F3 New Orleans

Author: RevSox

  • Sparring with a Hawg in the Gloom

    YHC arrived to the Fight Club with hopes that the River Ridge/Kenner F3 men would finally start to come out for a morning beatdown and he was let down as 5:30am came up on his watch and he stood alone at the base of the levee. It looked like this was going to be the morning when YHC did some shadow boxing at the Fight Club.

    He looked like a crazy man saying the disclaimer to no one in the dark and started the warm-up.

    SSH – 20

    Arm Circles – 20 forward and 20 backwards

    At this point Hawg came strolling in to help save YHC from his first dancing idiot F3 workout. Like a seasoned pro, he dove right into the warm-up without need of explanation.

    Real Freddie Mercury – 20

    Hillbillies – 20

    Windmill – 20

    With the warm-up complete, the Pax took off down Reverand Richard Wilson Dr. to workout at the Buddy Lawson Playground for the first Fight Club field trip. Once arriving at the field, YHC took advantage of the football field for a round of F3 suicides.

    Run 1/4 length of the field and stop for 10 burpees

    Run back to start, down 1/2 length of the field and stop for 20 jump lunges

    Run back to start, down 3/4 length of the field and stop for 30 merkins

    Run back to start, down full length of the field and stop for 40 big boy sit-ups.

    Run back to start

    Since this is the final week of regular season baseball, YHC wanted to honor the 2018 MLB season with a short game of Plankball. Plankball = run the bases and stop at each base for a plank exercise done together in cadence.

    1st base – 20 Plank jacks

    2nd base – 20 Peter Parkers

    3rd base – 20 Annies

    Home – 10 Nolan Ryans on each arm

    1st base – 20 Parker Peters

    2nd base – 20 Mountain Climbers

    3rd base – 20 Merkins

    Home – 10 Nolan Ryans on each arm

    We moseyed back to the boxing statues to finish off some with some core and leg workouts

    American Hammer – 20

    Wife Pleasers – 20

    Penguins – 20

    Flutterkicks – 20

    Dying Cockroach – 20

    Rocky Balboa – 20

    Channing Tatums – 20

    Tatum Channings – 20

    Incline Merkins – 10

    We counted off, called our names, YHC made announcements that were half for F3 and half for Grace Community Bible Church since the entire Pax are members of the Church. We circled up for a sweaty side hug of man and called it a day. Thanks for the sparring session Hawg. We will back in Kenner on October 3rd! Don’t forget to mark your calendars since Amnesia will be leading his first real Q.

     

    -Rev Sox

  • The Fight Club: Round One

    The Fight Club: Round One

    After a false start a few years ago, F3 is back in Kenner! The Fight Club is on!

     

    YHC hated F3 when Hawg and Channel Mullet dragged him to his first F3 workout last October. YHC hated F3 when he continued to workout at the Birdcage as he was unable to finish any of the exercises. A few weeks later, YHC’s opinion of F3 slowly changed from one of hate to tolerate to love. YHC knew F3 was getting into his blood when he would drive by the boxing statues in Kenner and think, “that would be the coolest place to lead an F3 workout. We could run up the steps, take the long run up the ramp on the levee, and we could run to the park nearby for some suicides. Maybe we can incorporate some of the drift wood into a workout?” So here we are six months later with the launch of the Fight Club at LaSalle Landing in Kenner. The home to the first ever World Heavyweight Boxing Championship match, and now F3NOLA.  8 men came out and endured the rain and wind of Tropical Storm Gordon to workout in the gloom.

     

    The Warm-Up

    We moseyed over to the Rivertown area with plans to workout by the picnic benches following the warm-up. (Note to self, they lock up the Rivertown area at night). We circled in the parking lot outside of the area for a standard F3 warm-up.

    SSH -20

    Peter Parkers – 20

    IW – 20

    Plank jacks – 15

    Arm Circles – 20

    Annies – 20

     

    Double Dip

    We moseyed back to the levee to continue the Fight Club. YHC planned on doing the next workout at Rivertown picnic benches, but since the Fight Club is the best site ever for F3, he was not deterred. We took care of the decline merkins and dips near the statues.

    15 – decline merkins

    20 – dips

     

    The Rocky

    We split up into 2 groups of 4, one group at each set of stairs. We ran up the steps like Rocky and at the top, we raised our hands in a jumping celebration (5 burpees). We ran back to the bottom of the hill and back up for more celebrating (4 burpees). Continue up and down until we reach one small burpee celebration.

     

    Dora

    YHC thought Dora was a must for any F3 launch as it is the ideal F3 exercise in his humble opinion. Do more reps of 3 workouts than you ever thought you could with help from an F3 brother and it has a stupid cartoon name (Dora sums up what F3 workouts are all about). While one pax did the rep, the other ran the long way up and down the levee (over to the police station and up the long ramp on the levee). Props to Jingle Vader for tapping into the Dark Side when he took a nasty stumble and was still the first to complete the Dora with a little help from Amnesia.

    100 merkins

    200 jump squats

    300 American hammers

     

    Mary

    Wife Pleasers – 20

    Flutterkicks – 15

    Dying Cockroach – 20

    Penguins – 20

    O Dolly – 15

    LBCs – 20

    Nolan Ryan – 20

     

    Depature

    Counted off, name-o-rama, and we named our new FNG. Welcome Nick Hybart the next time you workout at the Fight Club, and call him “The Gremlin.” The only announcement was a call to travel to Mobile on the 22nd to help with the start of F3 in Alabama. Thanks for showing up men to help bring F3 to Kenner, praying that God will use 45 minutes in the morning on Wednesdays to help the men in our community be better leaders, husbands, and fathers for His glory.

     

    RevSox

  • The Frac Sox

    YHC was counting on a small attendance for this morning’s Uptowner after yesterday’s challenge. YHC was not ready to be the only Pax at 5:28am. He was preparing to jump up and down and carry a rock like a lone idiot in Pontiff Park. Thankfully FracSac saved the day, and the YHC had a friend for the gloom. Thus the greatest name workout duo in F3 history was born on a wet August morning as the Frac Sox made a circle of two to kick things off.

    We began with a standard warmp-up

    SSH – 25

    PlankJacks – 20

    Arm Circles – 10 forward and 10 backwards

    Annies – 20

    Peter Parkers – 20

     

    Frac Sox grabbed our rocks and made a two man line at the edge of the outfield. We held our rocks overhead and lunge walked across the field to the tree line in the center. YHC planned on lunge walking the rest of the way across the field, but holding a rock overhead while lunge walking was a little more difficult than anticipated. Frac Sox walked our rocks to the covered picnic benches for some bench work.

    Right leg step-ups – 20

    Dips – 20

    Left leg step-ups – 20

    Decline Merks – 10

     

    Frac Sox took our rocks to the bathroom wall, so we could sit on the wall and watch the train pass by. Once the train was gone, we did 20 curls while sitting on the wall.

    We then walked over to the Pontiff Park Mountain for a round of elevens.

    It started with 10 shoulder presses on one side of the mountain with 1 bench press on the opposite side. After completing the bench presses, we did 10 Low Slow Squats with the rock on top of the mountain.

    After completing our elevens, Frac Sox walked and then moseyed our rocks back to the rock pile.

    YHC should have planned one more exercise, because he left a little bit too much time for the Marys.

    Flutterkicks – 15

    American Hammer – 20

    Wife Pleasers – 20

    O Dolly – 20

    Dying Cockroach – 20

    Frac Sox completed 10 burpees and 20 shoulder taps to bring the work out to the close.

    Thanks FracSac for pushing me through my first Q in a while.

    -RevSox

     

  • IRONPAX III

    Hawg stole YHC’s Q for this morning with IronPax Week III, and YHC was not happy.

    YHC loves his precious F3 workouts and these stupid IronPax Challenges were just ruining a good thing. The first challenge left me hobbled like a 90 year old grandma, but YHC is into it now. After watching Amnesia and Hawg up their scores in week two by over 100 from their first run at the IronPax at the Birdcage to their second run at the Uptowner, YHC was ready to take up the challenge and work his way into top 100 in the nation for week 3.

     

    Hawg weighed out a dozen 25-30lbs rocks, Mahatma set off cones 10 ft apart (we quickly corrected his mistake before the challenge started), and YHC led a warmup of 20 SSH and 15 PeterParkers.

    Mahatma served as our time keeper as he recovered from an injury and we were off. The IronPax challenges are surprisingly quiet as we go all out trying to get in the most burpees and other stuff as possible.

    This week’s challenge was a confusing one, but here it is in a nutshell:

    15 burpees, 50 hand release merkins, broad jump (bunny hop) 10 yards and back

    14 burpees, 50 goblet squats, broad jump (bunny hop) 10 yards and back

    13 burpees, 50 leg lifts while holding rock in bench press position, broad jump (bunny hop) 10 yards and back

    rinse and repeat while counting down the burpees

    Once again JV is the tops of the morning with an astounding 626 reps

    Hawg 532

    RevSox 519

    TripleShift 455

    Tool 440

    Rocket 431

    FracSac 404

    War Eagle 394

    Two Utes 389

    Amnesia 384

    Abacus 265

    YHC improved from 404 to 519. YHC points this out to say it was all based on watching his brothers tough it out last week in the challenge and push him to do better. You never know how you will challenge, encourage, or push the men out here simply by being present and challenging yourself. YHC is stronger and healthier thanks to all of you in F3, and he can’t put into words what this group has meant to him over the last 10 months. F3NOLA, keep pushing forward, so we can all journey with you.

    RevSox

  • The Thrillabon in the Audubon

    Being an F3 Nation member for only 10 months (last race I was nothin but a gleam in a Hawg’s eye), the Gnarly Nutria was the stuff of legend. A back and forth sporting event like the world has not witnessed since Ali vs. Frazier. Two heavyweights going toe to toe for 5.4 miles with the Uptowners dominating Gnarly Nutria I and The World squeaking by with a narrow victory in Gnarly Nutria II.

    This year The World looked to overwhelm the smug Uptowners with numbers, and we have been recruiting. I was even dreaming of running the first race of my life but fell to the wayside with a calf injury on Friday. Although The World would now be missing their best runner, they still persevered and began the race with a distinct advantage in numbers.

    Following an epic lightning storm, the race began at 9:10pm. Our first finishers were a family group, and hat’s off to Sandbar who brought two of his 2.0s who finished the first lap in solid time.

    I knew the Uptowners were going to be in trouble when the first runners to not complete all three laps were Uptowners. Then the top two finishers of all three laps were both from the World and the landslide began. Like an over-the-hill Frazier against Ali, the Uptowners were no match for The World in Gnarly Nutria III.

    The final score was 446 The World and 354 Uptowners. The World is so fast, we turned off the lights in our bedrooms when we got home last night and we were in bed before the room was dark.

    We welcomed 4 FNGs into our numbers in the largest sweaty ball of man I have ever seen. I got to hand it to the runners, the names for our new members were great. We welcome Tubbs, Tramp Stamp, Right Cheek and his brother Left Cheek to F3. May we forget your real names and always refer to you by your F3 names in public.

    Here are your Gnarly Nutria top finishers:

    1. Smooth – The World

    2. Turbo Tax – The World

    3. Pony Boy – Uptowner

    4. El Guapo – The World

    5. Mulligan – Uptowner

    6. End Time – The World

    7. YSR – Uptowner

    8. Swampcock – Uptowner

    9. Cavalier – Uptowner

    10. Mahatma-Ice – The World

    11. Right Cheek – The World

    12. Nip/Tuck – Uptowner

    13. Jadaveon – Uptowner

    14. Cowbell – The World

    15. Hawgcycle – The World

    16. Thighs – The World

    17. Freedo – Uptowner

    18. Cornbread – The World

    19. El Wire – Uptowner

    20. Mariah – Uptowner

    21. Rudy – The World

    22. Rocket – The World

    23. Peppa – Uptowner

    24. Saban – Uptowner

    25. Tubba – The World

    26. Tramp stamp – The World

    27. Bubba – The World

    28. Shorty – The World

    29. Brownbag – Uptowner

    30. Landing Strip – Uptowner

    Left cheek, Bad Moon, Two Yutes, Shooter, Bushwacker, Einstein, 86, Pi, Walleye, King Kong, Triple Shift, Reluctant Yankee, and Roots fell just outside the top 30 in this order. I couldn’t keep up with the names after Roots. Congrats to all who finished and all who completed 1 or 2 laps. Thank you for helping us all be better men as we do stupid, pointless things like run for no reason in the middle of a lightning storm while chased by Jaguars.

    I’m inviting you to our next AO at “the Boxing Match” sculpture in Kenner’s Rivertown. The first Wednesday of September will be the launch of the F3 NOLA “Fight Club.”

    Your Humble Scorekeeper (I don’t plan on doing this next year, so someone else better get hurt right before the race in 2019),

    RevSox

  • Mellon Collie and the Infinite Side Straddle Hops

    I checked the temp as I walked out out the door this morning to discover that it was a cool, crisp 81° with 91% humidity. Perfect weather for a F3 beat down.

    We gathered around the flags and at 5:30am I gave the disclaimer and we moseyed over to circle up next to everyone’s favorite rock pile. My sparsely used theme for the morning is 90s alternative rock, so we did some extra SSHs to go with my title which is based on the 1995 Smashing Pumpkins album.

    The warmup

    SSH – 35

    Parker Peters – 20

    Hillbillies – 25

    Smurf jacks – 20 (since I needed to get a few more side straddle hops in for the sake of my title)

    The Playground

    We picked out our rocks and took them over to the playground for a standard playground rotation exercise. Everyone got a partner and I tagged up with Mambi and Hand-Grenada. We rotated to complete sets of shoulder presses (with rock), pull-ups, under dogs, real freddie mercuries, burpees, and merkins. The count was 20 shoulder presses. We completed the rotation twice.

    Slow Motion Suicide

    We took our beloved rocks to the football field to complete a slow motion suicide. I felt like slow motion suicide sounded like the name of an alternative rock band from the 90s. (I just googled the name and Slow Motion Suicide is the name of an alternative rock band!) We did a slow suicide down the football field and back. We ran 1/4 length of the field with rock over head. We stopped for 20 curls and then dropped the rock to run back to the starting line and back to our rock. We took the rock over head to midfield for 20 bench presses. We ran down to the starting line and back to the rock. We put the rock over head to 3/4 of the field for 20 rows. We ran down to the starting line and back to the rock. We put the rock over head to the end for 20 LSS. Following a 30 count, we repeated the suicide across the field to get back to our original position.

    Mary

    We deposited the rocks back in the pile before circling up for some Mary.

    Flutterkicks – 15

    Penguins – 20

    American Hammer – 20

    Wife-pleasers – 20

    O Dolly – 20

    We ran back to the flags. At our arrival there was some controversy with Rudy complaining that he wanted 60 more seconds of Mary. I was ready to put her to bed, so we counted off followed by name-o-rama, and prayer. Thank you men for running and sweating with me. I would never be out there without you. 13 strong.

     

  • Oh the Terror

    This Q had me shaking in fear like night. I was not intending to Q this morning. I had made plans with Hawg to swap Qs. I would take his birdcage Q in early April, and he would take my Q in early June. I filled in admirably for him in the spring, but this week he informed me that he was running out of town to Arizona to avoid filling in for me. After eight weeks of missing birdcage workouts (family vacation, sickness, and trip to Israel), I did not feel ready to Q in my first F3 at this location since my April, but God gives grace to the weak and I faced my terror of leading a workout while feeling woefully out of shape.

    We started with 15 at the imaginary flag and following the disclaimer, we moseyed over to the WWI flag for a warm-up.

    SSH – 20

    Hillbillies – 20

    Peter Parker – 20

    Windmills – 21

    We ended by cleaning up with 20 Annies

    We did an Indian Run back past our starting spot and over to the monkey bars. We did a 4 part rotation with 10 pull-ups as the count Freddie Mercury, Merkins, and Big Boy Sit-ups with the other three stations. We did two rotations.

    We moseyed over to the open field in front of the zoo for the Suck. We did two rounds. 3 minutes each time to see how many reps of 7 SSH, 7 merks, and 7 squats we could each knock out.

    Following the Suck, we moseyed down Constance St. to the levee. My goal was to do elevens at this point. I think I sapped too much of our time and endurance with the 2nd suck, because we only finished half of the exercise before we needed to mosey back to the flag. The elevens started with 10 burpees on the bottom and 1 jump squat on the top. Most men finished the round with 5 burpees and 6 jump squats.

    We moseyed back to the flag. I hate Mary and tried to arrive right at 6:15, but we arrived about 90 seconds early. We did a round of American Hammers and then a round of Wife Pleasers to get ready for Father’s Day and my watch said we were done.

    We counted to 15, said our names, and called it a day.

    Thanks for putting up with my anxiety over my lack of recent attendance. The workout beat me down, and I hope all of the pax felt the same.

     

  • I Hate Trains

    I left 15 minutes early for F3 at the Birdcage this morning, so I could check out the route for the workout. I was only a few minutes from my destination when suddenly – There was a big train in the road Jock! I hate trains Jock! I hate em! Instead of arriving early to check out our route and get my head ready to Q, I rushed in one minute late to see Yankee running the Pax to the WWI memorial and Jingle Vader getting out of his car. I sprinted down the path to the memorial, flying past Vader, who used the dark side to run in the wrong direction, and I arrived just in time to start the warmup.

    SSH – 25

    Hillbillies – 20

    Peter Parkers – 25

    Windmills – 20

    Shoulder taps – 25

    We moseyed back down the path and across Magazine St to East Dr (ensuring that Vader would never find us) and down to the Labyrinth for some park bench work.

    Right leg lifts – 20

    Dips – 20

    Left leg lifts – 20

    We moseyed from the Labyrinth to the Tree of Life where I informed everyone that our workout today was planned at a wedding I officiated under the tree on April 6th.

    Dora needed to make her way to the Tree of Life, and the map told her that she needed to do 100 merkins, 200 jump lunges, and 300 Russian twits to make it to the Tree of Life. We partnered up to complete our journey. One partner ran down the field to the oak at the opposite end while the other knocked out the exercises.

    Arriving at the Tree of Life, I discovered that the tree looked lonely, so we gave it a big hug.  We circled up for a little Global Warming. Everyone started in Al Gore and we did 5 burpees each in a wave. Once that was finished we started over and did 10 burpees this time in honor of absent Q, Hawgcycle.

    We moseyed back toward the flag but stopped just before we got to magazine for a little Mary.

    Flutterkicks – 15

    Penguins – 15

    Big Boy Situps – 15

    Dying Cockroach – 15

    LBCs – 15

    We moseyed back to the flag for the names and the count. I hate that I was a minute late, but the Yankee and the Rev Sox worked together to get us all in the full 45 minute beat down. Thanks for the opportunity to Q. – Rev Sox

  • The Passover

    On a Friday morning with perfect temps and dry conditions, we started on what I hoped would be the greatest, most spiritual F3 workout of all time. It was time for Rev Sox to emphasize the Rev in his name and throw imprecatory curses on the Sox.

    To give this exercise greater spiritual significance we warmed up with:

    SSH x24

    IW x 24

    PlankJacks x 12

    Hillbillies x 24

    I am preaching on the First Communion this Sunday at Grace Community Bible Church in River Ridge (gcbcrr.org) at 10am. Since I was meditating on Communion and the Passover, I themed our workout around the Passover story in Exodus. The story begins with 400 years of slavery in Egypt as the children of Israel made bricks for generations, so we grabbed our rocks and made bricks.

    Making Bricks

    While carrying our precious rocks, we slowly made our way across one of the Pontiff fields by dropping down to our knees and rising back up followed by one lunge on each leg and repeated until we crossed the field.

    The Ten Plagues

    We did a series of 10 exercises. 10 reps each time and we never put down our rocks between sets to picture the 10 plagues that God sent on Egypt to rescue the Israelites.

    10 Shoulder presses

    10 Curls

    10 rows

    10 low slow squats

    Repeat all 4

    10 bench presses

    For the 10th and final plague, we painted the doorposts of our homes to protect our families from the angel of the death. The rock was the paintbrush. Starting position was holding the rock by your right foot, the rock was lifted straight up above the right shoulder, moved over the head to above the left shoulder, and slowly brought down to the left foot. The rock was brought back to the right foot for one rep. We painted 10 doorposts (we are friendly Israelites).

    Wandering to the Red Sea

    Following the plagues, Pharaoh sent us out of Egypt. Like the Israelites, we wandered around the desert on our way to the Red Sea. We walked around the bases of two baseball fields while holding our rocks. A few times everyone was instructed to lift their rocks above their heads as Abacus and Hawg serenaded us with In Your Eyes.

    Waiting for the Water to Part

    We went to the fence and took a seat on the fence to remember how God parted the Red Sea as the Israelites watched in awe. We did two sets of 10 curls while seated against the fence as we gathered our belongings to go across the Red Sea.

    Mary to Freedom

    This is where I ran into trouble. I thought the 10 plagues was going to take longer than it did, so we had a little extra time. My story got kind of forgotten as I struggled to think of Marys to finish the workout.

    Penguins x 20

    Big Boy Situps x 20

    10 Burpees

    10 Burpees

    LBCs x 20

    Here I was planning on sharing that the Egyptians ran in after the Red Sea but the water came in top of them. They tried to flutter kick their way to the other side, but their armor weighed them down and they became dying cockroaches. (I forgot this part of the story in my panic to think of things to get everyone to 6:15)

    FlutterKicks x 16

    Dying Cockroaches x 20

    Russian Twists x 20

    Oh Dolly x 20

    We counted off, shared our names, and named an FNG (Max) Mani-Pedi. Thanks for allowing me the opportunity to fly my Bible nerd flag. It was awesome.

  • The Q needs a flashlight and directions

    The only thing worse than posting at 5:30am to workout is posting at 5:30am on the Monday after Daylight Savings Time. I should have checked on that before asking Hawg to let me Q for the first time. Hawg did make my morning by arriving with the flag just before we started to get going. I think this was the 3rd or 4th time I’ve seen the elusive F3 flag.

    Disclaimer and then mosey to the rocks.

    The cadence was shaky but we did:

    – SSH x 20

    – Peter Parkers x 30

    – Imperial Walkers x 20

    – Propellers x 22 (11 each direction)

    -Hillbillies x 20

    We grabbed our rocks for some classic rock city exercises with more of my shaky cadence:

    Shoulder Press x 15

    Curls for the Girls x 15

    Rows x 20

    Low, Slow Squats x 30

    We moseyed over to the playground equipment for a 4 part rotation exercise. I needed a little help along the way to locate both the swings and later to the hill. It turns out that working out in the dark doesn’t help me know how Pontiff Park is laid out.

    Our rotation workout:

    Elf on the Shelf with a rock for a 10 count while we rotated between elf, underdogs, dips, and mercins.

    After playing around under the swings, we took our rocks to the hill for elevens. It was 10 bench presses with the rock on one side of the hill and 1 burpee on the other to start.

    We ended with Mary:

    American Hammer x 15

    Penguin x 20

    Dying Cockroach x 15

    LBC x 15

    We dropped off our rocks and moseyed back to the flag. I got us there one minute early and was threatened to put shame upon my family name for finishing at 6:14, so we did Freddie Mercury for one minute.

    Count off, namerama, announcements, and a prayer.

    I led. I survived. I am now a man.