A party of one showed up in the gloom. Spiderman warmed up alone, then moved the party to another location. It went like this:

Warm Up:
100 Side Straddle Hops
Arm Cirlces [front & back]
30 Squats
20 Merkins
15 LBCs

Around the World
Tricep Extension
Curls

Move this party to another location

Continued with

20 Kettle Bell Swings
10 Halos
10 Tricep Extensions
20 Squat Curl Press
10 Per Side – Lawnmowers
10 Curls

Repeat x 1

10 Shoulder Press
10 Goblet Squats
KB Swings 15
Around the World 10 – each direction
Halos 10 – each direction

Repeat x 1

Curls & American Hammers, Curls & Flutterkicks, Curls & LBCs

20 Squats
15 Shoulder Press
10 Tricep Extension
20 Kettlebell Swings
20 Goblet Squats

Pack it in.

I had the Q. I can’t find the weinke but we warmed up, we did some reps on the wall and around the amphitheater. We also did some 11s and ran sprints up the lower parking lot. We had a good time and no everyone walked way with all of their extremities in-tact.

5 Pub members posted for a crisp morning mosey through the Willow Creek neighborhood.  All 5 made it back alive!

Small crowd. Who didn’t change their clocks?

Some ran. Flintstone led a ruck themed workout for the rest.

Announcements
Hero WOD next weekend
Freight’s Trail relay the 18th
Thanksgiving morning frisbee tournament
Speed for Need at Christmastown 5K
Convergence
Christmas party

Prayers
Wirenut’s family
Broke’s mom
Others not mentioned
YHC

I was out-manned, outgunned, outworked and probably many more things this morning.  Blueprint let me take the Q and because he posted some verbiage on Slack, I wanted to end with some USMC trivia as he is a Marine.  He couldn’t answer so the other two would, but Black Flag is also a Marine so it all fell to Freon.  We did three burpees for every wrong USMC trivia answer at the end of the workout.  We found out Black Flag was a marine based on how confident and boisterous he answered the USMC founding question.

It was lots of fun and I chose this work as it hit a lot of support muscles we often neglect as well as major groups.

Warm Up:

SSHx15

Grass Pickers x10IC

ROL/LOR

MNC x15IC

Thang:

Tip Raises x10IC (20)

Calf raises x10IC (20)

Bent knee calf raises x10IC (20)

Sitting hip flexor raise x10IC (20)

Split squats (curb or bench) x10 each leg

Step ups x10 each leg

Merkin x10

Shoulder taps x10 each arm/shoulder

CDDs x10

Big boys x10

Leg Raise x10

Run two laps

RINSE AND REPEAT

Pledge

Announcements:  Shirts for Mt. Hollywood are coming out so look for that and support this AO, Trail Run Poston Park 11/18 – DM Freight, Ultimate Frisbee Poston Park 11/23 – DM Freight,  Beer Ruck 12/9 – DM BOS, Convergence at The Yank 12/2 and Christmas Party at Lewis Farm 12/2 (See slack for sign up and voting),  2nd F Lunch at the Lodge in Belmont Noon 11/15.

TAPS:  There are so many out there so as you go thru the day, be grateful for your troubles and strife and look to the good in your life.

TRIVIA QUESTIONS
What year was the Marine Corp Founded?
If a Marine graduates from Camp Pendleton, they are classified by this nickname?
This is the most decorated marine and recruits say good night to him every night?
This obstacle at OCS in Quantico, resembles my last name and shares it with a famous Australian?
In the USMC hymn, they are famed to have fought piracy on these shores?
In the move Full Metal Jacket, Private Joker is asked to give one of these to the Commandant and one to the “blank”, but the blank doesn’t get theirs?

2 Ruckers & 5 Runners put in miles at the Coconut Horse on Maybelline’s birthday.

Discussion was from McRaven’s Wisdom of the Bullfrog, on the chapter “Always Have a Swim Buddy.”  Basically, we need people in our lives who are going to take the time to listen and know us well enough to know what we need and tell us what we need to hear.  We also need to be that person for others.  A “swim buddy” is basically like a ShieldLock, in F3 parlance.

Swim Buddies/ShieldLocks should

• Be men of integrity with morals that align
• Always be available
• Be willing listeners
• Have mutual trust, likely as a result of the things they’ve gone through together
• Share confidence and strength, staying tethered so when one is going through it, he can count on his swim buddy to pull him out
• Take pride in what they do
• Live like it matters
• Be authentic and humble
• Can and will deliver hard truths (candor)

Grateful for a group that’s willing to invest in each other, and has pushed me to be better than I thought I could be.

Yabba Dabba Doo

Final Coconut Horse session for Wisdom of the Bullfrog.

We did the conclusion chapter which might have been my favorite chapter. Thankfully, Strogi reminded me the day before and I had time to get my stuff ready, otherwise it would have been a very short session.

The chapter started out talking about the book Gates of Fire (the book about the story from the movie 300 and King Leonidas). If that story doesn’t get you fired up, you need to go see your doctor and get your testosterone level checked. I’ll be watching that if I can find it as soon as I finish this BB. McRaven talks about how Xerxes asks the last remaining Spartan what made Leonidas such a great leader. The Spartan’s response was basically that he does not command their loyalty, he earns it by the daily grind of being in the trenches with them and not asking them to do anything he is not already doing or willing to do. He basically describes Leonidas’ behavior (and the complete opposite of the Xerxes’ behavior) throughout the entire movie 300.

McRaven then goes on to describe qualities of a great leader: integrity, competence, swagger, strength/stamina, and the willingness to take (measured) risk and dream big. In the end, great leaders must also share hardships with those that they lead. I couldn’t help thinking about several movies while I was reading this chapter: Band of Brothers, Hoosiers, We Were Soldiers and probably a few others that I can’t remember now. It also made me appreciate the recent trip to one of Jocko’s Musters in Texas. THAT was a great trip worth every penny and hope some of you get a chance to go at some point. Among the leadership lessons from the conference, I learned a couple other things:

1-I have missed out on some really good music: Audioslave can get me a bit fired up and I need to check them out.

2-if you want to hear George Strait, hang out in the bathrooms in hotels that play music in Texas. I probably took the longest bathroom breaks of my life on that trip. #goodmemories

Finally, McRaven finishes the book with some humility. He was in the Navy/SEALs for 40 years, led a major educational institution, and has written several books and finishes the book with the fact that he is STILL LEARNING HOW TO LEAD.

If you have not read the book, you might consider ordering it or borrowing it from someone. The chapters are relatively short, the lessons are memorable, and we all really enjoyed it.

Next week we start The Hero Code also by Admiral McRaven. Hope to see some new faces.

Whoopee

PS: almost forgot, 4 plus a nutsniffer rucked and 3 ran this am. Flintstone posted after running a marathon yesterday with his fastest half marathon time ever….

5 ruckers and 1 runner.  Started the 4th quadrant of Q-Source with Leave Right.  Find your ULP and act on it brothers.

You stay classy Gastonia,

Anchorman

Some pax might have arrived with assumptions about what was going to go down at the Gashouse bootcamp.  Maybe since Shortsale mentioned beer and women, they would be a part of the workout?  Maybe since Sargento was heading up 2nd F Coffeeteria following the workout, there would surely be no burpees.  Right?  Right??  Let’s find out…

At 0659 I tried to identify one of the Pax who could reliably keep me on track for time.  (I don’t wear one of those fancy fitness-tracker watches, and I like to leave my phone behind when possible.)  Shortsale proved not to be a reliable time-keeper as he had to scroll through at least 7 screens on his watch to find out what time it was.  I quickly pivoted and relied on Sargento’s and Stroganoff’s time-keeping devices for the remainder of the workout.

No disclaimer for the group of pros present today, so we got right into a quick warmup (SSH, imperial walkers, squats, merkins, 10xIC each) before I handed the Pain Lab-rats over to Time Frame and moseyed across Garrison with 6 boot-campers.

The Thang:

Oh, we brought along with us 2 18-lb kettlebells for assistance with a few exercises.  We stopped first at the library for a wall-sit with 5 OH presses for each of the KB’s.  Next was hip slappers and dirty-hookups (10xIC) before moseying on down Churchill.  Some of the Pax wanted to catch up on college football scores and today’s upcoming games when I called for 5 burpees.  Yes, 5 burpees as the start of our “rack & stack” BLIMPS.  So, we’ll do 5 more burpees at the speed bump at the bottom of the hill, then proceed one at a time to:
10 Lunges
15 Imperial walkers
20 Merkins
25 Plank jacks
30 Squats

Each round at the bottom of the hill, we would do all exercises in sequence up to what we did at the top.

After racking and stacking all the BLIMPS, we returned to the library for a reprise of the wall-sit presses, hip slappers, and dirty hookups.

Moseyed up Garrison to the front of the Presbyterian church for Dirty 11’s, Mike Tysons and Bobby Hurleys with a single burpee at the midpoint between the exercises.  After 8 rounds of this, we had 5 minutes left.  (Thanks for keeping me on track, Sargento and Stroganooff!)  I called Omaha on the 11’s so we could head back to the Schiele for 2 minutes of Mary before it was time.  A couple of the Pain Lab pax joined us for some flutter kicks, dying cochroaches, and American Hammers.  Then time for pledge and COT.

See Stogie’s newsletter for announcements – there are quite a few.

Prayers:  Turtleman, Norwood, Montana, Jackson Hall, Les Nessman’s M and family, Anchorman’s effort to find bone marrow donors.  Prayers also for those living in fear – and gratitude for most of us who have the luxury of being able to take personal safety for granted.

It was a fun time to lead this group of HIM’s this morning – thanks for the opportunity!
– Nutria