F3 New Orleans

Tag: Grundy

  • Got a spare???

    The beautiful weather brought the largest group of pacs that we have seen a while at the Mothership. We had 15 total including three FNG’s. I am glad that I brought some coupons with me, so that I would not dissapoint.

    Warm-Up

    SS Hops-25 IC, Seal Jacks- 25 IC, IMW’s-25 IC, High Knees- 25 IC, Butt Kicks-25 IC, Forward Arm Rolls- 10IC, Reverse Arms Rolls -10 IC, Overhead Claps – 15 IC

    Mosey….

    Bearmuda TIRE angle

    All pacs divide into three groups. Each group starts at one of three different stations. These stations are the sea wall, THE Tire, and a soft patch of green grass that is covered in the morning dew and one land mine. The exercises that were performed at each station went as follows:

    Station 1(seawall) – 10 Irkins, Station 2(patch of grass) – 10 Merkins, Station 3(tire) – 10 Derkins- (pacs’ feet were on the tire)

    Rinse and repeat this until all groups have done each station 3 times.

    When moving from one station to the next, all pacs must do a bear crawl to get there, hence bearmude TIRE angle.

    Just for the heck of it, we got back into a large circle and did 10 Merkins IC.

    Bearmuda TIRE angle 2.0

    This is a little twist on the previous circuit of exercises. The groups and stations were kept the same, but the exercises and how you got there changed.

    Station 1- 5 Step Ups each leg, Station 2-10 Copper Head Squats, Station 3- 10 tire(box) jumps

    All pacs had to bunny hop to get to each station.

    Recipe for Humble Pie = 1/2 of beatdown + 250lb tire flip

    I was suprised that I was able to finish the rest of the beat down due to me being so full from the HUGE piece of humble pie I had to eat before the next part of the beatdown started. While attempting to show the rest of the pacs the technique in flipping a tire, I quickly learned that the beatdown I was throwing at my fellow pacs had sucked a good bit of engergy out of me. So much, that I could not flip the tire solo. I had to call an audible……..

    Pacs break into groups of two. Each group flips the tire together 5 times. After each flip, the pacs flipping the tire do 1 burpee. While waiting for groups to complete tire flips, the other pacs are doing various plancs including regular, right arm, left arm, as well as some merkings and air presses.

    TIRE Throw

    Now we did not try to throw this monstrosity, but we did TRY to throw a football through it.

    Each pac took a try at making a 15 yard throw  through the tire.

    If the pac attempting the throw, made it through, NO BURPEES. If you hit the tire, 2 BURPEES. If you missed the tire completely, 3 BURPEES.

    Since no one made it through the tire, we all had to do 10 BURPEES.

    Indian Run back to Flag. Wait a second. There was no flag. Steve, where ya’t!!!!

    With 5 minutes left, we wrapped things up with some Mary.

    LBC’s – 20 IC, Puttins – 20 IC, Crunchie Frugs – 20 IC,  Freddie Mercuries- 20 IC, Flutter Kicks -15 IC, Straigh Leg Lifts – 10IC

    T-Claps to Shooter for helping me transport the TIRE to and from the AO.

    The newest members to F3, Dr. NO, Pot Hole, and oh yes, Poop Eye, did a great job on their first beatdown.

     

  • Strides and Sprints on the Incline

    Great to see Moby finally off IR and posting this morning at The Gipper for our warmup.  By the looks of things, it’ll be no time before he is completely back in action.

    Warmup consisting of toe touches, front to back lunges, imperial walkers, seal jacks, shoulder circles, full/empty can shoulder pulses, windmills, and Merkins…IC more or less 20x for most.  Then a tennis ball warmup exercise.  Bounce your ball and move to catch it as close to the ground as possible.  Once you get the hang of it, you’ll find yourself squating and lunging in all directions, and we did just that for a couple of minutes.

    Mosey to the back of the Justice Center for the W drill.  YHC placed some cones done in a W formation and then the PAX rotated through them via sprints/backpedals, lateral shuffles, and sprints with changes of direction.  Then a round of Peter Parkers before heading over to the roof of the parking garage for the main event.

    Stride down the ramp at 80%, execute a single leg burpee on each leg at the bottom, and then sprint back up the ramp at 100%.  Rinse and repeat for 6 total trips with some 10 counts and Mary thrown in between trips…Parker Peters, shoulder taps, flutter kicks, Hello Dollys, and cross over wife pleasers all 10x IC.

    Recovery walk and then mosey back to The Gipper to close things out.  Straddled a crack in the pavement in the plank position and the walked the hands laterally back and forth over the crack as fast as possible 20x OYO.  Repositioned and repeated this time walking the hands forward and back over the crack as fast as possible 20x OYO.

    Countorama, nameorama, and then Grudy prayed us out.

    Good stuff this morning men.  Thanks for letting me lead.

     

  • Carpe Diem Convergence

    The F3 Nation knew about YHC before YHC knew about the F3 Nation.  You see, YHC’s brother-in-law, Lynchpin, lives in Charlotte.  In the early days, before the F3 Nation planted its flag in NOLA, Lynchpin routinely and enthusiastically regaled YHC with stories of legendary beatdowns and CSAUPs, tongue in cheek nicknames, funny exercise names and other F3 lore.  Then, when F3 decided to expand to NOLA, Lynchpin tried to EH YHC, but YHC begged off.  It all sounded, well to be honest, like a cult and how could YHC trust Lynchpin anyway?  After all, he married YHC’s sister.  Ugh.  But resistance was futile.  The NOLA PAX crossed Lake Pontchartrain in its Durham boat, Reluctant Yankee at the helm like George Washington crossing the Delaware. Nacho and Chewy fell in upon the PAX’s arrival and, together, they planted the shovel flag in the Gloom on April 9, 2016.  F3 Northshore was born.  How could YHC resist a free workout in his own backyard?

    A few weeks later, the NOLA PAX boarded their Durham boat and retreated back across the Lake, leaving the Northshore PAX to make the most of their gift of F3.  We stumbled about, we made mistakes, we created a new AO only to abandon it a few weeks later, and we had more than a few beatdowns with one or two PAX.  Somehow, however, we made it and two years later look forward to seeing one another regularly to suffer and have fun together.

    As this morning’s two year anniversary convergence approached and YHC learned that the weather more likely than not would be awful, there was no concern.  Two years of meeting rain or shine, hot or cold, left no doubt in YHC’s mind that the PAX would post.  And post they did.  And you know what?  The weather held off just long enough for us to celebrate our birthday with a 3 hour beatdown, visiting 5 of 6 Northshore AOs by the mechanical device known as the bicycle.

    Mandeville Lakefront:  4 burpees OYO, 19 SSHs IC, 20 IWs IC, and 16 Seal Jacks IC.

    Captain’s Cove:  4 vertical jumps OYO, 19 Copperhead Squats IC, 20 Sumo Squats IC, and 16 Regular Squats IC.

    Milestone Marsh: 4 plyo Merkins OYO, 19 Merkins IC, 20 Shoulder Taps IC, 16 slow seconds Mission Impossible.

    At this point, Chewy politely pointed out that he had figured out what YHC was up to with the count but that our birthday is April 9, 2016, not April 19, 2016.  Point well taken.

    Grandmother’s House:  4 Sister Mary Katherine’s OYO, 9 front to back lunges IC, 20 45 degree lunges IC, and 16 later lunges IC.

    And then, after a 10 mile mosey on the Tammany Trace to Covington:

    The Gipper:  4 Freddy Mercury’s IC, 9 Freddy Flutters IC, 20 Hello Dolly’s IC, and 16 Flutter Kicks IC.

    Then we mounted our bikes for the 10 mile ride back to the shovel flag for the countorama, nameorama, Shooter’s prayer and a coffeeteria, arriving about an hour later than anticipated.  No one will confuse YHC for a Swiss train conductor after this morning’s logistics, that’s for sure.

    Thanks for letting me lead, guys, and thanks for your willingness to try something different and new and for posting despite the threatening weather and actually being disappointed it didn’t pour on us.

    Some parting thoughts:

    We’ve come a long way on the Northshore.  Things have become almost comfortable and, while there’s a lot of positive to that sentiment, there are dangers too.  We could stop growing.

    So here’s a call to action.  Commit to EH’ing more FNGs and supporting them through their virgin post so that they return.  Commit to Q’ing more workouts, putting time into planning your Qs, and posting timely BackBlasts.  Commit to a CSAUP.  Commit to making yourself better and leading by example, always keeping your eyes open for growth and leadership in all three of the Fs.  If we want F3 Northshore to grow, then we are the ones that need to make it happen.

    Carpe Diem.

     

     

     

     

  • I’d better get this backblast done before Turbo yells at me

    Have you every felt like “Phil in the backseat of the Mirthmobile?”

    Some of you young whippersnappers may not be familiar with Phil, if so, check out this link

     

    So as the heavy weather plowed through Covington early Wednesday morning, it made me think of the lyrics from Bohemian Rhapsody…Thunder Bolt and Lighting very very frightening me….

    anyways… with the inclement weather I had to ditch my workout plan and go with the Bohemian Rhapsody:

    Bohemian:having informal and unconventional social habit

    Rhapsody:episodic yet integrated, free flowing in structure, featuring a range of highly contrasted moods, color, and tonality

     

    Here is how it went in the steady rain:

     

    Warmup: Side Straddle Hops,Squats, Arm Circles, Seal Jacks,Butt Kicks, Toe Touches, Speed-Skater Hops, all 20xIC, with plenty of merkins in between.

    Mosey over to the parking garage for Hurdle and Plank fun-o-rama:

    Each pax in plank position, spaced about 10 feet from each other. One jumps up and hurdles each of the planking pax, then assumes plank at the end of the line. Did this up the ramps to the upper deck.

    Then we ran the stairwells up and down and around with a task (burpees, merkins, ditchdiggers, duckhops) in between each of the four roundtrips.

    Then we did a few sets of sprints across the top deck and back. The rain was feeling good!

    Then we did a slow meandering Indian run down the parking garage ramps & back to the flag.

    A few minutes of mary: Nolan Ryans and flutter kicks.

    Count-o-rama, announcements, and Astro leads us out with a prayer.

     

  • Mastering the 8-Count

    Warm Up: Toe Touches, Good Mornings, Windmills, SSH’s, Toy Soldiers, Seal Jacks, Sister MK’s, all IC at or around 20x.

    The Thang:

    Mosey East towards the Lakefront playground, hitting a series of 8-count exercises at each cross street:

    1st 20x 8-Count Bodybuilders

    2nd 15x 8-Count Absolutions

    3rd 10x 8-Count Bodybuilders, 10x 8-Count Absolution

    So the F3 Nation website or – the more frequently visited – Grundy Audited Database (GAD for short) says that a wise Q will introduce the 8-count cadence for the exercise known as Absolution, but then “instruct the PAX to do the exercise OYO, lest he give the impression of weakness.”  Well, YHC has never been accused of being wise and this group of men has certainly already seen me act weak (ahem… the high-pitched squeal as Captain Sparkles emerges from the bushes), so… time to forget one’s pride and school the Q in mastering the 8-count!

    The thing is, the 8-count isn’t actually that difficult.  So really, this was more of an excuse to wreck the PAX early on, which seemed to have worked.  (At the very least, it wrecked this here Q.)

    A few 10-counts later, we arrived at the playground and split into partners for a little routine up the tallest “hill” in Old Mandeville.  These sort of rigorous elevation changes would be good training for those running the Blue Ridge Relay this fall.  Here’s what we did:

    P1 does squats, P2 run-walks (aka, lunge walks) up to the swingset pad and back.  Flapjack.

    P1 does merkins, P2 bear crawls up and back.  A little slippery this morning.

    P1 does lunges, P2 frog jumps up and back.

    And finally, P1 does Freak Nasties, P2 does an 80% sprint around the perimeter.

    A few more 10-counts sprinkled throughout, and we’re onward to the back of the baseball field, which had a lot of action for 0700.  Gearing up for an early morning game, the PAX got to watch some kids practice their swings, and also witness the slowest-ever flag raise while we planked up and one by one (or two by two, I suppose) hit the pull-up bars for 8 pull-ups.  The 2nd round was 4 pull ups, and the flag had still only made it to half mast.  Did a round of 25x IC Mountain Climbers, but still didn’t get to see that flag hit the top.  Oh well, can’t plank forever.  Time for an Indian Run back to the flag.

    T-Claps to Low Nays who overcame the strong urge to splash some merlot and made it back to the flag for some Mary: (all IC) Flutter Kicks x20, Leg Raises x 15, Putins x20, Jane Fondas/QuickPulses/Heel-to-Knees x20 each leg.

    Countdown, nameorama, announcements (Sign up for the Classic!  Sign up to Q!), and The Manny led us out in prayer.  Thank you guys for the push to be a better man, and for a truly great start to the weekend.

  • I got a fever……

    T-Claps to the south shore and north shore pax who completed the Tough Mudder. The mumble chatter is that no obstacles were skipped and major injuries were avoided.  The mothership at the Lakefront was 5 strong including Rev Socks and Hog Sickle from the south shore. Honorable mention the Hog Sickle’s dad who took the ride to the north sore. He got in over 5000 steps during the beatdown!!!

    Warm-Up

    20 SSHs IC, 20 Windmills IC, 20 Toe Touches IC, 20 IWs IC, 20 Butt Kicks IC, 20 High Knees IC, 10 forward arm rolls IC (baseball) – rinse and repeat in reverse, 10 forward arm rolls IC (basketball) – rinse and repeat in reverse, 20 Overhead Claps IC

    COWBELL DISCLAIMER

    Those of you who made it to Ei’s Crazy Ivan on the North Shore saw the debut of the cowbell. It made it to the beatdown this past Saturday. Every time you hear the cowbell ring, all paxs drop and do ten burpees. After you ring the cowbell, you bestow the cowbell to another pac and they ring it at their discretion. The goal was to complete 100 burpees by the end of the beatdown. Mission Accomplished!!!!!

    Mosey…

    Indian Bear Crawl

    All paxs line up in a single file line in the planc position. The pac at the front of the line starts doing merkins IC while the pac at the end of the line bear crawls to the front. Rinse and repeat until you get to pre-designated destination.

    Indian Lunge Walk

    Once you get to the pre-designated destination from the Indian Bear Crawl, all paxs turn around and stay in the single file line. Pac at the front of the line starst doing squats IC while the pac at the end of the line lunge walks to the front. Rinse and repeat until you get to the original starting point.

    Mosey…..

    Heavy Bag Pull and Carry

    All paxs line up facing “The Shaft” holding the Al Gore. First pac, sits on ground and pulls a 75 foot rope that is attachd to a 45lb heavy bag. Once the heavy bag gets to pac, pac picks it up and runs with it  it back to the starting position next to “The Shaft.”  Drop it and assume the planc position until all pacs are finished.

    Mary

    25 LBCs IC, 25 Puttins IC, 25 Leg Lifts IC, 25 Flutter Kicks IC

    Mosey to Cazebo

    Freak Nasty Step Up Super Set

    10 Freak Nasties IC, 10 left leg step ups IC, 10 right leg step ups IC- Rinse and repeat three times adding 5 reps to each exercise every set

    On the final mosey to the flag, we were left with 10 burpees to get reach our goal. I thought that Rev Socks was going to sabotage the mission, but he did not dissapoint. Turbo did not dissapoint either by changing his last 10 burpees into slurpees by doing them in a large puddle left by the torrential rain from Friday. Way to embrace the suck Turbo.

     

    COT – Prayed out by THE Manny – Coffetteria afterwards

     

     

     

     

  • Run for the Hills

    Beautiful morning at The Gipper.  Six men strong.  Glad to see Astro and Grundy back in action.

    Warmup with Seal Jacks, Windmills, Squats, Merkins all 20x IC.

    Mosey to the Landing for a Ring of Fire.  Merkins, Peter Parkers, Parker Peters, Plank Jacks, and T Stands between plank walks around the ring in both directions.

    Recovery walk to the Main Event:  Hill Sprints from the Landing up the gravel road to the second oak tree.  About 15 feet of elevation gain.  The PAX started each sprint from a prone position, jumping to their feet and hitting it hard for about 35 yards. Recovery walk back to the Landing.  Rinse and repeat for six quality sprints.

    Then it was time for the day’s ISI challenge:  AMRAP of Butt Kick Jumps for 60 seconds.  Partner up and count for your partner.  Just as hard as expected with everyone fatiguing as the minute mark approached.  T claps to the Southshore PAX who reportedly put in a 90 second effort this morning.  That extra 30 seconds must have been tough.

    Mosey to the STP Emergency Operations Center for two rounds of 10 burpees OYO, 5 clap Merkins OYO, and 20 SSHs and then Seal Jacks 20x IC.

    Final mosey back to The Gipper for Mary.  Pulsing, alternate arm/leg Supermans and then straight leg Freddy Mercurys, both 20x IC.

    Good stuff this morning guys.  Thanks for letting me lead.

  • Valentine’s Day Massacre

    Madness has officially descended upon the Northshore PAX.  At first, it was easy to blame Captain Sparkles and Bushwacker, who, like tyrannical taskmasters, drove the PAX to run ever-increasing distances.  But eventually we must all shoulder the blame for the insanity, with Shooter, EiEi, and YHC taking things a step too far ourselves, going as far as to suggest (and then carry out) a 5 mile run ahead of today’s usual beatdown.  When the foreplay becomes a thang in and of itself (and it certainly felt like we went far beyond 2nd and 3rd base on this Valentine’s day), then perhaps the F3 lexicon needs to be expanded – ‘foreplay’ and ‘pre-thang’ just don’t seem to cover it anymore.

    So when Grundy rolled in to the Gipper this morning to find Shooter and YHC already sweating profusely, he wondered aloud what was going on but privately, I suspect he wondered when and where he could get in on the action.  And that’s what I’m taking about when I say we must all shoulder the blame: this is our group’s mentality and I can pretty much promise you, it will only get worse… (which in our F3 world is, of course, always better).  Don’t say I didn’t warn you PAX!

    Warm-Up:

    SSH x25, IW’s x25, Good Morning’s x15, Windmills x15, MC’s x25, all IC.

    The Thang:

    On to the Taj Mahal for a COP: Plank – 10 Merkins – 10 Peter Parker’s (left leg only) – 10 Mountain Climbers – 10 Parker Peter’s (left leg only) – Chillcut Plank… hold and recover.  Next up, hold Al Gore, while PAX rotates performing 10 Sister Mary K’s.  Then the same plank routine, but right leg for the Peters and the Parkers.  And finally, Al Gore routine with jump squats in place of the SMK’s.

    Short mosey to the Justice Center for a partner routine: P1 sprints to first set of benches, 10 merkins and jogs back, sprint to second set of benches, 10 merkins and jog back, and finally all the way up the stairs, 10 merkins and jog back.  P2 performs that lovely 8-count exercise that YHC has been driving into the ground lately: plank, groiner and back, chillcut, plank jack, and back up to regular plank.

    Second routine using the same path: P1 lunge walks and performs squats at each set of benches, while P2 does flutter kicks.

    Mosey back to the flag for the finale, an AMRAP of Turbo’s raccoon crawl up the wall along the small hill, forward rolls or crab walks back down, hop up to the stage for 10 merkins, and back around to rinse and repeat for 6 mins.

    Mary: Freddie Flutters x22, Leg Raises x20, Putins x20.

    Countdown (we missed you Einstein, sorry to see your streak come to an end!), nameorama, and Shooter prayed us out.  Even though, comparatively, this was a fairly tame beatdown, it felt like a massacre to YHC by the end.  Thanks guys for always pushing, I can’t say enough about all the motivation/inspiration this group provides.

  • Super Bowl Saturday

    A little foreplay, a short disclaimer and then off to the races this morning on Super Bowl Saturday.

    52 reps of Seal Jacks, Mountain Climbers and Imperial Walkers, all in cadence, for a warmup.

    Mosey to the first COP for:

    10 count Al Gore, 10 copperhead squats, and 10 vertical jumps.

    10 count Mission Impossible, 10 slow Merkins, and 10 Northshore (plyo) Merkins.

    10 count balance on right leg, 10 slow pistol squats right leg, and 10 right leg hops.  Rinse and repeat on the left leg.

    10 count isometric lunge with the right foot forward, 10 slow lunges, and 10 half Sister Mary Katherines.  Rinse and repeat with the left leg forward.

    Mosey to the Main Event:

    The PAX set up a field approximately 30 yards x 30 yards and then separated into two teams, one donning wifebeaters left over from the Krazy Ivan.  Two teams, one football and an old fashioned game of keep away that reminded us all of our 12 year old selves.  Liberal sprinkling of Merkins, burpees, vertical jumps and star jumps every incomplete pass.  Not exactly Eagles v Patriots although some previously undisclosed skills were revealed by the wheezing PAX.

    Mosey back to the Shovel Flag for Mary:

    Scuba Steves, plank right leg pulses, plank left leg pulses, flutter kicks, and dynamic side planks both sides all 52x IC.

    Countorama, nameorama, and Chewy prayed us out on our way to the coffeeteria.

    Fun time this morning guys.  Thanks for being such great sports and letting me lead.

    Moleskin

    T claps to the 10 Northshore PAX participating in the Run Ranger Run February challenge.  As of this writing, Team Northshore sits in 21st place on the national leaderboard with 83 running miles logged since Tuesday.  Let’s keep up the momentum men.

  • Is it a sign?????

    In the gloom this past Saturday morning, we had 6 pax show up for the beat down. Could this be a sign that the Patriots will be winning their SIXTH Superbowl Championship this upcoming weekend. Who knows maybe the Eagles will win their second superbowl. It is about time. The last time they took home the Lombardi was in 19SIXty.

    The last time that they played in one was on February SIXth, 2005 with Macnabe and Owens. No matter who wins, there are beatdowns that are getting served up SIX days a week on the Northshore. Here is the one I was honored to serve up in the absence of Captain Sparkles.

    Warmarama:

    Windmill – 20 IC, Toe Touches – 20 IC, High Knees 20- IC, Butt Kicks – 20 IC, Happy Jacks: ( 5 SSH’s IC, 2 Squat Jumps, rinse and repeat x 4), Seal Jack Burpees: (5 Seal Jacks, 2 Burpees, rinse and repeat x 4)

     

    Mosey…..

     

     

    Elevens:

    1 Derkin at seawall, bear crawl to street, 10 Copper Head Squats, lunge walk back to sea wall, you know the rest!

     

    Mosey…..

     

    Bearmuda Triangle:

    Each pac teams up with a partner. Group 1 does one burpee, run to spot 2 (about 50 yards)-do 2 burpees, run to spot 3 (about 50 yards) – do 3 burpees, run to starting position (about 30 yards) – Rinse and repeat 3 times. The three spots form the shape of a triangle, hence Bearmuda Triangle.

     

    Mosey to the Cabildo…..

    3 Sets:

    Step ups left leg( 5 IC), Step ups right leg (5 IC), Freak Nasties (5 IC), Knee Ins (5 IC)……Doubled the amount of reps for each set.

    Mosey back to park for some Mary…

    3 Sets:

    10 LBCs , 10 Freddie Mercuries, 10 Flutter Kicks, 10 Putins- All IC. Inreased reps by 5 on each set.

    Mosey….

    Pax circle up in a plank position. Starting with THE Manny, do one Merkin and hold plank. Go around circle with each pac doing one merkin until we get to 60.

     

    Indian run back to flag.

     

    Thanks to backdraft for praying us out. Keep an eye out for Backdraft’s virgin Q coming to an AO near you.