Polar Pain

The polar vortex blew in 17 PAX this morning to Broken Wheel where our theme was simply to keep warm and not die of hypothermia. It would have been a very Oregon Trail way to go, but, not on my watch!!

There was a Preparty, but: NumbTucks yelled something grumpy and unintelligible when I asked him what they were doing, so I let it be. To a bystander it looked like sprints between light poles with speed bumps of shivering.

PAX: Nimbus1500, CheezWhiz, Netflix, NumbTucks, Show Me, Creeper, Tebow, MicDrop, Stats, Gaylord Focker, Snowball, Barney Fievel, Steinbrenner (F3 Memphis), Sterno, Kermit, Inspector Gadget, and RagDoll (QiC).

Warm-up: 

  • 40 Side Straddle Hops
  • 10 LBAC’s forwards and backwards in cadence.
  • Stretch out the legs with some Toe Touches, Willie Mays Hayes and Good Mornings, and away we go!

Thang 1: Urban Typewriter

We’ve done the Typewriter a few times before on the glorious Forge football field, but we’re remanded to a parking lot this morning with only parking space stripes to guide us. So we’ll call this the Urban Typewriter.

  • Starting at the edge of the parking lot the PAX perform 10 Ranger Merkins (that’s a Merkin with your arms pulled back toward the bottom of your ribcage)
  • Then duck walk approx 40 yards towards the other end of the parking lot
  • Move forward approx 5 yards and perform 10 Burpees
  • Bear crawl back across the parking lot 40 yards
  • Repeat 10 Ranger Merkins and continue to serpentine your way through the lot, moving ahead 5ish yards each time you cross the lot.

Now, you kids that are over 35 should know what a typewriter is: that old writing machine where you press a key, and a hammer raises to strike an ink ribbon to impress a letter on a sheet of paper. Keys get pressed, the carriage moves right to left, until you get to a new line and it all starts over again.

Well, our typewriter looked more like one of those janky old rusty bits someone dug out of a dumpster behind Goodwill where all the keys are locked up, and you press one key and 5 letters all try to strike the ink ribbon at once, and it ends as a whole gobbed up inky mess that jacks up your paper.

I admit, performing the Urban Typewriter with little more than faint parking lot stripes to guide you is a challenging task, and as Q, I take responsibility for any unclear directions. The function was there – we’ll need to keep working on form.

At any rate, the PAX were breathing hard at the end of 10 passes across the parking lot.

Mosey 1: Catch Me If You Can

We line up for an Indian Run, 1.25 times around the the track. Last PAX in line drops to do 3 Yurpees (check the Exicon, courtesy of F3 Nolensville), then sprints to the front of the line, tagging the last person in line on his way past who then drops to do 3 Yurpees.

Thang 2: Wall Work

We pull off at the Snack Shack to do a Nimbus1500 favorite thing – Wall Walk-Ups. After pairing off…

  • Partner 1 does 5 Inverted Box Jumps (start at the top, jump down), while
  • Partner 2 does as many Wall Walk-Ups as possible (begin in high plank position, then walk your feet backwards up the brick wall of the Snack Shack, then down again).

Rinse and repeat this, increasing the number of Inverted Box Jumps by 5 each set – 5, 10, 15, 20 – until Q calls time or Barney Fievel breaks your phone.

Mosey 2: Catch Me If You Can (Redux)

Those who had already done Yurpees get to start at the front of the line while we continue our Indian Run. We complete another .75 times around the track and then stop off at the picnic shelter.

Thang 3: Arm To Table

We number off in groups of 4, each standing at the corner of a wooden picnic table bench. We do three sets of:

  • 5 Derkins
  • 5 Overhead Presses of the picnic table

I know there was some jealousy for those who didn’t get to do Yurpees on our Indian Run, so after circling up we all do 3 Yurpees together for good measure.

Nameorama / COT

I was impressed to have 17 PAX on what I think has been one of our coldest mornings of the winter so far… even while missing a couple regulars on IR. Great job men!

Creeper gave us a 9th Man overview of his life which included the fact that he is an Eagle Scout, how he started dating his wife when she was but a young intern at a local church (he assures us she was 18 and not his intern), and how he’s a professional wrestling super-fan. Who knew! I honestly don’t think we could handle any more info from Creeper than we got today – mind blown.

Continued prayers for Soccer Mom and fam. Keeping 3rd Degree and his fam in prayer as they prepare for 2.0. And healing for all our injured PAX.

Really enjoyed seeing you all and leading you this morning. Until next time, peace!

~ RagDoll