Tag: City Park

Weather: Light sprinkles greeted the PAX in the early City Park gloom; an omen of the storms awaiting us for the rest of the day, perhaps – but nothing that keeps the loyal PAX from their morning workout.  Cars rolling in hot turns a PAX of 5 at 5:27 to a PAX of 14 at 5:30.  After the disclaimer, off to the main lawn.  YHC had a workout ready to look back on 2016, remembering those who were called to greater glory during the year.  And what a list it is.

Warm Up: Mosey to the Great Lawn.  Quick warm up of SSH x25, Peter Parker x25, Mountain Climber x24 (oops…).

COP 1: Actors left and right.  Debbie Reynolds; Abe Vigoda AND Ron Glass from Barney Miller.  But for the workout, we went with Florence Henderson: TV’s ultimate Mom.  And what says Mom better than a round of every “Minute On the Minute”.

• 10x Burpees OYO (modify to 12x for the brave, 8x for the faint-of-heart).
• Repeat at the top of every minute.
• 7 minutes: Greg, Peter, Bobby, Marcia, Jan, Cindy and Alice.

COP 2: Mosey back to the Jungle where we remember the Animals we lost.

• Harambe: What better way to remember the most famous Gorilla of 2016?
  • Monkey Humpers x25
  • Gorilla Humpers x20 (Monkey Humpers but with feet spread wide and grab inside of ankles)
  • Howling Monkeys: Circle up and all PAX hold the Monkey Humper position.  1 PAX does 10 Monkey Humpers, repeat with the PAX on the right.  All hold until the wave makes it all the way back to the start.  Having so much fun, start a second wave while the first is still going around.
• Jia Jia: Worlds oldest Panda Bear passes on in October.  Dan Haggerty, he of Grizzly Adams fame too.
  • Bear Crawl Ring of Fire.  Crawl in circle for a while, then PAX hold plank while we pass around a wave of 10 Merkins.
• Pepe the Frog: Feels Bad Man.  Feels Good Man.
  • Frog Jump to the big oak tree over yonder.

COP 3: Off to the Tad Gormley fence.  People feared the Calf Raises, but not today.  Instead, YHC calls out from the long list of notable musicians: Maurice White, Leon Russel, Pete Fountain for starters. According to Wikipedia (the source of all truth): Glenn Frey, David Bowie, Prince, George Michael, Merle Haggard combined for a total of 66 Billboard #1 hits.  So – Route 66 it is.  11 Brick Pillars on the Tad Gormley Fence.  Squat Jumps is the exercise.  1 at the 1st, 2 at the 2nd, etc…  YHC legs were burning by the end.

COP 4: To the mini-foundry, today referred to as “Space”.  Here we run a set YHC chooses to call “The Right Stuff”

• 5 Pull Ups for John Glenn, America’s first Astronaut
• 10 Dips for Edgar Mitchell, survived Apollo 13 and then landed on the moon with Apollo 14
• 15 Death-Star Merkins for Carrie Fisher.  Combine Plank Jack and Merkin: “Out, Down, Up, In”.  (People mocked YHC “That’s it?  That’s the best she gets?”  YHC heard much less mocking after PAX had been at it for a while…)

OYO, repeat repeat repeat until YHC says stop.  YHC said stop after 4:55, commemorating John Glenns 4 hour 55 minute first trip to space.

In memory of Kenny Baker, the actor who literally played R2-D2, PAX repeated the same cycle for 2 more minutes.

COP 5: Literary figures: Edward Albee, Umberto Eco.  But for this round, we commemorate Harper Lee with a re-enactment of the great chase scene.  Partner up.

• PAX 1: Scout.  We don’t have our pageant costumes on.  Instead, High Knee run.  Hands in front, keep knees hitting hands.
• PAX 2: Bob Ewell.  Drop for 10 Merkins, then chase Scout.
• Flapjack and repeat until back to the Great Lawn

YHC noticed that PAX knees (especially his own) were not nearly as high at the end as they were at the start.

COP 6: Athletes.  Muhammad Ali, 4 separate heavyweight title belts.  Gordie Howe, 4 Stanley Cups.  Arnold Palmer, 4 Masters.  Nate Thurmond, first ever NBA quadruple double.  Athletes and the number 4.

• Tabata: 4 minutes of Mountain Climbers.

PAX grumbled about DJ-Rudy’s music selection (1999 from Prince and Heroes from Bowie).

COP 7: Running short of time, but one last round: Politics.  Intentionally kept to a short list.  Antonin Scalia and Fidel Castro.  Opposite ends of the spectrum (YHC forgot to reference Scalia.  My apologies….).

• Tabata, take your pick: Scalia’s American Hammer or Castro’s Russian Twist.

DJ-Rudy queued up Freedom by George Michael.  Bogey especially appreciated DJ-Rudy’s enthusiastic rendition.

Back to the VSF (where are the flags?).  Count-off, Name-o-Rama, Announcements:

• Join the F3 NOLA 2017 NYR: how many F3 workouts will you shoot for?  Join the GroupMe chat, make a commitment public.  Let us all hold each other accountable.
• Check the Q schedule, you may be on it with or without your knowledge

Finish with a prayer.  As we look back on 2016 and those lost, let us all remember that none of knows the day nor the hour when we will be called back home.  Let us live our life every day as good and faithful servants, doing our best with the talents and abilities we have been blessed with, to be leaders and followers, helpers and servants, inspirers and inspired.  When our time comes, let us each be ready to look back on our time here with pride for what we have done for our brothers and sisters around us.

Thank you for letting me lead.  I pray for blessings for all of my F3 brothers and their families for a joyful 2017.

Despite being the middle of December, the PAX was met with a summer-like temperature and long sleeves were nowhere to be found.  Many Saturday regulars trickled in along with a few new faces including Einstein from the Northshore and two FNGs courtesy of Triple Shift.  The PAX started with a dozen but quickly grew to 15 when a few not-so-punctual guys rolled in hot.  This was YHC’s first Saturday Q in five months so several ideas had been brewing which were narrowed down to another cinder block showdown.  After the disclaimer, we were off in a mosey to the Great Lawn for the Warmup, all in cadence:

SSH x30, Windmill x20, Arm Circle x20, Peter Parker x20, Plank Jack x20, Low Country Crab (or Crab Cakes?) x20

Mosey over to the field across from the Big Foundry where YHC had his truck positioned with a pallet of cinder blocks.  This block party would be limited to the half sized variety (18lbs) since inventory was low on the full sizes blocks.  The smaller blocks allowed a different mix of exercises which meant YHC was new to some of these.  Each PAX grabbed a block and circled up for the following:

COP #1:

Elf on the Shelf R-L x20

Squat Block Swing x20

Merkin w/RH on block x20

Elf on the Shelf L-R x20

Squat Block Swing x20

Merkin w/LH on block x20

Going by the soreness in YHC back as he types this, the demostrated form could have used some improvement.  Sorry for any tweaked muscles cause by this.

COP #2:

Pair up in a line for:

PAX #1 grab both blocks and lunge walk while farmer’s carrying the blocks to the designated palmetto tree aka “Arecaceae” or whatever the Yale guy said (50yds away?), crank out 10 burpees, and farmer’s carry back (no lunge).  PAX#2 run to foundry, crank out 10 pullups, and run back.  Flip flop, plank and wait for the six.

Repeat circuit for round 2 with farmer’s carry (no lunge) with block lift there and back with 10 burpees in the middle.  Flip flop with run and pullups.  The forearms were feeling it at this point.

COP#3:

Circle up for:

All PAX shoulder press block while one person drops for a burpee going around counting up to 45 (15 PAX, 3 rounds totaling 45 burpees).  This had some shoulders screaming.

Repeat circle with block curls and burpees counting up to 45.  T-claps to Bubba for pushing hard and displaying a very intense game face.

COP#4 w/Mary:

Russian Twists w/block x20 IC

Flutter Kick (holding block 6″ above sternum) x20 IC

Cockroach Crunch Block Press Supreme x20 IC

Wife Pleasers w/ feet on block x20 IC

Hello Dolly (w/ block 6″ up) x20 IC + x5 for surprise lagniappe

 

Mosey over to the the Museum ledge with a few minutes left for COP #5:

Dips x20 IC, Box Jumps x10 OYO, Dips x10 IC

Mosey back to the flag where we knocked out an abbreviated version of the plank routine known as “The Rotisserie Chicken” (compliments of Marlin).  Finished one minute in to overtime.

Note that Hawg pulled a LIFO (Last In, First Out) and ducked out….guess he wasn’t up for any small talk that morning.

Solid COP including a rather thorough naming process for the two FNGs.  YHC thanked the PAX for keeping me on track the past six months as my son w/special needs was away from home and our family went through a whirlwind of events.  The morning workouts are a good form of therapy for such things and helped YHC stay healthy both mentally and physically.  Thanks for the prayer intentions throughout that time.  My son is now back home and doing better.  Also prayed for Mason, those battling cancer, and the many less fortunate children not just locally but throughout the world.  T-claps to the guys who stuck around for some F2 coffee and our favorite waiter Mike.

Thanks for letting me lead and sorry again for any sore muscles.

Tool

 

 

 

13 Pax posted for the first cold morning workout in New Orleans.  Perfect temperature.

I hate burpees and need to conquer them so I worked them into workout in small doses in order to accomplish a large goal.

First -we started at the flag with .. 10 burpees

We headed to the Peristyle for some jumps up a small wall, 5 burpees on the patform, 10 plank jacks, 5 extreme decline (balls to the wall?) merkins.  Repeat 4 times.

Over the bridge and through some woods to warm up in a field: Arm circles, calf raises, 5 burpees, imperial walkers, some other warm-ups, 5 more burpees

Next – over to Crawfish Island – fortunately it was cold and there were no rotten crawfish.  We grabbed a bench a did a series of box jumps, leg ups, and single-leg squats. No burpees here.

Indian run through the front of the park with a break for some zombie walkers and… burpees.

Next over to Delgado community college for some backwards bear crawl up the front steps while the other half of the group did LBCs.  We got kicked out.  Isn’t Delgado a public place?  The campus cop didn’t seem to want to negotiate.

Back into the park with a couple of burpee breaks.

Over to the the performance pavillion for some very high leg-ups and box jumps along the water with some breaks for… burpees.

And finally we finished up on the Great Lawn with a series of animals and Mary with numerous breaks for… burpees.

110 Burpees in all.  Apparently this is a record for the New Orleans group.  Seems to low. Will push for more next time.

It was a big goal that I might have wanted quit on all at once…. but by conquering it one bite at a time we easily got there.