13 Pax for two laps of merkins

Weather 61 deg 82% humidity

COP/Disclaimer/Prayer

13 SSH IC

15 IW IC

10 Willy Mays Hays IC

10 Merkins IC (one done real slow just to keep the pax humble on the cadence part)

17 Windmills IC

The Thang:

After warm up, mosey from the amphitheater to the start of the inner loop around the open field oft the AO.  13 Light poles line the loop.  YHC instructed the Pax for the first lap to stop at each and do atomic merkins with increasing reps per light (1st pole 1 AM, 2nd pole 2, 3rd 3x, etc) Second lap at each pole do decreasing number of regular merkins (I dont think they were excited to do two laps, candidly it was harder than YHC thought it would be).  When finished mosey to far side then off to Tombstone Hill.  4 trips up the hill facing each direction each trip (forwards, right, left, backwards) then each trip back down lunge down the hill.  The mumblechatter picked up during this…believe Donatello said something to the effect I can’t do anything normally (since when does F3 do anything “normally”?).  Mosey back to amphitheater to finish up with some Mary of American Thor to 6/24.

Moleskin:

YHC has been thinking quite a bit lately about the mantra that we are here and doing this to “get better”.  What exactly does that mean?  Does that mean that we are there to get better at working out? I do not think so since that is very superficial and falls way short of anything meaningful and is quite literally left at the AO.

So what then does it mean?  YHC and 7 other Pax recently competed in our first CSAUP at a local 10k OCR with a large amount of it on mountain trails.  YHC knew two things going into that event, I have never ran that far at one time in my life.  Secondly, as the lone representative of the F3 Johnson City 200lb club that was running, there was a high probability I would be last…not just of the group, but last.

So as I myself and another Pax approached the last obstacle (a 100+ yard long mud trench that ranged from ankle to mid thigh deep) I was barely able to keep my balance.  As I neared the end of that pit, I noticed that the rest didn’t go on ahead to finish (and I truly would not have blamed them at all), rather they were encouraging me to keep going and to finish, and that we would finish as a team, since that is how we started.  That very act meant more to me than they could have ever know.

Getting better means just that.  Taking the encouragement to and from others during these workouts beyond the AO and into our lives.  Also, that it isn’t always about ourselves, and that most times when we give up something others may gain.