Konvergence for Kenya

We converged on 6/10 to with a special weinke designed by the PAX of F3 Nairobi (but “may” have been augmented by Poppins…)
Weinke

Warm up
Various, but highlight was 150 SSH in sets of 50. #CrowdPleaser

Groups of 5
Indian Run
5 burpees by the guys at the back

Dora on the football practice field
50 burpees – bear crawl
200 merkins – bear crawl
200 squats – lunge walk
300 4-count mountain climbers – frog leap a partner

Lots of bat flipping on the 4-count of the mountain climbers and the frog leaping

The guys in Kenya average a 5 mile transit to and from the AO, so a group of PAX dutifully pre-ran and post-ran 5 miles after the beatdown. YHC took a bit of flack, because it was me that spitballed that idea and then did not pre or post run. I did bring my 2.0 to the workout to try to cover the fact that I wouldn’t be running extra, but to no avail. Badlands 100% called me out.

Welcome FNGs
– Dungeon Master
– V-neck

Pre-runners:
– Badlands, Poppins, Rolloff, Maximus, Funhouse, Sasquatch, Cyclops, Beaker
– rucking: Sprocket, NakedandAfraid
Post-run:
– Badlands, Poppins, Rolloff, Maximus, Funhouse
All running
– Gears

The plan was to raise $$ to purchase a vehicle for transportation of Nairobi PAX to workouts, supporting efforts to assist in community and coordinating donations etc. The need is tremendous and our financial support is magnified in Kenya.

As of this backblast, we raised $2620. I have no idea when you’re reading this, but you could possibly still contribute and Poppins may still have T-Shirts in the back of his vehicle: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-our-kenyan-f3-brothers?member=26869695&sharetype=teams

Announcements:
Q-School Wednesday 6/14 at Bushwood
The Fort Retreat 8/11-8/13 (Register now!)
https://criout.regfox.com/f3-him-camp

Safari (F3 Nairobi Nantan) facetimed in at the end to offer up a prayer closing out COT.

This backblast respectfully submitted by Band Camp

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The Kettlebell Tolls for Thee, at Cannonball

It was a misty morn as 14 gathered to sling kettlebells at Cannonball, including FNG “Silent Bob”, who was EH’d at Trunk or Treat by O’Reilly just this past Sunday.  YHC sort of forgot I was on Q till yesterday, so props for the promo from Two Ferns.  Post disclaimer for the FNG, here’s how it went down:

Warm-o-rama

  • 20 SSH IC
  • 15 Imperial Walkers, IC
  • 10 Windmills, IC
  • 10 Merkins, IC
  • 20 Moroccan Night Clubs, IC
  • 200 year walk with kettlebell held high, around the parking lot

The Thang, Part I

We split the group into two teams of 7 so we could divide and conquer 3 boards:

Board I – all with 25lb kettlebell

  • single arm curls, 10 per arm
  • Goblet squats, 10 (although group 2 did 15)
  • around the body partner pass, 15 revolutions each direction
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm
  • KB swings, 10 IC
  • KB Merkins, 10 each arm
  • KB lunges, 10 per leg
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm

Board II:

  • Lawnmowers, 10 per arm
  • Tiny Tim (75ish lb KB) deadlifts, 10
  • Alternating shoulder press ladder, 1-5
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm
  • KB calf raises, x30
  • 2 handed triceps extensions, x20
  • Single arm chest press, 10 per arm
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm

Board III:

  • 10 burpees, (without KB)
  • Flutters with KB, 15 IC
  • Freddie Mercurys, 15 IC
  • KB American hammers, 15 IC
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm

The Thang, part II

  • People’s chair with KB, guys on the end do 3 leaping jump squats
  • BttW (or People’s chair mod), guys on the end do something I can’t remember
  • take walking lap around the parking lot with kettlebell held high with one arm
    • on the last leg, KB Lieutenant Dans (about 30 yards)

The Thang part IV:

  • Bear crawl relay, about 25 yards…not sure which team won
    • started by dragging the KB, then Omaha’d to simple bear crawl

For a non-running post Nessie workout we still got 1.4 miles in.  Prayers for healing and New River Women’s retreat.  Welcome to FNG “Silent Bob”.  It was an honor to lead.

Wolverine

 

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Ultimate Burpee Championship

With the Iron Pax challenge winding down and also taking a page from Witch Hunt’s timed workouts I decided on making up my own Lake Wylie Ultimate Burpee Championship. I went to Wally World to look for a cheap trophy to hand out (Coffee Travel Mug) and formed the championship from there. 13 Pax answered the challenge at an AO I feel does not get a lot of love, the infamous Bermuda Triangle.

My Rules(Disclaimer: If you would like to do something like this, you do not have to copy my method, just make tweaks to it as you see fit, this is F3 after all):

400 meter run as warm up

4 sets of 1 minutes of Burpees with 30 second rest in between to write down your numbers

400 meter run

4 sets of 1 minute Man Maker Burpees-30 second rest to write down numbers

400 meter run

4 sets of 1 minute Kraken Burpees-30 second rest to write down numbers

400 meter run

Championship round-4 sets of 1 minute Burpees-30 sec to write down numbers 

400 meter victory lap

Count up number of Burpees and announce winner(and award trophy), which was Two Ferns with 209 Burpees in the 16 minutes given. Congrats to this great HIM. 

This was just a trial run to see if the Pax liked it and it seemed to work. For the next championship I will have a WWE belt ordered to hand out as a trophy and will advertise it to the surrounding regions to see if we can get more involvement. Thanks to Wolverine for letting me use his AO as an experiment. Good luck to all the Ragnarians this weekend and don’t forget about the Nesses October 26th! Prayers always for this crazy world we live in. Peace!

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Taking the Kettle Bells Up the Ladder

15 posted at Cannonball to climb the ladder with their Kettle Bells

It was supposed to go like this:

Warmup

Long mosey to lower parking lot LEAVE BELLS

(Mod slow mosey the short route)

SSH

Moracan NIght Clubs

Hillbillys

Freddie Mercurys

The Merkin

Windmills

Bears and Bells back to the top lot

 

The Thing 4 corner ladder

Corner 1:

Big Boy transfers / twist 10, 20, 30, 20, 10

Curls 10

Tricep ext 10

Corner 2:

KB Swings 10

KB Bench press 10

KB Squat Thrust 5, 10, 15, 10, 5

Corner 3:

Bent over rows 10 each arm

Overhead press 10

Figure 8 10 single pass

Corner 4:

Straight up rows 10

KB pass (partner) 10

Hand on Bell merkin 10

But we had to mod the reps because time was not on our side!

However there was a great push from all men and lots of encouraging words were being spread.

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Poop Deck (9/26/2019)

We had 13 HIM at the Poop Deck on a beautiful fall morning. We started with a mosey around the parking lot before circling up for the warm up.

Warm Up
Goofballs – 20 IC
Windmill – 10 IC
Cotton Pickers – 10 IC
SSH – 20 IC
MNC – 15 IC
Hillbillies – 15 IC
Imperial Walker – 15 IC
Peter Parker – 15 IC
Parker Peter – 15 IC
Downward dog to Honeymooner

The Thang
We made our way to one of the rows in the parking lot of the Muscle Factory. Each exercise was finished where we started. There were approximately 13 rows (26).

Round 1
Bear Crawl to each line, followed by a merkin.

Round 2
Crap walk to each line, followed by 5 crab cakes.

Round 3
Lunge walk to each line. At each line we did a squat.

Round 4
Broad jump to each line. At each line we did a burpee.

5 burpees OYO for Cat Lady or was it Cat Man (thanks Wolverine..sigh)

Dora 1-2-3
Partner 1 performs 100 merkins, 200 jump squats and 300 mountain climbers while partner 2 runs and then flip flop until all exercises are complete.

Mary
Exercises included crunchy frogs, lbcs, box cutters, chopsticks, merkins, plank jacks, alternating shoulder taps and dying cock roaches.

Circle of Trust
Beginning the week of October 14 for approximately six months the following AO’s will be at 5:00 a.m. (Crow’s Nest, Cannonball, Shipwreck and Poopdeck).

F3 Lake Wylie CSAUP is Saturday, October 26. Check out the backblast here.

Don’t forget to order your F3 Lake Wylie shirt. Deadline to order is October 3. Order your shirt here.

Speedhandle promoted a bible study Friday morning at 6:30 a.m. and Men’s Night at 7:00 p.m. Friday evening at New River Church.

Prayer’s for Survey Says.  His grand father recently passed away. Also prayers for the Lawton family at New River Church.

I enjoyed the opportunity to lead. I hope you all were able to burn as many calories as I did this morning.

Aye,
Sean Corcoran (RADAR)

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Cards & Bells

Yeah, why not take the deck of cards across the lake? What could go wrong? Oh, you mean Cannonball is a kettle bell workout…uhhhhh, ok.

Welcome to what went through my head as I penned the Weinke for this morning’s Q at Cannonball. During the TRAINING process for an upcoming event, I’ve spent a decent amount of time with the infamous deck of cards so the last thing I wanted to be called was selfish. I must share this with my “friends.” After all, we only have 45mins which, after a little warm up, means closer to 40.

So, once 14 others joined me and got disclaimed, we took off on our warm up jog with a little, and I mean a little, additional stretching. Back to the start for some warm up exercises consisting of:

Mountain Climbers, Peter Parkers, Merkins and Windmills

Soooooo, get comfortable with your bell and listen to today’s version of the deck of cards.

Like normal, each suit represents an exercise and the number/face on the card represents the rep count. Here’s the twist, I’m planning to get through the entire suit (numbers at random and are decently shuffled) before moving on. Once we finish a suit, we’ll do a little 4-corners visiting. I know, I know, you’re longing for a better explanation so for those still reading (hey Funhouse), you’re welcome:

Diamonds: Slow upright rows w/ the KB.

Run the 4 corners of the parking lot with 15 Merkins at each corner.

Hearts: 8ct Body Builders with a KB swing at the top rather than a jump. We made it through about 1/2 of these before I noticed the time was getting away from me. Yeah, I’ll blame it on that.

Run the 4 corners with 15 Chop Sticks at each corner. Think Flutters but in a “C” formation rather than straight up and down.

Spades: KB Curls. While challenging these were a welcome change.

Run the 4 corners of the parking lot with 10 Dips at each corner.

Clubs: KB Thrusters. We made it through 5 of these before losing to Father time.

It seemed a little too easy in the beginning but as has been the case EVERY SINGLE TIME we do the deck of cards, it turns into a heavy dose of humility. For those that travel with work and you’re not able to find an AO to visit, take a deck of cards with you to have your own workout in the hotel gym or parking lot. It’s a great alternative to running with the fern. Unless of course, you get to run with Two Ferns.

My message today was about training. I shared some personal training journeys I’m currently on and encourage the PAX to train for something. Don’t make the mistake thinking training is only possible in the physical sense. Training is putting a plan together to get better at something or in some aspect of life. Think about how you can train spiritually, mentally, emotionally or, in a relationship. If you’re not training, you’ll be stagnant which means you’ll become part of the culture. We need to be the “break the glass” people that our conentrica calls. However, if you’re not training, you won’t get the call.

Good times hanging & laughing with the boys of LKW.

Maximus

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Living up to its name

We had 11 on a wonderful fall morning for part 2 of my back-to-back Q’s this week.

We had an FNG out this morning so I gave a nice disclaimer and off we went for a long lap around the parking lot mixing in some toy soldiers and karaokes along the way.  We then circled up for some CoP.

I’m not much for warm-ups so after 9 slow windmills I explained how we would do CoP this morning.  Since today I was tackling the letters F & G from the Exicon, I found a a routine called “Global Warming” that I thought might be a fun way to get the blood flowing.

The PAX, already in a circle, had to hold Al Gore while shuffling their feet (think football drills) while I called out an exercise & count, they then perform the exercise OYO and returned to their Al Gore shuffle.  I was mixing quite a few in so I can’t remember everything I called, it was completely random, but consisted of Merkins, Mountain Climbers, Squats, SSH, and then a plank hold routine I like to do that went on for a couple of minutes.  I tell all the PAX to get into plank and then call out randomly up/down.  When down is called you are supposed to hold 6″ until I say up again (returning to normal plank).

After Global Warming we went down to the lower deck and quickly realized why we don’t go down here much anymore, it smells horrible, just what you would expect a “Poopdeck” to smell like I suppose.

Anyway, the next routine was F- Four Corners Escalator.  I had setup some cones in a rectangular shape with the long ends probably 100 yards apart and the short ends, maybe 20-25 yards.  Start at the 1st cone and work your way around all 4 Corners Escalator style!

  • 1st cone   10 Flying Squirrels
  • 2nd cone 10 Flying Squirrels, 20 Merkins
  • 3rd cone  10 Flying Squirrels, 20 Merkins, 30 Squats
  • 4th cone  10 Flying Squirrels, 20 Merkins, 30 Squats, 40 Lunges

Method of travel between each cone was to run the long sides and bear crawl the short sides. Upon completion of all 4 cones we took a long mosey around the entire bottom parking lot and then worked our way back down the Four Corners Escalator.

  • 4th cone  40 Lunges, 30 Squats, 20 Merkins, 10 Flying Squirrels
  • 3rd cone  30 Squats, 20 Merkins, 10 Flying Squirrels
  • 2nd cone 20 Merkins, 10 Flying Squirrels
  • 1st cone   10 Flying Squirrels

Same method of travel and then another long loop around the parking deck when done.

For the final routine we did “Gunners”, which is basically some sprints.  The explanation was something like a gun, from the hammer to the barrel or something like that.  So the Q picks a number for the “hammer” which were American Hammers x50, and then an explosive exercise, so I chose 10 Bombjacks, followed by a run/sprint AYG (down the barrel I suppose).

So PAX on their six, 50 American Hammers, 10 Bombjacks and then 100 yard sprint AYG x2

Then 2 more sprints (back & forth), but this time Burpees instead of Bombjacks.

After this we had a few minutes to spare so we moseyed back to CoT and did about 2 minutes of Abs.  I called out Hello Dolly’s, and other PAX called out some LBC’s, Flutters, and Alternating Shoulder taps.

Exercise Totals:

  • Almost 2 miles of running
  • 80 Flying Squirrels
  • 120 Merkins (not counting CoP)
  • 120 Squats (not counting CoP)
  • 80 Lunges
  • 20 Bombjacks
  • 20 Burpees
  • 200 American Hammers
  • 4 “AYG” sprints
  • ~ 100 yards of bear crawlin’
  • And some other Ab lab stuff and CoP exercises.  Not too shabby!

We wrapped it up as usual in our CoT:

  • 10/26 LKW CSAUP (teams of 3)
  • Literally no other praises or prayers this morning so we ended with a prayer of what was on our hearts and prayed for our families and injured PAX.
  • Welcome FNG Floss!

Thanks for the Q Costanza!

Until next time,

-Flux-

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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.
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Dirty D’s

Another great LKW start to a Monday morning. 16 PAX showed up to work off “whatever” they consumed during the NFL kickoff weekend.

I gave a good disclaimer, asked if anyone had any injuries I needed to know about, and off we went for a FAST mosey.  I announced where we would end up and let the PAX filter in as we started some CoP exercises, which included:

SSH (20)

Windmills (8)

MNC (15)

I then asked if anyone knew how many points the Steelers lost by the night before.  Since I stayed up for that debacle, I made everyone do a Flying Squirrel for each point my team lost by… so 30 Flying Squirrels, OYO.

Then finished up with something a bit different.  I had all the PAX get in plank and I yelled out down (6” hold) and up (back to plank) at various intervals for the next couple of minutes, this was fun.

I’ve been working my way through the Exicon and today was the letter “D”, so whatever exercises or routines I picked would be found in that section of the Exicon.

1st routine:

Dirty McDuece

Pretty simple routine (keeping it simple is good) that had the PAX doing 4 sets of 3 exercises followed by a lap after each set.

The sets included; 12 4-count Merkins (24), 12 4-count Squats (24), and 12 4-count Hello Dolly’s (24).

After doing about 100 apiece of those exercises we were all nice and warm.  Next up…

2nd routine:

Doracides

Another simple yet effective exercise that most PAX quickly understood and off we went.

We partnered up in typical Dora fashion and performed the following exercises:

100 Bombjacks

150 Step-ups

200 Dips

250 2-count Flutters

While PAX A was dong the reps PAX B was doing a short 10-yard Bear Crawl/Crawl Bear to kick off the “suicide” followed by sprints of about 25 and 40 yards before swapping with their partner.  Most finished, but I called this one a little early because get to my last routine.

3rd and final routine:

Del Brown

He was some fly fisherman or something, but the routine was simple, 10 diamond merkins, 25 yard crab walk, 10 diamond merkins, 25 yard crab walk back, followed by 10 more diamond merkins.  What I didn’t tell the PAX was is that I was timing them and if they didn’t beat their time on the 2nd attempt there would be a penalty.  Alas, we will never know, we were running short on time so I gave the PAX and option to finish up a couple minutes late and finish the 2nd set of the routine or head back… they quickly chose the EASIER thing and headed back. 

Oh well, there is always next time.

We finished up with the usual announcements, praises, and prayers in our CoT.  

Announcement – LKW official on 10/26, we’re launching with our 1st CSAUP that morning, the “Nessie” get your teams of 3 ready!  

Prayers for safe travels, (I’m on a plane as I type this), sick and injured PAX, and they death of a 19 year old girl who passed away recently. 

Thanks Iced-T for the opportunity to Q.

Until next time,

Flux

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C

So it is almost a week later as I write this.  Better late than never I guess. Hopefully I can recollect most of what happened!

It all started with the usual disclaimer and then a quick lap around the parking lot.

I’m not much for warm ups, but did to some this morning.  Certainly some windmills, merkins, squats, SSH’s.

I then got my speaker out for  a little fun.  Since I have been working my way through the Exicon and we would be doing the letter C today I play a song called Alphabet Aerobics, and made everyone go from Merkins to 6″ holds every time he began rapping a new letter.  The song is just over 2 minutes, but you felt it!

1st routine: The Cycle

We moseyed to the baseball field and started at home plate

  • bear crawl to 1st, 3 burpees, crawl bear to home
  • bear crawl to 2nd, 6 burpees, crawl bear to home
  • bear crawl to 3rd base, 9 burpess, crawl bear to home
  • bear crawl to home, 12 burpees, crawl bear to home

This one always sucks.

2nd routine: C.L.I.M.B.

We went to the hill and did the following exercises:

  • Ran down the hill
  • Crab Cakes, Lunges, Imperial Walkers, Monkey Humpers, Bombjacks
  • NUR up the hill
  • The increments were x2 so it started with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and then 2, 4,6,8,10, etc.
  • We did this 4 times and x2 on the exercise count each time.

3rd routine: Catch me if you can

Mosey back to main lot and partnered up.  You all know how this one goes.  I called out various exercises and Partner A did them, then caught their partner who was NUR’ing, rinse and repeat.  We did 4 reps of this and I called out a new exercise each time.

I can’t remember what we announced or prayed for, but we did!

Thanks for the Q O’Reilly!  It is always a great time Q’ing here!

Until next time,

FLUX

 

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