7th Year Convergence for The Fort

The 7th Year Convergence for The Fort followed an exhilarating Invergence from the night before.  Hoping to continue that acceleration, the 4 Q’s had a plan to talk about the 4 Skills needed for Virtuous Leadership: Vision, Articulation, Persuasion, Exhortation.

CakeBoss to start us out with Vision: Recognizing advantage and the movement required to achieve it.

Disclaimer and welcome
“Go Hard or Go Home!”

Take off for 100 yard mosey up path, Get in 3 lines – Indian Run across WEP

Break into 4 lines, 2 groups of seal teams -20 seal team sit ups in cadence

Back into 2 lines , Everyone plank – Tunnel of Love (25 guys per line) – Plank series while guys army crawling under

Crowd pleaser for sure!

7 Burpees for 7 Years!

Vision is what I spoke about and the men that saw the advantage of F3 and planted it (moved towards it) in Charlotte, the The Fort and we continued to give it away in Rock Hill & Lake Wylie.

Hand off to Maximus

Articulation: Describing vision to others in a clear manner. Being able to tell others where we’re going and being able to describe that vision to others.

So, with that said, we’re going over to the top of the big hill to start with drill bits:

½ the group goes one direction while the other goes the opposite way

At each white post (drill bit), 10 Jumping Lunges (10 each leg)

10 Jump Squats

Mosey to the base of the other hill, the one with the statue on it:

NUR (backwards run) up the hill

3 Burpees at the top

Bear Crawl down

5 Burpees at the bottom

Hand off to Fun House for the “P”.

Persuasion – The initiation of first Movement.  Convincing people to move in the direction of advantage, abandoning their Status Quo,

YHC gave an awesome yet forgettable speech about Persuasion.  Then the Thang:

Circle Up – Duck, Duck, Goose – One guy runs around the circle the rest of us plank, the next guy goes when the running guy finishes.  Planking excercises were called out: High Plank, Low plank, Mountain Climbers….. Audible called to get the next guy running after 1/2 a lap around the circle of Pax….. Peter Parker, Parker Peters….. Audible called to get the next guy running after 1/3 lap around….. Mak-Tar-Jai, Left Hand High, Right hand high…..Done.  That took 10 minutes!  60 guys is a lot of guys to be running around in circles.

Stay in circle, 5 minutes left, Jack Webb: 1 Merkin to 4 Overhead hand claps.  We got to 8!

Hand off to Pusher for Exhortation!

Exhortation – Incentivizing The Breach Of Obstacles.

Burpees x 10 OYO
Flutters IC x 10
Mosey to a corner of WEP
Burpees x 9 OYO
Flutters IC x 10
LBCs IC x 10
Mosey to another corner
Burpees x 8 OYO
Flutters IC x 10
LBCs IC x 10
Rosalita IC x 10
Mosey to another corner
Burpees x 7 OYO
Flutters IC x 10
LBCs IC x 10
Rosalitas IC x 10
Hello Dollies IC x 10
Mosey to another corner
Burpees x 6 OYO
LBCs IC x 10
Flutters IC x 10
COT
Naked Moleskin – The name-o-rama took forever.  That is a good thing. When 60+ PAX post to celebrate something that has obviously changed their lives, then change is happening!  Thanks to Maximus who put this awesome weekend celebration together!  His leadership is not only Effective (Using VAPE) but he is a Virtuous Leader! (Check out the Q Source for the 5 C’s Virtues of Virtuous Leadership) Can’t wait to see what year 8 brings to The Fort!  More importantly, who it brings!  Time to go EH someone.  See you in the gloom.
TClap |
1

Burpee Ranch Dressing

It was a not so humid, humid morning as 8 bootcampers and 2 ruckers decided to show up and accelerate their Thursday morning. I started off with a quick introduction and disclaimer, and then we were off. We did a Mosey around the side of the school followed by some warmups.

Warmup:

15 Side Straddle Hops
15 Squats
15 Windmills
10 Merkins
Down dog/Up dog

Not wasting any time, we ran over to the wall.

10 Peoples Chair with overhead claps
10 Wall Mountain Climbers
10 Peoples Chair with overhead claps
10 Wall Mountain Climbers

A quick discussion on our word of the year and where we are with our word.

Moseyed over to the soccer field for some cone work. I brought this workout out at The Colosseum a few months back. It was such a crowd please, I thought I would give the people more of that they want. Lots of burpees!

The Thang:

  • 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.
  • 10 Burpees. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 90 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.
  • 10 Burpees. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 70 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.
  • 10 Burpees. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 50 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.
  • 10 Burpees. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 10 yards. 10 Plank Jacks. Run 30 yards. 10 Plank Jacks. Run 10 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.
  • 10 Burpees. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 10 yards. 10 Plank Jacks. Run 10 yards. 20 Big Boy situps.  Run 10 yards. 10 Plank Jacks. Run 10 yards. 10 Carolina Dry Docs. Run 10 yards. 10 Flutters. Run 10 yards. 10 Squats. Run 10 yards. 10 Burpees. Run 110 yards back.

We line up for suicides.
10 yards
20 yards
30 yards
40 yards
50 yards

Headed back to COT for some ab work, and some prayers and praises.

JWow

TClap |
1

Tinsel Utensils at Golden Corral

Perfect weather to bring out some toys to play, I did my regular 4 stations setup where each stations works a particular group of muscles. After the disclaimer we did a quick run and started our warm up:

Windmill

Moroccan night clubs

Low Slow Squats

Mountain Climbers

Low Slow Merkin

The plan was to finish a full 4 station circuit within 22 minutes and we did, after completion of a station you had to  bear crawl the next one. stations were setup as follow:

STATION 1

30 LBC’s

30 Rosalitas

30 Sledgehammer swings (15 each side)

40 Heel Touches SC

40 Dying Roach SC

20 slam ball to ground with 20# ball

STATION 2

10 burpees

10  Tire flips

20  Monkey Humpers

20 lunges SC

30 low squat (touch the ground with hand)

50 calf raises

STATION 3

10 diamond merkins

15 wide arm merkins

20 regular merkins

30 battle rope wave SC

40 Shoulder taps

40 plank jack

STATION 4

USE WEIGHTS OR CINDY FOR ALL EXERCISES

10 man makers

15 biceps curls

20 bent over row

25 overhead press

30 triceps extension

40 shoulder shrug

After about 32 minutes we were done with a full circuit and had the visit of the legendary captain Thor, 1 Big Boy Sit Up and 4 American Hammers, progressive to 10 BBSU and 40 AH, lots of whining during this exercise, one PAX was even offered some cheese to go along with that whine!! After we finished captain Thor it was time to stretch out our backs with superman, we did 2×25 count. With about 5 minutes to spare we lined up next to what used to be Fort Mill BBQ and did some sprints all the way across to the end of the parking lot, after 5 sprints PAX where smoked but we had one minute left so we went for a 6th sprint, not sure if PAX liked it since there was lots of mumble chatter.

We moseyed back to COT for announcements, prayers and praises.

Great push by everyone, good mix of legs, core and upper body work.

Tinsel out…

TClap |
2

#Serving at Thanksgiving with Many Thanks

With great apologies for the delay in this backblast, here is a followup to our Thanksgiving meal drive. The PAX were truly inspiring in reaching out. We are all called to serve, and can do so in many different ways.

Immediate thanks to Figaro for the turkey donations, along with the 20 men who did not hesitate and within 3 days quickly donated to the cause… and whom most have chosen to remain anonymous. Special thanks to Cable Guy, Frat Boy and Crab Cakes for helping with delivery. More details further below. And additional thanks to Crab Cakes and M Kara for followup support to one of our families!

Many of us don’t truly realize the experiences of the poor and needy  until we are able to observe in real life. Most of stay in our one station in life, but it can be a privilege to experience others’ stations. (see next full story, try to get through it all)

One of the most meaningful and deep scenes in a movie I have watched comes from one of the silliest movies. In the movie “Overboard” with Goldie Hahn and Kurt Russell, Hahn’s female character (Joanna) plays a very stuck up, rich woman who falls overboard at night from her yacht while near WA (state). She gets amnesia. She is ‘claimed’ by Russell’s carpenter character (Dean) to ‘compensate’ for her refusal to pay him for his services performed by him in the days before.

Joanna ends up living a poor life with Russell and his 4 boys for about a month. She experiences things she would never had in her rich world.  She learns humility living a life with little money. Eventually her memory returns and she returns to her yacht.  But she no longer acts like the ‘debutante’ who her mother and privileged husband so want. They think something is wrong with her.

Later on board the yacht, Joanna has an interaction with her servant butler (Andrew) who has been taking care of her his whole life with no thanks for his efforts:

  • Andrew: (Andrew hands Joanna her earrings after they’ve drank tequila shots below decks with the crew) You best not lose these again, madam.
  • Joanna: (perplexed) Again?
  • Andrew: You will forgive me, madam. (clearly mocking her) “Andrew! I seem to have lost my ruby earrings somewhere between 64th and 68th street, find them.”
  • Joanna: (genuinely contrite) I’ve behaved so badly. (Andrew raises his eyebrows)
  • Joanna: You’ve done all these wonderful things for me and I never even once said thank you. I’m sorry.
  • Andrew: (embarrassed) Apology accepted, ma’am. (he turns away and to the sink)
  • Joanna: (following him) Everyone on this boat thinks I’m crazy. Do you think they’re right?
  • Andrew: (turning around to face her) Oh no, madam. Oh no. You… most of us go through life with blinders on. Knowing only that little station to which we were born. But you madam, have had the… rare privilege of escaping your bonds for just a spell. To see life from an entirely new perspective. How you choose to use that information is entirely up to you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlHlKi2dATw

The movie ends up with a happy ending with Joanna returning to Dean and the boys.

It is up to all of us to decide how we use information we have at hand. If you are called to serve, how are you actually serving? Are you truly seeking to serve? Are you open to learning about others less fortunate than you? Even more so, are you willing to put yourself in an uncomfortable environment to learn firsthand?

Here is a quick synopsis of this year’s turkey meals donation.  We had done turkey drives before, but some of the feedback we got was, not that it wasn’t appreciated, but that it was too much of a ‘giveaway.’ Best teach a man to fish, so to speak. But we’ve been in the Paradise community over 1 1/2 years now and we didn’t want to let Thanksgiving pass without some involvement. A plan was put together on Monday, announced to the PAX on Tuesday, enough donations received by Thursday, food bought on Friday and delivered on Saturday.

Thanks were in abundance from those receiving the meals. We had a few crying in appreciation. The names of the 10 neediest families were given to us by Kim Vinisette of SON Ministries who has been working in the community for years. F3 has a strong relationship with Kim. As we shared with the families, we asked them to also share to any others that could use food for the holiday.

We gave each family a nice presentation basket of initial food along with their turkey, an F3 flyer, a holiday card from F3 and a gift certificate of varying amounts (depending on family size) to buy additional food, ie. fresh food, dessert.

We arrived at the park Saturday afternoon and the PAX helped deliver.

Lessons learned include…planning to spend more on each family roughly in the $100 range, buying all the food necessary for a full meal, starting much earlier, getting other groups involved to help support the cause. Maybe next year we can increase the # of families.

I have some pictures but not at the ready. Will get posted here shortly. I want to get this BB out.

*** An additional good experience came from this endeavor. One of the families, a single mom with 3 girls, had next to no furniture in their apartment.  Crab Cakes and his M Kara came through as we identified their needs and their rooms went from having nothing to being filled!  Awesome job!  We are now working on another similar situation. Will post that info soon!

Great thanks once again to the PAX.

Aye! Bolt

 

 

 

TClap |
5

August 2018 – Impact Convergence

On the morning of Friday, August 3rd, 61 Men of High Impact joined Homebrew, Deacon, & Jiffy for some #Convergence work.

For this Round Robin of Pain, we separated the PAX into 3 groups and rotated to each station for 12 minutes.

Station 1 – Jiffy:

He had setup a row of 4 cones in the bank parking lot and ran the PAX through the following exercises.

  • 5 Burpees OYO
  • Straight suicides
  • Lunge walk, 10 squats at each cone
  • Bear crawl, 10 merkins at each cone
  • 15 American Hammers in cadence
  • Suicides with 3 Bomb Jacks at each cone
  • Broad jump to each cone, 5 lunges each leg
  • Crab walk, 5 diamond merkins at each cone
  • 15 LBC’s in cadence

Station 2 – Deacon:

Find a partner

One partner runs to Pizza Hut and back while the other does a series of exercises until the team does merkins (100x), Squats (200x), LBCs (300x).

  • Partner Drills (Round 1) – Partner Big Boy Sit Ups (15x for 2 rounds), Partners Push Ups (15x for 2 rounds), Partner Leg Lifts (15x for 2 rounds)
  • Partner Drills (Round 2 if time permits) – Partner Wheel Barrels to each side of the parking lot (2x for 2 rounds), Partner Ski Jumps (15x for 2 rounds)

Station 3 – Homebrew:

4 Corners and Burpee Roll

PAX were divided into four groups, with one group being sent to each corner. Complete all exercises listed at your corner then bear crawl to the center. At the center was a large foam die. One PAX would roll the die for the group to determine how may burpees everyone would do. Amazingly, only one 6 was rolled all morning – I’m lookin at you IceT. Once the burpees were completed, crab walk from the center to the next corner going clockwise. Rinse and repeat until all corners are done or time runs out.

  • Corner 1
    • 40 SSH
    • 40 Plank Jacks
    • 40 Mountain Climbers
    • 20 Crab Cakes
  • Corner 2
    • 15 Merkins
    • 30 CDD
    • 15 Wide Arm Merkins
    • 5 Kraken Burpees
  • Corner 3
    • 10 Donkey Kicks
    • 50 Calf Raises
    • 40 Monkey Humpers
    • 20 Lunges
  • Corner 4
    • 10 Big Boy Situps
    • 20 Hello Dollys
    • 30 Dying Cockroaches (double count)
    • 10 Boxcutters

There were prayer requests for family, school returning and those with health needs.

Cakeboss took us out in prayer.

Great job, Homebrew, Deacon, & Jiffy!

– Ginsu

TClap |
2

8/1/2018 – Tour of the Pantheon

Warmup – lap around 1/3 mile track with butt-kickers, high knees, l/r side shuffle.

Warmup – regular, wide, diamond merkins followed by Moroccan nightclubs.

1 Reps Circle of Power Time
Field Ptnr WelBrw Suicide Long Way BoxCutter 1min
Theatre Bear Crawl/Burpee Top/Bottom – 6 2x Squat Jump 1min
Hill Sprint 1 Plyo Merkin 1min
Ball Field MTJ/Car Dry Dk 30 3 Uppercut/Sprwl 1min
1 Reps Circle of Power Time
Swings Pull Up/Plank Crunch 10/failure Seal Jacks 1min
BB Court Inchworm/Sumo Jack Failure Pistol Squat 1min

Announcements – convergence on 8/3, Ragnar & p200 teams looking for runners.

Prayers/Praises – Olafs daughter, Cable Guys’ Family and Brother.

TClap |
0

Breathing Relief

Cable Guy lost his sidekick so Smuggler put out an APB for help and YHC decided to make it 3 in a row Qs. Cable Guy started off with:

Quick COT: 30 SSH; 5 burpees OYO; Squats, then mosey around the park

Another round of COT:

Seal Jacks; wide merkins; imperial walkers; wide merkins; moroccan night club; peter parker; parker peter; 10 burpees (5 for each late PAX arrival)

Grab a block for Burpecides:

Round 1: suicides to each of the 4 cones, increase burpees by 1 at each cone, back at start complete 5 squats – ALL with block

Round 2: same but with tricep extensions

Round 3: same with curls

Round 4: hand off to Trucker

Mosey to long hill. Start at top, run to bottom and complete 5 merkins, run to top and complete 10 LBCs – UvsU for as many rounds until Q calls halt. (most of PAX got 3 rounds in, a few got 4).

Mosey towards fire station, stop at Pull Up bars. This is the 10 count. each PAX does 5 pull ups while rest of PAX does squats until everyone completes their pull ups.

Moesy to short hill. Start at bottom, run to top by fire station and complete 5 merkins, run to back down and then up other side of hill and do 5 merkins, run back to bottom. Plank till 6. Repeat 3 times. Bear crawl to first driveway up hill then sprint to top of hill by fire station. Mosey back to COT for 3 minutes of Abs.

its always an honor to Q the best AO in The Fort. Each PAX proved they could push themselves especially in an extreme humid morning. Remember to be an IMPACT to your family and community.

Trucker and CG

TClap |
0

Sandy Cones at Alcatraz

Warmup:  Seal Jacks, Multiple Hold Merkins, Low Slow Squats.

1st Half Thang by Bear Grylls:  Mosey to the hill for uphill AMRAP sandbag and 20 & 35lb ruck work.

  • 20lb slam ball – Carolina Dry Docs and A Frame Crunches,
  • 20lb Sandbag – Lunge Choppers,
  • 45lb KettleBag – Squat Upright Rows,
  • 40lb Spartan Pancake – Front Raise to Overhead Tricep Extension,
  • 60lb Sandbag – Row to Curl.
  • 75lb Sandbag – Clean Jerk Press

As rucks reach top or bottom of hill, PAX advance to next station via bear crawl.

2nd Half Thang by SkateOrDie:  Mosey to Parking lot for cone workout

Cones with 3 exercises each for 20 reps in each corner, then advance to middle for group cone exercise then back to corners.

Prayers for victims and perp at school shooting, those in hospitals.  Praises for pax brother new job and pax wife negative test results for good health.

Aye!

TClap |
4

Rain, pain and gain at the Fort

At 5 minutes to 6am with no PAX in sight, CableGuy and Bolt wondered if it was going to be a dual beatdown. With seconds to spare, 4 more PAX arrived in the high moisture content morning.

We welcomed back Comeback posting for only his second post, first last fall EH’d by VuVu. Disclaimer was given and we moseyed around the WEP trail.

Taken by CableGuy to the upper parking lot for warmups.  As per his style, cadence proceeded at a pace about 50% faster than most Q’s. We kept up the best we could with SSH’s, ParkerPeters, PeterParker’s, mountain climbers, merkins, squats, seal jacks, …

*** Q’s, always take note of who’s in attendance and that a demonstration/reminder of an exercise may be necessary. ***

Staying in the same lot, we were treated to a beatdown ladder of burpees countdown starting with 10 at one end (to 1), cross lot sprint, and the other end 10 squats each time.

Marylou nicely informed us  it was a total of 55 burpees.

The blood was pumping and the arms were hurting as the rain started to trickle about halfway through.

Before Bolt took the PAX to the field for 5 pain stations, he gave the PAX a few words about our responsibility as men to watch out for and protect the women and girls in our lives. We have been going through a steady stream of news on sexual abuse, assault and domestic abuse.

An easy walk down the hill to catch our breaths before the 5 pain stations which each had their own ‘lanes’ of varying length. 5 starting cones had workout instructions on them and a corresponding turn-around point cone.   A little improvisation with only 6 PAX (expecting 10 or more), we lined up at the cones. Top instruction for one PAX, bottom for other PAX staying at cone.

cone1: top instruction: Run up hill carrying 40# to cone and back/bottom for PAX staying: squats

cone 2: top: Broad jump to corresponding cone and back;  bottom: calf raises

cone3: Sprint to cone and back/ American Hammers w/ 20# or 30#

cone4: BearCrawl to cone and back/ bomb jacks using 2-10# bags

cone5: Lunges carrying 2 sand bags to cone and back/ merkins

We did a final run through of the stations as a group.

Back to COT lot for a few minutes of Mary.

A good push by all PAX.

*** Q’s: Remember to never leave the 6 behind. Remember that we are all at different fitness levels. Be encouraging and positive and supportive.

Bolt finished with his thoughts about it being our responsibility to look out for all the women in our lives: our wives, our daughters, our nieces, our friends, our neighbors. We are seeing bad men do bad things and a lot of men who downplay the problems or don’t speak out against the perpetrators. It is our responsibility to not only protect, but to speak out against the behavior when it occurs. Talk with your women, but especially your daughters. Let them know what good behavior of men should be.

Yeti in 2 weeks.   Reminder about our community involvement in Paradise with our workouts and mentoring/reading sessions.   P200 coming.   Prayers for PAX with sick children and relatives with health issues.

Thanks to Uncle Sam for volunteering to tutor in Paradise

2 for post workout breakfast at The Peach Stand.

*** Final Q tip: After using cones and/or coupons on a rainy day, be sure to not stack cones and leave in car for a few days and dry coupons asap. Stinky!

 

TClap |
3