(Pre) Adopt a Highway Beatdown

16 PAX for The Fort and 6 PAX for Milllkshake on a lovely spring morning

Battlebot started off with disclaimer and straight into warmups in the amphitheater parking lot… first warmup exercise he called was Goofballs, and with that the milllkshake crowd had seen enough and split.

(IC) – Goofballs, Cherry Pickers, Overhead Claps, MNC,  Merkins

We then began a mosey on trail towards Harris Street Park with a pain stations along the way

Station 1: 10 reps – Monkey Humpers, Imperial Walkers, American Hammers

Station 2: 10 reps –  CDD, Peter Parkers, Lunges

 

At Harris Street Park:

use full length of basketball court – Bear crawl to one side, crab walk back

use full length of basketball court – high knees there, duck walk back

10 reps each exercise-

use benches – Bulgarian Split Squat, Incline Merkins, Step Ups, Derkins, Dips

use swingset – pullups

Burpees

Run halfway back up trail towards WEP until you get to the beer bottle, turn around and hit the full circuit again

 

BattleBot handed Q to YHC at about 0658 and we began our mosey back towards WEP – about 3/4 of the way back we stopped for 25 LBCs (IC)

Continued to WEP playground where we partnered up for a DORA – Partner 1 exercises while partner 2 runs from playground to the statue on the hill.

Exercises:

50 reverse pushups on swings (short on swings so a couple groups got to do 50 pullups)

100 hand release merkins

150 squats

 

We finished up the last 7-8 minutes with a HIIT 45Sec ON 15Sec OFF doing the following exercises:

Burpees, Freddy Mercuries, High Knee Taps,  SSH,  In&Outs, Side to Side Squats, Shoulder Taps

 

Congregated back at the parking lot with about 30 seconds to spare and Al Gored to finish at 0730.

 

Got through announcements and started Prayers/Praises before I realized I forgot Name-a-Rama.  Another reminder that I am surely not a professional.

Thanks for the opportunity Grinder

 

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Beyond The Lighted Stage

Ten of Fort MIl’s finest met at the newly remodeled Walter Elisha Park for a combined boot camp (The Fort)  and IR/walk and ruck(Milkshake).  I heard that the milkmen did a tour of downtown Ft. Mill holiday lights.  Here is what the boot campers did:

The Thang:

Senator Tressel on Q

After the standard disclaimer, the group moseyed around the parking lot and headed into the park before doing a 180 and jogging back to the pavilion stage for COP.

All in Cadence:

SSH x 25, windmill x 15, merkin x 10, IW x 20, squat x 20, CDD x 15, Freddie Mercury x 20, jumping lunge x 20, wide arm merkin x 15

Mosey to the playground:

Round 1:  10 pullups, lunge walk from the playground to the side walk, 20 merkins, lunge walk back

Round 2:  10 pullups, run from the playground to the walking path, 10 burpees, run back, 10 bomb jacks

Round 3:  10 pullups, bear crawl from the playground to the walking path, 20 diamond merkins, karaoke back

Boat and canoe x 5.

Hand off to Grinder

Dora 1, 2, 3  (100 merkins, 200 calf raises, 300 LBC).  Partner runs around the playground.

Mosey to the small lot at the park entrance and circle up.  With the pax in a circle, one person in the center did a modified American Hammer (20 count with a brick) while everyone else performed an exercise.  Everyone took a turn selecting an exercise and sitting in the center.  Today, we did merkins, flutter kicks, burpees, and others I cannot remember

We finished off with the ACDC hit, ‘Thunderstruck’.  Every time the band sang the word ‘thunder’, the pax did a burpee.   It was a crowd-pleaser and now I don’t like that song as much as I used to.

COT

Naked Man Moleskin

What a pleasure to be back at the Fort on a Saturday!  Alcatraz is my usual Saturday stop, but Grinder asked me to Q this past Sunday and I gladly accepted.   It’s been close to a year since I’ve been back to Walter Elisha Park and well over three years since I’ve Q’d a workout here.  Wow – how different it looks now! The town did a great job with the upgrades to the park and it was pretty cool to do COP from the stage of the pavilion.  I see many more there on future Saturdays.

It was a pleasure to be back at WEP and to lead the group on a beautiful morning.  Good to see my brother Cable Guy back in action after an extended absence, and yes, I just put another reference to my favorite band Rush into an F3 backblast (RIP Neil Peart).

Announcements/Prayers/Praises

  1.  Adopt a Highway starting today (way to go Fogerty and F3 for continuing to give back to the community).  #HIM
  2. Prayers for ST’s friend Joe with cancer, and for those suffering from Covid 19.
  3. Praise for DD’s friend (a single parent) who raised a son graduating from HS.
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Keg and Kettlebell

Started with some warmup then the stuff.

One PAX takes the keg (empty, but still weighting approx. 30 lbs) and carries it around two parking islands and back to the group.  The rest of the PAW do an exercise until he returns.

American Hammers

Carolina Dry Docks

Squats

Box Cutters

Curls

Air Drama

LBC

Halos

Al Gore

UHauls

Butterfly BigBoys

Skull Crushers

Lunges

Superman

Lawn Mowers

Flutters

Chest Presses

Hello Dolly

Side Lunges

The PAX blasted thru this list in half the time so as each PAX left with the keg, he chose an exercise for the rest of the PAX to complete.  @Bandcamp is not invited back for calling Turkish Getups.

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FieldDay at Paintheon

My shorty was really excited about having a field day at school so I thought I would bring back some elementary school memories and lead the PAX in some old school field day activities.
I don’t usually put this much effort into a Q because there is a lot of stuff to figure out and prep beforehand. Luckily I have been riding the good vibes of June FNG Jamboree so I was willing to put in the extra effort in hopes the PAX have fun while still getting a workout in.

Started the PAX off with some standard exercises then moved right into the games.

The following games were played. If you want to know more then you need to show up next time. Thank you to Lutefisk for joining us while on IR and for capturing some incredible footage of the games.

Sharks and minnows and bears. The bear crawl is the only mode of transportation. then around with only being able to NUR which turned out to be way more dangerous than expected.

The next field day game was the egg toss.
Wanting to continue to have access to the facilities of the elementary school the eggs were swapped out for golfballs. Eggs smashed baking in the sun while the kids stand in the car rider pickup line would not be great for fulfilling the mission of F3.
Golf ball egg toss rules. If you drop the golf ball you and your partner must perform 3 burpees before moving back to the next cone. Note that golf balls were also dangerous. Especially with the limited photons present in the gloom.

On to the second to final field day game. The famous water relay. Everyone is split into two teams. Each team member will perform exercises while the first person in line will fill the holy cup,(it’s a cup with holes in it to let the water leak out thereby encouraging running) and run down around the farthest cone then back to a second cup that is to be filled. Exercises are merkins, squats, plank for the guys not running with the leaking water jug.
This was one of my favorite parts to watch as PAX had different theories and strategy was definitely a factor in the outcome. There were some cheaters so the rules had to be adjusted to only carrying the jug with one hand. Great job fellas pushing yourselves to win for your team. (IT especially was running fast)

Last but not least was the “nobody is watching my six” dodgeball.
Pax around the circle perform seal jacks while trying to hit the person in the middle. If you hit the person you then go into the middle and take a turn dodging while they take your spot around the circle. At first, it was only one person and one dodgeball which was pretty elementary so we had to add more excitement by adding a second person in the middle and a second dodgeball. So now there are two people in the middle and two dodgeballs in play. It became much more chaotic which I enjoyed and many more guys were getting into the dodging action. The game also added some chaos because with only two out of 4 dodgeballs in play at a single time everyone had to be aware of the sequence at which the dodgeballs were allowed to enter the game. To make it as easy to remember as possible we established that the order of balls that could be in play was green, yellow, red, and finally blue. So the game starts with the green and yellow balls in play and if one of the green or yellow balls ends up outside the circle then the next ball which is red becomes active.

Kudos to Uber for his world-class dodgeball skills.

Hope you guys enjoyed it and it was great to see Tinsel back out in the gloom after his rabdo scare.

Thanks for the opportunity 38 to lead. Stay frosty my friends,
Olaf

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Mini-training day

(For the record since it’s been a while since I’ve posted a backblast, I actually wrote this the morning after the workout and sadly it took me another fully week and then a couple days to copy and paste it…at least I’m making some kind of backblast progress…)

Aren’t all days in a sense training days?

Today, 9 men gathered, 3 had miles on their minds so split off for laughs and miles but could have just been laughs and coffee as YHC wasn’t there to witness.  Regardless, 6 men set off for the unknown.  Before any setting off happened, we had ourselves a little warm-up.

Slick: 20 SSH, 10 man makers, 25 SSH, 5 man makers

With heart rates higher than 5 minutes ago, we rucked up, gathered our 3 sand bags, and headed towards the church parking lot.  Wait…we first had Mainframe and Maximus do a quick demo on how to transfer a sand bag the proper way since a majority of the crew is headed to GrowRuck Grandstrand next week.  Demo concluded and we trekked off.  At the arrival of the church, we did 2 group sand bag handoffs, somewhat successful, and started on the first pain station.

While 1 guy ran / shuffled, with ruck, around the church parking lot circle and acted as our timer, the remaining 5 did the following exercises:

  • Plank hold
  • Flutter
  • Merkins
  • Squats
  • Overhead ruck press
  • Upward row with ruck

Next, we got in a ball of man of sorts, but YHC asked the guys to close their eyes and “mix around” while all the time keeping our eyes closed.  The goal of this exercise was to play with our minds and remove our site so communication became key since vision was impaired.  During an event, it’s going to be dark and disorienting and a guy, or guys, will need to find their voice BUT, also be ready to listen.

  • Objective 1: organize ourselves by height from tallest to shortest in a single file line
  • Objective 2: organize ourselves by age (days matter) in a single file line

Objective 1 – fail by ¼-1/2 inch.  Tinsel is working out too much and has stunted his growth.  10 burpee penalty

Objective 2 – pass

In summary, communication is key, but details matter.  How much is too much communication?  Depends on the situation and if penalties are involved.

Loaded up and moved to the fire station with sand bag transfer happening and Ruck event war stories filling the early morning air!

Arrived at fire house and unloaded gear.  Next up was “jacob’s ladder” modified version.  1 end was burpees and other end was squat presses with ruck (so this was done slick).  Counting was starting at 7 for both exercises and working our way down to 1.  Finished this by 0555 with not a lot of time (underestimated distance to COT) to get back.  We did see the space shuttle walking back which filled more questions about alien invasions and why is that plane’s lights facing the wrong way, etc.

Made it back to COT where we did the normal….aside from ball of man which we may have done for those that were ok to participate.  I will tell you that it felt pretty awesome.

Thanks to Tinsel for the opportunity!

Shady

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Blessings

YHC was honored to be granted the Q Spot for Slow Burn on the mildest morning of the week.  The rising temperatures likely led to increased turnouts throughout the week so as YHC sidewalk chalked the finishing touches on the workout and pulled up to COT, it was great to see a big number of HIMs gathered to start of the morning.

All PAX were disclaimed and assured that YHC was absolutely not a professional.  Risk was assumed by all present and off we moseyed to the warm-up:

COP consisted of the following exercises in varying quantities:  Windmills (Trucker-approved), Imperial Walkers, Hillbilly Walkers, Side Straddle Hops, PAX remained in the plank position for the following: Merkins, Down dog, Up dog, Mountain Climbers, Peter Parkers, Shoulder taps, a 6-inch hold for a notably slow 10-count given by Trucker and the warm up was complete.  PAX moseyed to the Hampton Inn entrance were partner Dora was to commence:

50-100-150 – Merkins, LBC’s & Flutters

16 PAX made for even splits into groups of 4, which fit nicely with the 4 corner stations that were about to commence.  PAX counted off and miraculously all remembered their numbers as we moseyed to 4-corner land for 10-20-30’s.  Mode of transportation between stations varied and some PAX were displeased and modified.

PAX completed roughly 6 stations in total , did all exercises together in their assigned groups and rotated in clockwise fashion.

Station 1 – 10 bombjacks, 20 diamond merkins, 30 flutters and crawl bear to station 2

Station 2 – 10 burpees, 20 merkins, 30 Rosalitas and lunge walk to station 3

Station 3 – 10 bombjacks, 20 shoulder taps, 30 boxcutters and bear crawl to station 4

Station 4 – 10 burpees, 20 werkins, 30 Hello Dollys and NUR to station 1

YHC called time at 0556 and PAX moseyed to the Empire Pizza wall.  People’s Chair was held and each PAX spoke of a blessing for which they were thankful.  There were many.   After all sounded off we moseyed to COT for announcements, prayers and praises.

Announcements –

T-Claps to Curious George for taking the Q reins on Fort Mill Care Center and to Assassin for his leadership in this effort.  Sign up genius to post soon.

April 13 – Pancake breakfast celebrating 1-year anniversary of the Bubble.  T-Claps to Twister for spearheading this 2nd F event.

Prayers were offered for the schools beginning back full time Monday.  Praises to all the teachers, administrators and those who were part of this effort.

NMM – Blessings come in all forms.  As we slowly lift from the depths of this pandemic, YHC has found the simplicity of an ordinary day to be one of the greatest blessings there is.  Having the ability to get up, exercise and improve in all facets of our lives is something we all must embrace.  The effect that has on others around us is often greater than the effect on ourselves.

Thanks to Twister for the opportunity to lead.

With Gratitude,

Cyclops

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Fresh off GR021, we’re now at the Fire Ant

If you were one of the 20 PAX that attended Fire Ant today, you heard me talk briefly about the impact of GR021 (GrowRuck 021) in Louisville this past weekend. Along with Olaf, Shady, Italian Job and Dark Helmet, I was blessed to participate in this extremely impactful weekend. Much like the rest of F3, the true benefits go way beyond the workout or in this case, the 14hr team ruck event spanning Saturday night into Sunday morning.

I tried to bring back just a taste of what we experienced and some of my learnings but unless you actually participate in these GrowRuck weekends, it’s hard to comprehend. However, I did want to bring a taste of the PT to our local PAX and so with 19 other Ruckers, we did the following.

Disclaimer

Warm Up
Jog, Knees to chest, Jog, Toy Soldiers, Butt Kickers, Jog back to our rucks

SSH x 5
Windmills x 5
SSH x 10
Windmills x 5

Ruck Up
Rucks overhead for a 30ct
Ruck Curls x 20 IC
Squat hold with rucks overhead for a 20ct
Ruck swings x 20
Tricep Extensions x 20 IC
Squat with ruck press x 10 IC

2 line ruck shuffle to back lot & ground the rucks
3-tier suicides then ruck up
Bear crawl to the far suicide line and plank
Bear crawl back to the half way point and circle up
Slick-dying cockroach x 30IC
BEAR ROACH for a while (I think we did a total of 20 to the left and 20 to the right). For this exercise, you get into a bear crawl position with your ruck on then upon command, roll over to the dying cockroach position. Upon command, get back to the bear crawl position.

2 line ruck shuffle back to the first starting spot and circle up
5 Merkins – 10 Carolina Dry Dock – 15 Bent Over Rows (all IC)
5 Squats – 5 lunges each leg
2 line ruck march back to COT

Announcements:
Read your newsletter
SIGN UP FOR THE F3 10YR
SIGN UP FOR A FUTURE GROWRUCK

SYITG
Maximus

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Just. Keep. Posting.

On a crisp 48 degree morning, a similar # of pax posted for a convergence at The Fort/Milkshake to commemorate 8 yrs of pain and impact in the Gloom of Fort Mill, SC and elsewhere in York County.   The occasion drew pax from Rock Hill, Metro and Raleigh.

The Thang

Double D led a warm up with yog to the Church of God parking lot plus some Carioca

COP — Mtn Climbers, Peter Parker, Parker Peter, Monkey Humpers, SSH, Seal Jacks, Merkins

Hand off to Jekyll

Yog up the hill to the rug factory lot and a re-introduction to, yes, you guessed it  — The Board Pain!!!

See photo for the Weinke from here….or check your soreness today (Sunday) for those who were present.  A Jekyll Classic!  Heard at F3 from Redwood @Santini “I’ve been avoiding this Board for years…100 Burpees!!”

Yog back home

COT

Naked Man Moleskin

8 years…Is that a long time?  Well, the average time of degree completion for US college students is 6 years.  Only 50% of startups make it to the 5th year mark.  So, I suppose 8 years qualifies as something of a landmark.  At the same time, I don’t personally remember much about being 8 years old.  What about the 8 years from 2-10 years old?  Or maybe 10-18 years old?  Yes, I remember more…and if I had my way I’d like to forget some of those moments!

Well, I can remember quite a bit of the past 8 years.  I quite clearly remember 9.29.12…a date etched in my memory like my wedding day, my daughters’ birth dates and my birthday.

As I reflect back on 8 years of #Impact delivered by the men of F3TheFort, what really matters is 10.06.12 and 10.13.12.  You see, those were the Saturdays when pax returned to WEP for week 2 and week 3.  And FNGs posted for their own personal version of #TheLaunch.  And then Saturdays became Tuesdays, too.  And then a short time later they also became Thursdays.   In the end, what matters the most is not what happened in the past, but what happens today.  Or what will happen tomorrow when pax post to one of 30+ workouts across Fort Mill/Tega Cay or 70+ workouts across York County.

Just. Keep. Posting.  The one true constant across life is #Change.  Since 2012, I’ve moved to a different house,  nurtured two chicks out of the nest, collected a paycheck from two additional employers and traversed through a lot of ups and downs.  One of my rocks during this period has been the community of #HIMs known as F3TheFort.  You’ve been steady in your acceptance of me each time I post.  And along the way, you’ve revealed to me more and more parts of myself as you’ve revealed parts of yourself.  I know I’m all the better for it, and so is my family.  I’m pretty certain you’re better too.  And in the process our town, county and country are also better.

So, yes, we should take heart in what’s transpired over the past 8 years.  It is remarkable.  It is a blessing.  Some might call it a miracle….or miracles.  And the only way to honor this fruit and express our gratitude to God and the men who’ve contributed (past and present) is to Just. Keep. Posting.  Because if a day ever comes when no one posts…well…let’s Just. Keep. Posting.

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The Buble’

The temps were steamy. The Bubble was bubbling. The disclaimer was disclaimed. Eighteen HIM decided to get better.

Warm Up

  • 15 Side Straddle Hops
  • 10 Windmills
  • 10 Low Slow Squats
  • 10 Flutters
  • 10 Dying Cockroaches
  • 10 Big Boy Sit ups
  • 10 Mountain Climbers
  • Down/Up Dog
  • Static Stretch

Round 1

Indian Run around the block as the caboose did 2 burpess and sprinted to the front.

As the PAX gathered after the run I spoke on the importance of serving. The Bible tells us so.

Luke 22: 27 – 28

Jesus “For who is greater, the one who reclines at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at the table? But I am among you the one who serves.”

There is so much opportunity to serve the community. If the Son of God can serve us, we can certainly find ways to serve each other. Don’t be the guy that reclines at the table. Be the guys that serves.

Round 2

Indian Plank while the PAX in the back bear crawls to the front. We continued out of the parking lot down the alley and back. This was a crowd pleaser.

Round 3

Indian Peoples Chair while the PAX in the back lunge walked to the front. We continued out of the parking lot down the alley and back.

Time flies when you are in pain (or something like that). We circled up for COT.

Announcements/Prayers/Praises

-JWOW

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