Author: Rosie

  • Well Executed Plan

    3 intense SOJers hit the streets early with weighted packs to find some treasures but ventured back to the AO to join YHC and Bullseye for form focused beatdown. As you can see YHC had a very detailed, well thought out plan for the beatdown, much to the surprise of the PAX.

    Warmed up with some standard stuff that the PAX modified to accommodate various injuries. (Anyone know a PT in the PAX, they could make a living treating F3 guys).

    Over to the pull up bars for a few slow easy pullups with no confusion on the instructions, mosey/lunge/mosey to the front of the school. Find for a bench, only 35 to choose from yet somehow I was the only one with a bench to myself. Alternate between slow dips and single leg squats – Bulgarian Split Squats if you’re looking for the technical name.

    Front of the school for the rare quint/quad check – runner is the timer, HRM, APD (1leg if you got it), deep squats, leg lifts. 4 times through, just for variety. More dips and BSS – more lunges and mosey, a few more pullups. Close out with 6MOM. Goal for the day, get some solid reps in, enjoy some fellowship, and not wear anyone out for the Frozen Triangle – mission accomplished.

    Frozen Triangle tomorrow – see 1stF channel for details – 6am at Dogpile

    Lots of ruck options around RVA – come try it out to see what the excitement is about.

    Lots of good discussion post workout about family/friends, the damage that can be done by alcoholism and other diseases, and keeping in touch with the ones you love. Thanks for sharing gentlemen and thanks for letting me lead.

    Have a great weekend, enjoy your sleep if you can get it.

  • Flooded Trails

    6 SOJ ruckers, an F3 runner and some friends met Off the Books for ruck training around TwinTeam. Draper and some coworkers ran off into the Gloom in search of some hills while the rest of us hit the streets toward Robious Landing Park. What looked like a cliff near the river turned out to be the overflowing banks of the James. As most of the trails circle around to the river, access was not to be found today. Hopefully not too much damage to the park or floating docks. The only reasonable alternative was hit the TwinTeam hill, the ruckers never broke stride and crushed the hill with ease in route to a 5k in well under an hour.

    More ruck options this weekend – Saturday pre-RockNRoll, and Sunday 6am at the Pump House. YHC had my doubts about rucking but I am already seeing the benefits – cross training, easy on the joints, opportunity for more fellowship, and getting back on the trails around RVA. We’ll add more Off the Books options during the week so be on the lookout – join the #rucking or #GTE47 channel for opportunities.

  • Burpees for 2024

    NoToll welcomed 33 high impact men ready to bring in 2024 the right way. One old hat and 2 newer men of F3RVA split the Q to ensure maximum pain.

    Intro and warm up with Rosie, standard fare including SSH, Jazzercize, tempo merkins, shoulders taps, and only 1 round of helicopters among others. Group sample of Old Glory. Corner 1, 20 Hand release merkins IC, Corner 2 – 20 jump squats, soggyCorner 3 – 10 burpees, and corner 4 – 20 WW2 IC.

    Yeehaw takes over with a beast of a triple check, runner across the field and back with the other 2 PAX getting in rounds of Iron Mike’s and Navy Seal burpees.

    Purple Rain took us around the fields with moving arm circles, raise the roof, Bernie, all the way back to the dry field. This is where he broke the news that Dora was the next to join the party. 100 burpees, 200 American Hangers, and 300 mountain climbers. Some planks, both sides to make sure the world is balanced.

    Back to YHC to close the fun – Lindsey on the basketball courts with SSH and Freddie Mercuries. 5 minutes of Mary to wrap up the first beatdown of 2024.

    Announcements

    GrowRuck – sign up if you haven’t already. Let’s show the visitors from other regions what F3RVA is about. Leadership training, CSAUP, fellowship, and acceleration of F3 RVA all right here in our own backyard. LFG!! Here is the link https://growruck.com/event/gte-47/

    Thanks to Oyster for coordinating Breaking Bread. His challenge for 2024, sign up for your birthday month.

    Florence will be boosting the F3 RIchmond presence on social media. Take and send him pics at AOs, 2nd F, 3rd F or other events.

    Prayers for the families dealing with the tragic car accident in Brandermill this past week.

    Thank you all for letting me and my fellow SOJ PAX lead you all on this first day of 2024. We have been given an incredible opportunity to be a part of this group. F3 means something different to everyone but I think we can all agree F3 is something that we benefit from and maybe didn’t know we needed. As we move through the next year let’s continue to give it away to others that need it.

    Everything is coming up Rosie.

  • River City – GTE #47 – May 3-5, 2024

    Let’s Go!! F3RVA, as announced at the 12 Days of Christmas workout this morning, the registration is open for the “River City” GTE #47 May 3-5, 2024.  Sign up before the January 7, 2024 price hike and let’s get training. This hometown event is the CSAUP we have been looking for to accelerate F3RVA and each man individually.  Check out the link below for more info and CLICK HERE for registration information.

    The weekend will consist of:

    • Friday Night Rally – A social gathering with a meal, it is open to all men, not just those signed up for the ruck.  This is where we kick off the weekend and learn about what’s in store for us throughout the weekend.  
    • Saturday Morning Convergence King Builder – This is a bootcamp workout that will be held at the premier AO in RVA, Dogpile.  This too is open to all men and may be an excellent opportunity for an EH or motivation for a last minute sign up.
    • Saturday Morning Grow School – This is a leadership training class led by F3 Nation Trainers that is part of your registration fee.  Will be held at a location close to Dogpile immediately after the King Builder.  
    • Saturday Night Crucible Ruck – This is the main event where everything from the previous events is put together and we work as a team of leaders to step out of our comfort zone and do something that will help us all grow.

    More information will follow on specific locations and timing for each of the events.  If you are considering participating and do not have a ruck, reach out to me, there are loaner rucks available that we can get in advance for training and the event but we need to get those requests in soon.

    The important thing is that you sign up now before the price hike, we don’t want to be outnumbered by out-of-towners. 

    Lockjaw and others will be leading ruck training at AOs around the region along with separate ruck centered events in the next few months to prepare us for the GTE. 

    https://growruck.com/event/gte-47/

  • ‘Tis the Season

    47, yes, you read that right 47 festive carolers rolled into the parking lot of Huguenot Park after Swirly secured the AO for the event. Lots to celebrate in 2023 so the PAX showed up strong for the 12 Days of Christmas.

    0530 let the party begin – Big circle for intro and warm up. 12 SSH, 12 IW – introduce the FNG, 12 Helicopters. Main event – this has not changed from the past couple of years and why would I change a good thing.

    1 – Dozen LBCs, 2 – Field Sprints (jogs), 3 – Diamond merkins, 4 – Imperial Squat Walkers, 5 – Burpees, 6 – Carolina Dry Docks, 7 – Ball Dippers, 8 – Hand Release Merkins, 9 – American Hammers, 10 – Freddie Mercuries, 11 – Crunchy Frogs, 12 – Broad Jump Burpees.

    Extra time on the clock and I want to make sure everyone got the full 45 minutes – 6 Minutes of Mary – Dollies, Rosalitas, Cross leg lifts, Flutter kicks (slow then fast then ludicrous), Heels to heaven, Shoulder taps, Tempo Merkins.

    Numbers – 47! – Names – this is where YHC was trying to record but apparently did not start until I got around to Buddy, let’s blame it on cold fingers. So much for not testing the recall skills today – all 47 accounted for. Thanks to EF Hutton for giving me a 28, 29? DK, person head start with the gift exchange. Excellent idea, well received by all, and with that a new tradition is born. I can’t get over the energy from this morning and how much it has carried over into my day, and likely the rest of the week. There is a normal energy to an F3 workout and then there is 46 brothers posting to let me lead them through some pain and suffering (by suffering I mean listening to us sing). Thank you all for showing up today and every other day to make F3RVA a great place, it doesn’t happen without each of you.

    Announcements

    GrowRuck – GTE #47 River City May 3-5, 2024 – Look for a pre-blast on Slack and the website later but here is a preview link to the registration https://growruck.com/event/gte-47/

    As Hardywood said, LFG, sign up and make this an RVA strong event. We know guys from other areas will show up but this is our chance to show them what we have here.

    Have a great day and a Merry Christmas. apologies to Big Data for throwing off the calculation for the New Year’s convergence – who wants to come back to NoToll (or SOT)?

    Everything is coming up Rosie.

  • Stay Dry, Keep Moving

    As YHC waited for the PAX I realized this should be a Murph Friday. No Murph on the Q sheet and no other PAX joined in the fun so the goal was to stay dry. I may or may not have done a Murph with extra miles, perfect pull ups, extra merkins, a visit to the James River, bonus 11s, burpees, a few trips up Twin Team, and closing out with a solo indigenous people run.

    Grateful for the men of F3RVA, have a great weekend gentlemen.

  • Largest Dutch Oven

    No runners to be found so a prime number of 7 bootcampers headed out for a field trip. Warm up in the bus parking lot with some DQ, IW, AST, the brand new plank arm circles, merkins, and Freddies.

    Mosey across to the path at the side of the school and to the shopping center parking lot. Lunge Indigenous people walk with the last man adding 5 jump squats before running to the front. Cross into the church parking lot and line up along the curb for Indigenous plank walk – 5 merkins before running to the front.

    The only idea in mind for the day was the field trip but when we got to the church parking lot no one could tell YHC was making it up as we went. With a solid prime number of PAX it was every man for himself. Increasing reps as we traveled by various methods between the parking aisles – 10 burpees, 20 HRM, 30 squats, 40 Mountain Climbers, 50 Flutters, 60 SSH, 70 Curb taps. Reverso OYO running between aisles. Just a plain ole 4-corners next – no prostitute, no reverse, alternate travel methods – just simple 10 Diamond Merkins, 20 Jump Squats, 30 Plank Jacks, and 40 LBC. Before we left the parking lot we had to reverse the plank walk to make sure we all came out balanced.

    Back to the bus lot for a solid 6 minutes of high powered Mary – lots of stuff packed into 6 minutes.

    Thanks for letting me lead the boot camp today after a long hiatus of MOT running. On our field trip we found a well lit basketball hoop for potential future use – hoopers take notice.

    Announcements

    Thanksgiving Day workout will be at 45MOM at 6am. Mudslide has the Q, all Virginia history, all the time, the only version that matters.

    Lots of food collected at the SOJ ruck last week, great job gentlemen. There’s another opportunity to Ruck for Food in Tuckahoe Friday – See slack and/or Lockjaw for details.

  • No good way to go

    10 runners started out excited that the route included going down Manders. Somehow it was lost that going down that hill also meant up Grove Hill and Honeymooon hill.

    Good pick up of speed through the middle mile to stretch out the legs. The half-marathon runners are ready for a couple rest days before heading downtown to the starting line. We’re all ready to go, the journey is the destination, the training has been fun now let’s log the time our watches expect us to finish, sit back, and enjoy.

    Starbucks afterwards was excellent. Next week YHC will have the Q on the Bootcamp side of this AO.

    Saturday 11/11 – Ruck with Food – 6 am at TwinTeam – see slack or OC for details

    Next Friday 11/17 – Ruckahoe canned food drive. See slack or Lockjaw for details

    A pleasure to lead this group of fine gentlemen through the streets of Midlo.

  • Dinner is on

    YHC and 2.0 made our way over to the Daily Planet to serve some deserving folks some food. Lasagna, salad, garlic bread, and cookies were on the menu. Not as many people as expected but they were grateful and happy for the potential of leftovers. Always a pleasure to serve.

  • Jorts Takeover

    11 Westenders expecting a Gomer Q were met with a half-dozen SOJ pirates hijacking the Q for a Ghost Flag takeover. On the way to the AO we realized YHC was the only clown car occupant that had experienced the AO, the only AO in RVA and maybe the U.S. with it’s own diesel pump. With the offer of a brief tour the others decided I would heat up the potato for the others. The woman walking the track saw some of the following:

    Warm up in the parking lot with the old standbys, nothing special here. Mosey to the bus loop for a singular BLIMP – 5 burpees, 10 Lunges, 15 Imperial Walkers, 20 Merkins, 25 Plank Jacks. Mosey to the wall, which Honeydo properly pointed out is the donkey kick wall for a Triple Check – Donkey Kicks, Wall Sits, Run across the pavement.

    Pass the spud to OC – Basketball court 20s – 5 of each exercise alternating sides of the court – Burpees, merkins, monkey humpers, WWII, and werkins.

    Give the tater to Chaplain – he decided we had stayed dry long enough so we found some wet, freshly cut grass at the bottom of the namesake hill – 11s – Jump Squats at the top, HRMs at the bottom. Once on that hill is solid – 10x is punishing. Well done Chap.

    Reallocate the tuber to Don Draper – mosey to the end of the track for some plank – pull ups. PAX planks while 2 go do 5 pull ups. Rotate through all with plank variations. Back to the shovel flags.

    NMM

    What a great morning to be out in the gloom. The air was cool this morning but the SOJ crew came in hot with 3 of us in jorts (overalls if you’re OC). Not only did we look hot but the jorts hold in a surprising amount of heat. And while I can’t speak for the others, my M was beyond thrilled to see me walk into the house in jorts this morning.

    Great West End crew out today that were certainly there to support Gomer, sorry to disappoint, but it was fun to see everyone and introduce some SOJ guys to the Heartbreak crew. There was a DK/Atilla reunion after so many mornings at Circus, a second post for Rainman, and even an extra explanation of an exercise for Fudd. I am sure Handshake, Honeydo, and crew are plotting their next takeover already.

    Announcements –

    SOJ lunch Friday 10/27 @ Rusty Taco at Westchester

    Ruck for Food – Nov. 11 6am at TwinTeam, +/- 10 miles Copying the Tuckahoe effort of a couple years ago but better – there may or may not be a clown, juggler, and petting zoo. See OC, Boberry, or Doublemint for details.