one Burpee every minute until you can no longer complete the number of Burpees in that minute. This group pushed themselves to the limit and made it 15! For those who don’t want to do the math that’s 120 total Burpees

With all the PAX sucking wind we slowly moseyed over to the building and partnered up for a little DORA. With a partner complete 100 Dips, 200 Squats, and 300 double count Flutters while their partner ran to the parking island and back.

With the PAX sufficiently smoked, we moseyed back to COT.

MOLESKIN
F3 has impacted my life in more ways than I can count. I shared today that for most of my life due to various factors including being bullied, I have never had the confidence to look people in the eyes while speaking with them. I didn’t feel worthy. It felt intimidating. While I’ve held leadership positions, I’ve never known what it took to be a leader. F3 has given me the confidence to finally do that. The mental shift that happens when all of a sudden you lead and others follow is life changing. It’s downright empowering. These 45 minutes or hour leadership sessions have not only impacted my relationships, but my professional life as well.

There’s your preview for BEYOND. Check out the next BB for PART II.

Wild Thing Out.

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What was Paula Abdul doing at the Poopdeck!?

There were 11 PAX including Adretti, who we lost to I.R. a couple months ago, at the Poopdeck on a nice Thursday morning.

At 5:15 sharp I gave  a quick dislamer we moseyed to the gravel-filled parking lot below where we circled up for some cadence exercises.

Warm-A-Rama

  • SSH x20
  • Moroccan Night Clubs x20
  • Windmills x10
  • Imperial Squat Walker x10
  • Evil Lance Armstrong x20 (10 each leg) Got this from our F3 Plano brothers.  It consists of extending 1 leg out 6″ off the ground and then doing a Freddy Mercury with the other leg.  And then switching legs.  It pains so good.

1st exercise: Spartans runs

After warming up a bit I discussed our first exercise of the morning which were some Spartan runs.  I had setup some cones about 100 yards apart.  We were going to sprint 100 yards “AYG” and then 20 merkins (5 each of wide, normal, diamond, ranger).  We repeated this 5x. Grand total 100 varied Merkins and a whole lot of heaving breathing and a couple of premature starters (Royale, Wolverine).  I wonder….

2nd exercise: Del Brown

I had some additional cones setup 25 yards apart.  We were to do 5 diamond burpees, crab walk 25 yards perform 5 wolverine burpees (thanks to our false starters) crab walk back 25 yards and do 5 more diamond burpees.

We did this 2 times, although I felt bad and called and Omaha on the Wolverine burpees during round 2.  I figured once was enough punishment.  Grand total 5 normal burpees, 20 diamond burpees, and 5 wolverine burpees, and 100 yards of crab walking. FUN!

3rd exercise: Paula Abdul!

Yep, she was spotted at the Poopdeck and as it turns out, I think the Poopdeck is just where she belongs.

I had 6 cones about 50-60 ft. apart.  Each of the 6 cones had an exercise written on them.  In typical Paula fashion, we were to Bear Crawl to the 2nd cone, perform the exercise, and then Crawl Bear back the 1st cone.  We were going to do this until we got to the end.  So, 2 cones forward 1 cone back, breakdown as follows:

  • Cone #2 – 15 Flutters IC
  • Cone #1 – 15 “Hand Clap” Merkins (did we skip this one or did I just black out?)
  • Cone #3 – 10 Crab Cakes IC
  • Cone #2 – 15 Flutters IC
  • Cone #4 – 10 Donkey Kicks
  • Cone #3 – 10 Crab Cakes IC
  • Cone #5 – 5 Kraken Burpees
  • Cone #4 – 10 Donkey Kicks
  • Cone #6 – 10 Jumping Spiders
  • Cone #5 – 5 Kraken Burpees

Then a nice mosey back to CoT for 4 minutes of “Ablab” where 4 of us called out some exercises which ended up consisting of LBC’s, Dying Cockroaches, Flutters, and Big Boy situps.

We finished up with the tycial Announcments, Praises, & Prayers.  We prayed for our children, specifically, prayers to overcome struggle as they grow into adulthood.

This was  a tough workout, we all survived and got better.  Shout out to Andretti’s for making it through a tough workout to return to.   Thanks for the Q Peg.

Until next time…

Flux

 

 

 

 

 

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Fun times with Cable Guy

9 Strong Men braved the cool weather and a Cable Guy Q

Brief disclaimer given and a nice warm-up mosey to the middle of he track

COP

20 Seal Jacks

20 Plank Jacks

20 SSH

20 Mountain Climbers

20 IW

20 Peter Parkers

20 Slow Squats with a calf raise

20 Parker Peters

20 Moroccan Night Clubs

Mosey over to the side of the track closest to the school

do 10 dips and run a lap

repeat 10 times

Bonus round for those who finished early!

Mosey over to the wall for some Peoples Chair and Burpees (wouldn’t be a Cable Guy Q without Burpees!)

Start from one en and do one Burpee each and back to the wall

Round 2 was 2 Burpees each

Round 3 was 3 Burpees each

Proper technique was suggested!!

Round 4 was a changeup of Ball to the Wall and 1 Burpee down the line

Mosey back to COT

Spoke about the tragedy at The Peach Stand yesterday. Prayed for both the victims family and the suspect for forgiveness. Also spoke about school shootings and Det. Doty. Prayed for peace!

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Whopper on Deck

Since I started posting at F3 over a year ago, I made it an unspoken rule that I never posted on thursdays. Back when I was always 2nd shift, I would post M-W-F-Sat, gym and run tuesdays or thursdays . Therefore the only thing that got me to the poop deck this week was Wild Thing’s 2nd attempt at getting me to volunteer for the Q. 20 degree morning with just 4 made it special.

Thang: Long loop behind bowlnbounce and abbreviated circle of pain to warm up at the parking lot by the boats. SSH, LSS, peter parker, nothing crazy

Main event was 4 exercises and lots of running. Phase 1- partner suicides out to 4 cones, guy behind did as many reps as possible in that period. Exercises were, in order: Merkins, squats, freddie mercurys, burpees. between the 4 of us it was determined what the highest amount of reps were for each exercise.

Phase 2- Together, ran to far light post and back to do the max reps together, total of 4 times. 53 Merkins, 44 squats,  68 Freddies, 15 burpees.

Phase 3- sucides together, 4 times to do same amount of reps of the aforementioned exercise.  started having to take pauses on the merkins to let us do all the reps haha. Time was running short by time to take the last sucide, I called for us to sprint to the light post instead on that one.

Followed by mosey back to COT, prayers for Wild Things son, Royale’s sister in law, and my continued search for better employment opportunities going into the new year.

I was happy to find that the Q was simple, brutal, and took the whole time without having to fill time hugging the wall.

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The 12 Pains of Christmas at The Poop Deck – Redux

Thursday before Christmas in 2016, I Q’d this same workout up at The Poopdeck. We had a great time then, and I was asked to bring it back again to The Poopdeck this year. That’s quite a complement to redux a Q. Thanks Wild Thing for the request and opportunity to lead.

Ho ho ho! Santa Q was out and ready to receive the PAX of HIMs this morning when they rolled in to the Poodeck. It was a great day, balmy for December. What a treat in itself. Everyone was in a great mood. Alot of mumblechatter. It is always great to start your day with a group of HIMs like this,
No FNGs unfortunately. After the disclaimer was disclaimed, off we moseyed around the parking lot a to get the heart rate up. After the warmup run, we circled up for the COP, 20 or so of each:

 

  • Side-straddle hops
  • Imperial walkers
  • Windmills
  • Moroccan night clubs
  • Cherry/Strawberry/Weed Pickers

We were all nice and warmed up. A brief run over to the large parking lot at the boat ramp for NASA’s follies…..

The 12 Days of Christmas…. Pain:
NASA Claus came prepared with a red bag full of goodies for each and every PAX, whether naughty or nice they have been. In Santa Q’s sack was 12 ‘presents’, complete with bows even. With warmth from his heart Santa Q gave each PAX a present. The joy and excitement each PAX had of receiving these wonderful, yet unknown gifts was an incredible sight to see. I wish I had my camera at the ready! The PAX were excited to reach in NASA Claus’ sack to see what they got, but NASA Claus had to remind him to be gentle with it, for it is VERY old.
After a gift was opened, the group had to partake in the pain it presented. Not only that, the HIM who opened the gift got to lead the exercise it outlined. They were gifts that kept on giving. Each PAX took turns opening their gifts from NASA Claus to find the following pains:
Gift # / Pain:

 

  1. 15 Burpees OYO
  2. 25 Monkey Humpers, cadence (c)
  3. 40 Merkins (c)
  4. Run, run Rudolph! (Run a loop around the entire boat ramp parking lot, about 1/4 mile loop)
  5. 50 Plank Jacks (c)
  6. 50 LBCs (c)
  7. 40 CDD (c)
  8. Grin and Bear it!! (Bear Crawl loop the circle of HIMs –  had to open the circle a little for this one)
  9. 40 LSS (c)
  10. 30 Hello Dollys (c)
  11. 50 Calf raises (c)
  12. Don’t be Crabby (Crab walk loop the circle of HIMs)

 

I wanted cadence to slow the exercise down, focus on form rather than speed. Even with not much rest between ‘gifting’, that took a good chunk of the 45 minutes. We still had around 10 minutes or so left, so we started another round. Due to tough economic times, we had to regift and Santa Q redistributed the presents for round 2, letting each PAX reach into Santa Q’s sack AGAIN to grab a gift of goodness. Unfortunately due to time we cut short round 2 to only 4-5 presents. Even so, it was alot of pain combined with alot of fun. Each and every PAX had alot of laughs.
Run to the COT for Announcements, Prayers, and Praises.
Brief discussion on Gifts: My opinion the most precious Gifts we are blessed with is Christ and time. Without those, all other Gifts we have been blessed with we would never be able to be thankful for.  Do not take either for granted. Use every moment of time you have to utilize the Gifts you have been blessed with in a positive way. In doing so, maybe you will bestow a Gift upon someone else.
Thank you for the opportunity to lead.
Merry Christmas and God Bless,
-NASA
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