F3 Knoxville

BACK TO SCHOOL, BACK TO SCHOOL

Big Ball

THE SCENE: A very brisk, 46 degree morning with the fog rolling in heavy.
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:

A quick stretch to loosen up in the cold followed by an Indian Run past the amphitheater, across the bridge and back down to the big ball.

Circle of pain: Monkey Humpers

Circle of pain: BBSU

Circle of pain: Merkins
THA-THANG:
We grabbed some of the classic Big Ball specialty coupons and made our way across the parking lot to a waiting whiteboard that laid out what was ahead of us: The Billy Madison. Pax were told that we were going back to school to try to prove once and for all that we are not so foolish. Each exercise represented the final exam to pass a specific grade- and each exam (much to our disappointment) was completely cumulative for all of the prior years. The final exams were as follows:

  • 1st grade: Merkins x 10
  • 2nd grade: Squats x 10
  • 3rd grade: LBC x 10
  • 4th grade: Coupon curls x 20
  • 5th grade: Plank jacks x 10 (4 ct)
  • 6th grade: Coupon squat press x 10
  • 7th grade: Iron Mike x 10 (2 ct)
  • 8th grade: Mountain climber x 10 (4 ct)
  • 9th grade: Coupon rows x 10
  • 10th grade: American hammer x 10 (4 ct)
  • 11th grade: Side straddle hop x 10
  • 12th grade: Burpee x 10

Though there were many valiant efforts made- least of which from YHC – none of the Big Ball participants had what it took to graduate and move on. Unfortunately in this reenactment of the story, O’Doyle continued to rule.

MARY:
Working as hard as we could to graduate on time left us no room for Mary today. She wil
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
G-6 (respect, respect, respect), Wedding Singer, Magic Mic, Frizzles

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Today was some encouragement towards EHing those around us. F3 is too good of a thing to keep to ourselves and we should continue to keep eachother accountable in inviting others in. A quick example of the way that F3 can be used in a man’s life was seen at the F3 10 year convergence a couple of weeks ago when F3 Nation leadership was naming FNGs on the beach:

“Our newest FNG was named ‘Rojas’ at the 10 year convergence. Olaf from F3 The Fort gave him an EH as we ran to the workout. He joined us for the full beatdown. After a couple of minutes of throwing out ideas in the Name-a-Rama, we settled on ‘Rojas’ after a character on the show ‘Ted Lasso’. We didn’t know until afterward, but he was honored to get the nickname. Unbeknownst to any of the 355 men there, Rojas was his mother’s maiden name. She passed away three months ago and on the morning we ran by him, he was thinking about her. If you do not believe in a higher power, perhaps this story will remind you that there are no coincidences. Leave space for the miraculous.”
MOLESKIN:
It is unfortunate that the exams were timed as I believe all Pax would have successfully graduated if they had been allowed all the time they needed. Perhaps next time we will move quicker in to the exam time and see what kind of performance is achieved. Maybe we can even see what some of these guy get up to after graduation! It was also a disappointment when everyone realized there would be no recess included in the studies. Perhaps including a quick recess in future attempts would improve morale and allow for some graduates to shine.