The runners take on Pantheon

Thanks to Gears for putting the word out and doing some quality marketing for a rare Bootcamp Q by YHC, and an equally rare BC participation from Gears & Zima.  As I waited in the gloom, the cars kept coming in.

Circled up, disclaimer was given and the 3 runners took off and the rest of us moseyed around the parking lot for a nice warm-up.

COP – SSH, IW, Low slow squat, Merkins, Mountain Climber, Peter Parker

Mosey to the bottom of Hubert Graham hill for a little BLIMPS.  Run to the top -5 Burpees, back down for 10 Lunges(each leg), back up for 15 IW, Down again for 20 Merkins, up again for 25 Plank Jacks, last trip down for 30 Squats.  Mosey back to school parking lot for a round of 11.  Start on the curb for 1 Mike Tyson(look it up) Bear crawl across parking lot for 10 Hello Dolly(in honor of Carol Channing RIP) jog back for 2 Mike Tyson, and so on and so on. The Mike Tysons were a real crowd pleaser, especially with the runners.

Another Mosey around the parking lot, with an AYG to finish at COT just in time for some Mary.

All in all a great morning, awesome to see some faces I hadn’t seen in a while, and it’s always fun to have Olaf around.  Thanks to Royale for making the long trip over the bridge to join us.

Announcements – Q-Source, Joe Davis, Special Honey Badger workout on Monday, and of course The Yeti!

Quick discussion on the Word of the Year, a few guys shared their word and why it was chosen

Prayers & Praises – Mile High is thankful for coming out for 6 months and the change it has made in his life. Prayers for sick friends & family members as well as injured Pax.

 

 

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Big 50 Birthday bash

Today was my 50th Birthday and Maximus allowed me to lead a Beyond so that I could take some extra time to discuss somethings that I have been pondering as I approached this milestone birthday.  To go along with our monthly theme of Vulnerable I took the opportunity to share some struggles as well.  With that we moseyed.

Warm up of SSH, Imperial walkers, Squats, Mountain Climbers, Merkins, and Plank Jacks

Moseyed to Rite Aid parking lot(some chatter about too much running, but I ignored it).

Sharing time #1 – Shared with the Pax that I feel like 30 year old me would have thought that 50 year old me would be “further along”.  Further along Professionally and Financially, Further along Spiritually and in Family.  In 2001 I was recruited to Charlotte for a position with a new company, for a salary that I thought would be my ticket ahead.  I had great plans that I could do this for a bunch of years, make a bunch of money and then I could check out and go do something that I wanted to do , maybe full time ministry or teaching.  Within 1 year it all blew up, I was demoted for not doing a good job, salary was slashed plans were gone.  17 years later we’re still feeling the affects.

First circuit – Partner up – Partner 1 does People’s Chair Partner 2 does a lap, then flip it.  Next Partner 1 does Plank, Partner 2 does a lap, flip it.  Next Partners do 100 Merkins as a team, 1 runs I does Merkins, flip it.

Sharing time 2 – Felt like I would be further along spiritually.  30 year old me would have thought I would have gotten past my need for man’s approval.  I would have thought that the sins that tripped me up back then would be conquered and pride & lust would no longer be an issue foe me, but they are still there.  Felt like I would be further along in family & parenting. My plan was to be an empty nester at this point, but here I am with a 7th and 9th grader still at home, and t top it off I’m not particularly better at parenting then I was when I 30.

Circuit #2 Partner again – Lap #1 Partner 1 does Al Gore Partner #2 does a lap.  Lap #2  Partner 1 does Flutters Partner 2 does a lap.  Lap #2 Team does 100 Big Boy Sit ups total while 1 partner runs.

Sharing time 3 – The truth is that when I look at my life with clear eyes I can see that my life has been Blessed beyond measure!  I have a job that I mostly enjoy, and work with great people(shout out to Royale) and I am well compensated.  I have a beautiful wife of 26 years and we have a great marriage that keeps getting better.  I have 5 awesome kids who are healthy and bring me great joy, and sometimes frustration.  To add to it I have found this thing called F3 and a group of friends and Brothers that I never even knew I needed!  To see my 50 year old life s anything but blessed is ridiculous.

Off to COT for 2 minutes of Mary

Final share – What I have found is that the only times that I get down about where I am at 50 is when I look around me at others and I compare myself to what  my perception of them is.  This can lead to pride but for me it mostly leads to despair.  What I am trying to learn is contentment as Paul describes it in Phil. 4, whether he had much or little Paul was content.  The source of this contentment is found in Phil. 3 where Paul shares that all of his achievements, any possession he may have or any legacy he may be able to boast about , all of is it is worthless, or as he calls is a big pile of manure, compared to knowing Christ.  Paul says he has 1 aim, and that is to Know Christ!!  The secret Paul learned is that all he need was Jesus and if he had Jesus he had all he needed, and if he had Jesus, he could never lose him so therefore he could always be content.  In whatever amount of years I have left let this be my aim; that I may know Christ!!

Thank you for the opportunity to lead.

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Hit the Threshold

Lucky Seven Stallions showed up for a long overdue track session.

My personal opinion is that we don’t do enough structured running workouts… my goal is to try to remedy that.  Here’s what we did:

  • Very easy warm up for 5 min
  • Easy Run for 8 min
  • Repeat the following 3x:
    • Recovery Run/Walk for 2 min
    • Threshold Pace for 9 min
  • Cool Down for 8 min

See here to determine target paces: https://runsmartproject.com/calculator/

 

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Not much of a game, but a whole lot of suicides

So for some quick backstory, YHC had the Q at the Deep on 9/29, but was asked by our Nantan to be on of the Q’s at the convergence at WEP.  I was planning on doing a football themed workout there, but since I was losing that Q, I thought I would try to move it to the Swamp.  That being said, nothing about what this workout evolved into resembled anything like what I was originally thinking, but as always, it was great to lead these awesome PAX.

There were 16 at The Swamp on a morning that was back to being hot and muggy.  I gave a short disclaimer and we started promptly at 515, the PAX were really chatty this morning, which stopped almost immediately after I got started because there wasn’t much time to breathe after that, let alone talk.

We took a short mosey around the parking lot and did some toy soldiers and shuffle steps on our way to the parking lot by the fountain where we circled up for a quick warm up.

  • 10 Windmills IC
  • 15 Moroccan Nightclubs IC
  • 10 Low Slow Squats
  • 10 Merkins IC

I only had 1 “thing” planned this morning, we would have 2 teams and do the same thing over and over again mixing in different exercises.  I had 5 cones on each side of the lot/fountain spaced 10 yards apart.  We would start at the back island and essentially do suicides while stopping at each cone and doing an exercise of my choice.   The first whole team to cross the finish line at the other end of the lot by the far island got a point for some friendly competition.

Breakdown:

  • Run 10 yards, do exercise, run back to finish
  • Run 20 yards, do exercise, run back to finish
  • Run 30 yards, do exercise, run back to finish
  • Run 40 yards, do exercise, run back to finish
  • Run 50 yards, do exercise, and then go the final ~60 yards or so via a movement of my choice.
  • Mosey back to start and repeat with different exercises

Exercises:

1st set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 Merkins
  • 30 Squats
  • 40 LBC’s
  • 50 Alternating Shoulder Taps
  • Sprint to finish

2nd set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 Werkins
  • 30 lunges
  • 40 flutters
  • 50 SSH’s
  • Bearcrawl to finish

3rd set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 Diamond Merkins
  • 30 Monkey Humpers
  • 40 Rosalitas
  • 50 Overhead Claps
  • Lunge Walk to finish

4th set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 CDD’s
  • 30 Reverse Lunges
  • 40 Dying Cockroach
  • 50 Plank Jacks
  • Crab walk to finish

5th set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 Ranger Merkins
  • 30 Lateral Jumps
  • 40 Hello Dolly
  • 50 Seal Jacks
  • NUR to finish

6th set

  • 10 Burpees
  • 20 Crucible Merkins
  • 30 Calf Raises
  • 40 Box Cutters
  • 50 High Knees
  • Shuffle/split the distance to the finish

We finished up with 2 minutes to spare, 1st team consisted of YHC, Bones, Cha-Ching, and Mainframe and we won with 4 points.  The 2nd team consisted of Gears, Regal, Tinsel, and Moab and they won 2 of the sets.  Winning team had a choice of 10 more Burpees for everyone or 20 for the losing team, we chose 10 more Burpees for everyone.

Mosey back to CoT right on time.

  • Invergence tonight!
  • Convergence 9/29 at WEP
  • Prayers for Moab and his big interview
  • Prayers for Cancer
  • Prayers for our troops that fight and the struggles they have with PTSD when they are back home.
  • Prayers for victims and families who are dealing with Hurricane Flo

Thanks for the Q Cha-Ching!

Until next time,

-Flux-

 

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Hills, Arms, Suicides and Hills

Sir Topham Hat and I were pretty excited to take on Alcatraz together. A couple or “runners” who really “enjoy” hills? What could possibly go wrong? A warning was sent on the Twitter machine that this would be hill intensive, so I was pleased to see 11 Pax show in addition to YHC and STH. It was a bit of an Alcatraz reunion of sorts with some familiar faces. We knew we needed to bring it.

STH on Q

  • Warm up jog with side shuffles, butt kickers and high knees
  • Mosey to the play area
  • Amrap pull-ups (unassisted), 20CDD – 3 Times
  • Mosey to Parking Lot
  • COP: SSHx20, cherry pickers x 10, Mountin Climbers x 20, Peter Parker’s x 10, 6” twice
  • Mosey to Upper Hill for Jacobs ladder
  • 7 burps and 1 bombjack at top.  Made it 4 rounds
  • Al Gore to squats (which prompted some colorful comments. Just do an Al Gore while doing squats and it’ll become clear immediately.
  • Mosey to Wooden wall.  7 count incline merkins in cadence, flip to dips 7 count in cadence.  Flap jack 4 times #smokefest
  • Handoff to Zima

Zima on Q

  • Mosey to Parking Lot
  • 25 SSH IC
  • 17 Something I can’t remember IC (I blame it on being light-headed)
  • Mosey to Middle of Parking Lot for Suicide Burpees (5 burpees at baseline each time running to 3 increasing suicide targets)
  • Walk 20 yards back for 10 hand release merkins at baseline with 4 suicide series targets
  • Walk 20 yards back for 7 bombjacks at baseline and 5 suicide series targets
  • Go to field for 4 corners
  • Corner 1 20 Monkey Humpers IC
  • Corner 2 20 Walking Lunges IC
  • Corner 3 20 Monkey Humpers IC
  • Corner 4 15 LS Squats IC
  • Run to short steep lower hill for 5 Min Quadzilla (insert copious amounts of complaining herre)
  • Mosey back to parking lot for 5 mins Pax Choice Mary
  • Finish with double 10 count body destroyer

All in all it was a pretty good smokefest. Everyone pushed their limits

NMM (here are our notes)

  • STH is super fit but bailed for Zima Q (cited family commitments)
  • Fish Sticks = #King #WarDaddy
  • Great mumblechatter this AM
  • Maximus is a beast and smiles through the entire workout like “Is that all you got?” Yes Max, it is.
  • Highlight of the morning was Dark Helmet’s commentary on STH’s Al Gore Squats #graphic #hilarious
  • A couple of Pax almost got laid out by a Buck (Deer) that didn’t see them and then shot off across the street
  • Quadzilla is still a crowd pleaser (esp. when you add a minute)
  • For all the comments about being out of shape, Gears seemed to be towards the head of the pack
  • Glad to see half the team of “Beauty and the Beasts” support us

Prayer, Praises, Announcements

BOM on Zima

Thanks for the opportunity to lead Smuggler! Keep me in the rotation.

Zima Out!

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Fun and Games Friday @ The Swamp

On a cool Friday morning, things got weird quick. After we ditched 5 ruckers led by Zima, the 17 bootcampers moseyed to a parking lot with some shuffles on the way. Warm-o-rama started with some windmills, peter parker peters, mountain climber merkins, super low super slow squats followed by smurf jacks. We went on to do some T-bombs and a superman hold which led to sun gods and Moroccan NC’s whilst in superman pose. This warm-o-rama made for much mumble chatter.

Next, mosey to the walls between target and home depot for some wall work, where PAX started with a derkin ladder from 10 to 1, running to the other wall in between. Next was ascending testicles, with feet starting at 10 degrees for a 10 count, then 45 degrees for a 10 count, followed by full BTTW 10 count. Mix in some leg work with a squat countdown. Start with 10 squats and hold Al Gore for a 10 count. Not too bad, until you do 9 squats and hold Al Gore for a 9 count. Repeato until 1:1.  Ouch…

Numbered off 1’s and 2’s to split into teams.  Regal forgot he was a 2.  Fridays are hard.  When we finally got the teams even, both teams hold BTTW and one at a time run to other wall and get up BTTW then call for next teammate. First team to have everyone BTTW on the other side wins.  Team 2 won both.  Probably because Regal was on team 2.

Mosey to parking lot where we lined everyone up at the end of the lot. It was game time. Good ole Rock Paper Scissors. Everyone against the Q. If you beat the Q, you had to bear crawl forward approx. 10 yards.  If you tie the Q, 1 burpee.  If you lost to the Q, 1 kraken burpee.  In perfect statistical form, about a third beat the Q.  Next, round two, where the winners bear crawled another 10 yards, the ties did 2 burpees, and the losers did 2 kraken burpees. This went on for a total of 6 rounds and I’m fairly certain I saw 1 or 2 PAX who lost them all.  More ouch…. Regal won

Mosey to grassy hill to finish off the arms with 2 rounds of clock merkins on the hill, mosey back to COT where we met up with the ruckers. With 2 minutes left, busted out the JBL for some linkin park workout. Let the Bodies Hit the Floor (LTBHTF).  On the lyrics “1, 2, 3, 4” we did a merkin. On a “LTBHTF” it was a donkey kick.  Hold plank in between.  Made it just under halfway though the song for a 6am COT.

Thanks for the opportunity to lead Cha Ching!

~Lutefisk

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Beyond- Freedom has never been easy.

Always an Honor to Q. To be able to push men Beyond their comfort zone. To teach and be tought.  America has given me freedoms that most of the world can not even fathom. Freedom has been given to us all by the selfless acts of men and women willing to give themselves up so that we can live like other country.

We started with a disclaimer. Let all know who I was and checked to see if we had any FNGs. None present so made amentsl mental note to self that I need to work harder on bringingthis gift to other men in my reach. We took off with slow mosey that led into some dynamic movements Stopped for Pledge of Allegiance and then circled up. We warmed up to the acronym FREEDOM (Flutter kicks, Rosalita, empty wheelbarrow, Everests, donkey kicks, outlaws, and Mtn. Climbers) we than did 17 Merkins in cadence followed by 76 SSHs in cadence.
We moseydto drop off in front of school did the next 5 exercises followed by sprint Squat jumps, merkins, bomb jacks, CDDs, burppees 10 of each.
Mosey to small car circle. Get into discussion on true freedom and that is through Jesy=us CHrist. Q had found verses in bible that talked about freedom through him and matched it up with some good exercises. Fastest each round would get to read next verse. Here they are if you want to li=ook them up.Romans *:16- 10 jumpsquats. john 8:32 burpees- 1 peter 2:16-17- 10 grave diggers each side, 1 cort. 6:12 10 jumping lunges, 1 cort. 9:19 10 tony hawk burpees, Acts 13:39 10 bomb jacks, 2 cort. 3:17 15 squats, Psalm 119:45 20 CDDs, romans 6:6-7 20 merkins, gal. 5:1 10 hand release merkins, Gal. 5:13 20 Monkey Humpers, Psalm 118:5 20 flutter kicks. COT. Prayers, and Praises.
Thank You was an Honor.

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Taters beat down

23 Pax, 19 for Bootcamp and 4 Ruckers

Welcome FNG Mill-Billy

It’s been a while since Tater had the Q and he did not disappoint!

He gave the disclaimer and we were off to mosey, Toy Soldiers, Butt Kickers, Knee to chest, Karaoke

COP Did a few exercises here to get nice and warm before we mosied over to the fountain and partnered up

Dora 1-2-3-4 100 Derkins, 200 Step-ups, 300 Dips, 400 LBC one partner ran the loop while the other partner did the exercise

We got through one full round and started our way back down before we stopped and returned to the COT area to do a little Ab-Lab

Excellent work! It was not an easy workout and we were all challenged!!

Great work Tater and the PAX!!!!!!

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4 Corners . . . with some “Elders”

I will keep this backblast shorter, but I will say it was a lot of fun today at the Pantheon! Thanks to Fishsticks for letting me Q.

Some Pre-work:

1 group of runners headed out to who knows where at 4:45.

Fishsticks and I did some extra ab work that I call high octane abs. It hurt.

Disclosure given. Lots and lots and lots of chatter. Completely dark. Did I mention there was lots of chatter?

Short mosey to the lighted area for a different dynamic stretching workout after some high knees and butt kickers.

Some confused minds about what we were doing since very few had done this style of warm-up before (~8 exercises). Eventually I shifted to some traditional SSHs and the crowd went wild. It was like the PAXs’ bodies woke up.

At this point I inconveniently forgot a few demos of a few of the exercises to come for the main event.

The Thang:

We broke up into 4 teams of 5 and went to each respective corner on the soccer field. Fortunately, it was not very muddy.

I’d tell you the 20 different (and difficult) exercises that we did, but  . . . that means I’d have to type them out right now and I feel lazy after a long day of work. So if you are reading this, feel free to retweet it and comment what your favorite one was even if you don’t know the name of it. We did do Tunnel of Love and People’s Carry between cones.

I had a second round prepared, but, oh well, . . . time slipped away from us. Beware of next time. Round 2 was scheduled to be harder.

COT: Main Announcements: Convergence coming up; Praises: Lutefish’s daughter rocked it; Prayer: let’s continue to pray for children going through difficult times and Badger and his family.

Thanks to everyone, including the “Elders” for their hard work today!

Lastly, I think I missed one of you on the list. So sorry. My memory can only remember 19 out of 20 without a recording. Feel free to identify yourself.

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Hills, more hills, and some remembrance

With spring break starting and Longshanks having part of the Q I didn’t know what type of crowd would show up. With Easter being the next day and this week being very reflective for me personally, we tweeted out about some Easter trivia and before I knew it we had several of our more scholarly PAX HCing so I went back and tuned up the questions. It was great to a solid collection of PAX ready to go when start time rolled around.

Longshanks led us thru some SSHs and Wind-mills while Sasquatch finished getting dressed. Once he was ready Longshanks took us behind the park to the bottom of the big hill for a Longshanks style warm-up. Partner up for a Dora 1-2-3. 100 Merkins, 200 Squats, & 300 LBCs, other partner is running about 3/4 way up the hill and back.

After everyone was ‘warmed up’, we moseyed back up the hill to playground. Again with Easter being the next day I worked up some questions about the events leading up to Easter. 4 questions per station, 3 stations, and exercises accumulated at each station.

  1. At the last Supper, who did Jesus say would deny him 3 times before the cock crowed twice? Peter – 5 Pull-ups
  2. After dinner they walk to the Garden of Gethsemane , when Jesus goes off to pray what does he ask Peter, James & John to do? Not go to sleep – 5 Pull-Ups, 10 Dips
  3. In the Garden, how to Judas identify Jesus to the guards? Kisses him – 5 Pull-Ups, 10 Dips, 10 Derkins
  4. What was the name of the Jewish group that initially condemns Jesus? Sanhedrin – 5 Pull-Ups, 10 Dips, 10 Derkins, 5 Burpees

Mosey over to small hill

  1. When Jesus is initially brought to Pilate, who does Pilate then send Jesus to? Herod – 10 Monkey humpers, run up hill and back
  2. Pilate nor Herod can find anything to convict Jesus of so Pilate asks the crowd if they want to free Jesus or a criminal. What was the criminal names? Barabbos – 10 Monkey humpers, 10 squats, run up hill and back
  3. What is the name of the location where Jesus was crucified? Golgotha or Calvary – 10 Monkey humpers, 10 squats, 10 lunges, run up hill and back
  4. Who was voluntold to carry the cross when Jesus was unable? Simon of Cyrene – 10 Monkey humpers, 10 squats, 10 lungers, 10 calf raises, run up hill

Mosey over to parking lot

  1. When Jesus was crucified, at noon what natural event occurred? Sky went dark for 3 hours – 3 line suicide
  2. Who took Jesus’ body down, wrapped it, and place it in the tomb? Joseph of Arimathea – 3 line suicide with 10 Plank Jacks at each end line
  3. Who was the 1st human to see Jesus after he rose from the dead? Mary Magdalene – 3 line suicide with 10 Plank Jacks at each end line and 3 Burpees at each start line
  4. How many days did Jesus stay on Earth before ascending to heaven? 40 – 3 line suicide with 10 Plank Jacks at each end line and 3 Burpees at each start line: waited on all PAX and we did 40 SSHs

Longshanks finished us up with about 3 minutes of Mary.

PAX went 100% on the questions. There really wasn’t going to be more exercises if they didn’t answer a question correctly but I was impressed nevertheless. Hopefully everyone got a good quick recap of the events that occurred but also got a solid work-out. Always an honor to lead this group. Thanks Smuggler for the opportunity!

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