Creative Misery at the Rock

When Smuggler organized this Q combo, he must’ve known a lot of PAX were looking for that Saturday morning push. After some banter back and forth between the WEP Q’s and us Alcatraz Q’s, we were pleasantly surprised to see car after car after car roll into Runde Park this Saturday morning. The weather was warm and the PAX were primed with the early mumble chatter. With the typical “don’t hurt yourself and don’t sue if you do hurt yourself” disclaimer, we took a very abbreviated (10yd) mosey to the right side of the parking lot (a slight teaser for what was coming).

Jog to the other end of the lot and back then repeat.

Walking lunges 1/2 way down then high knees to the end. Same thing on the way back to the start.

Windmills & deadlifts to warm up the legs a little more then mosey to the top of “THE HILL”

PAX squat for 20sec then jog to the base of the hill followed by an all-out sprint back to the top of the hill and squat for the six.

Repeat for a 40sec squat hold then the jog down/sprint up and squat for the six.

Repeat for a 60sec squat hold then the jog down/sprint up and squat for the six.

Find some curb and 50 calf raises each leg.

Mosey to the field for a circle up.

This was when I think they really lost my mind…Lt. Dan’s (1 squat and 4 jumping lunges (2ea side counts as 4)) and we went to 8:32 before handing it off Tesh!!

With Tesh on Q, you just had a feeling this was going to get bad.

With the PAX in a very long plank:

5 Merkins

10 Mountain Climbers

5 Merkins

10 Peter Parkers

5 Merkins

Various Tesh-approved CORE exercises

Mosey to the fence line:

Merkin-Turtle crawl (can’t explain…you had to be there)

10 Merkins

Bear Crawl 50yds

More Tesh-approved CORE exercises

10 Bombjacks x 3 rounds

Mosey to the playground and split into 4 groups

Rotate through 5 pull-ups & 10 dips. For those waiting, hold the Al Gore pose.

Yet more Tesh-approved CORE exercises

Repeat the above 2 lines

Closed it out with 6min of Mary which couldn’t end fast enough.

Announcements: Yeti (Newsletter), Reading in Paradise

Prayer Requests: Praise for Palmer family, Cornerstone’s family, continued prayers for the Family & Friends affected by the recent tragedy’s our community has experienced, our officers, job transitions, marriages.

I’m sure Smuggler will get a little verbal backlash on this but hey, it made us better and everyone crushed it.

Maximus & Tesh

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All The Jacks

Alcatraz has so many options for doling out the pain. With the recent snow there was still areas of ice so decided to stay on campus and use those resources.

Warm ups: SSW (Jumping Jacks), Hillbilly Walkers, Imperial Walkers, Seal Jacks, Merkins, Squats, Plank Jacks, Mountain Climbers, Squat Jacks, LBC, Flutter Kicks

Four Corners on Field:
Wind Up
1st Corner 20 – SSH
2nd Corner 20 – SSH, 15 – Squats
3rd Corner 20 – SSH, 15 – Squats, 10 – Merkins
4th Corner 20 – SSH, 15 – Squats, 10 – Merkins, 5 – Burpees
Unwind
1st Corner 20 – SSH, 15 – Squats, 10 – Merkins, 5 – Burpees
2nd Corner 15 – Squats, 10 – Merkins, 5 – Burpees
3rd Corner 10 – Merkins, 5 – Burpees
4th Corner 5 – Burpees

Partner Up
Wall: P1 – Wall sit, P2-Bear Crawl, Flap jack – Crab Walk, Run to Fence
Playground: P1-20 Dips, P2-step ups, Flap Jack 3x
Benches: P1-Derkins, P2-Run to end of parking lot Flap Jack

COP2: SSH, Loungers, Big Boy Sit-ups, Box Cutters, Peter Parkers, Saved the best Jack for last – Jack Webs

COT

Always honored and appreciate the support.

Cornhole
Out

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Block Party 2018.04

So I was expecting it to rain for this Q so I had an entire plan for under the awning of the Springs Global building but alas, the sky Q seems to always lighten the precipitation at 5:15…

Warmup
Mosey to Springs Global building parking lot
SSH, Hillbillies, Merkins

Thang
Head to wall for 30sec People’s Chair, 30 sec Balls2Wall, for a total of 5 min.  Last round doubled the time added arm flutters to chair and inverted mountain climbers.

Mosey to the top of Gun Shop hill and partner up for a Dora123.  100 bombjacks, 200 merkins, 300 squats, run to the bottom of the hill and back

Mosey to circle drive to nowhere parking lot and do more peoples chair.  1 min then chalf raises while in peoples chair x20

Mosey to playground for 1 1arm pullup each arm, 5 pull ups, activated deadhang until failure.

Mosey back for COT
I touched on what the word of the month brings to my mind.  Beginning.  Beginning is the time in which you define the problem you are going to fix, the answer you are going to solve.  If the reason you do Merkins is to be able to do more Merkins, then this may not be for you.  But if you do Merkins so that you will get stronger and better at pushing, then maybe you have something.  Exercise is answering a problem, but first you need to know what problem you are solving.

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Going Primal at Pantheon

At 0514, Pusher learned that YHC had the Q for Pantheon this morning and acknowledged that he needs to check Twitter more often. But, he stayed, along with six other PAX who didn’t know what they were getting themselves into.

At 0515, the disclaimer was given, and a promise was made that there would be no levitating, as apparently that was a concern to some.

Took a long, slow mosey around the back of the school with high knees, lunge walks, knees-to-chest, and toy soldiers thrown in before circling up in the side/hidden parking lot for COP.

COP

10 Slow windmills IC

15 Hillbilly walkers IC

20 Moroccan night clubs IC

Wrist and elbow mobility (wrist circles, elbow circles, wrist lock, wrist stretch)

10 Merkins IC

Quick downward dog to honeymooner combo for good measure

Mosey back around to the front of the school for the real fun.

The Thang, Part 1

I am a huge fan of exploring mobility and building flexibility and athleticism at the same time. This morning, we did a series of different animal “walks” or “crawls” in front of the pillars, as there’s a nice, straight, flat area to work with. We didn’t get through all of them, but this was the plan:

Bear crawl (2 lengths)

Crawl bear (1 length)

Anteater walk (1 length; Tesh complained about this a lot, so you know it burned)

Crab walk (forward 1 length, backward 1 length; Never Never is a king crab walker)

Fiddler crab (lateral crab walk, facing the school for 2 lengths; Shady modified with some sort of flipping breakdancer spin move, while Pusher, Sugar Daddy, and some others modified with what ultimately turned into a butt scoot)

Monkey/gorilla crawl (facing the school for 2 lengths; Lutefisk demonstrated good form with pointed toes and everything)

Sneaky gorilla (1 length, lots of knuckle dragging, i.e., glove destroying)

Low bunny hops (1 length)

We didn’t get to komodo dragon crawl, chameleon walk (this one would be a real crowd pleaser), frog jumps, and one or two equally horrible others. But, with time running short-ish, I wanted to make good on my promise to alleviate the pain and bring back the inverted burpee. So up we went to the soccer field for

The Thang, Part Deux

Burpee 11’s just sounds bad. Add in a bear crawl and LBCs and it’s even better. Cones were lined up 30 yards apart with a row at the halfway point. PAX started with 10 burpees, bear crawl to the middle cones for 20 10 LBCs, then bear crawl to the far cones for 1 inverted burpee. Bear crawl back to the middle, 20 10 more LBCs, and bear crawl to the start. Rinse and repeat, 11’s style (9 burpees, 2 inverted burpees, 8 burpees, 3 inverted burpees, etc., but always 10 LBCs).

We got maybe halfway through this last part before time ran out and we moseyed walked to COT to wrap up.

Announcements

  • Fish Sticks needs a Q for next week, but YHC is apparently not invited. Pusher and Shady both indicated they were possibilities.
  • Yeti is coming up February 24. Do it, or make a relay team, or pass out water, or something.
  • Read your newsletter.

Prayers and Praises

  • Pusher mentioned Cesspool (PAX in Columbia) is in a hard place, as his wife is having health issues that came to a head over the holidays. Prayers for her, and for him and their kids.
  • Shady has a friend at work dealing with infertility
  • Shady is also looking at pursuing another job within his organization
  • Praise that Tesh’s job is going well, even if it means he has to work to make money

Thanks to Fish Sticks for the opportunity to lead these men, and for the PAX who put up with this nonsense. You don’t get better if you don’t push yourself to do new things, and I think we did a few new things, and had some fun in the process.

-Jedi

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Different Q to prevent 0-59. Turns out it was just a #GDTBATH

Temps of 20F, 15 PAX were early and ready to go. Mumblechatter of running vs standing around was way better.
Mosey through Pickup Lanes x2
  • Regular
  • High knees
  • Butt Kickers
  • Toy Soldiers
COP at Basketball Court
  • SSH
  • Windmill
  • Moroccan Nightclub
  • Peter Parker –> Jekyll was quick to call YHC’s exercise as Mountain Climbers, so Jekyll gave a demo of a real Peter Parker (legs wide) and everyone was enlightened
  • Parker Peter
YHC is a Clemson fan, and the goal was to do something different today so that Clemson did not go 0-59 (Spoiler Alert) when playing basketball at UNC. So we did some basketball themed work
Basketball
  • Baseline
    • Side shuffles “Defense” (reverse, back up)
  • Circle up
    • Wojo – slap ground, clap – 4count x15
    • Plank + Merkin Wave 2count – x2
    • Squat – basketball ball hot potato in circle
  • Curb
    • Toe-taps – 4count x30
    • Dips x30 OYO –> The name “Herb Sendek” was mentioned to Maximus by YHC during this exercise. We kept that between us.
  • Baseline
    • Ball roll backwards (pretend 1 hand on ball, 1 hand in air) in a defensive position – 4-counts to switch position
    • Suicide
  • Knock-out
    • PAX wearing gloves shooting on 10ft goals wasn’t awesome. But we Played knock-out for about 5min and PAX did SSH-like exercises while they waited, or if they were knocked out
  • 4-Corners – showing respect to Dean Smith, totally 58
    • 10 Burpees
    • 10 Merkins
    • 20 Mountain Climbers
    • 18 LBCs
Over the wall
  • Burpee from 1 up to 5 count
    • Over-the-Wall
  • Donkey Kicks, 1 each time
Mary – people’s choice
  • Nomad – American Hammers
  • Flattire, Jekyll, MacGyver, Maximus – I forgot what they called 🙁
  • Cooter – LBCs
  • Router – Boxcutters
  • Fishsticks – Superman + Parachute
COT
  • Prayers
    • Nomad – Father’s, to be better ones, for youth group that doesn’t have them, and to make sure we are following our heavenly one
    • Maximus – Fathering daughter’s
    • Router – teaching son how to be a man, and girls for the type of man they should find
    • Maxims – In Memory, Gremlin in Mint Hill
    • Jekyll – for us to be able to receive love.
It was a fun Q. It didn’t end Clemson basketball streak of losing at UNC, but it still has me sore as I finish this backlist within 48hr of completing the Q, so thats good?
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#218in18 Kick-off Convergence BackBlast

76 PAX (including 4 FNGs) met in the gloom at Harris Teeter this morning to kick the year off the right way.

Group 1 – Jedi

Start with 60 seconds of plank tutorial, then a fairly lame attempt to explain the exercise “routine” for the upper body station. The routine, to be done in increasing AMRAP style:
· Incline Merkins
· Low Country Crab Boil (One leg, one hand dips)
· 90° Turn clockwise
· Staggered/Uneven Break Dancer Merkins (Left hand on curb)
· Staggered/Uneven Carolina Dry Docks (Left hand on curb)
· 90° Turn clockwise
· Pseudo Planche Merkins
· Donkey Kicks
· 90° Turn clockwise
· Staggered/Uneven Break Dancer Merkins (Right hand on curb)
· Staggered/Uneven Carolina Dry Docks (Right hand on curb)
· 90° Turn to starting position

Start with 10 reps for each exercise, then add 2 reps each round after that (10, 12, 14, 16, …). Only the elite few made it past the round of 12.

Group 2 – Peabody

An absolute honor to lead a convergence and had so much fun working with all the guys. Here’s the fun of the cardio Q.

SPRINT Relays!!!  

3 team

60 Yard sprint

Team members are doing Seal Jacks, side straddle hops, or flutters while teammate runs.

Winning team selects penalty exercise for 2 losing teams. (Unknown is losing team has to do the penalty exercise too but only half the reps).

Rinse and repeat the sprint relay races once teams are mixed up.

Mary to follow:

  • 50 LBCs
  • 25 Flutters
  • 10 Freddie Mercury’s

Lists of fun to hear the encouragement of other Pax and see the competition bring out the most in guys.  Saw lots of guys really push hard to win for their team.

Group 3 – Jekyll

Motley Crue and 80’s hairband soundtrack

  • COP: SSH, IW, Squat
  • 5 Burpee OYO, 4 OYO, 3 OYO
  • Lt Dan: squat and jumping , 1:4 ration
    • 1 squat: 4 jumping lunge, 2 squat: 8 Jumping lunge…10 squat: 40 jumping lunge
  • 5 burpee OYO
  • Calf Raises 25 each: Straight, Toes Out, Toes In
  • Donkey Kicks

COT

Welcome FNGs Iron City, Humps, Hillary, and Juliet

Prayers by CakeBoss for leadership.

– Ginsu

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5 at Armory with Celebrity Jailbreak

5 braved the cold for some kettlebell misery while we watched other Pax head to the warmth of the Journey Group (Respect.)

Maximus was our celebrity jailbreak as kids have no school so he had nothing better to do in 23 degree temps.

After a mosey and some warmups, kettle bell were used for sets of:

Calf raises, John Travoltas, Figure 8’s and a jog.

KB swings, Around the worlds, Clean Presses and a jog.

Lunges, One hand swings, Snatch and squats and a jog

Big Boy Sit-ups, Flutter kicks, Benxh presses and a jog .

I really enjoy the times we have smaller numbers. It gives us a chance to share more about ourselves and as we learned in COT we have some heavy hearts.  We lost a member of the Pax from Mint Hill. Prayers to Short Sale on the death of his brother.  Prayers for Squeaky’s daughter recovery from mono and for his family as they think of loved ones in the coming months who have been through some tragedy.

God bless –

ASSASSIN

 

 

 

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Pre-Joe Davis and 6 PAX words

Dynamic warm up of lunge twists, toy soldiers, back extension/inch crawl, arm circles and shoulder pulls.  Mosey to  field 1, take a lap and circle up.
.
 COP, all in cadence:
.
  • SSH x 40, Merkin x 10, IW x 20, CDD x 20, Slow Squat x 20, Crunchy frog x 10, Makhtar Jai x 20, Windmill x 10, Diamond merkins x 15, LBC x 25
  • Mosey to playground and split into 2 groups:
  • Group 1 does 10 pull ups while group 2 does 20 dips (flapjack).  Repeat two more times.
  • Mosey to the concession stand wall:
     Peoples chair with overhead hand clamps, recover and shake ’em out
     Lunge walk to the end of the infield, and then jog back
     Peoples chair part 2 with overhead hand claps
     Crabwalk to the end of the infield
 .
Hand off to Bolt
 .
  • Figuring in the cold, this was the running part of the workout. 5 cones were evenly distributed across the entire parking lot. With many going to Joe Davis, we targeted 20 “movement” minutes.
  • The layout was to run to each cone and do a designated exercise x5 with a full length parking lot sprint back. The catch was each PAX took turns picking the exercise for each run. During each ‘rest’ after every sprint, PAX took turns giving their word of the year with a brief explanation and goals that applied to that word.
  • While I do not remember which 6 exercises were chosen, burpees were definitely in there. And I assure you, we did not get cold for those 20 minutes.
  • The words of the 6 PAX were as follows (thank you to CrabCakes for helping remember the words at our kids’ basketball game):
 .
  1. Open – Sugar Daddy
  2. Joy – Crab Cakes
  3. Enjoy – Tesh
  4. Shady – (Positive)
  5. Smuggler – Consistent 

.

Seek – Bolt – I expanded on my word and let the PAX know I want to seek to improve in all 3 F’s, but especially on the 3rd F. I need to seek to take advantage of the resources available through F3. I need to be more willing to reach out to seek assistance to improve physically, mentally and spiritually. Especially though on the 3rd F, as a ‘seeker’, I need to reach out and ask the PAX for assistance. If you have read this far and wish to extend your experience to me, please reach out and do so.
 .
Announcements, prayers and praises were fairly quick with a dash to Joe Davis!
 .
Noting here I got to spend time with Sparkplug at Joe Davis who I normally only see every so often at Alacatraz! Good talks, Sparkplug.
 .
Thanks for the opportunity to lead. Apologies to Senator Tressel who quickly turned around his end of the BB and the delay was all my own!
 .
 Bolt
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The Hive 2018.01

Happy New Year!

It was sub-teens this morning and by the forcast, not supposed to get above freezing today.  Even though this weather is slightly ridiculous, 5 men still posted to the Hive to find something hard to do, and get it out of the way early.

Warmup
SSH x30, Burpee x10 OYO
Mosey to the band practice lot for some yard markers.
Tricep Extension x20, Burpee x10

The Thang
AMRAP for points: front raises = 1 point, 40 yd dash and back = 6 points
I was around 56 points on this one…  Apparently, no one else could add at this point, so I win by default?  I think Geronimo was in the 60s which means he needed to bring out his 50lb KB.  AMIRIGHT?!
Flutter x20, FredMerc x20, Burpee x10
AMRAP for points: bent rows = 1 point, 40 yd dash and back = 6 points
I was at 70 points on the nose on this one, and I was last.  Peabody, Airborne, and Geronimo had me beat.  Sugarbug refuses to count over 32 apparently.
Flutter x20, FredMerc x20, Burpee x10
Split into two groups 40 yards apart: Fireman Carries with 2x 40lb KBs relay style till each man has three 40 yd carries
Squat Hold x12, 40 yard dash
Steven Curry with holds for 20 yards, 80 yard dash to the endzone.

Mosey back to COT.
THE HIVE IS AT HARRIS TEETER CONVERGENCE ON 160 AND SUTTON/PLEASANT NEXT WEEK (12/12).  Joe Davis is tomorrow so WEP is closed.  Read your newsletter for announcements.

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More Running, Less Bootcamp

#HypeTrain rolled into the #LacesIn Station once again.  This time it was a family affair with #SPEEDFORNEED coming south to join forces as well as #LacesOut (#F3RunClub) (#Yogging (soft J)) converging with the Bootcampers for 45 minutes of …..well lots of running.  The irony was not lost on YHC (the artist formerly known as Mountain Buffalo) as he gave up the ‘running for an extended period of time’ thing years ago.  Vowing never to return.  Yet his own Q hijacked by nothing more than simple running.  At the very least YHC squeezed in a couple of merkins (only for #Rooney’s sake) and taught everyone what an “updown” was – seriously?  Who doesn’t know what an updown entails?!?  It’s even in the gawl-dang name.  YHC digresses.  Here is what happened:

Little Baby Jog to the football field (so cushy – so soft).

Dynamic Warmup

High Knees, Butt Kickers, Side Shuffles, Toy Soldiers, Toe Touches, Long Strides, Power Skips (Trademark: WWLs).

Then merkins (Rooney!!!)  and windmills to straighten everyone out.

Time to Bootcamp:

Partner up and size kinda matters for very confusing sequence.

UpDown – Partner Push – Run to Opposite Side of Field – UpDown – Partner Push

Repeat this every 20 yards as you move down the field to the endzone and then go back down to the other endzone.

(This was a rugby (shocker – I know) simulation – expend energy – sprint – get on the ground – get back up – expend more energy – sprint again – then repeat.  While it was unorthodox and confusing to some – it was a smoker.)

Rinse and Repeat with 2 updowns before each partner push.  Another smoker.

Give me a ten count.

Hey – let’s breakout the running chairs and do some sprints!!!  Tolkien was nice enough to give us all a quick tutorial about how they work.  We split into teams and relayed around the track with weights.  Then we got on the field and chased the chairs for 100 yards – over and over and over and over and over again.  Then some (small) pax jumped in the chairs and they got pushed and the rest of us chased for 100 meters over and over and over and over again.  Okay – enough running!!!  Back to the field.

YHC went back to one of his favorites – the extra long bear crawl.  This time – 100 yards.  Crowd pleaser!

We worked our way back with some rugby sprints (could not resist).

Ended with a little bit o mary then ran the chairs back to COT.

 

Great time out there among so major #HIMs and it’s always an honor to lead.  YHC saw a tweet asking for more “SERVICE” to our community from F3Nation.  No better example of pure SERVICE then Tolkien.  The amount of time/energy/passion/service this man brings to #SPEEDFORNEED is incredible.  Follow his lead in 2018 – get out there – get uncomfortable – and serve others!  Aye!

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