Posted on

The Evolutions

YHC arrived to the AO early to make sure that the Hotel Pooper was vacant so the PAX could use it freely. To my surprise, there was no one in there spending the night. I am training for an HTL in less than 30 days (holy crap that’s soon…) so I decided to get in some pre-beatdown miles in with my ruck. I received a text from Groundblind thanking me for breaching and clearing the bathroom and to let me know that he had his rucks in the back of his truck. Between the two of us I knew that I would have enough for the PAX to do what I planned (thank God cause that almost a cluster Q). Anyway, I got back around 0640 and there was no one there. I started to think that it was going to be GB and myself and then PAX started pouring in. Off in the distance we saw a grayish figure in the distance trying to run into the Y. Turns out it was none other than the #GrayMan himself, PAPERBOY. He looked over my workout, said, “Stallion, are you trying to kill them? This is too much for me.” (or something to that effect) and hurried off to the Y for 3 rounds of 5 count arm circles. It was now 0700 and time to get started.

Warmup:

Nothing special here because I didn’t want it to eat up time for the main event.

 

SSH IC x 15

Reach Thrus IC x 15

Toe touch leg stretch

 

We counted off into 3s and the moseyed over to the side walk.

 

I planned on doing the 3 evolutions below as AMR(ounds)AP at 18 minutes each. Each group started on the number that they were assigned. I printed EVERYTHING out on multiple pages, but still ended up having to explain everything to the PAX for 10 minutes. Trail Mix is the only person that gets a by on this because he normally does Bowtie’s skipping school and they only run. He was introduced to a man’s Q today.

Evolution 1:

  • WZ Run
  • 26 HR Merkins
  • WZ Run
  • 26 LBCs
  • WZ Run
  • 26 V-Ups
  • WZ Run
  • 29 Burpees (well I'll be...this was supposed to be 26)

Evolution 2:

  • 25 Flutter Kicks
  • 20 Mountain Climbers
  • 15 Lunges (each leg)
  • 10 Squats
  • 5 Leg Raises
  • Sprint WZ and back

Evolution 3: (Ruck)

  • 6 Merkins with Rotations
  • 12 big boys
  • 24 Squats
  • Backwards run to Memorial and back.

 

Since I was short on time, we did 18 minutes 1 evolution and then 16 for the other 2.

 

Mary:

Paperboy told me that he was going to come out and do some Mary with us so I asked him for 3 exercises.

We did 1 minute AMRAP of the following:

LBCs, Box cutters and Flutterkicks (maybe not in that order)

Highlight of the day:

This marked our first 2.0 Convergence and Apple was the only 2.0 to make it. Highlights of his stellar performance was passing Benchwarmer (multiple times) and verbally abusing Purty Mouth on his terrible form. This kid has quite the mouth.

 

DEVO:

Short version…Choose the harder thing. The right choice isn’t always going to be the easiest and that doesn’t mean you have to do it alone. Stand shoulder to shoulder with your family and help shoulder the burdens.

 

I encourage you all to check out Jocko Podcast 121, 122 and 123.

 

Everyone out there today walked away sweaty, tired and better. Thank you for giving it you all and standing with us.

 

Respectfully,

Stallion

You already voted!
Posted on

Heavy Hands

Conditions: 36 degrees

YHC has missed a couple of workouts this year and wanted to make sure that I was getting back on track. There has been a lack of BC Q diversity since Paperboy was recovering from his “hip” surgery so, naturally, a strong leader had to step-up..enter yours truly.

Warm-up

Since I didn’t wake up until 0515, I had to make sure that I was properly stretched for the mosey over to the brick pile. We also had a few ruckers and I wanted to give them chance to get over there.

Reach-thrus – 15 IC

SSH 15 IC

Mosey to Brick Pile

The Thang

PAX were instructed to grab a block and two bricks. Once we got to the circle we partnered up. Some PAX honor Paperboy by doing the Grey-man Walk, but that is a stupid workout. Instead, YHC asked everyone to do 10 Junkyard Dogs. There was an odd man out and FNG Southern Bell was looking like a lost puppy. YHC had already partnered with Chainsaw, but when I called out the exercise, he graciously allowed me to partner with the FNG. I believe his exact words were, “I’m not doing that $&%#!”

Next, we moved on to the main event.

First, we grabbed out bricks and did some Jack Webb.

The count was 1-4, 2-8, 3-12, 4-16 etc all the way to 10-40

After that, we moved to so heavy lifting. We grabbed our blocks and did the following exercises.

40 curls

30 Overhead Press

40 Chest-press

We decreased reps by 5 each time, with the exception of Overheads. YHC could only muster 30 reps the first go around so we continued to do 30 reps until we caught up with the other exercises.

Once we got do 10, we did 40 of each again instead of 5.

We put our blocks and bricks up and moseyed back to the parking lot.

Announcements:

None

DEVO:  I did a summarized version of the speech at the end of Black Panther.

“In times of crisis, the wise build bridges while the foolish build barriers”.

You already voted!
Posted on

No Cluster Here

Conditions: 36 degrees

YHC saw that no one had stepped to the plate on Sunday for the Brick City Q so he snatched it up. However, he then got a call that his 2.0 dropped a stool on her foot and completely forgot to plan anything. Oh well, I was sure that something would come to me.

I arrive at BC with about 30 seconds to spare. YHC give the disclaimer and tells everyone to mosey over to the brick pile. Once we arrived we got a concrete block and two bricks (and unlike most Qs, I actually used the bricks). We circled up and started to work.

Round 1

50 – Curls, Back-flies, Overheads, Big boys, Chest press and some new exercise and then 5 burpees.

New exercise - Lay on your back with your hands extended in the air holding your two bricks. You lower the bricks over your head to the ground while keeping your arms extended. After the first round we added holding 6 inches too.

Rounds 2-5 were the same format, but we decreased the reps by 10.

YHC called time and we headed back to the Splash Pad.

DEVO:

I’m sure you all have heard about the 30 day challenges by now. November’s challenge will be Qed by Last Rites and will be a great one to participate in. We will be issuing the challenge of spending 5 minutes a day of quiet time with the Father. I filled the PAX in on the challenge and that Last Rites will be posting more about it soon.

NMS:

Regardless of my new perfect Q performance of calling out the exercises, Benchwarmer would ignore my cadence and just do his own thing.

Fudger showed up today. That was a miracle in and of itself. In an effort to show the PAX he “still had it” he threw a block down and shattered it. Goldi advised him that we now had a policy that whomever breaks a block has to buy all the PAX present a round at MAC’s.

Magic Mike almost tackled me because YHC almost forgot to record his name. The Clinic is starting to wear off on him.

Windows started slinging cusswords out after he called BS on everyone finishing their Big Boys and he was still working. I’ve never heard anything like it before in my life.

Paperboy, being the BA he is, was calling out the rep before YHC could call “up” or “down”. IYAFYL would have been proud.

Dumper said that he knew Bench would be running beforehand so he kept hitting snooze cause he didn’t want him to affect his pace.

 

Thanks for allowing me to Q today. It’s always a pleasure to start the week off with HIMs. The rest of the PAX is really missing out on Brick City and Sink or Swim.

You already voted!
Posted on

Breaking Walls

YHC was looking forward to his Convergence Q! I planned it all week long fine tuning it to make sure that I covered everything. I went to Brick City Friday night with the 2.0s to load the coupons required for this masterpiece of a beatdown and woke up early on Saturday to make sure that I did all my prep work.

 

At 0700 we circled, gave the disclaimer, broke off into teams of 5 and YHC started to explain what we were doing. I had all the instructions printed out and a lot more copies than we needed. I planned for 20 and we only had 10 post. No matter, let’s move on to the thang.

 

One the instructions were 8 objectives, but before we could get to those the PAX had a few exercises to complete

Warmup:

100 Burpees

200 Monkey Humpers

300 Merkins

400 2 count Hammers

 

The Thang:

Revolution 1:

As mentioned, we had 8 objectives we had to complete. One person from each team also had to have a ruck on at all times.

Objective 1: Retrieve a sandbag from the Hartsville Museum.

Objective 2: Collect coupons

  • 1 Log
  • 2 Water jugs
  • 6 Concrete Blocks
  • 8 Concrete Cylinders
  • 16 Bricks

Objective 3: Move the log around the Vista Pond and back

Objective 4: Go the YMCA planters and complete the exercises there

  • 200 Dips
  • 200 Derkins
  • 200 Step-ups/Box jumps

Objective 5: Tireflip a tire down Warzone and back

Objective 6: Bear-craw with tire down Cargill Way and back

Objective 7: Go to the vacant lot beside the pond and do Block Slider Suicides

Objective 8: Return Coupons

 

YHC has done a similar workout like this before and did not anticipate how fast the PAX would complete everything….not today. We finished everything in around 36 minutes. Then we moved to some other races.

Revolution 2:

Heat 1:

Line up in plank position toes to head with the last person touching the sidewalk beside Cargill. The first person was wearing a ruck and had to bear-crawl to the flag and back then give the ruck to the next person and so on.

Heat 2:

Same format, but we sprinted to the end of Warzone and back

Revolution 3:

We got in line for some banjo bear-crawl, but Dumper was nice enough to tell me about some new animal crawls.

Heat 1: The Gorilla crawl

Heat 2: The Orangutan crawl

 

Mary:

Minute AMRAP each of Merkins and Bigboys.

 

Announcements:

New AO will be planting Thursday in Kellytown

 

DEVO:

“The brick walls are there for a reason. They aren’t there to keep us out. They are there to show us how much we want it.”  - Randy Pausch

 

Randy was diagnosed with cancer and after treatment, it came back and he was told that he only had a few months left to live. He spent the rest of his time speaking to people about following your childhood dreams and doing whatever it takes to live them out. He wanted to work for Disney as an Imagineer (CGI work etc) and did not get the job when he applied. However, he found another job, put in the work and eventually became an Imagineer at Disney. He then gave the quote above. This is a mentality that I want to apply in every facet of my life. I posted a picture on the Instagram page recently that said, “If someone ask you ‘What do you do?’, you should say ‘Whatever it takes’”

 

NMS:

Both teams were nice enough to let YHC and Goldi wear the rucks during all Objectives. We get the “I am 3rd” award. First runner up for this award is Windows who helped Paperboy carry his team’s coupons back (even though it was a race).

T-Claps to Judy and Baby Beasley for running to get the sandbags and then carrying logs solo around the Vista pond.

If you want to make Goldi come really close to a merlot, make him sprint in a ruck.

Dumper has been spending too much time with the Clinic boyz. When I asked who hasn’t ever worn a ruck he replied, “I did once and beat your ass at the Fox.” Tasteless…

Judy is in charge of creating a new animal crawl called the Dragon.

The PAX were singing praises of Dump’s name when he suggested the two alternative animal crawls.

You already voted!
Posted on

Farsight goes couponing

Conditions: 50 degrees (Great workout weather)

YHC went to Brick City the night before the beatdown and loaded up some coupons. He heard that Farsight had been robbed of everything and wanted to make sure they were lifting and moving heavy things also (didn’t want them to get soft).

I arrived earlier (I know, shocker) and started unloading everything while Gutenberg, Linus and Divac watched. 6 tires with ropes, 6 concrete cylinders and 12 water jugs.

A disclaimer was given and we started…

Warmup:

No time

The Thang:

Teams of 3 were made.

Station 1: Run to the jungle gym and do 10 pull-ups

Station 2: Tire drag around the parking lot

Station 3: 50 curls and then farmer carry around the lot

Each partner went to a station and started working. The person finishing station one rotated everyone so each person moved through the stations accordingly.

We did this until 0611 and then packed up my truck.

Mary:

None

 

There’s no doubt in my mind that Audit is going to fit in nice with the IYAFYL group. Not only did he not welcome me when I went around the circle at the start, he also made a fat joke after the workout.

During my Devo, I mentioned talking to my wife late at night to which Bodybag said, “Trying to convince her not to leave?” Farsight could have its own “Dickhead of the Week” award.

When I arrived, I thought Divac and Gutenberg were consoling a lost little old lady. I was surprised to find out that it was just Linus wrapped up in a grandmother style afghan.

When YHC was checking to see how many we had, I mentioned to Gutenberg that we need 2 more. T-Claps to him for saying, “I can just leave if you need me too.” Way to be 3rd

DEVO:

Someone is always going through something.

We all have our issues and it’s very easy for us to become blinded by them and forget that people we see every day are dealing with their own struggles. Be more aware of what is going on around you and ask God for vision to show you people that are also struggling so that you can help them.

You already voted!
Posted on

Stallion Rides Again

Conditions: Does it matter? We are still gonna sweat.

Not sure if people have noticed, but YHC hasn’t been posting as frequently as I use too. No matter, after taking a few days off I decided it was time to get back into the swing of things. I signed up to Q at each Hartsville AO as a bit of accountability to myself.

I had this fantastic idea for a Q and spent hours planning it out. It was going to be my Mona Lisa, but things change. Stepper asked if I needed any help setting up for my Q the day before. I quickly accepted his assistance knowing how in depth my plan was. I arrived in the parking lot of BC at 0455 and immediately realized that my Q wasn’t going to work. On the spot he helped YHC setup a whole new beatdown. I drove over to the Clinic with about 5 minutes to spare. More than enough time to hear Arnold tell a joke about balls and realize Woody was still a d***.

 

Warm-up:

None. No time for that mess today. I didn’t even give them a disclaimer.

 

The Thang:

Once we got to the parking lot I made sure to give a proper disclaimer because Benchwarmer is a stickler for the rules and may try to make me signup for his “1 on 1 Q school”. Nice try.

 

We partnered in groups of threes with one group of twos.

Station 1: Run to jungle gym and do 20 pulls then run back

Station 2: Flip tire to the first light pole and back, block slider to second light pole and back and then farmer carry two jugs to third light pole and back

Station 3: Tire drag around the perimeter of the parking lot.

 

Finishing the station 1 is what rotated the partners. For example, Partner A did the pull ups while partner B did station 2 and partner C did station 3. Then, partner A moved to station 2, partner B to station 3 and partner C to station 1.

 

We did this until time was called and moseyed back to the AO after cleaning up the coupons.

 

NMS:

I said that when Bowtie gets back we were going to call time. Team The Young, the Old and the Worn out (aka Barfly, Paperboy and Bench) said they were going to show how to “push” by taking all of station 2’s coupons and go to the first light pole...they made it all of 10 yards and then tried to gloat as if they were champions.

Somehow Woody, Chainsaw and Groundblind made it on a team together. Pretty sure they did over 200 pull-ups total.

Team Fartsackers (Winkles, Skinny Pete and Pathfinder) were busy spooning each other and playing with other coupons.

Anybody seem Baby B? I haven’t seen that guy in a month.

Team Whoop Ass (Arnold, Bowtie and Station) showed textbook form on all the exercises and were said to be the Clinic’s Role models.

Keeping in line with being the Clinic’s resident bully, Paula Dean had some choice words for his team. Not sure who he was partnered with, but I dare not repeat the string of explicit words that he used to describe them.

Also, special thanks to Woody for screaming into the recording and nearly busting my speakers when I played it back.

DEVO:

It’s not often that I get to live out a devo that I give. A few months ago, I spoke on how God will not let and suffering offered to him go to waste and he will turn it into something good. I recently had an event in my life that has been a large cause of stress and a burden in other ways. After dealing with and constantly asking for God’s help (usually in the form of complaining). We had a major breakthrough and he made a way for something we didn’t was possible. (No we are not pregnant). Keep your trust in him, ask him to for help and he will provide. Just make sure you have eyes to see what he offers.

 

Nothing but 110% effort by everyone at the Clinic today. Iron sharpens iron.

 

You already voted!
Posted on

Log Corner beatdown

Conditions: Easy day, all day

 

Last night Goldi put something on the chat about YHC having the Q. Since I thought I signed up for it and forgot, I said, “Yea I got a plan”. I didn’t, but I knew I wanted to make it heavy. The M and I took the kids downtown to the block party and we were having a great time. Then, I heard someone say it was past 8 and I remembered the mother of all GORUCK events was being live streamed. I quickly advised the family that it was time to pack up and roll out. When I got home, I quickly hopped on line and started watching. One hand on the phone, the other putting kids in PJs. I put the kids in bed and headed downstairs so I could watch it on a larger screen. About that time, they started laying into the rosters with F bombs. That’s when the wheels started turning for my Q.

 

Warmup:

Do what?

The Thang:

PAX were instructed to mosey over to the log pile. Since we had 5, we had a team of 2 and a team of 3. YHC instructed the PAX to grab a log and head towards the corner of Cargill and 4th. We were doing the big block 4 corners.

Round 1:

Cargill and 4th:

Drop the log and do 100 merkins. Pick up your log and get going.

4th and Carolina:

Drop the log and do 100 squats. Pick up your log and get going.

Carolina and 5th:

Drop the log and do 100 big boys (crowd pleasers for the Clinic crew because of how many big boys we did at my Tuesday Q). Pick up your log and get going.

5th and Cargill:

Drop the log. Do 50 merkins, squats and big boys. Get your log and head back to SP

 

After round one we dropped the logs and did a ruck mosey around the course.

 

Round 2:

Cargill and 4th:

Do 50 merkins.

4th and Carolina:

Do 50 squats

Carolina and 5th:

Do 50 big boys.

5th and Cargill:

Do 25 merkins, squats and big boys. Head back to SP.

Mary:

Put the logs back

Annoucments and DEVO:

Paperboy said he is ready for Selection.

 

I grabbed my phone to do a count off and saw that I had a few missed calls and a text from the M asking me to come home. Quill was sick and she thought he may need to go to the ER. Goldi closed it up.

When I got home, my M had just finished giving Quill a breathing treatment and he was doing much better. Didn’t think there was an immediate need to go to the ER so he will be seeing the Dr today.

You already voted!
Posted on

Wheres my watch

Conditions: 66 Degrees and pissed. I left my watch at home

YHC thought he signed up to Q the 28th (day before my birthday), but I must have forgotten because Dumper was listed. No matter. I will just bring the beatdown a week early.

YHC noticed that Bench was sitting down putting his shoes on so we did a little warmup.

Warm-up:

20 IC SSH

Enough of that. We moseyed over to the Brick pile where YHC had setup 3 cones at different distances. I heard some PAX joking about the cones not being very far out and close together. When I told them what we were doing, they still laughed.

We paired off into groups of 2 with 1 group of 3. The DORA exercises were as follows:

Cone 1: 100 donkey kicks

Cone 2: 200 Big boys

Cone 3: 300 Hammers

Round 1:

Each team member flip-flopped running to the first cone until the donkey kicks were completed, then ran to the second until the big boys were done and finally the last cone for the hammers.

Round 2: (same exercises)

Same format, but bear crawl to and from the first cone (it wasn’t that far out remember?) and then to cones 2 and 3, but run back

Round 3: (same exercises)

Same format, but with burpee broad-jump. BBJ down and run back

We did this until 0610 and moseyed back.

Burpees on the six

ANNOUCMENTS:

  • Temple tomorrow. Show up and do one of the stupidest things in Hartsville.
  • The Clinic has the Q for Saturday. We are planning to bring it.
  • T-Claps to Groundblind on smoking the Fox Trot and also to Bowtie’s 2.0 for destroying her goal
  • T-claps to Stepper for always telling me what time it was

DEVO:

Mark 16: 14-16

I encourage you to seek out those verses and read them. I am still, fairly, new to F3 and I remember exactly how I was before. I was pretty useless in reality. I sank into a depression that was directly affecting my work and my home life. After my first workout I realized that F3 was something that I was missing and didn’t even know it. Jesus tasks us to go out and spread the gospel through a call to action. I have grown more spiritually in the last year and half with you guys that I have since I was saved. I see guys all the time that I know would benefit from F3 and I invite them because I remember what it was like to be a Sad Clown. I remember that “alone” feeling. It seems almost selfish to not spread F3 as much as I can. The world needs a little more positivity right now and we, as Christians, are called to change the atmosphere. I encourage everyone to try to get an FNG out this week and also to invite some to church with you as well.

You already voted!
Posted on

Magnificent Eight

Conditions: 72 or so. Not extremely humid

YHC grabbed the Q Thursday and only had a basic idea of what I wanted to do. We celebrated my daughter’s 5th birthday Friday night, so I was unable to put a lot of planning into my Q. Whatever…some of the best Qs are improvised. I drove by our destination to make sure it wasn’t occupied and headed to Convergence. We did a few warmup exercises to give some late guys a chance, but it was just the Magnificent 8.

 

Warm-up

20 IC SSH

20 IC Reach Thrus

1-mile Indian Run to Lawton Park (Eisenhower threatened to beat with the flag a couple times on the run)

The Thang:

Partnered up and did some DORA

Round 1: 150 team pull-ups

  • Do pull-ups to failure. Upon failure, you did 20 big boys (changed to 10 after the first round)
  • Partner A started the pull-ups and partner B ran to the stop sign at the intersection of Rogers and Prestwood Dr. and the switch

Round 2: 300 merkins

  • Rotate partners. Partner A started merkins and partner B bear-crawled up the steps and then bear-crawled down the other set of steps and then switched.

Round 3: 500 squats

  • Rotated partners. While partner A started the reps, partner B did something a little different.
  • Hold plank in front of a step, bar or platform. Starting in plank position, go up onto the platform or bar into a higher plank and then back into a normal high plank. All the way up and down is one rep. You had to do 20 before switching with your partner and doing squats. This was a modified version of the Catalina Wine Mixers on the F3 site.

10 count and water break.

Mary:

1-mile Indian Run back to Convergence.

 

DEVO:

Do good in the world.

You already voted!
Posted on

Currahee/Sink or Swim

Conditions: Q’s Birthday so…was going to suck regardless of weather.

Equipent: 25 meter pool, 2 duffel bags, 2 cinder blocks, 2 bricks, and goggles.

Currahee is traditionally a ruck workout but, I decided to move the PAX to the pool to experience what the Sink or Swim AO has to offer. I was afraid I was only going to have two so post for the workout. I was supprised by the number of PAX and the names that posted. We also received a visit from Bowtie who always has his mouth open everywhere I see him. I made sure to ask everyone if they could swim. We were going to find out either way. Rocky hesitantly got in the pool and then hung on the side for dear life. Reminded me of a bug going down a drain.

Warm-up

5 laps down and back.

The Thang

2 swim lanes had a duffel bag with a cinder block inside and a brick at the bottom of each. We divided into 2 teams. Each team had to drag the bag and push the brick under water down and back 5 times. At the shallow end everyone got out to do 50 merkins and 50 flutter kicks. At the end of the deep end everyone had to do 3 rounds of salmon ladder.

Doesn't sound too bad but, the PAX were out of breath for most of the time. This is a great team building workout and an excellent mental challenge. I kept looking to see how Rocky was operating. He was still kicking.

Cool Down

Tread water for 5 mins.

Devo

We BOM while treading water in the deep end. Some PAX got closer to God. Little Jack joined us.

Moleskin

Rocky impressed me. I was really wanting to have to supply rescue breaths and high quality chest compressions for which he would never live down. Other PAX started questioning their regular Fitness routines. Some even commented that they felt like a FNG. Everyone should try to push themselves out their comfort zone. The next challenge is to attend Bowtie's and Benchwarmer's Zumba AO they been recruiting for on Farmersonly.com. Well, that may be a closed group and by invitation only.

Great push guys.

Aye!

 

You already voted!