Category: Northshore

  • The Backup

    Being called in as a last minute backup can go one of two ways: either you’re a little stressed because you have to plan a beatdown quickly, or maybe the opposite, a little too relaxed, shirking that preparation because… hey, you’re the backup, what’re they expecting?

    Now, I’m not gonna say that YHC came wholly unprepared, not my style.  But preparation was …light.

    We already knew Pik and Wacker were out this morning, so Shooter and I stood in the darkness wondering if it’d be just the two of us.  Then we saw Cowbell’s truck coming in hot… or at least, we thought it was Cowbell’s truck.  It came and went.  Hmm. “I guess that wasn’t Cowbell,” I say to Shooter. “No, that was him,” he responds. And sure enough, the car returns after pulling a three-point turn and Cowbell pops out.  Hmm. Well, it is early in the morning, no judgement here.

    Warmorama:  Torso twist, arm circles, SSH, IW’s, high knees, and butt kicks, all x20 IC.

    Thang:  Mosey a whopping 20 feet to the edge of the basketball court for a mix of suicides and AMRAPS:

    Full court suicide

    1 minute of merkins

    Full court suicide

    1 minute of BB sit-ups

    Full court suicide

    1 minute of jump tucks

    Full court suicide

    1 minute of one leg lateral hops, another minute for the other leg

    Full court suicide

    1 minute of Aussie pull-ups

    Full court suicide

    90 seconds of plank jacks

    Lunge walk half the court, bear crawl back

    1 minute of shoulder taps

    Full court suicide

    Over to center court for a rousing round of Burp n’ Merk (ascending merkins with each burpee), up to 10. Shooter requested we descend back down to 1, as real men would, but time was short.

    Closed it out with some Mary, little manny crunches, hello dolly’s, x 25 in random cadences.

    COT and Shooter prayed us out.  A sincere thank you for the opportunity to better myself with good men like yourselves.

  • Back Blasts from the Past

    Inspired by Chewy’s spate of back to back to back blasts, YHC figured it was time to put some fingers to the keyboard. I love to read these things, so why have I shirked my duty for my last 3 Q’s?  

    Alright, let’s forget the counts just this once, as I’ll be lucky to get the rest of it right:

    Warmorama – SSH, IWs, Cherry Pickers, arm circles, air presses, etc.

    And finally, high knees until called, then drop for a burpee…. round the circle we went, a few times.

    Thang: Over to the pull-up bars, my favorite feature of the marsh.  One man does 5 pull ups, while the rest of the pax does flutters.  5 rounds of this, (that’s 25 per man for you non-mathematicians) and then on to hanging knee tucks.  10 per man this time, while everyone does J-Los.  3 rounds here of this.

    A long mosey from the warm confines of the Marsh to the warm expanse of the lakefront.  Oh, forgot – we sprinted a few of those blocks.  Maybe… 2?   Then hit up the sea wall for none other than: Step Ups, Freaks, Bulgarians, Freaks, Step ups with Knee Raises, Freaks.

    Over to a grassy spot for some Captain Thor, 1 sit-up to 4 putins, up to 10/40.  This was Cowbell’s virgin Thor experience, he seemed to enjoy.

    Mosey back to the Marsh, this time stopping at each corner to do 10 merkins.  Switched it up each block, alternating between wide, diamond, T, and your plain ol’ average merkin.  

    COT and Cowbell prayed us out.  Thanks gents for the opportunity to lead, and for keeping each other sharp.  Love to start the week out here with you guys.

  • B-Limps

    8 pax met at Gma’s house on the gloriously muggy morning.

    The attendance was a little up this morning, after Cowbell’s call to action on Saturday at the lakefront.

    The Thang:

    Mosey to parking lot for Quick Warm up:

    SSH x 20; IW x 20; Merkins x 20 all IC

    Mosey to the under pass for

    1 lap of hill repeats and 25 Burpees, Lunges, IW, Merkins, Plank J’s, and Skwaats after each

    Mosey back to the Flag
    Distance 2.5 miles according to Cowbell.

    COM: including Side ups, and V Ups x 25 and BB sit ups x 10 led by Zoo

    Zoolander, again showing his ability to heal like Wolverine, running hill repeats < 10 weeks post-op ankle surgery.

    COT, Name-o-Rama: Welcome FNG Handy, who is married to Zoolander’s sister. Prayer .

    thanks guys for letting me lead,

    Chewy.

  • SOAP Note

    Subjective: The pax arrived at Shovel flag, everyone was happy to see EiEi and Burgundy. They haven’t been around in a while.

    Objective: Warm up exercises including jane fondas, wife pleasers, Mt climbers and IW x 20 each. The pax then ran 3.something miles, and then finished up with 100 skwaats.

    Assessment: Cowbell and Waterpick are fast, they had to plank a long time waiting for Ei and YHC. There was a lot of grumbling about the 100 skwaats, but overall everyone enjoyed the run and seemed to tolerate it well.

    Plan: Lets do it again next Thursday!

    Thanks for letting me lead,

    Chewy

  • Circuit Soup

    4 pax met up at Gma’s house last tuesday for a circuit of exercises in the 95 degrees heat and humidity at 5:00 am.

    Is November here yet?!

    The Thang:

    1/4 mile run around the block followed by

    -10 Aussie Pull ups

    -15 HR Merkins

    -20 Good Mornings

    -25 Skwaats

    Rinse and Repeat x 6

    Name-o-rama, COT, Prayer.

  • Diamonds In The Rough

    Warmarama:

    10 reps IC for each exercise:

    Toe Touches, Wind Mills, Imperial Walkers, Slow Squats, Side Straddle Hops, Seal Jacks,  High Knees, Butt Kicks, Forward Arm Circles, Reverse Arm Circles, Overhead Claps

    Mosey

    Circle Burp……

    All pacs formed the best circle that 22 guys could make. Everyone starts doing High Knees. Starting and ending with yours truly, when Pac shouts “DOWN,” all pacs do one burpee. High Knees commence until the next pac says down. Rinse and repeat until all pacs have done one burpee.

    Mosey to the Park

    7 of Diamonds

    Not sure if anyone found any diamonds, but I am pretty sure everyone found the bottom of their gas tanks with this one.

    Starting at one corner of the park, all Pacs will perform an exercise layed out by THE Manny for 7 reps.  Once that exercise is complete, all pacs mosey to the second “corner” of the park. The same exercise is completed for the same amount of reps.  Pacs mosey to the third corner,   rinse and repeat the same exercise and reps performed at the first two corners. Once everyone gets back to the first corner, plank it up until 6 gets there and then wait for the next exercise and reps to be distributed to the troops.  Here’s how this went down this morning.

    Round 1 – 7 Burpees

    Round 2 – 14 Merkins

    Round 3 – 21 Squats

    Round 4 – 28 Plank Jacks

    Round 5 – 21 Mountain Climbers

    Round 6 – 14 Squat Jumps

    Round 7 – 7 Burpees

    Mosey to the spot of the Circle Burp and get on your 6 for some Mary.

    Little Manny Crunches – 15 IC

    Freddie Mercuries – 20 IC

    Flutter Kicks – 10 IC

    Leg Lifts – 10 IC

    Puttins – 10 IC

    100s – 10 IC

    Absolutions – 10 IC

    Pacs break into two groups and Mosey back to flag.

    Special appearance by Capt Sparkles for the Circle of Trust. Thanks for treating the 22 Pac Turn Out to coffee Capt.

    The Hammer prayed us out.

  • A Love Letter to the Gipper

    Hey Gipper! It’s been a while. Did you miss me? I sure missed you. In fact, I missed you so much that slow-ass drivers and blinding rain couldn’t keep me away this morning. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder! And, of course, my most sincere apologies for my lateness, but I made sure you were in the excellent hands of Barely Legal until I arrived. He made sure you were nice and warm with Windmills and other exercises by the time I got there. Though I had to be absolutely certain you were ready to break a sweat by adding Torso Twists and Scorpion Kicks to the list.

    I didn’t want to waste any time in getting reacquainted so I lead you to the top of the justice center parking garage, which seemed like the perfect setting for some…fun n games;)

    I was planning to honor Coconuts, and crown a new champion in Turbo Tax’s conspicuous absence, but, alas, I forgot my phone with the freshly downloaded Beep Test app. Instead, I – wouldn’t quite say settled – on Doracides to really get you all hot and bothered. Moby Dick was playing with himself, as we all teamed up to do cumulative 100 SSH, 200 Merkins, 300 Squats and 400 100s, while the odd partner did suicides with 1 or 2 burpees at each point.

    By this time our pulses were racing, but things were really about to get Jacked Up. In cadence, we did a set of x50SSH, then 40Seal Jacks, 30 Plank Jacks and 20 Smurf Jacks. I don’t know about you, but that really took my breath away!

    After revving our engines so hard, I wanted to finish things off a little more gently. So we mosied back to the flag for some Little Manny Crunches and Freddy Mercurys.

    Still flying high on the buzz of our electrifying encounter, the COT was immediately followed by some direct O MY HALLELUJAH from Einstein.

    I’m sorry I had to run out so abruptly when we finished, but, ya know, I had a… thing… I had to get to. You were incredible Gipper! My body aches in places I didn’t know I had, for cryin’ out loud! You’ll always be my favorite…be seeing ya.

  • When Life Gives You Cinderblocks…

    Everyone can finish the saying, “When life gives you lemons…”. But not everyone knows how to complete the saying, “When life gives you cinderblocks….” So let YHC help everyone out; “when life gives you cinderblocks, you use them in your workouts!!!”

    The PAX learned the truth of this saying this morning in a more than intellectual level. And even though this workout was very difficult, I would argue that all the blame should be placed on TurboTax. For he’s the one who lent me his cinderblocks. I take no responsibility, Turbo should have known better.

    So after a disclaimer was given, the fun began.

    Warmup

    Side straddle hop In cadence to 52! I wanted the pax to remember Dredd’s saying when he came down for our GrowRuck, “Be prepared for the expected, but be ready for the unexpected.” Doing side straddle hops to 52 definitely drove that idea home.

    Then we did:

    Windmills in cadence, and a shoulder series warmup in cadence.

    The Thang

    Moseyed to the opening before the bridge where the Grundymobile was parked with the aforementioned cinderblocks. But first we did something called the welsh dragons.

    Welsh Dragons: Remain in plank position the whole time. Bear crawl forward 4 steps, do 1 merkin, 1 plank jack, and tap the BACK of each shoulder 1 time. Repeat adding 1 rep to each exercise each time – bear crawl forward 4 steps, do 2 merkins, 2 plank jacks, 2 sets of back of shoulder taps… etc. We went until We reached 10 reps each and covered 30-50 feet.

    Then the Q realized he had left the keys to his car back at the flag… So the Pax got a 5 minute plank/rest while the Q ran back to grab them. I’m sure everyone held a plank the whole time…

    Upon returning, the grundymobile was opened and the cinderblocks were distributed. It was time for the main event. Everyone partnered up (some teams had 3 people), and we did a Dora 1, 2, 3 with cinderblocks. Round 1 (100 step ups on to the sea wall with the cinderblock) partner 2 ran to the walkway and did 3 burpees and returned to take over the rep count. Round 2 (200 kettlebell swings), and round 3 (300 overhead presses).

    There was much pain involved but kudos to all of the pax for pushing through! We returned the cinderblocks and moseyed/walked back to the flag for some Mary.

    Like the beginning of the workout, be ready for anything. Like Little Manny crunches in cadence to 53!!!

    Circled it up and Manny closed us out wonderfully.

    Great job everyone!

    Until next time, Grundy

  • Routine break

    Backblast will be like the beatdown, just a routine break at work.. It shall be brief and to the point so here it goes..

    Warmup

    10IC Torso twist, 10IC Scorpion kicks, Down dawg stretch with right leg high and left leg high.. 10IC SSH and 10IC Butt kicks..

    Thang

    Standard route through ole Mandeville with 4 breaks in the run. 3 taking place at the corner of Monroe and Massena Street to drop for 5 Merkins, 5 eight count body builders and 25 LBCs. One on the run down, after the circle, on Sunset pier and again at the corner on the return to the AO..

    Upon return the PAX completed 20IC Freddie Mercuries, chill cut Plank with right arm high and left arm high.

    count, announce, COT

    Appreciation to Waterpik for 🙏🏻 us out!!

    👍🏻👊🏻✌🏻 Till the next Gloom!

  • Return of the Green Mile

    19 pax showed up to the Lakefront on Saturday Morning, for a beatdown known as the Green Mile.

    Pre-thang; 2 miles Tanked up, Bushwacker, Barely Legal and a late arriving YHC.

    The thang:

    Warm up: SSH, IW, Mt climbers, Slow skwaats, and dippy birds all IC x 20

    The Green Mile: 1/2 mile from shovel flag to eastern playground with 7 fire hydrants along the way. The pax were instructed to perform 5 merkins and 10 squats at each hydrant on the way down and 10 merkins and 20 squat on the way back. The pax returned to the shovel flag with 30 min to spare, just enough time for a second round. Only this time it was 10 merks/20 squats on the way down and 5 merks/10 squats on the way back.

    Cooldown: SSH, IW, Mt climbers, Slow skwaats, and dippy birds all IC x 20

    It seems that the pax has some superhumans among them: with Zoolander only weeks out of surgery for a lower leg fracture, leading the front of the pax…unreal. And Tanked-up despite finding a 7th gear to end the workout up front, well done guys.