The Hammer decided that it’s time to up the preparation for the Spartan Beast in October. Since YHC is off for the summer, I get to write the backblast. It’s only fair, since he created the workout. 6 arrived at 5 for 6 stations, 1 minute at each station, then rotate. The stations: dirkins, knee ups, planter carries (grip strength prep), rifle carries, pull-ups (which for round two turned into knee ups, then for round 3 was a dead hang), and the last was a 1 minute plank. 3 rounds total in 15 minutes, give or take. Then we moved to the running. 20 burpees followed by 1 lap around the park. 4 rounds of this was rough. The chatter was on point as usual. YHC brought the music which reminded the music videos of ACDC. Unfortunately, I cannot remember which videos I was supposed to come home and compare.
One runner: Waterpik
3 ruckers went 20 minutes out, 20 minutes back: Russo, Chewy, and Akbar. From what I gathered, they nearly solved all the world problems on the way out, and focused on conspiracy theories on the way back. Something about chem trails….Not quite sure.
I believe that we are going to try and make this a Thursday thing for my fellow Spartan warriors. If you have any ideas to prepare for the Spartan, please share.
COT with Hammer praying us out. Intentions: continued prayers for Bird’s family, and a Happy Fathers Day to all the Dad’s out there. SYITG!
Tag: The Hammer
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A Mini Spartan at the Scramble – from The Hammer
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Tabata timer please!! – from Shooter
Big thanks to Moby for having the Tabata timer available this gloom as the YHC came less prepared.. 6 PAX converged on the corner by the gravel pit after warmups of 20IC/10IC Imperial walkers, Hillbillies, SSH, Cherry pickers, Arm circles, Good mornings and Mummy kicks..
30 secs work, 20 secs rest, 4 rounds of each and loops around the rail.. Rope, one arm kettle swings, curls, chest press, squat thrusters and Shoulder press..
Thanks to Hammer for COT and the headlock for 5 AM Spartan at the Scramble…
Appreciate the post gentlemen and until the next Gloom 👊🏼👍🏼✌🏼!!!
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WE ARE F3 – AROO AROO AROO!!! – from Bushwacker
This fall, some of the PAX of the Northshore will be CSAUPing at the Spartan Beast obstacle race near Dallas. There is a palpably intense excitement in the air and this beatdown was designed to make sure all in attendance felt it. YHC, along with some some kind and committed brothers, arrived at 5:15 to begin setting up. We just beat the pre-thangers back to the flag in time to get things started promptly.
WARMORAMA
Warm up consisted of briefly attended tabata, and a garbled pronouncement of rules, regulations, and “the way things aughta go”, which, thanks to Jose’s requisite comments and interjections of others, were immediately and throughout the course disregarded, slightly adopted, and outright ignored. But a great challenge was mostly bested and a fun time was had by all teams of 2 who attempted.
1. Tire Shuttle – step in each of 6 tires while running through (QIC tripped and fell so never assume anything is TOO easy!)
2.Sandbag StepUp – holding 50lb sandbag, 10 Step Ups on sea wall (MAY have forgotten to mention the step up part)
3. Bucket Carry – 5gallon bucket filled with sand carried out and back
4. Sledge Hammer Slam – 15 wacks on the tire with a 10lb maul
5. Tire Toss – 2 tires tossed individually out and back
6. Sled Drag – 2 45lb plates on a minil sled pulled out and back
7. Battlerope – 3″ battlerope slung up and down for 15 reps
8. Rope Climb w/ Cowbell (not the short crunchy-frogging runner) – climb rope appx 12′ and tap the bell. As indicated prior to start, if a PAX was unwilling or unable to complete an obstacle, they were to complete 10 Burpees and move on. However, the rare and awesome challenge that a rope hanging from a tree posed caused a bit of a pile up by the time QIC and partner Shooter arrived. Immediately Shooter was pulled in by the tractor beam as well
9. Dummy Drag – appx 150lb hose dummy dragged out and back
10. Tire Pull – giant tire with long rope attached, pulled length of rope
11. Spear Throw – in addition to the Rope Climb, Farmer’s carry, Sand Bag, flags and cones our own Zoolander (aka Chaka Zulu)supplied his new favorite toy to be thrown at and stuck into a foam target strapped to a tree. However, our honorary FNG, Al Gore, let us know with great protest that we were committing arbocide and proceded to take picture of the crime scene, and tear down the foam target for good measure.
12. Farmers Carry – set of appx 30lb logs with handles carried out and back
13. Tire Flip – giant tire flipped end over end out and back
14. Sawhorse Hurdles – 4 8′ sawhorses spaced 6′ apart hurdled overStrong Work, great fun, fantastic teamwork!
COT
Count, Name, Grappler demurred praying us out in lieu of Rev Russo.
Just a small taste of thing to come in October, gentlemen. Thank you for allowing me to lead you in tackling this Fire/Spartan obstacle coursePost Script: Many thanks to the many hands who made light work of picking up the coupons!
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Every left turn – 20 Merkins – from Waterpik
A large crowd assembled today for the scramble. Instructions from Y.C. were run the lakefront route and every time we take a left jump down and do 20 Merkins. The watch said we got in 4.2 Miles and we did 100 Merkins a nice even number.
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Inaugural Lakefront Rugby Sevens – from Brexit
12 HIMs graciously posted for my Virgin-Q in full knowledge that it would likely be an absolute shambles. I had to do something British-themed for my first ever Q so, with it being the day of the London Sevens which is an annual rugby sevens tournament, I decided to do a Rugby Sevens inspired workout. You may not know it, but the US is part of the World Rugby Sevens and they’re sometimes pretty good at it (although sitting at 9th in the standings right now). Sevens is a much more simplified version of rugby, which is probably why the US is better at it than normal rugby, played with seven players instead of the full 15. Thought that by focusing on sevens it could be a good intro to the game.
Warmup:
Side straddle hops, arm circles, grass grabbers, toe touches, imperial walkers, peter parkers, merkins (only messed up the cadence once)Got into pairs and moseyed to the shaft passing the rugby ball between each other. The Rugby ball can only go backwards so each player had to sprint ahead to pass the ball backwards to his teammate. You could not move if you didn’t have the ball. Any dropped passes meant 5 burpees which is the number of points you get for a touchdown in rugby, aka, a try.
7 burpees on our own at the gazebo after regrouping. Continued the passing drill to the shaft with the addition that the person without the ball had to do a single burpee while the person with the ball moved ahead of him. It appeared that I had over-estimated the hand-eye coordination of the group (to be fair, some of the pairs were geared up more than others…only so many rugby balls in circulation here so some were forced to use toy footballs that got completely taken with the wind with each pass…) and so was running a little behind schedule but we made up for this for a quicker than expected Sevens (staying on theme) – derkins and sister Mary Catherines. Bear crawl one way, run back.
Moseyed to the rugby pitch, no passing this time.
Get into teams and then did a passing along the line drill. A dropped pass was 7 burpees for the team (this was changed to 5 burpees for the team that YHC joined in with). The other team did merkins/squat jumps in the meantime (merkins on way up, squat jumps on way back).
YHC gave his best attempt at explaining the rules of touch rugby in about 3 minutes and then game-on – 15 min (7 min halves).
Skins v Shirts with Shirts kicking us off. Good formation to start with but it seemed like some of the players got confused with the fact that you are actually allowed to run forwards, you only have to pass it backwards…not too much territory made in the opening play. The Skins got the first try after a good line break (apologies, can’t remember which HIM scored first as I left it a week before I wrote this), but the Shirts re-grouped and came back strong to score two tries in quick succession. After a high-risk move to intercept the ball by the Skins didn’t pay off (if you don’t catch an interception and fumble it, it means a possession turnover), the Shirts were in a commanding position. In the closing minutes of the game, the Skins had their backs against the wall in defense but held firm to win a turnover deep in their own territory. From this position, Zoolander scored a highly controversial try to level the game in the final seconds. The try was awarded against a fierce appeal from the Shirts about a forward pass…this decision was in no way affected by the fact that the impartial ref had jumped into the game a few minutes beforehand and had started playing on the side of the Skins.
Throughout the game, there was some obvious flouting of the offside rule and a little bit of confusion on the number of touches before a turnover, which wasn’t helped by a very forgetful ref, however we had some great runners of the ball on both sides and, all in all, was very impressed with the ability of the HIMs to pick up the concept of the game very quickly. Obviously a testament to the Q. It was great way to get some good cardio in while having some fun. Next time we’ll be introducing scrums…After a few reminders about time running out, we moseyed back, no passing the ball. No time for any core.
Announcements – Spartan Beast, T-shirt ordering and Bogue Chitto trail run on June 15.
COT – Russo closed us out with a special prayer for Grundy and his soon-to-be new addition to his family.
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Standards at the Scramble! – from Shooter
7 HIMs posted on a mild Thursday gloom to get in some work. Arrived with Jose10k getting in some pre work, while Hammer was doing some stretches on his own. Out of the shadows arrives Waterpik with his pre mosey to the Scramble. BD came over through the park with ruck sack in tow, as Chewy walks up with a Ruck as well. . Oh wait, what are these late headlights coming in. Has Cowbell returned? Negative, its Bird rolling in Hot as the warmup is under way..
15IC SSH, Hillbillies, Windmils 10IC Bridges, wife pleasers, glute stretch and hold.
Ruckers 20 out and back, while runners journeyed original route adding an extra loop through the Hermitage. Runners had some time to spare so completed 20IC Elbow to knee left/right, LBCs and 20 Merkins OYO..
Annoucments: BEAST and don’t forget the shirt order.. Hammer has the Q Saturday and PickAxe may be part of the planning so prepare..
Chewy closed us out with COT and until ther next Gloom 👊🏼 👍🏼✌🏼!!
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Milestone Memorial Day Murph – from Akbar
13 for the Memorial Day Murph at the Milestone Marsh. Mumblechatter was strong and the weather was stifling hot, muggy, and brutal.
PAX: Speedy Gonzalez, Bird, The Hammer, Parrot, Zoolander, Steve, Shooter, Tanked Up!, The Manny, Chewy, Jose 10k, TruCoat, Akbar
Warm Ups: SSH, Self-Love, Arm Circles, Grass Grabbers, Windmills, Overhead Claps, Slow Squats
Thang: The Murph
1 mile run to the Lakefront wall and back
100 Pull Ups
200 Merkins
300 Squats
1 mile run to the Lakefront wall and back
Count-o-rama, name-o-rama
Trucoat shared personal experiences of how tough battle can be, reminding us that the wars fought don’t end on the battlefield – but can carry on for a lifetime. Shooter prayed us out with thanks and honor to all U.S. Military who have served and will serve, honoring those who died while serving our country.
Announcements:
Spartan Dallas in October – se Zoolander or Hammer for sign up information
T shirt order ends in 6 days.
Coffeeteeria at Zoolander’s house
SYITG,
Akbar
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Til the Medicine Takes – from Akbar
Mid day text from Whacker alerted YHC that rain was in the forecast. Even when there is an 80% chance of rain, there is an 80% chance that it won’t rain. Last minute change to the Marsh was necessary. We finished the original workout in 30 minutes, which is the average time it takes a medicine to start working. Good thing YHC has done this before, we filled the time quite nicely – with only 1 moment of thought blockage.
PAX : Baby Yoda, Duke of Hazard, Buttsplice, The Hammer, Jose10k, Russo, Trucoat, Brexit, Bushwhacker, Grundy, Zoolander, Steve, Akbar
Warm Up:
SSH, Grass Grabbers, Arm Circles, Self-love, IW, Hillbillies, WindmillsThang:
Full body 4 ways: with runs and bear crawls in between. And some other stuff made up on the spot – Steve Style.Each set included 2 exercises, performed with 4 variations: Cobra style, regular, fast, and a 10 count hold in the middle of said exercise to finish. x10 IC each round
Round 1: Merkins, Lunges, Bear Crawl to the White mailbox, run to the stop sign and back
Round 2: Stone Mountain, Freak Nasty, Bear Crawl to the White mailbox, run to the stop sign and back
Round 3: Pull Ups, Supermans, Bear Crawl on the court, run back.
Intermission 1: Bear Crawl court again, sprint back.
Intermission 2: Swerkins (Knee Tuck Merkin with feet on the swing) while partner holds Chill Cut – 3 sets
Another set, 3 rounds of Freak Nasties and Bulgarian Split Squats x10 IC.
Sprints on the the basketball court, high knees and run, then 11’s of Crunchy Frogs and Little Manny Crunches. There may have been other things as well.
Mary – Flutter kicks IC for 1 minute
Count, Name, and Zoolander prayed us out.
Announcements
Atlanta Beastrun in October – still taking sign ups.
Brexit VQ / Birthday Q next Saturday
Saturday Q sheet is full through June 22Thanks for the opportunity to lead –
SYITG, Akbar
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Buns of Steel – from Akbar
3 at the Marsh for an early morning get together – starting the week out right with good conversation and sweat. School, inflation, a little bit of baseball, and always wondering why people drive up to the park and sit in their cars at 5:30 am. They must be related to Soccer Girl.
Here is how it went.
WU – SSH, Grass Grabbers, Windmills, arm circles, self love, hillbillies, imperial walkers
Trying to stay away from Glutes this morning, we mosey to the playground for 4 sets of 10 pull ups, calf raises, hanging knee raises, and 10 count dead hangs
Mosey to the Lakefront wall for Freak Nasties and Shoulder Taps x10 IC, then Scuba Steves and Glute Bridges each leg x10IC. Yes, we did more Glutes, on accident.
4 sets of that rotation and we ran back to the Marsh stopping for Merkins and Abs.
Mary – Plank til time.
YHC prayed us out for safety, those with exams and graduation, and for good influences in our lives.
Announcements:
Memorial Day Murph at the Marsh 6:30am start
The Atlanta Beast run- talk to Hammer if you want to goThanks for the post, always a great way to start out the week.
SYITG – Akbar
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Nickel and Dimed to Death OR Steve Is a Mean Stupid Face – from Bushwacker
First off, let’s just take a moment to recognize the Pax that got out there early for the pre-thang – I think there were 7-8 guys? And that’s not counting Jose and JV, who started even earlier to roll at their own pace. AND, an additional t-claps to Jose for not only EH’ing JV, but also for getting out to the Marsh extra early for a pre-pre-thang of 30 minutes of pull-ups.
And I’d argue we were off to a good start even before that, when in the wee hours of the morning the temperature mercifully dipped down into the mid-60’s. That small fact made all the difference – were it not for those 8-10 degrees, JV (by his own admission) would’ve punched that guy on roller blades in the face. And hasn’t Christian Slater suffered enough these last few years?
Usual warmorama (can you decode them all?): WM’s, IW’s, GG’s, HB’s, AC’s, SSH’s. And 20 Merkins OYO.
Split Q today, with YHC (Steve right now), up first. I tried to find the most pricker-filled patch of grass to mosey to for our first set of:
Nickel and Dimes I:
5 burpees, 10 hand release merkins, then SSH until next minute – for a total of 5 minutes. (Shout out to Catfish who taught me that one way back when.)Many noticed PI’s entrance at this point, but few saw Zoolander’s sly exit.
Next up: Partner Races (or foot races, if Turtle had been there):
Line up at the start of Marigny for a sprint down the longest block known to man. Winner does 10 merkins, loser 10 burpees.Tank, who positioned himself as the final sprinter, noted that every guy looked good running that block. “If I was passing by and saw those guys, I’d say, ‘Wow, those guys are athletes.’” High praise from the leader of the gazelles.
Back at the pricker-filled, ant-infested (sorry Bird) patch of grass for:
Nickel and Dimes: First Blood Part 2
10 Sister Mary’s (2:1), 5 squats, plank until next minute. 5 minutes.And another partner race down Marigny, with winner taking 10 merkins, loser 10 burpees.
There were plans for Nickel and Dimes III: Nickel and Dimed With A Vengeance, but thankfully Bushwacker had arrived and it was time to cede leadership duties. Even I was hating myself by this point. (Though I’ll point out, quite a few guys still had plenty fuel left in the tank for Wacker – including Russo, who was somehow able to calculate the age of Madonna’s hoo-ha in between Side Straddle Hops [approx. 130 yrs old, if I heard correctly].)
So without further ado, time to turn the pages of this backblast over to the man himself, the Wacker of Bushes (and here you thought he was the long-winded one!).
Geez! Chatty Cathy, huh, guys?
Anyhoo, YHC got a taste of this race business (10 Burpees courtesy of Mr “I’m not really trying hard” Tank), and no thank you sir! Instead, a healthy order of circuit training was on the menu.
All OYO, plank for the 6:
50 100s, 40 SSH (single count), 30 Freddy Mercury’s (2is1), 20 Jump Squats, and 10 Burpees. 1 lap around Noah’s Ark and plank for the six. I reckon we made it through 5 or six rounds, with the final lap continuing to the flag.
COT
Count, Name, Steve prayed us out. Guys, I don’t know why you put up with Steve and his shenanigans, but I know he appreciates the allowance of said pied piper status. On a much more humble note, I appreciate this brotherhood and the ability to contribute in any small way to its lively and fulfilling existence.