Author: Opus

  • Holy Crap — that took a long time!

    15 Native PAX members showed up for a fun and frolicking good time at Daville!

    Here is what went down:

    COP
    Hillbillies
    Arm Circles
    Flutter Kicks
    dollys
    Rock Em Sock Em Robots
    Jump Squat
    Plank Jack
    Roll Ups

    Longish Mosey to Hill near the Gate
    Doras — One partner does Broad Jump Burpees up hill, run down hill.  100 ww2 situps, 200 merkins (modified to 175), 300 SSH (1 count)

    Say good-bye to the hill by running up and down three times as fast as possible.  Wheelie did not fall down the hill for the first time ever.  Props and T-Claps.

    Indian Run back to wall for donkey kick fun

    2 donkeys, touch 1 tree
    4 donkeys, touch 2 trees
    6 donkeys, touch 3 trees
    Some of the PAX made it up to 8 before YHC realized what time it was and had to scurry the group back to the flag.

    Numberama, Nameorama, Announcements, Chowdah took us out this morning.

    YHC has not quite gotten the hang of how long something will take for a certain PAX.  Sometimes, there is not enough stuff and some scrambling occurs.  This morning, there was way too much stuff and massive cutting and splicing took place.  The original title of this Backblast was supposed to be “What the Hill?” — YHC had two more adventures with the hill planned, but realized that time was not on our side because the daggone DORA’s took much longer than I thought they would.  No worries, I will be Q’ing again at Daville soon enough!! 🙂

    Yardsale mentioned that the PAX should have a Shovel Flag making/ tasty brew drinking night at someone’s house.  YHC concurs.  Who is up for having some guys over to make that happen?

    Announcements:
    Fudd’s house this Saturday.  Not sure the time or how to get there.  Check the Pre-Blast for more info.

    Have a blessed takeover week!
    Opus

     

  • My pre-birthday suit

    15 gentlemen showed up to celebrate YHC and his birthday eve. It truly was 70 and sunny this morning when we started.

    Slaughter Starter — 20 Burpees
    Mosey to field
    ww2 situps 1 minute
    SSH
    arm circles
    gas pumps
    Sumo Squats in cadence — wide stance, touch ground
    Jump Squats in cadence — take it slow
    Rockem Sockem Robots — squat kicks with a punch

    ww2 situps 1 minute

    mosey to pavilion
    skull crushers in cadence — 5, 10, 15 per side and derkins on own 5,10,15

    triple check from middle of field
    bear crawl and flutterkicks start in same spot, dips at bench
    bear crawl relieves dipper who relieves american hammer
    each exercise 3 times

    ww2 situps 1 minute
    dan taylor across width of field
    1 squat, 4 lunges
    2 squat, 8 lunges

    Native American run

    Weasel Crawl — YHC sings “Pop Goes the Weasel” on the word “Pop” PAX goes down into a merkin, on “Weasel”, PAX does alternating shoulder taps

    Merkin Ring of Fire — 5 each

    NMS —
    Today was the last day YHC will ever get to say 47 during the name-o-rama.  Another year gone, lots of great memories, including meeting a bunch of you blokes.  Where has the time gone?  My eldest is going to high school, my youngest to elementary school.  My head is spinning.
    Enough of that — workout was fun — Thanks Circle K for the great mumblechatter this morning — made the workout less painful.
    Not sure who had the really awkward form on the bear crawls, but it was great entertainment observing it and pointing it out to other PAX members.
    Weasel Crawl didn’t work as well as it should have.  Live and learn.
    Looking forward to another year in F3!

     

     

  • Breakin’ the law

    18 PAX members showed up on a glorious morning to better themselves and hopefully not hurt themselves.  Here is how it went down…

    Mosey to Circle of pain, but wait, no… it’s a detour to the Atlee wall first to do a Donkey Kick-Off. (This one is going up to the exicon).  5 Donkey kicks, on the fifth one hold feet on the wall for 5 seconds.  Then, up it to 10 donkey kicks and 10 second hold.  Then 15 and then 20.

    Now to the COP…
    IJR
    Arm Circles
    Mountain Climbers
    Werkins
    Copperhead Squats
    Heels to Heaven
    Crabcakes
    Plank Jacks
    ATM’s — 15 Alternating Shoulder Taps, 10 tempo merkins, 10 fast merkins

    Mosey to the poles for what I thought were Pole Smokers. (More on that in the Moleskin)  All hold the pole and do 6 inches.  First PAX member does 10 WW2 situps and sprints down the line.  Repeato till all are done.

    We are Family Run…
    Run from Atlee to the corner of Atlee Station and Atlee service road stopping and doing 15 merkins and 15 jumps squats at every light post.  I think it was about 7 light posts, maybe 8?

    Partner exercises…
    15 partner leg throwdowns
    15 partner merkins
    15 jumpovers

    Mosey to Bus Loop
    One partner runs bus loop while the other holds isometric prayer hands and a leg lunge at the same time.  Only had time for one of these

    Off to the flag for a quick round of Mary…
    5 merkins each around the circle while all held plank.

    NMS —
    YHC is hoping not to be fined by corporate for not having a Circle warmup at the very beginning of the workout.  Had to change things up a little.  The PAX enjoyed the Donkey Kick-off immensely except someone whose F3 name I can only tell you rhymes with StabBat.

    This workout was supposed to be called “My F3 Workout — what is important to me”.  It was supposed to have a theme regarding the things that are important in YHC’s life like friends, family, faith and music.  YHC came up with that 6 months ago.  How lame that title sounds now, so YHC kept most of the workout intact and just changed the name.

    Observations
    — YHC was going to go to 25 donkey kicks, but Carpenter looked tired so we moved on.
    — Pole smokers (or whatever what I did was called) take a long time with 18 people.
    — Kudos to the 2.0’s for one armed merkins during the Mary!

     

    Announcements — see labrat’s comments below

     

  • These go to 11!

    5 pretty studly gents showed up on this bright beautiful morning to take on a Q inspired by the movie mockumentary “This is Spinal Tap”.  Here is what transpired…

    COP
    arm circles — just eleven large forward and back
    plank 1 minute — discuss most memorable F3 workout whilst waiting
    SSH — 11
    elbow plank 1 minute — discuss least liked exercise
    IJR — 11
    plank step outs 1 minute
    ww2 situps — 22
    shoulder taps 1 minute
    Smurf Jacks — 11
    mountain climbers 1 minute

    Sets of Eleven
    1) Donkey Kicks,  run to kettle bell, situp press
    2) goblet squats, bear crawl to edge of bus loop and back, lawnmowers

    4 Corners — turned into 2 corners for time’s sake
    good mornings — 11
    boat canoes — 11

    Mary
    american hammers
    renegade rows

    Moleskin

    YHC had never Q’ed a Kettlebell workout before — thanks to the PAX for their understanding and patience!
    We started out with an aimless kettlebell mosey to emulate the section of the movie when the fictional band gets lost within the maze of the arena and can’t find its way to the stage.  The rest of the workout was devoted to the theme of 11’s.  Nigel Tufnel, lead guitarist for Spinal Tap, is showing his amp to the interviewer and explains that his amp is special because all the knobs are numbered to 11. (see the clip).

    The hardest part of being the Q is knowing how long something is going to take.  Elevens take a long time…  Modification was necessary, but the PAX took it in stride.

    We ended up doing 77 ww2 situps this morning for those who are participating in the May challenge.

    On a side note, thanks for Mudface for teaching us the correct way for doing Boat Canoes.

    Announcements
    5/20 — Ashcreek 5 K
    5/11 — New AO startup at Pole Green Park — meet at the school lot

     

  • Smurf That!

    In honor of every smurf everywhere, this workout is for you

    13 smurfed up PAX members showed up on a beautiful morning to show they had what it takes to beat the gloom!

    Hallelujah run around the church

    COP

    American Hammers, LBC’s, Don Quixotes, Invisible Jump Ropes, Arm Circles, Diamond Merkins, Roll-ups (20 OYO)
    Table tops,

    shoulder taps
    Plank Toe taps to the side (repeated these two)

    CURB STEP UPS — 1 minute

    The Thang
    SMURF Trivia —
    7 questions about the Smurfs, answer incorrectly — 10 Smurf jacks in cadence
    answer correctly, only 5 Smurf jacks in cadence
    YHC will post questions at the end if you want to see how well you would have done.

    SMURF Run —
    Like the Native American run except we all skipped — last person skipped faster to get to the head of the PAX.  Some of us even sang the theme song as we skipped.  Yippee.

    SMURF Chase Scene —
    5 lunges keeping an eye out for Gargamel, Sprint like mad across the rest of the field, immediately drop and give as many merkins as possible waiting for the rest of the PAX to finish (2x)

    10 lunges, sprint, and as many LBC’s as possible till the PAX caught up (2x)

    15 lunges, sprint and as many Burpees as possible until the PAX finished. (2x)

    SMURF TRIVIA (part deux)
    same as before — we all love smurf jacks now.

    CIRCLE UP for ascending ring of fire merkins — we got to the number 6

    Numberama, Name-o-rama, Bring it in

    Naked Smurfskin —

    YHC has had a love affair with the Smurf Jack since his first Q a few months back.  Hence, this workout came together after Spit gave it up to hit the smurfing #TwinTeam AO today.
    YHC wanted to incorporate as many smurf jacks as possible into the Q today, so we did the smurfing Trivia contest as a way of keeping it fun.  Smurf it, the PAX only got 5 and a half questions correct out of the 14 smurfing questions.  The last one was half correct, so we did 7 and a half smurf jacks for that one.    Total = 107.5 SmurfJacks for the day, well done!!

    Some other notes — Lunging and Sprinting across the field was the favorite of many a PAX member today.  I heard lots of “What the Smurf?”  and “Smurf it to Smurf!” while completing the exercise.  Will do this exercise again at the next Opus Q.  Be Ready.

    Circle K informed YHC that he was doing the arm circles backwards when YHC said forwards.  Good catch Circle K (just seeing who was paying attention and you were.  Kudos.)

    Here are the Smurfy Questions if you are interested… (answers can be found on the interwebs)

    1)What is the country of origin of the Smurfs?
    2) Which Smurf always carries a package?
    3) Name Gargamel’s cat.
    4) How tall are the smurfs?
    5) Which famous VP’s daughter had the code name Smurfette?
    6) What project were the smurfs working on in every episode?
    7) When baby smurf got sick, what flower did they bring back to cure him?

    8) Which smurf carried a pencil?
    9) Who was always trying to steal the smurfs food?
    10)What smurf was Brainy’s sidekick?
    11) What is the new movie called?
    12) What was Smurfette’s original hair color?
    13) How old is Papa Smurf?
    14) What color were Papa Smurf’s clothes?

    Announcements — Charlottesville Launch May 20th.  Contact LabRat with names or any other items related to new AO

    Ashcreek 5K — also May 20th.  Use code HAPPYEASTER to save $5 this week!

     

     

     

  • Sad Clown

    I wrote a song to say adios to my sad clown.  I didn’t even know I was a sad clown before coming to F3, almost dying at several workouts, meeting new friends, and reading the book.  I knew there was something not quite right in my life but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

    Anyways, I used to write songs all the time, but I hadn’t written one in several years until this one popped in my head.  I already shared this link with a few Mechanicsville peeps, but I decided to jump in headfirst and put it out there for the rest of you all.  Hope you enjoy!

    Thanks for helping me be a better man,

    Opus

    PS The picture is of three of my kids, none of which is a sad clown, but Daniel does look a wee bit creepy…

  • The family that stays together, plays together, aka study up on the exicon before coming to an Opus workout

    14 eager and somewhat feisty PAX members showed up on a cold Friday morning for their beatdown.  This is what transpired…

    Semi-long Mosey around the church and the big field, back to parking lot for opening circle frivolity.

    YHC thinks these numbers are accurate.  There is no way to know for sure, though, since Abacus was in the fartsack.

    SSH x 30,  Smurf Jacks X20,

    Crunchy Frogs X18,   LBC’s x25

    Rotating Merkins X25,    Plank Jacks X30

    Red Bull Smurf Jacks X20 (Ouch)

    Booyah Merkin Mixer —

    Bear Crawl to a friend, do 7 Boo yah merkins with them, bear crawl to another friend.

    Repeato until you have done this with 5 friends.

    When you get to the last friend, stay with and do 25 rotating jump squats.  Head to field.

    The Family that Stays Together —

    YHC had a card that only he could see with 12 different ways to move from place to place.  PAX member called out a random number from 1-12 corresponding to the card and we moved to the next corner that way.  When we got to a corner, we did a different ab exercise for a minute and 15 seconds. ( A minute seemed way too short) 🙂

    Bear Crawl length of field, Heels to Heaven

    Skip width of field, Reach Throughs

    Frog Jump length of field, Reverse Crunches (see notes in recap)

    Chop Feet, American Hammers

    High Knees, Freddy Mercurys

    Head to pavilion for 10, 15, 20 dips and derkins.

    Back to flag for Superman and Ring of fire Merkins

    Moleskin:

    YHC spent some time studying the F3 exicon for this particular beatdown.  Every once in a while, the PAX was a little confused on what they were supposed to do.  YHC called out Reverse Crunches and looked around — every PAX member was doing something totally different.  SMH. I think they had fun with the newer exercises, though.

    [On a side note to Corporate, YHC  thinks we should somehow incorporate a Red Bull Smurf Jack challenge some time soon.  Those kicked butt today.]

    YHC needs a new watch and a new pair of gloves.  Watch totally farted out on me during the timed exercises.  They don’t make Timex watches like they used to.  By the end of the workout, YHC thought his fingers were going to freeze off.  Emoji offered up his hand warmers, which were amazing.  Will be buying some soon.  See you in the gloom!

    Announcements :

    BRR-see TYA, Smokey Mountain Relay-see Swirly, Ragnar-see Toga, Ashcreek 5K-see Spit

     

     

     

     

     

  • Meet in the Middle

    “I Start Walkin’ Your Way, you start Walkin’ Mine, we meet in the middle ‘neath that old Georgia pine.  We gain a lot of ground when we both give a little.  Ain’t no road too long if we meet in the middle.”  — Diamond Rio

    16 strong (including one FNG) gathered for my VQ this morning —

    Started with the Slaughter Starter (Thanks, Upchuck!) — 20 burpees on our own

    Brief quick run around the church to the other side of the parking lot.

    COP

    • x30 — SSH
    • x30 — IJR — PAX was encouraged to come up with creative ways to jump rope today and they did not disappoint!
    • x30 Heels to Heaven — thanks Helix for the reminder!
    • x20 — Dollys
    • x20 — Rosalitas
    • x20 — American Hammers
    • 1 ATM — 15 3 count shoulder taps, 10 tempo merkins, then 10 fast merkins with no stopping

    I lost my Weinke along the way, so there may have been one exercise I missed on the BB.

    THE THANG

    Mosey over to the field for the next segment called Meet in the Middle — for F3 purposes, we shall call it MIM. 🙂

    I created this section because I love partner exercises and I love the Diamond Rio song of the same name.

    Everyone partnered up and headed to opposite ends of the field and proceeded to do the following

    1. Billy Idol Lunges (complete with fist pump) till partners met up in the middle, Booyah Merkins, then run back to your own side.  Rinse and Repeat — 10x, then 15x, then 20x on the Booyahs
    2. High Knee Run to partners in the middle, then Partner Leg Tosses, run back to own side (again 10, 15, and 20)
    3. Bear Crawls to partner in the middle, then Partner Derkins (one partner in plank the other does Derkins).  In the interest of time, we did 5, then 10, then 15.

    We finished up with the Tunnel of Love.  More on this later in the Wrap up.

    Mosey back to the flag

    COT/NAMEORAMA

    MOLESKIN

    What can I say about my first time out as Q?  I have to be honest — I was nervous from the moment I decided to take that step until the workout started this morning.  And then, I was fine and had a ton of adrenaline to push me through!  If I can do it, anyone can do it!  Make it a New Years Resolution to Q in 2017!

    We had a very friendly PAX this morning — no surly faces, at least not that I noticed in the gloom.  After we enjoyed the 20 burpees to get us warmed up, we hit the Circle and got ourselves moving.  During the IJR’s I saw some really good jump rope moves and even some guys going double time with the rope.  Impressive.  Could they do that with a real rope, I wondered…  I wish I had hit the ATM one more time in the circle, but I moved on to make sure we had time for Meet in the Middle.

    The hardest part of “meet in the middle” was the actual meeting in the middle since it was so dark out in the field.  I heard PAX members shouting out their partners names trying to find them in the gloom.  It actually added an element of fun to the whole thing.  I almost stepped on a 2.0 at one point — that would have left a mark.  Looking back, I think I would have done more reps of the meet in the middle exercises, but not knowing how much time anything would take, I think it turned out okay.

    There was definitely a slowdown in the tunnel today as we crawled our way through.  Part of the reason might have been the unexpected sharp turn in the tunnel as people made their way through to the end.  We rectified the situation eventually and the back up in the tunnel subsided.  We headed back to the flag and finished up!  Why was I so nervous??

     

    Announcements:

    • CSAUP Saturday January 21st. 9 to 10 mile run with short AO in between. 3 to 4 hour with cook out afterwards. See Circle K and more Pre-blast for details
    • LBC’s Monthly Challenge – January. 10k is the Goal. See link below to sign up!

    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-L8e9W24ygnU0suaGyKxzi1PgPqY1CBd57hLrKTZI-g/edit#gid=656233322

    • Order your Focus Prayer Books by paying Abacus $20 and going to this link and filling out the form – – – http://www.paracleteanswers.com/material.html
    • Emoji’s M had surgery this week — please continue to pray for the family!