Month: January 2016 (Page 2 of 3)

Becoming Daisy Duke

January 14, 2016 / Roscoe / 0 Comments

I misplaced my Weinke before leaving work yesterday and had to recreate one late last night. Fortunately, I was inspired because our infamous Twitter Q’s preblast picture of Daisy Duke and a threat that YHC would sport some short demin shorts in the cold gloom was an inspiration and a new Weinke was generated in short order. The threat was not to be after I unsuccessfully scoured my closet for some old faded 501’s that I could take the scissor’s to prior to the 0530 start time.

We started right on time with a series of SSH, Imperial Walker, Prayer Squat (or put your hands in your sweatshirt pockets squat), and the Pledge of Allegiance.

We moseyed quickly to the parking lot above the BB&T. The second Weinke tried to disappear but was recovered on the cold ground by Dolph who graciously returned it. He was given a reduction of one rep in one of the below exercises.

You can’t tie your shirt above your navel like Daisy if you don’t have ripped abs, so the ABORAMA began:

Good morning darlings 50
LBC 20
V Hold 25 seconds
Flutter kick 45
Mountain Climbers 20
Superman hold 25 seconds
6 inches and overhead hold on your six 25 seconds
Side plank dips both sides 10 IC
Side oblique crunches 10 OYO each side
Backstroke 10 IC
WW1 sit-ups 15 IC
Mountain Climbers 20 IC
Homer/Marge
Superman hold 25 sec
Plank for one minute

Now that we were ripped with no love handles and ready for the half shirts, we moseyed to the Goat Pavilion. Partner up. P1 does 2 pull ups and runs to P2 who is doing ten merkins and holding a plank at the parking lot. Switch.
Then 4 pull ups, then 6 pull ups, then 8 pull ups then 6 pull ups, then 4 pull ups, then 2 pull ups. The roof of the Pavilion serves as a really good pull up station with one flaw….it is freezing cold and takes the warmth from your fingers on the first rep. Wahh.

After the upper body work, we needed to work on the glutes. You don’t look good in jean shorts without nice glutes. Mosey to the top of the driveway near City hall. Lunge walk two light poles and back one light pole. We began squats in cadence while waiting for the alarm to go off, signaling two minutes to go. We did fifty squats which seemed like forever before we heard the alarm and returned to the parking lot for a final round of Flutter kicks until YHC called time at 0615.

A few prayer requests and announcements before the COT and closing prayer.

A pleasure to lead again this morning after not much sleep. Thanks for tolerating it. Now that you have the Daisy Bod, you need to remind people that “your eyes are up here”.

Roscoe

Mercury Rising… well just a little.

January 13, 2016 / Bandit / 0 Comments

As the Q arrives, Defib and Outhouse are just finishing up their EC 4 mile run. Studs! As others arrive, 12 in total, there was some discussion that 34 degrees was feeling a bit balmy with the deep freeze experienced at our weekday AO’s recently. Thanks to Outhouse for keeping time this morning (really need to find that watch again). Ok… time to start.

Warmup this morning consisted of…

SSH IC x20
Toy Soldier IC x20
Don Quioxte IC x20
Merkins IC x10
LBC IC x20

Pledge

Mosey to baseball pavillion at Martha Rivers. Inspired by(certainly not modelled after) the Murph, the plan today was to complete 100, 200 and 300 reps of some excercises (Merkins, LBCs and Squats in this case) in 10 sets with some short sprints in between. We could definately tell that the mercury was rising as evidenced by the pile of dirty laundry accumulating in the center of the COP. Glad we got that under control quickly… was getting worried.

We completed…

Merkins IC x10
LBC IC x 20
Squats IC x 30
Sprint, Run, Mosey, or Crawl down sidewalk and back
Rinse & Repeat x5

This took quite a while longer than expected, and at the current rate did not seem like we would finish the full 10 sets promised. To be fair, since we did all exercises with a 4-count cadence, ends up we reached the same goal (in spite of YHC chronic counting issues). At the gleeful satisfaction of the pax, YHC calls “Oklahoma”. Only to disappoint the pax with a bear crawl around the pavillion. Not sure about anyone else, but at this point, my legs were spent from the squats. All looks good on paper, does’t it?

With 15 minutes to go, we mosey back to Brewsters for about 9 minutes of Mary with some portions brought to you directly from the pax. It went something like this…

LBC
WWII Sit Ups
Dying Cockroach
Freddie Mercuries
Flutter Kicks
Homer & Marge
Mountain Climbers
Heels to the Heavens

At 6:15 we wrap up with announcements (see email blast for details), Name-o-rama (including induction ceremony for Drone) and BOM.

As always, appreciate everyone I get to do this with. One year ago, would have never considered that I would be leading a bunch of fit guys in workouts before the sun comes up. Keep pushing the rock!

Aye!

– Bandit

#BB THE Storm

January 12, 2016 / Dolph_Gashouse / 0 Comments

11 Pax appeared on the chilly gloom to run the Storm.
Warmup: 10 IC; SSH, TS, MERKINS, IW, TSS, TGU
TS- toysoldier
IW- imperial walker
TSS- trunk side stretch
TGU- turkish get up
After the warmup the pax grabbed a partner and dumbell or kettlebell courtesy of the SCHS weightroom and BA, mosey to the field and drop weight on goal line. Pledge

The Thang:
Run one lap and include the home side stairs gather back at goal line. With partner aggregate counts
50 TGU with weight/ run to 50yd line 5 burpees; omaha 35
50 Plyo Crawly Merkins/ run to 40yd line 10 squats with weight
100 CDD/ run to 30yd line 20 single count sitting flutter kicks
Run one lap include home side stairs; collect weight return to weight room

Little bit a Mary:
Tricep pushups 10 IC
Side Plank Updowns 8 IC R/L
LBC 15 IC
Joboo’s 10 IC
French Fries 10 IC

Moleskin:
Nice way to start the day! Thanks guys for the opportunity to lead, always a pleasure. TGU’s harder than I thought, hince the Omaha. Defib thanks for the #Push. Nice work by all Pax! TSquare, thanks for the Prayer. Till the next one.

#PB; The Storm is Coming

January 11, 2016 / Dolph_Gashouse / 0 Comments

See you in the Gloom.

Blockamania 2016

January 11, 2016 / Godfather / 0 Comments

Introducing first, at a combined weight of five-hundred ninety-five pounds, hailing from Vandalia, Ohio and Southern Pines, North Carolina, your Q’s for this morning’s beat down: BA and Godfather!

Introducing second, at a combined weight of (approximately) 3600 pounds: the rest of the PAX who showed up for a guaranteed no-running, cinder-block beatdown.

Godfather began the match with a mosey to the back-country farm at the entrance to the Schiele Museum’s nature trail. The Warm-Up consisted of 20 Side-Straddle Hops, 50 Moroccan Night Clubs, 20 Flutter Kicks, 20 Freddie Mercury’s, and 20 Low Slow Squats all in cadence.

Godfather made his way to the corner and tagged in BA for the next part of the beatdown. The PAX moseyed back to the parking lot, partnered up, and took one cinder-block to the bottom of the big hill on the nature trail. Counting on aggregate, the group would complete 50 Berkins, 100 Blockies, 150 French Curls, 200 Bicep Curls, and 300 Overhead Press using the cinder-blocks while the other partner runs up the hill and completed a random exercise to a count of five and returned to the bottom to switch out with their partner.

With most of the PAX reeling, BA decided to stay in the match and continue the beat down with an original exercise. The group moseyed to the bridge and split into two groups. One half of the group would complete 5 Merkins on one side of the bridge while the other half completed 5 Carolina Dry Docks. Between each exercise, the group would either run over the bridge or through the stream to get to the next exercise. This exercise ended after five rounds.

BA made his way to the ropes and tagged Godfather back into the match and he would stay in until the end of the match. Making their way to the benches that circled the gazebo, the PAX completed 50 Dips on their own. Next, they made their way to the stone wall and completed 10 Inverted Merkins aka Balls to the Wall aka BTTW in cadence.

Moseying back to the cinder-blocks that had been resting at the bottom of the hill, the PAX got back with their partner and completed a Duck Walk up the hill with the cinder-block hanging between their legs while the other partner lunged up the hill. When one partner got tired, the other partner would tag in.

Back in the parking lot, the PAX circled up for some continuous Mary, which included Hello Dolly, Rosalita, Homer to Marge, World War sit-ups and French Fries.

With time expiring and no clear winner, the referee was forced to call the match a draw. There was no clear winner, but the PAX were certain to have a painful reminder of the beatdown for next few days.

2016 Word – Sacrifice

January 9, 2016 / Longshanks / 6 Comments

The past couple of years, Santini has challenged our F3 brothers to choose one word to focus on that year to help make a meaningful impact in their life and the people closest to them. See here – http://f3nation.com/2015/12/28/your-one-word-for-2016/

Some intial words I came up withe were GOALS, PLANS, and SERVE with each being an acronym for something else. I saw Santini at church last week and told him my word would be PLANS. He asked me to search deeper. So deeper I would search and spend some time in prayer trying to decide on a word. The word Sacrifice kept coming to mind (it was part of the S in each of the acronyms above). So I decided that Sacrifice would be my word for the year.

Definition of sacrifice

: the act of giving up something that you want to keep especially in order to get or do something else or to help someone
destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else
: something given up or lost <the sacrifices made by parents>

Hebrews 13:16

Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.

So I started looking at my life and searching for areas where I could make some sacrifices for the betterment of my family. I looked at finances, family, work, and other areas of my life and made a list of sacrifices.

Would give up on always trying to prove I was right when having a disagreement with my wife and stepkids. Sometimes keeping the peace is is better than having an argument over something stupid just to prove that you are right. In the end nobody wins.
Sacrifice having the newest running shoes or running gear, or more F3 shirts, etc. so I can pay off all of my credit card debt by the end of the year (hold me to this guys #accountability)
Giving up what I want to do everyday after work, so I can spend more quality time with my family and actually plan things to do with the family.
Sacrifice my wants to line up with what God wants of me.

So this morning before the Joe Davis Memorial Run, I saw Santini and told him word. His response “that’s a dangerous a word.” It is a dangerous word, but a word I know that will challenge me throughout the year. I didn’t know at the time what this word would truly mean, until about 45 minutes later and 1.25 miles into Joe Davis 10k. At that point, my arrhythmia started to flare up. I made the decision to stop running and DNF the race (I know not very F3 like to quit). But I could tell even before the race that something wasn’t right. F3 brother after F3 brother slowed down as they passed me to ask if I was okay. Told them to continue on (as I know how hard most of them trained for this race). As I was coming up one of the hills to walk back to WEP, I saw Double D come back to get me. No man left behind was his response. In short, he sacrificed his time (which I know was going to be pretty good), to make sure that I got back to WEP and that I was medically taken care of. It hammered home a point to me that Sacrifice goes 2 ways. We often think about what we must give up and seldom realize what others give up for us. It really hammered home that my word for the year is two fold. Not only to recognize what I need to give up but what others have given up for me, with the ultimate sacrifice being Jesus laying down his life for the forgiveness of not only my sins but all of yours as well.

MOLESKIN – WHY F3 WORKS

There I was, Disappointed!! First race of 2016 and my first DNF ever. I was bummed not only for me, but for Double D as well. After being cleared by Medics, I told Double D we should go towards the Finish Line to cheer everyone on as they finished. I know it would bring me some joy (and also some hurt) to see my F3 brothers finish. One by one they came across the line asking what happened to me. And I told them. And this is why F3 works. It wasn’t a bunch of guys calling you a p*ssy for quitting or telling you that you should have just sucked it up and finished. It was a group of guys that were sincerely concerned with how I was doing and feeling. Where else will a group of guys do that? And it really doesn’t matter if its a 5k/10k/half marathon or something else going on in your home life, work life, etc. These guys are always here for you. It’s why F3 works!! Thank you Double D for helping to reinforce my word for 2016.

John 15:13 – Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends

Gashouse Downtown

January 8, 2016 / Roscoe / 0 Comments

Our first downtown workout of 2016 since we went to the awesome 5^th Year convergence on New Year’s Day.

Our Twitter Q sent a pre-blast that may have been threatening to some, which may be why the PAX were slow to arrive in the Gloom or not show at all. To paraphrase Neil Peart (my apologies Neil) “If you choose not to decide to post, you still have made a choice…to fartsack #Freewill.

It felt balmy compared to the last several days with temps this morning around 39 degrees. We had an F3 guest (Scandal) from the Raleigh/Durham area and after some welcomes Defib informed us it was time to begin.

We started with SSH as three sets of headlights entered the lot. By the time we hit 30 IC, two more had joined with an additional walking in making ten PAX for the morning glory. Slow squats x10, Merkins x10, LBC’s x10, CDD’s x10, and Imperial Walkers x10 followed by the Pledge of Allegiance

A quick mosey west around the parking lot and back east past the Pavilion to the Wall of Pain.

Wall sits to recover briefly and then

Wallwalkers: The PAX lie flat with heels on the wall and push up to walk up the wall to vertical and back down 5 OYO

Wall sits with overhead presses IC

Balls to the Wall/Verkins: Walk up the wall as before but at the top do presses OYO to failure. A disclaimer was made prior to the exercise warning of the possibility of busting your skull on the concrete. When the PAX reached failure, it was a quick collapse to the ground in a crumpled mess, or maybe that was just me.

Wall sits with front raises IC

Derkins on the wall: The PAX walked up the wall to 30 degrees and completed 10 IC

This is where we were supposed to do some BB&T’s (formerly Donkey Kicks thanks to Whoopee) but I didn’t consult the Weinke. Q fail!

We moseyed around again to the “art” sculpture and circled up. There we completed:

Ten single leg lunges each leg with the rear leg on a bench. We learned that Defib can’t count in sequence and Dr. Feelgood has a premature calculation problem. Mumblechatter about the squats being a ski exercise so that spawned an idea to plan a ski trip for a 2^nd F when the snow runs deep. Sugar Mountain in the next couple months for sure.

Next was a wave of merkins for maybe 10-15 until some fell out.

Transition to the six and did some ab work. I can’t remember but I know we did 20 WW1 sit-ups followed by a V Up and hold, followed by the backstroke 10 IC. We then walked out a plank very far and at some point something starting hurting in my hip so we moseyed again, running to the parking deck and up the floors to the top.

A set of 10 CDD’s and 30 Flutter kicks and then ran back down the deck to the bridge.

We partnered up. P1 would bear crawl to the fourth light pole while P2 would do minimum 25 squats. Switch. This was supposed to be an aggregate to 100, meaning each Pax would complete two sets of each but first the P 2’s went all EC to the 5^th light pole and then made another Bear Crawl so it ended up being 3 rounds with 150 Squats. Good work!

Mosey back to the Pavilion for some curb walkers, 360 pushups on the curb, and a 7 count burp and merk in honor of Whoopee.

YHC totally screwed up the Nameorama by forgetting to do it, (2nd Q fail) but we hit some announcements and prayer requests which are:

Announcements:

1^st Anniversary CSAUP April 9^th. Will need RSVP ASAP for t-shirt orders. Will be Mudgear and good quality which is what you would expect from the Gashouse but the timeline will be tight! Let me know if you are a hard commit and want a shirt!
Scandal (Patrick Walker) from Raleigh/Durham invited us to a CSAUP in Durham called the Bull. January 23^rd 0600 hours.
Dolph is looking to take a clown car to seize the Ghost Flag in Denver I believe. This will be Saturday morning. DM Dolph for instructions:

Prayers for Outhouse’s mom on a pending scan and for Stroganoff’s cousin and family.
A pleasure to lead again and enjoy the benefits of this great group of men!

Beatdown Accomplished. No Apocalypse Yet.

January 7, 2016 / Godfather / 0 Comments

“…he will place the sheep at his right hand, but the goats at the left”

Sheep: Nine PAX braved the gloom this morning at #GoatIsland.

The Goats: Fartsakers

Warmup:

SSH, Merkins, CDD, JoBus, LBC, Hillbillies, Flutter kicks & a lap around the field.

The Thang:

The PAX laid railroad tracks up the hill, and then did a 3 Corner Escalator (10 burpees, 20 Rocky Balboas, 30 Merkins, 40 squats) then back down the escalator doing all the same in reverse.

Next we moseyed behind the BB&T for 200 LBCs. One partner did LBCs while the other ran up the hill to the railroad tracks and slid, crab-walked, or tumbled back down. Next we did some Moroccan Nightclubs and a round of ATMs (Hat Tip Whoopie for introducing them yesterday).

No Cramerton beatdown would be complete without honoring our friends at BB&T. Tempting as it was to proceed with Donkey Kicks, we settled for the People’s Chair with two PAX at a time running around the building.

We ran a lap around the field to return to the parking lot, where Roscoe led an awful burpee/merkin combo, JK2 led some Imperial Walkers, Dolph led some exercise that he can name, and someone led some flutter kicks.

Announcements: 1/16 Q school + beatdown + community service; anniversary F3 at Boss Hogg’s–coffee will be served.

Prayer requests: Stroganoff’s bro-in-law.

COT

Insufficient Funds

January 6, 2016 / Whoopee / 0 Comments

It was clearly the coldest post for me on record, however we still had a very good showing, including 3 who showed for some extra credit at 5am to get a little running in before the workout (OutHouse, Defib, Whoopee-thanks for the push OutHouse). I learned a few things this morning: 24 degrees is too cold for shorts, SSH is best thing for pre-frost bite fingers (more is better, 40 reps is adequate), and I don’t like Wells Fargo ATMs.

WU: 10-15 reps IC of the following: SSH, CDD, Flutter, Squat, Merkin, Imperial Walker, Freddy Mercury (this was a true WU for me full of boredom after the first few exercises but I felt were necessary given the low temps).

Pledge

The Thang:

Mosey carrying the medicine ball to dilapidated Lowe’s parking lot, partner up (not necessary but gave us something to do until all pax arrived). Split into 2 lines and 1 pax from each line did relay with medicine ball around parking lot in different directions but crossing in middle on other side of lot to hand off medicine ball then continue around back to start. While partners were doing this running thing, the remaining pax stayed at the start and did rounds of AMRAP of the following exercises: SSH, CDD, Flutter, Squat, Merkin, Imperial Walker, and Freddy Mercury. After the pax returned to start, the next in line repeated the relay/run with ball until all had gone twice (I think) while remaining pax moved on to the next exercise. This really makes sense in my head but sounds very confusing on paper.

Next exercise consisted of Donkey Kicks (also known as BB&T’s) and Dips. We started in front of store and did 30 seconds of BB&Ts then moseyed to end of building and did 30 seconds of dips. I think we did 2 sets of this, but just for the record let’s call it 5 sets of each.

I was getting bored with this I think because of the lack of mumble chatter. Was not sure if it was the workout or the cold weather….my vote is the weather since I had snot-icycles at this point.

We moved on down my Weinke and did a quick audible. My plan was to mosey to the local Bank of Bank (not really that far) but during the mosey we came upon a Wells Fargo ATM which served my purposes just fine. In front of the ATM we did ATMs (A=15 sets of alternating shoulder taps in 4 counts, T=tempo merkins:1-3 down then up on 4, M=regular fast single count merkins). We moseyed around the entire parking lot for total of 2 sets of ATMs (only comment was from OutHouse-“insufficient funds” which almost made me laugh a snotcylce out) then went back to the original starting point in front of the store and did some zombie lunge walk. At this point my fingers were numb and my legs really felt funny so I pulled an Oklahoma and did a bunch of SSH-this quickly returned blood to my fingers which made me want to keep doing them (sorry Linus, my fingers needed that). We did some more lunges then moseyed back to start for a few minutes of Mary plus a frozen cockroach. I succeeded in avoiding the escalating burpee/lap run on my Weinke so I was relieved to be finished.

The cold weather really takes some of the fun out of this for me, however if I did not have the pax to work out with, I would clearly be at home in my fartsack. Instead, I had a half hour of running before the workout with a couple great guys, learned something about cold fingers and SSHs, and got a chance to talk about F3 with Defib and some non-F3 people on the way to a lunch meeting after finding the medicine ball in my back seat. Thanks for showing up and posting.

We ended with announcements: Q school Jan 16 with some community service after for those able to stick around, Yeti in Feb, Congrats to Boss Hogg on the grandchild and a few others I cannot remember.

Great seeing everyone this am. If you need me, I’ll be at Dick’s getting some long, cold-weather running pants, earmuffs, mittens, a scarf, goggles, and a pair of yak-lined running shoes.

Whoopee

A Trip to Victory Hill – BackBlast

January 5, 2016 / Godfather / 0 Comments

Fifteen PAX (including one FNG) answered the call and posted to the first workout at #TheStorm of 2016. When YHC got out of the #momwagon the temperature outside was 26 degrees, so it was no surprise to the see all members of the group tightly bundled – all members except Top Hat, who posted in his signature Duke hoodie and SHORTS. With one FNG in tow, it was time to remind everyone of the disclaimer, stating that no one here was an expert and that we’re idiots so if you follow us, you must be an idiot too. YHC stated that if F3 stood for Food, Fun, and more Fun, that he might consider myself an expert. With the laughter coming to an end, it was time for the Warm-Up (Unfortunately, no one would actually be warm until a little later).

The Warm-Up, as always, was in cadence and began with 20 Side-Straddle Hops. Next came 20 Scorpion Carolina Dry Docks (CDD’s with one leg in the air like a scorpion’s tale) with ten reps of each leg in the air. The third exercise brought the PAX to frozen ground, as it was time for 20 Little Baby Crunches. The fourth exercise was a lesson in cultural sensitivity as the PAX completed 10 Appalachian Americans (formerly Hillbillies) in a nod to T-Square, who has not appreciated all the racism (is Hillbilly, er, Appalachian American actually a race?) we’ve been having in F3. The final exercise of the warm-up was a set of 10 Imperial Walkers, and since we didn’t have any soldiers of the Grand Republic Army in our group, we left it at that.

The Thang began with a mosey to the gate of the football stadium. The PAX were then notified that they would be completing a round of Burpicides with increasing burpees at each stop. In all, there would be EIGHT stops, so the PAX who were able to complete 100% of this work out actually did 36 burpees by the end.

Partnering up, the group had to go the length of half the parking lot alternating between Lunges and Bear Crawls. T-Claps are due to JoBu who made sure YHC only had to Bear Crawl about 15 yards. With plenty of time still left of the clock, the PAX moseyed their way further from #TheStorm with many beginning to wonder if we would be heading to #GoatIsland to finish the workout. Instead, the PAX stopped just before leaving Stuart Cramer’s campus and met for the first time, #VictoryHill.

The Beatdown of #VictoryHill commenced with the PAX once again joining with their partner and completing 200 Squats on an aggregate count while their partner ran up the hill and did one Burpee before returning to the bottom. YHC informed the group once again of the disclaimer as #VictoryHill has quite a few holes – cannonball craters, no doubt, from the storied Battle for Castle Cramer during the 1460’s.

The Beatdown continued with a Bear Crawl up the hill and by then, it was time to count off not once, not twice, but THRICE (look it up) before moving on to the next exercises. The PAX then moseyed across the field and back before making their way down the #VictoryHill. Extra Credit was awarded to Dolph and others who decided to do a Backwards Bear Crawl down the hill.

At the bottom, it was time to make our way back to the start but as many of you know, YHC is not a huge fan of running anywhere without stopping. So, the PAX started their journey back with a Bear Crawl from the first speed bump to the guard rails. Stopping for a break at the rails, the group completed 10 Dips and 10 Derkins, in cadence, on the rails before moving on. From the guard rails, it was time to complete a Zombie Walk to second speed bump. In an Ode to the Mayor, the PAX then completed a Backwards Skip from the second speed bump to the SCHS Spirit Rock. After moseying from the rock to the third speed bump, the PAX completed 15 Flutter Kicks in cadence and a round of Homer to Marge.

Several of the PAX were deducted T-Claps for racing back to the starting point when they were clearly instructed to mosey – I’m looking at you Dolph, Roscoe, and Bandit! Back at the starting point, the workout was closed out with 7 French Fries, a Ring of Fire with 5 Merkins each, and 5 Burpees OYO.

The BOM consisted of the Pledge of Allegiance, Name-o-Rama, Announcements, and Prayer lead by T-Square. T-Claps are in order to our newest FNG, Stick (AKA Wade Crofton), for braving the freezing temperatures to see what this F3 nonsense is all about.

Closing Note – The temperature actually dropped from 26 to 23 degrees by the end of the workout!

Thanks again to all that showed up this morning, I wholly expected three or four guys to be out here.

Godfather