Author: Madoff

Admittedly, I wasn’t super excited to have the Q at Snoballs this week. Things at work & home have been super busy (& stressful).  I’ve been rising very early and hitting the hay very late at night… just to keep my head above water.  The snow/sleet event over the weekend was awesome for my 2.0s; however, it added to the stress for work as the workweek was cut short. Long story short, I wasn’t chomping at the bit to Q. That said, I was voluntold a few weeks ago by one of my closer F3 brother’s, Gastone, that I needed to Q Snowballs. Gastone has been a great friend of mine since my introduction to F3. He’s EH’d me when my posts were sparse, provided Godly counsel when times were tough, invited me to events outside of F3, and provided a necessary push (more than 1 time) to get me out of my comfort zone (i.e., BRR).  As such, I didn’t give any pushback , and I added the Q to my calendar.

As usual, Gastone tweeted a reminder about Snoballs & invited everyone for EC to “get sum”.  Hipaa replied with a HC to EC.  This meant he publicly committed himself to arrive at 0500 for a 3 mile mosey in the cold & icy gloom prior to my Q.  While Hipaa’s HC didn’t surprise me, I couldn’t help thinking about the positive transformation I’ve witnessed in his health since he started F3 nearly 1 year ago after being EH’d by his cardiologist.  Reflecting on Hipaa’s metamorphosis, I asked myself if I’ve changed for the better or worse over the last year.   This question can go in so many different directions, but for the purpose of this backblast, I asked myself “Am I stronger and healthier today than last year?” Unsure about the answer, I quickly decided that I should take a step in the right direction by joining the EC group.

One of my close friends likes to tell this story about a guy who decided to climb a hill and begin “crazy dancing” in clear site of a large group of people. The crowd watched from a safe distance, thinking the guy was completely off his rocker.  Eventually though, another guy climbed the hill & joined him in the silly behavior. As time passed, another guy joined the two men….then another and another and another until the entire crowd was dancing like fools atop the hill and a revolution was birthed.   Specific to my experience this week, Gastone represents the initial nincompoop who climbed the hill and invited all of us to join him for a run in frigid temps at 0500 when 99% of the population remained in the warm fartsack.  Hipaa represents the second brave soul who sloughed off the sad clown tendencies and decided it was a good idea to join Gastone.  Subsequently, Hippa’s tweet, “HC for EC” provided the necessary push I needed  to join the group for EC.

The point of this missive is to remind us that we need each other. This week, I needed to be voluntold by Gastone that I needed to Q, and I needed Hipaa’s prompt to get out of bed &do the hard work required to better myself.  Next week, it may be you who needs the necessary push.

In summary, I’m grateful for F3 and your positive impact on my life. Thanks for the many “necessary pushes” over the years to be a better HIM.

We ran the usual 5 mile loop. Some did EC. YHC completely failed with an obvious Q responsibility…to make sure everyone knows the directions to complete the loop. As such, we nearly lost 1 HIM. Fortunately, all 7 returned in time for the COT & coffee-rama.

It’s been a while since YHC has Q’d a workout, and it showed…there were multiple Q fails.  When Stroganoff posted the opening for Gashouse, I knew it was time to knock off the rust (shake off the Sad Clown) and get back after it.  I’ve had great excuses for slowly drifting into a Sad Clown (knee injury, coaching soccer for the 2.0s, moving to a new home, preparing the old home to be sold, etc.); however, these are still excuses.

At 0700 the Pax circled up (both bootcamp & pain lab). We identified an FNG (Asher Greer, Dolf’s 2.0…forever more to be known as Dijon) and I gave a quick disclaimer before jumping into the warm up & pledge:

SSH x 25

Don Quixotes x 20

Morocan Nightclub x 20

PLEDGE

After the warm up, the PAX divided into two group: bootcamp & pain lab.  YHC was the QIC for the bootcamp & Hipaa was the QIC for pain lab. 12 HIMS participated in the bootcamp workout, and the PAX was given a quick overview of the WEINKE and introduced to the figurative Sad Clown (a 6” x 6” x 8 ‘ pressure treated timber decorated as a Sad Clown thanks to my 2.0, Monet) that we planned to carry around.  I thanked the PAX for following up with me over the last several months…literally, many of them came along side me to help shoulder my Sad Clown burdens.

The Thang.

The PAX ran 0.25 miles while carrying the figurative Sad Clown then stopped for some exercises (30 seconds per exercise) through 12 pain stations.  The PAX carried the Sad Clown (approx. 65 lbs) in groups of 2 and alternated frequently to shoulder the weight.

Station #1 – Mercans, Lunges

Station #2 – CDDs (Def push ups), LBCs

Station #3 – Hillbillies, Monkey Humpers

Station #4 – Time for some Dora: 100 Freddy Mercuries, 200 Alternating Shoulder Taps, 300 Flutter Kicks

Station #5 – Imperial Walkers, Broad Jump Burpees

Station #6 – American Hammers, Bear Crawl

Station #7 – Rocky Balboas (in honor of Stage Coach’s Philadelphia roots), Mike Tyson Pushups

Station #8 – Donkey Kicks, People’s Chair, Hip Slappers

Station #9 – Joe Hendrix

Station #10 – Crabwalk

Station #11 – Mtn Climbers

Station #12 – skipped the exercise because low on time

Bootcamp & Pain Lab finished with some Mary (WWI sit ups, Dying Cockroches) before the bells rang.

After the bells, Linus confirmed the PAX covered +3.2 miles (including the Dora run). Who says you can’t complete a 5k run with Speed for Need?

Hippa shared announcements, took prayer requests, and named our FNG (Asher Greer). Welcome Dijon!!!

YHC thanked the PAX again for “not leaving me behind” the past several months and encouraged the PAX to continue to be intentional to reach out to our other MIA brothers….it makes a difference knowing that someone cares. We concluded our time in a COT in prayer.

Feeling guilty for fart sacking Tuesday morning following the 2017 CFB Playoff National Championship Game, 14 pax showed up in the Gloom for a customary Goat Island beat down. (Quick side bar – I believe TCLAPS are warranted here for Tiny Tank and Shad Rap who both watched the game and still mustered up the fortitude to post Tuesday morning at The Storm. Well done!) Back to the Goat….It was a beautiful morning for an F3 workout. 50 degree temps. Energy and mumble chatter were lively between the pax. (Almost) everyone was early, and we had 1 FNG. After a brief welcome & intro for the FNG, the disclaimer was given.

The QIC explained to the pax that today’s workout was intended to be a tribute to Monday’s 2017 national championship game…arguably the best college football national championship game of all time.  To make sure we were all on the same page, a summary of the game was provided: Clemson was able to avenge last season’s 45-40 loss to Alabama in the 2016 Nat’l Championship game with a thrilling 35-31 win to be crowned the 2017 champs.

Warm Up & Pledge

Don Quixotes x 16 in honor of Alabama’s 16 national football titles

SSH x 18 in honor of the combined national football titles for these two heavyweight football programs

Moroccan Night Clubs x 26. The tigers snapped Alabama’s 26 game winning streak.

Hillbillies x 9. The Tide’s average third down distance to go was 9.3 yards for the game.

Mosey down the hill & back x 2 – high knees, butt kickers, karaoke right, karaoke left

Pledge

The Thang

The QIC used these standout statistics from the national championship game for the workout:

Clemson’s red zone touchdown percentage was 100%. The Tigers were a perfect 4 for 4.  Hearing the number 100, the pax begged for the opportunity to complete 100 burpees before 5:50 am, (#allin) which we did, via the 10 Minute Burpee Challenge. 60 seconds to complete 10 sets of burpees with the following reps: 8,9,10,11,12,12,11,10,9,8 = 100 burpees. (Thank you Nantan for providing this idea…though I missed the snow.) This was a crowd pleaser.

Alabama was 1 for 13 on third down attempts longer than 4 yards.  This meant that Alabama punted the ball 11 times. In recognition of the 11 punts, Round of 11s: hip slappers, pull ups. With 14 pax, we divided into 2 group so that we would have adequate space for pull ups. One group started at the gazeebo with pull ups and the other group started with hip slappers (double count) across the bridge.  Given time constraints, we Omaha’d somewhere in the middle of the count so that we could highlight a few more stats.

Clemson ran a total of 99 plays against The Tide, a feat that no other opponent was able to do this season in a single game.  (The Alabama defense hadn’t faced more than 84 plays in a single game all season).  Attributing much of this accomplishment to teamwork, we partnered up to Wheelbarrow 99 Yards across bridge & back. Teams were encouraged to switch every 24.75 yards (for the engineers in the pax).

The Alabama defense had been stifling all season. It was reported that, with the number of points scored by the Alabama defense during the regular season versus their opponents, the Tide would have finished the season 6 and 8. Again, this assumes the Tide offense never took the field in the 14 regular season games. Wow! Surprisingly, for a defense with the ability to rack up lots of points, Alabama only scored only 3 points off of two Clemson fumbles. Recognizing that each of us will also “fumble the ball” in life and will need our F3 brothers to fight for us in the scrum to help recover the ball (kick us in the duff & remind us of the gospel), we did a variation of the Bermuda Triangle (3 corners in tribute to 3 points scored) to practice recovering fumbles. Using the triangle intersection on Goat Island, we split into three groups. The groups bear crawled from one corner to the next. At each corner, the pax did French Fries x 20 (single count). The goal was 2 laps around the triangle…which we cut short due to time. Quick mosey back for the COT.

TIME.

Named the FNG – Q*bert

COT.

It’s an honor to be in community with you men. Thanks for encouraging me to DFQ….to keep pushing the rock.

Last stat from Monday’s national championship game…which I’ll work in to future workouts: Clemson had 4 receivers with more than 90 yards receiving