Author: Opus

  • Number 2

    2 davillians posted this morning for a Tomato Run but neither knew the other was there until halfway through.

    YHC started out a lonely run in the midst of the mist at around 5:30.  Behind school, honey meadows, KC, turn around and head back.  Got to back of CSES and said Hi to this crazy guy walking the other way.  Mudface!  Joy abounded as we met up and leisurely made it back to Atlee.

    Numbers, Names, etc.

    NMS — Unbeknownst to Mudface, YHC had been trying to figure out the best place to ‘let nature do its due diligence’ back behind the Atlee complex somewhere.  When Mudface came along and the pace lessened, the urge went away thankfully.  No poop for you.

    See you in the gloom!

     

  • 10/2 = 5

    8 davillians showed up this morning and I gave them 5.  A lot of times.

    Short Mosey to COP —
    5x of each of the following sets, no pauses in between exercises — all IC
    1) 5 SSH into 5 merkins
    2) 5 WW2, 5 American Hammers
    3) 5 Booyah Merkins, 5 plank jacks

    Shorter mosey to the bus loop for a 5 corners exercise.

    At each corner start doing exercise.  Some time after the 6 arrived, YHC counted 5 more out loud and then we moved onto the next corner.
    run to 1st corner, for hand release merkins.
    2nd corner — Freddie Mercuries
    3rd corner — Donkey Kicks
    4th corner — Dips on Benches
    5th corner — Burpees

    We did this whole thing 5 times, reversing the order of corners each successive time.

    Bear crawl Dora’s
    Bear crawl to light while partner does 50 Am Ham, 100 Mountain Climbers and 150 SSH.

    Native American run back to flag

    merkin round the world
    1 merkin from each PAX member, then 2, etc up to 5.  Rest of PAX planked.

    ABC’s

    Numbers Names Announcements

    NMS —
    I abhor improper fractions.  Thus the title of this backblast.
    and now a haiku for you.  it even rhymes.

    5 is a number
    so minute and yet so grand
    fingers on a hand

    YHC keeps thinking about the giant numbers YHC sees in these backblasts.  1000 merkins, 500 SSH, etc.
    but what if we keep the number small.  how would a workout like that work?
    YHC thinks it worked pretty well this morning.  Great to have Phonics back at Daville.  That boy is like Forrest Gump.  He just keeps running.

    Over and out,
    Opus

  • There ARE swings here!

    A lucky 7 guys showed up this morning for a kettlebell thing.  Luckily, they brought kettlebells.  Otherwise the workout would not have gone very well.

    Tricep press Mosey to COP area.
    5 Burpees OYO
    Arm Circles
    DQ — not Dairy Queen
    WW2 Situps
    KB Situp presses
    Cottonmouth Squats (for Emoji)
    Racked Squats
    Goblet Squats
    Half Kneeling Presses
    5 Burpees OYO

    Triple check —
    Bear Crawl to light post and back, KB Thrusters, KB Bob and Weave

    Longish farmer KB carry mosey to the swingsets.

    3 people halo mosey the track while all else do Swingset planks.  Both hands on swing, lean arms and push swing as far as you can go without falling over and hold position for as long as you can stand it, then relax for a few seconds.  Repeato until the KB walkers get back.

    Ratio exercises.
    1 KB Swing followed by 4 upright pulls
    then 2 swings, 8 pulls
    then 3 swings, 12 pulls
    then 4 swings, 16 pulls
    then come back down the ladder.

    Follow same course with
    1 KB am hammer, 4 sit up presses…

    Mosey back to flag for a few boat canoes
    Numbers, Names, Announcements
    YHC took us out.

    Announcements —
    PP at Dogpile 7 AM
    CSAUP run coming up soon — see backblast for details!

    NMS —
    No one had stepped up to Q this thing as of a few days ago and YHC hadn’t Q’ed a KB workout in a while so YHC was anxious to try again.
    YHC put some feelers out last night to Mudface and Spit asking if there were any swings at Manndate.  Mudface became worried when I asked him.  YHC told him he should be.  Mudface said there were 4, so YHC came a little earlire than usual to see if Mudface was accurate — lo and behold he was.  So the swing planks were in play.
    YHC sometimes forgets how much longer a Bear Crawl seems than how long it really is.  That’s okay — the PAX modified as needed and no one was injured.
    The Swing planks were a great hit according to YHC.  Everyone else I am not so sure of, but those are a great core workout along with some lats, those oft forgotten about muscles that complain when they get used.
    The first ratio exercise was great — the second one flopped — it was way too much — could have lowered the ratio?
    A great time was had by all — mumble chatter centered around the difference between being a newlywed and having been married for many years.  Glad to have Pick 2 back after a mini hiatus and glad his marriage is going well so far!
    Righteous Blessings,
    Opus

     

  • Opus’ day off

    9 warriors showed up on this kind of moist morning for a gentle beatdown.

    Here is what happened (more or less)
    Hallelujah Run around the church

    Circle up —
    IJR, Smurf jacks, arm circles, crab cakes, flutterkicks, box cutters, dirty dogs, curb one legged copperhead squats
    5 burpees OYO

    1 minute plank on curb, 1 minute reverse plank on curb

    Move over a little and do uneven merkins on curb (one hand on curb, one hand on asphalt) do 10 IC each arm

    THE BEAST — 6 at each light
    1) toe taps on curb
    2) alternating shoulder taps
    3) Smurf Jacks
    4) Merkins
    5) Jump Squats
    6) Burpees

    Lights go off at 6:05 right as we are finishing the Beast

    11’s around the loop at front of church
    starting with 1 stump merkin and 10 mountain climbers — you know the drill

    Numbers, Names, Announcements, YHC took us out

    Announcements –
    1) The Creek 2 year anniversary will be held next Friday the 21st!  Had No idea it has been that long!

    2) 4 year anniversary of F3 at Dogpile  on the 22nd.  6 AM bootcamp.  7:15 VITA course race.  Munchies afterwards.

    NMS —
    Most of the mumblechatter dealt with the fact that Opus (and all the local students) were off today for a light summer shower.  YHC actually wanted to be at work today — was just starting to get into a rhythm at school and YHC’s kids were actually getting ready on time without complaining!  Not complaining about a day off, though.

    Many prayers for the people who are in need of rescue and also the ones doing the rescuing.  Men and women willing to sacrifice their lives to save another.  We are indeed grateful for all of these people who do this kind of thing on a regular basis and make it their life’s calling.

    all apologies to No  Idea.  Sorry I skipped right over you during the Name-o-rama.

    Peace
    Opus

  • Wally World

    18 studs came out this morning for a beatdown that went something like this.

    Short Mosey to a longish COP
    ATM — 15 Alternating shoulder taps IC, 10 tempo merkins IC, 10 reg merkins OYO
    Smurf Jacks
    Crab Cakes
    Flutterkicks
    Boxcutters
    American Hammers
    arm circles
    tabletops
    One more round of ATM’s

    Wally World
    PAX will perform one set of the following:
    5 Donkey Kicks, climb to Balls to the Wall position, hold for 5 seconds, bring it down and do 5 stump merkins
    Repeato with 10
    Then with 15

    Mosey to the Tennis Courts
    Triple Check — one does suicides across the court, others are doing PLT’s, switch up, do 3x of course.

    Back to Wally World for the deodorant we forgot from the first trip
    see above, but this time modify to regular merkins instead of stump merkins
    We did 20 and finally 25!!  Good work, guys!

    Quick Catch me if you can
    One runs backwards, the other does 5 burpees and then catches up with the partner.

    Circle up
    Various members called out exercises and we had to do ten of whatever was called out.
    WW2 situps, one legged crossover raises,  low merkin hold around the circle (everyone had to count ten seconds), run to the wall and back.  I think there was one more, but YHC has no recollection of what it was.

    Mosey back to the flag
    Numbers, Names, YHC took us out

    Announcements —
    Check preblasts for the upcoming CSAUP’s and the Labor Day convergence.
    Aug 25th is the next Puppy Pile — bring your 2.0’s!

    NMS–
    Confession time.
    YHC likes big Weinkes and long COP’s.
    YHC is also very fond of Donkeys.
    There it is.  In a nutshell.
    Not that there is anything wrong with that.

    SYITG,
    Opus

  • it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

    “… it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness.” — Charles Dickens, A Tale ot Two Cities

    10 really smart fools showed up this morning for some F3 fun.

    Here is what took place —
    COP — lbc’s, am hammers, flutterkicks, v-ups, alternating shoulder taps and merkins 15 each,  repeato with 10 each

    speed bump burpees — run to first speed bump, do 5 burpees, when done do alternating shoulder taps until the 6 is done.  add one burpee each time we hit a new speed bump until we get to ten.

    More Alternating Shoulder Taps, a few rotating merkins until the light got light enough  for us to

    Mosey to the big hill behind the football field

    Modified Dora— partner up — one runs up and down hill, complete together 50 ww2 situps, 100 merkins, and 150 squats

    Mosey back to the flag.  Did it really take that long??

    Numberama, Nameorama

    Announcements —
    Check preblast for info on the Convergence on Labor Day at Three Lakes park.  Let’s have a good showing from Davillians
    A couple of runs in October that sound truly dreadful.  But if you are interested, check out the preblasts. 🙂

    NMS —
    Whenever YHC thinks of F3, he thinks of this masterful quote.  When YHC tries to EH some new guys to come out to F3, everything sounds great to them — it’s free, it’s with other cool dudes, it’s you vs you, etc.  until YHC says 5:30 AM.  Then it doesn’t sound so great.  Is it foolishness to start your day with a crazy workout?  Some might think so — YHC believes it is genius.  Most geniuses have a little crazy built into the fabric of who they are — Einstein, Newton, Faraday, Dickens, Galileo, Michelangelo — all had a major impact on the world as we know it and all possessed a little cray cray as well.  For example, Michelango almost always wore all of his clothes to bed including his boots.  In fact, when he did take off his boots every once in a while some of his skin would peel off with his boots.  OUCH.
    Let’s get a little crazy because just enough crazy can change the world we live in.  Maybe not like Michael Faraday did, but we can change people’s lives through these workouts.  YHC knows this first hand and would not have come out it it wasn’t for another crazy guy (The Carpenter) inviting YHC out for the first time and other guys pushing alongside to better themselves.  So people might think you are crazy for doing these workouts at 5:30 in the frickin morning, but you know better.  You know it takes a little crazy to make this world a better place and that is why you do this F3 thing.  Keep on EH’ing.  Someone will take the bait and they will be the better for it!

    YHC has nothing to say about this particular workout except it was good to see (and hear) Labrat this morning.

    Later,
    Opus

  • Bison-tennial

    16 came out this morning to tackle a semi-themed workout at the Creek.

    Here is what went down–
    COP
    IJR, DQ, arm circles, tempo merkins, plank jacks, alternating shoulder touches, flutter kicks, roll-ups, box cutters

    Mosey to big field
    10 minutes of burpees — PAX members pick a number of burpees between 6 and 12 and complete that many in one minute — any extra time left over is rest time before the next minute starts.  Repeato 10 times.

    4 faces of Mount Rushmore
    1st face — 10 Lincoln Leg lifts
    2nd face — 10 LLL, 20 Roosevelt Roll Ups
    3rd face — 10 LLL, 20 RRU, 30 Jefferson Jump Squats
    4th face — 10 LLL, 20 RRU, 30 JJS, 40 Washington Werkins

    Mosey to Lot for Bisontennial

    One partner bear crawls to picnic tables and runs back while other partner does the following exercises —
    200 Crabcakes
    200 SSH
    200 Mountain Climbers

    Mosey to Flag for Numbers, Names, Announcements
    Emoji took us out.

    NMS —
    YHC will miss all you guys for the next month while he is gone on a family vacation whose original plans started a long time ago when the kids were young and watched a documentary on the redwoods.  It was at that point that the vision of this great cross country trip first started.  It is now much bigger than YHC could have even imagined at the very beginning.
    People’s reactions when we tell them what we are doing range from “That sounds like an amazing vacation” to “You’re crazy!”  We have thought the same things going through this process.
    Anyhow, the workout went pretty well — everyone loved the 10 minutes of Burpees just as much as YHC loved them the first time he experienced them at 45 MOM a few months back and the second time a short while ago at the Gridiron.
    Kudos to Sugarsock for kicking butt on the four faces of Rushmore.  Those roll ups were tough after about 10.
    Will post pics of YHC and family planking in front of Mt Rushmore for you all on Twitter.

    See you soon
    Opus

     

  • Hot Potato Q, an Abacus Sighting, and a Crazy Car

    8 Crazy guys showed up for a rain soaked workout this morning!  Gumbo was supposed to Q, but the M and 2.0’s got sick in the middle of the night.  Gumbo texted Spit who was already up because of Baby Spit and Hot potato was called.  Hope the Gumbo family is feeling much better soon!

    Spit took the beginning — mosey around the church with 5 merkins every so often to break up the run a little
    COP — in no particular order
    IJR, Merkins, LBC’s, Arm Circles, DQ, Helicopters, Flutterkicks Crab cakes, Imperial Walkers, Dying Cockroach

    Pass off to Hardywood
    10 merkins, run around a loop of the parking lot
    Next loop around do 10 merkins, add 20 squats
    Next loop around  do 10 merkins, 20 squats, 30 WW2 situps
    Next loop around do 10 merkins, 20 squats, 30 ww2 situps, 40 flutterkicks

    Pass off to Vinny
    A brand new exercise!!  with a cool name.
    It is called the Windsor Farms Do-Si-Do
    Brief description — Partner up.  1st partner holds 6 inches and holds other partners ankles while the other partner completes 10 merkins, repeato with 15 merkins and then 15 merkins again.

    Pass off to Phonics
    11’s — 1 upright alabama prom date on bench, 10 burpees
    Rinse and repeat (literally)

    Pass off to Opus
    5 Skull Crushers each leg, 5 dips, 5 derkins
    10 skull crushers each leg, 10 dips, 10 derkins

    Numbers, names, announcements
    Tomorrow is Puppy Pile at 7:05 Dogwood Dell — all bring frisbees!

    NMS —
    Last night there was a mysterious message from Phonics saying that there was a guy coming to the Creek today, but he needed some shoes.  size 11 or 12.  I thought it was an FNG — if it had been his name would have been Joe Jackson.  Anyways it turned out to be none other than Abacus who was not wearing normal workout clothes, but did have tennis shoes on from somewhere.  He showed up in a Tesla (his employer) — more on that later…

    Workout was fun and difficult, but extremely wet.  It rained and then it rained some more.  and some more.  YHC was wringing his shirt and shorts out every few minutes.  At least YHC was not sweating to death…

    Nice having Abacus, Vinny and Hardywood there from other venues!  Come back any time!

    On to the Car.
    Afterwards, Abacus asked if we wanted to ride in his car.  Some of us took us up on that offer.  But first, the car had to give us a demo…  see the video if you want to see something completely stupid and utterly pointless.  but also pretty cool.

    So Abacus took some of us on a ride.  A few notes — going 0 to 45 in a second is quite awesome!  Having the car drive itself, also awesome, but maybe a little scary.  If Teslas are the way most cars will end up in the future, then the future will be great!  Go check one out if you ever have a chance.

    Peace out,
    Opus

     

  • Grab your sack and hold on tight. Opus VQ

    28 showed up this morning for the Opus VQ at Dogpile — here is what went down…

    COP —
    Hillbillies
    Helicopters
    Don Quixotes
    Combo exercises —
    5 Plank Jacks, 5 merkins 5x
    5 WW2 Situps, 5 Freddie Mercuries 5x
    5 flutterkicks, 5 scissor kicks 5x
    5 copperhead squats, 5 pistol squats

    Mosey to the bathhouse for a triple check–
    1 person runs to the service road and back, 1 does Donkey Kicks, 1 does an ab exercise of their choosing

    Mosey to the hill behind amphiteatre —
    supposed to be a mountain with a partner consisting of
    100 jump squats, 200 mountain climbers, 300 amercian hammers, 200 mountain climbers, 100 jump squats
    modified to finish with the amercian hammers for the sake of time

    Mosey to the field (once YHC found it with the help of Saab)
    Old fashioned relay race.  3 teams.
    Sack race to first cone, bear crawl to second cone, sprint to third cone, sprint back to second cone, bear crawl to first cone, sack back to the start.
    All others were doing SSH, LBC’s and other exercises while waiting

    Grab stuff head to the amphiteatre–
    round of skull crushers 10 each side
    2 rounds of 4×4 merkins (4 derkins, 4 merkins on one side, 4 upward merkins, 4 merkins other side)

    Back to the flag…
    Numberama, Nameorama, Announcements, etc.

    Announcements —
    7 AM convergence at Tredegar Monday morning!  Be there!
    24 AO’s — 104 or so days to get to all of them.  Did Phonics say we could earn a cool patch for competing the Summer Challenge??

    NMS —

    It has been two years since YHC has been coming out to these F3 beatdowns — YHC made it a goal at the beginning of this year to Q a Dogpile workout before the end of the year.  Check.  Next goal?  Hit some different AO’s this summer.
    YHC had a few butterflies this morning on the ride over, but once it got going the butterflies were gone.
    YHC purposely left his glasses in the car so he could read the Weinke, but that led to getting lost a few times.  Thanks Saab for the help finding the field for the relay race (or at least I think it was Saab??)

    Naming new folks was especially difficult this morning.  Every time we would settle on a name, it was shot down.  We had to rename the new folks several times bc the original names were too… sketchy?  too long?  who knows?  Wilson kept pushing for Amber Alert… YHC liked Reading Rainbow… We settled on The Graduate — some story about Seymour and the new kid were at a graduation last night (they didn’t know each other before this) and Seymour out of the blue just invites this guy to F3.  “Hey little kid, come out and meet me at Dogwood Dell early in the morning, oh and bring your gloves”  And the guy came.  Welcome to the graduate.
    The other trouble was with Chief — he was originally named Bromance by some deviant in the group, bc YHC knows the dude’s brother and the conversation went on too long, so there ya go.  We nixed Bromance and went with Chief bc we are fellow Monacan grads!  I am the Q, dammit.  I pick the names so no more complaining. 🙂

    YHC loves relay races at F3 — we should do more of them…  It was especially fun getting to tell everyone this morning to grab their sacks and get moving.  Hardest part of the relay by far was watching everyone try to get themselves in the sacks!!

    Thanks guys for making this morning really entertaining!

    Opus

  • Friday on my Mind

    7 Grown men and one feisty 2.0 showed up for a beatdown this morning.

    Here is what transpired…
    Hallelujah Run around the church

    COP–
    Hillbillies
    Helicopters
    Combos (not the snack) All IC —
    5 SSH, 5 Merkins 5x (no stopping between exercises)
    5 WW2 situps, 5 Freddies 5x
    5 flutterkicks, 5 scissors 5x
    5 copperhead squats, 5 pistol squats 4x

    1 minute toe taps on curb
    30 seconds on, 30 seconds rest
    40 seconds on, 20 seconds rest
    50 seconds on, 10 seconds rest
    1 minute full on.

    Triple Checks at the benches–
    derkins, ww2s on benches, touch a car
    dips, skullcrushers, touch a building

    Catch me if you can — 
    one partner starts bear crawling around the building, other one does 7 burpees and then runs to catch the other one.  Switch roles.  Repeato until we make it round the building.

    Thanks to all the guys and girl who showed up today for this morning’s beatdown.  It was a beautiful morning with a little less humidity than normal.  Nothing stood out this morning as far as mumblechatter is concerned, but YHC thinks everyone was having a great time with the workout.  Pick two has become a regular again and we are glad for that!  Missed regulars Carpenter and Spit this morning.  Hope you both are doing well — see you soon!
    BTW — George Young of AC/DC fame was a member of the Easybeats back in the 60’s.  This is one of the first rock songs YHC remembers from his youth and still loves it!

    Peace
    Opus