The snake pit 12/18/19

F07A9CBF-DBA9-43DF-96EE-3E615C1EE305Had a fun time for my first Q, was very interesting getting ready for it. we had 17 people show up with 2 fng’s present.

warmup :

-lap around parking lot

-windmills (10)

-ssh (25)

-cherry pickers(15)

-hillbilly walkers (15)

-imperial walkers (15)

-lbc’s (10)

-Moroccan nightclubs (20)

 

pre-workout (wall)

-wallsit/kB  (everyone did 5 burpees until reach middle)

-calf raises (30 seconds) X2

-wallsit/kb (everyone did 5 Merkins until reach middle)

 

workout (partner):

-KB Swings (200)

-American hammers (200)

-lbc’s (200)

-rows (300)

-squats (200)

 

C.O.T

-Floyd plank (20 seconds) “quite a bit of complaining involved “

-circle of Mary (until 6:00)

We finished with the name o Rama and names two FNG’s

thanks again for letting me Q for the first time, it was a fun experience and will definitely try to do again!!

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Super 21s at Minnow Pond

Run with Super 21s
Route:

https://twitter.com/jisenhour/status/1207634513045721089?s=20
https://twitter.com/jisenhour/status/1207634927572918273?s=20

13 PAX
3.75 miles
231 merkins
231 squats

Burpee circle sharing our word for 2019
Flutters to finish

COT

NMM

Focus on your goals for 2020. Minnow Pond pushes PAX hard on the 1st F. How are we pushing ahead on our concentrica, 2nd F, and 3rd F?

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Snake Pit – Pick Your Poison

10 PA

Pick your poison. Name the exercise for the group while you run to said point and back.

Circle up. Now, do your own exercise 100 times. Look to your right, do theirs 50 times. Look left, do theirs 50 times.

Dora. Partner up.  – 100 deadlifts, 200 upright rows, 300 curls

COT

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Preparation at the Armory

19 PAX at The Armory

Workout is pretty clear from the outline I think.

We ran a bit in between the reps for the Thang…..at an allegedly fast pace….pretty sure it was slow on the Fish Sticks scale. Also we did 60 SSH….a real crowd pleaser. Alternating between Mtn Climbers and a Yoga sequence over and over and over was also “well” received.

I did use my handy cheat codes on my forearms to keep myself on task. It’s cheaper than buying one of those quarterback play-caller wrist bands like OldBay has, but decidedly less cool. Forgot what DD (Downdog) stood….But on a Mosey Shady reminded me; at which point, I was glad for his assistance and that we’d already done that sequence in the warmup.

Mary to close out:
– Windshield Wipers
– Flutters
– restarted the Thang from 5 reps and built up (crowd pleaser) got to 10
– Pigeon Lunge

COT

NMM:
Advent is about Preparation. How are we preparing ourselves daily to handle our Jester(s) beyond just fitness?

Thanks to JWOWW for the invitation to Q. Great to have such a group of HIM present.

Band Camp Dismissed

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RPG-Broga-Varsity Combo

Last Friday of every month will have a travelling Broga-RPG.  Varsity (at Nation Ford HS) was the location for November.  Nine pax came out for the 0500 start time to burn off after-Thanksgiving calories.

Broga
YHC was the lead-off man started the group with a some simple yoga positions, then Sasquatch brought us home with warrior poses.

The group split off: three went running; six stayed for boot camp.

Boot camp details:
Warm up
Mosey Run
Toy soldiers, high knees
Circle up and do:
SSH (In Cadence 16x)
Windmill (IC 16x)
Imperial Walker (IC 12x)
Plank Jacks (IC 16x)

Thang 1: Elevens
Mosey to JrROTC building
Run to bottom of hill, do 1 burpee
Run up to pull up bars, do 10 pullups
Incremental changes for the 11’s routine.

Thang 2: Wall Sits

Thang 3: Global Warming
Circle up, low stance position, all pax side shuffle about the circle, stop and do exercise called out (each pax had opportunity to call out an exercise):
Smurf Jacks
Imperial Walkers
Big Boy sit ups
Merkins
Squats
Etc.

The runners returned after traversing around 4ish miles.

Fini, COT
Prayers for pax traveling this holiday weekend, and for those that have lost a loved one recently.

Look for the traveling RPG-Broga coming to an AO by you; take advantage of the opportunity to get better!

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A cool, Shady, 38 degree Special morning

11 PAX woke up on a cool Saturday morning in November of 2019. Little did any of them know that immediately after the disclaimer they would be headed for the much maligned Tega Cay Drive hill of pain.

The mosey immediately headed that way as YHC (38 Special) led the PAX down the hill. Everyone circled up for 25 SSH, 15 Low Slow Squats, and 15 mountain climbers.  Some good Saturday morning mumblechatter including some compliments about the length of certain PAX’s shorts and the decade in which they might have been procured.  That was plenty “warm up”.

The Thang: Part 1

PAX counted off by 2’s. 2’s were instructed to run the 150M hill backwards. Team 1 to lag behind so eyes were going forward and backward. YHC was pleased to hear Team 1 offer quality mumblechatter on the way up in the way of encouragement.

At the top of the hill, everyone ran back down and Team 1 took their turn to run backwards while Team 2 pulled mumblechatter duty.  Now that every quad was suitably inflamed it was time for phase two of part one.

Until YHC’s time was out, we would run 11’s.  Starting behind the western baseball diamond, double count stepups. Run the roughly 100m to to the benches just before the pullup bars and do burpees.  If, somehow, anyone were to finish, it would have added 2k to their bragging rights. Some got to 4 step ups left, others 6.

YHC used the last minute of his time to speak briefly about pushing oneself in order for the group. The above was selected not because I could kill it, but because I knew I could do it with commitment, and without killing myself, and sorta, maybe tried to encourage others to do the same.

The Thang: Part 2

Shady took over and wasted no time running the PAX over the baseball field and into the parking lot, stopping near the playground.  Everyone paired up for what Shady said would be your ‘basic’ Dora. There was a brief lament about the lack of bricks when one of the PAX brought to everyone’s attention that there were some large rocks at the bottom of the trail.

If YHC were a geologist, he’d have called these rocks “boulders” (any rock with a diameter of > 25.6cm)…

Run back up the trail and into the playground.  Round one of the Dora was
100 – Hand Release Merkins
200 – Shoulder (boulder) Press
300 – Flutter

YHC wants to point out that the first two parts of that set were brutal.

When the set was over, Shady spoke to the PAX about his word of the year and encouraged everyone to think about theirs again. Some of the PAX talked briefly about their words as well. After this 10 count was concluded it was time to move onto round two.
100 – Incline rows
200 – Boulder curls
300 – LBC

YHC would also like to point out that the incline rows, while being sufficiently difficult, made some of the PAX look utterly ridiculous, and as most of us know, PAX would allow any of their brothers to look that ridiculous without drawing a great deal of attention to the fact.  It’s just good manners.

Time ran out during the LBCs and there was one more run down into the woods to return their boulders to their homes.  Joined up at COT.

Announcements: Thanksgiving convergence on 11/28 @The Ranch, HTL convergence on 11/23 @WEP and the Christmas Party 12/6 ~Baxter area. Everyone who knows Kenyan is invited to join the celebration of Life for his departed wife that morning.

There were also some prayers and praises lifted up to Sky Q’s consideration.

The PAX dispersed…

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On Frozen Pond

I arrived a little before 5am to prepare for my Q since it was my first at the Minnow Pond.  As it got closer to 5:10 am, I was worried I would be running solo since no one was around and the temperature was below 30 degrees.  I was thinking about what I would write for the backblast..Lost fish at Minnow Pond, Finding Nemo, Frozen Fishstick.  No need to worry, soon there were several cars pulling into the parking lot.  Now I just needed to focus on the Q.

Due to the cold weather, short disclaimer and no warm-ups.  The six of us ran a one mile warm up around the neighborhood surrounding Walter Elisha Park.  We stopped in the parking lot for the next portion of the workout.

I designed a mini cross country course (a bit over a half a mile) in honor of the Fort Mill XC team reaching the State Finals this weekend.  Sharkbait, my 2.0, is part of the team.  I mentioned how proud it is to see your children reach milestones and accomplishments.  A year ago, it was alot different story.  My son struggled and had lots of excuses for why he was not performing at his potential.  I tried my best to balance being supportive and tough love.  He had to be responsible for taking ownership of his training if he wanted to get better.  This summer, he trained almost everyday with some of the top runners in the area.  The hot summer heat and even the rain did not stop him.  The results were great, he started every varsity race this year and had a 5K PR last week of 17:20.

My reason for mentioning this is obvious I am proud of my son, but also the old adage is true.  You have to work for the things you want.  The easy example is posting to workouts in the gloom, the more frequently you do it, the better you will be physically.  It works the same way with our relationships (M and 2.0s).  Put the time in and its almost guaranteed to be positive.

Ok, back to the workout.  Each lap began with 10 leg lunges, 10 monkey humpers, and 10 calf raises.

Half mile XC course:  Run up to the top of the hill beside the soccer field, lap around the parking lot, down Self Street to the corner of the park, back down to the WEP parking lot.

Reverse direction each time.

We each did this course 3 to 4 times before we headed back.  Before COT, we ran over to the staircase across the street and did a few sets are stair repeats.

Great job by everyone today!

We keep Kenyan and his family in our prayers during this difficult time.

 

 

 

 

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Not really a merkinfest…more a don’t stop movingfest

20 PAX gathered for a Jedi inspired chilly morning at the Swamp.  This Friday AO is a great place to run around, see lots of parking lots, check out stairs and look at the water feature fountain…hard to pass up and a good place to be if you’ve never been.  Quick disclaimer and YHC was shot out of a cannon.  With the first mosey stop at Petsmart, the PAX followed the leader for some parking lot shuffles, karaokes, high knees, and butt kickers before progressing to the previously mentioned fountain.

Prior to getting to the fountain, we stopped in the back parking lot for some warm-ups which included: low slow squats, slow windmills, merkins (all counts of 10).  Given this is a Cha Ching AO, what better way to get the PAX warmed up than a Cha Ching inspired 60 seconds of blood pumping 33 SSH and 7 burpee – rinse and repeat for a 2nd min.  This was followed by some up/down dog stretching and then on to The Thang!

Mosey over to the fountain where it was time to get our merkin on…(not that kind of merkin so calm down).

  • 20 regular merkins
  • 20 wide arm
  • 20 diamond
  • 20 decline
  • 20 ranger
  • 20 incline
  • 20 hand release

After every round of merkins, PAX were instructed to run to the stairs – up, down, back up, then back down and back to the fountain…for the next set of merkins.

Since this was not enough fun, we partnered up and did some Dora with our new partner.

  • 100 bombjacks
  • 200 CDD
  • 300 American Hammers (double count…well, because)

As partner 1 did exercise in the “warm-up” parking lot by the stairs, partner 2 took off to the fountain and did 20 dips before returning and relieving their partner.  This took a good amount of time but the PAX finished American Hammer’s with the 6.

PAX took off towards COT but with 5 or so minutes remaining, MARY was calling our name so we answered the call.  PAX went around clockwise with ab exercises until the bell was rung.

Normal mix at COT, but the highlight of the morning was welcoming FNG, now Chicken Noodle, to the party to join the lineage of other “chicken” inspired PAX.  Thoughts and prayers to all prayers and praises raised.  Thanks as always to Cha Ching for the call…enjoyed every minute of it!

Shady

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Disco inferno with DJ Twister

Twister was up to getting the group awake this am with some 70s TV trivia which is good for the respect crowd but very challenging for those of us born in the late 70s…and even an 80s in there.  Since YHC controlled the weinke but not the jams, all was good.  Disclaimer was given as the sweet melodies of 80s rock played in the background, and a brisk mosey ensued to the track.

Warmup of SSH, windmills, imperial and hillbilly walkers, merkins, low slow squats for counts ranging from 10-25 got the blood flowing.

Boss Hogg took off for loops on the track given the nursing on the shoulder while the rest of us counted off in 2 splitting into groups.  Here’s the game: name the 70s TV show tune played by DJ Twister and avoid the 5 burpee penalty.  While you’re thinking of the song, do the name of the exercise called off by Shady below with a minimum and maximum number associated (this was adjusted very quickly b/c some people watched a lot of TV growing up!)

  • 10 hand release merkins
  • 20 squats (10 min)
  • 25 CDD (10 min)
  • 30 lunges (10 min)
  • 50 plank shoulder taps (20 min)
  • 40 ski jumps (20 min)
  • 60 calve raises (30 min) – out/reg/in
  • 20 diamonds (10 min)
  • 50 SSH (25 min)
  • 25 merkins (10 min)
  • 40 mountain climbers (20 min)
  • 30 American hammers (20 min)
  • 30 plank jacks (15 min)
  • 50 LBC (25 min)

We rinse and repeated through most of the list but the minimums were removed a second time through.  With about 15 min left, we ran around the track stopping at each 100 yard corner where we did some core (for the most part).  1st corner was 50 LBC, 2nd corner was 20 big boy (and some monkey humpers for our our track walkers passing by), 3rd corner was 30 American hammers, and 4th and final was 30 flutters.

With about 5-10 min remaining, we took our last bit of time to the football field.  Lining up on the goal line, we ran back and forth from the goal line to the 10 yard, back to goal then to 20…all the way to 40 yard line.  At each 10-40 yard line, we did 1 burpee for 10 yard up to 4 burpee at 40 (so a total of 10 burpees + the running for those of you who struggle with quick math!).  Once back on the line, there was time for a 10 count along with a message about being intentional.  Be intentional with the exercise, be intentional with your kids at home and at their activities, be intentional with your wife – pay attention to them!

Once everyone caught their breath, we rinse and repeated the lines and burpees – crowd favorite!  Once said and done, we did a mosey back to COT for closing ceremonies.  All in all, great morning and great push from the PAX.  Enjoyed it as usual and thanks to Manziel for the opportunity!!

Shady

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