F3 Knoxville

The Not-So-Merry-Go-Round

THE SCENE: 60’s, clear skies, a little damp from yesterdays rain
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:

Static stretching, Tempo Squats, Hill Billies
THA-THANG:
Moseyed over to the field behind the amphitheater with the paved walkway around it, then got into partners with someone who would push you but not lap you or be lapped. Here we had 8 stations, 4 corners and 4 cones (1 between each corner). Each had a different workout assigned to it. Pairs rotated around the stations by completing the exercises, running a lap around the field, and then moving on to the next. Here are the exercises at each station:

  • Toe-Tap-Merkin Bearcrawls forward and backwards across the large paved section
  • Monkey Jumpers across the field then duck walk back
  • 50 x Cobras, 25 x Carolina Dry Docks, 10 x Walkout merkins
  • 100 x BBS
  • 25 x Hand-Release-Release Merkins, 25 x standard Merkins
  • Murder Bunnies across the field and Overhead Carries back
  • 25 x Standing Shoulder Taps, 25 x Plank Shoulder Taps
  • 20 x American Hammers, 20 x Flutterkicks, 20 x Freddie Mercurys, 20 x LBCs

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Shared the story of Robert McCherye, who was a 19th century minister who was just as well known for his faith as he was for being a workaholic. He died of cardiac arrest at 29 and on his death bed wrote “God gave me a message to deliver and a horse to ride on. Alas, I have killed the horse and now I cannot deliver the message.” I think we tend to acknowledge that rest is worthwhile but are still reluctant to take the time needed for it. Sometimes it makes us feel weak or like we’re wasting our time. When Jesus was confronted about working on the Sabbath He said that man was not made for the Sabbath but the Sabbath for man. It’s easy to walk away from that saying “OK, Jesus said its fine for me not to rest”, but rather we should hear that and acknowledge that if the Sabbath was made specifically for us then it must be worthwhile. So let’s seek out rest wherever we need it, whether that be physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Hardship Hill next weekend

Terror Tabatas

THE SCENE: 60* and rainy, but not a total washout
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:

Quick jog to the bridge at 5:30 to get out of the rain
Squat and reach
Hillbilly’s
Shoulder taps
Tempo merkins 5x each diamond, ranger, wide
This and that
THA-THANG:
Simple today.  Jog to the amphitheater, hop on stage for tabatas.  Ascending and descending in rounds, 40 seconds of work with 20 second break.  After each exercise is finished with the noted number of rounds, run a stair circuit.  Starting at stage right, run up the stairs and snake down and up until you reach stage left.  Move on to next exercise and increase/decrease the rounds.

  • Burpees – 2 rounds
  • Lunges – 3 rounds
  • Merkins – 4 rounds (can alternate incline/decline/hand release/whatever you want)
  • Flutter kicks – 5 rounds
  • Inverted rows on rails – 6 rounds (sucked)
  • LBCs – 3 rounds
  • Last round we only had three minutes, so we did one round each of squats, 8-count bodybuilders, and finished with jump squats

COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA
8 braved the rain: Livestrong, Java, Walrus, Postman, Swanson, Trowel, Magic Mic, Abort
CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
“Open your mouth only if what you’re about to say is more beautiful than the silence.” This was directed internally much more than externally, had a quick listen to the rain and sounds of downtown (mostly nice, also a dumptruck)

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Hardship Hill build day this Saturday at Swanson’s house.  OCR the following Saturday, some talk about teams and rucking.

Who Wears Short Shorts – Steam Wears Short Shorts

[ The Scene ]

CHILLY – Finally.

  • Welcome to F3: Fitness – Fellowship – Faith
  • My name is Steam and I’m honored to be in your company and be your Q this morning
  • FNGs? – Yeah, 1 (Thanks G-6)
  • Couple of things before we begin:
    • (1) Contrary to popular belief I am not a professional
    • (2) You’re here on your own volition
    • (3) If you need to modify anything we do this morning – feel free to do so as you need but push yourself and those around you.
      • No man left behind – no man left the same
  • COVID measures are still in place so as much as you can let’s try and keep 6ft if possible.

[ Warm-o-Rama ]

  • If you have keys or anything you need to throw in the ruck now would be the time to do it – I’ll also have water, some medical gear and my phone.
  • Here we go – let’s mosey

—Pause—

Did some warm-up Xs while we were waiting on Cheatsheet – got the blood flowing

[ The Thang ]

(Mosey to the track)

(2) Warm-Up Laps

  • SSH: 10 x1

Take a lap

  • Cherry-Pickers: 5 x 1

Take a lap

(Mosey to stream across tracks)

(3) Rockin’ Down the Stream

  • Pick a rock, any rock
  • 50 curls
    • Walk (rock overhead) to the end
  • 50 curls
    • Walk (rock overhead) back to the stairs — 10 merkins 
  • 50 rock presses
    • Walk (rock above head)
  • 50 rock presses
    • Walk (rock overhead) back to the stairs — 10 merkins
  • 30 rock rows
    • Walk (rock on 1 shoulder) to the end 
  • 30 rock rows
    • Walk (rock on other shoulders) back to the stairs — 5 merkins
  • 30 rock squats
    • Walk (bear hug rock) to the end 
  • 30 rock squats
    • Walk (bear hug rock) back to the stairs — 3 merkins
  • 10 rock triceps
    • Walk (rock overhead) to the end
  • 10 rock triceps
    • Walk (rock bearhug) back to stairs — 1 merkin

(Put back rocks)

PAX hold the Al Gore position and just listen. Simply listen. To the sound of the brook running below, the world waking up, etc. No matter what comes at you today, no matter what happens this week – take in THIS moment. Just listen to the simplicity of creation.

(Mosey back to AO)

  • hit track lap on the way back — same exercises as 1st time + 2 laps 
  • Hit 9-square up on the way back 
    • Under bridge — 9 squares = 9 burpees to get across

BTTW (Balls To The Wall) back to the AO (100 or so meters)

[ Mary ]

  • 5 slow flutter kicks
  • 5 slow American hammers
  • 5 slow Little LBCs
  • 5 slow hello dolly’s

Light stretching Xs

[ COT ]

  • # off — 10
  • Name o Rama
  • FNGs — 1 = Roadkill
  • BOM

Encouragement from a “It Could Always Be Worse” GORUCK patch

THIS is a great patch. What a good reminder – It COULD Always Be Worse.

You woke up this morning by nothing of your own doing. Breath was put in your lungs. You have vitality in your bones to do something like F3. Physical health.

When it feels really dark – tell yourself “It Could Always Be Worse” and put one foot in front of the other.

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has no enough trouble of its own.”‭ — Matthew‬ ‭6:34‬ ‭

TODAY is a good day to have a good day. Focus in on today. Also let’s talk about this word “trouble.” I want to challenge us to reframe this word.

“Trouble” — trouble for the kingdom of Hell. There is a very real enemy that seeks to kill, steal, and destroy. So when we do things like F3 and gather together to strengthen each other in prayer and as High Impact Men – this causes trouble for the enemy. Let’s cause some trouble for the enemy this week by what we say, what we do, and how we live our lives as HIM. 

BE ENCOURAGED! (1) It Could Always Be Worse and (2) It’s A Good Day To Have A Good Day

Tree Biscuit – The Quacken

THE SCENE: Warm 83
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER: Covid-19 as well as welcome
WARM-O-RAMA: SSH, Windmills, Cherry Pickers, Phelps, Big Arm Circles

The Tree Biscuit

As a group, Run to an un-slapped tree, slap it, everyone call out the running burpee total,  do A single burpee, repeat.

Suggestions/Notes/Guidelines:

  • A tree only gets tagged once
  • Scaling/Modification: Skip a burpee if you need to but stay with the pack always.
  • Taggers: Be sure to take turns tagging/slapping a tree
  • In Cadence: The group also calls out the running total, not just the tagger. The tagger calls it out first though. the louder the better.
  • What’s a Tree: Don’t waste time & energy on shrubs – skip the shrubs – tag the trees
  • No Poison Ivy: Pass trees that are surrounded by shrubs, ivy, waist high grass.
  • Terrain:  Be careful when running not to twist and ankle – trees have lots of bumpy roots around them.  And don’t hit your face on a rock or root when doing a burpee in the dirt.
  • Milestones: At 50, 100, 150, 200 make sure the group catches up and circles around the tree, wait a few seconds. Do the burpee.  Celebrating these milestones adds to the encouragement factor.

It’s not about the numbers but in the spirit of healthy competition here they are:

Previous Tree biscuits from other AO’s

In the interest of more burpees, “the Mary” is skipped.

Circle of Men

1 Corinthians 9:24 Don’t you realize that in a race everyone runs, but only one person gets the prize? So run to win! 25 All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. 26 So I run with purpose in every step. I am not just shadowboxing. 27 I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified.

Announcements :

Rain Plans

THE SCENE: Lower 70’s, started with a drizzle ended with a downpour
F3 WELCOME & DISCLAIMER
WARM-O-RAMA:

SSH, Arm Circles, Shoulder Taps, Tempo Squats, Rockettes
THA-THANG:
Went to the coupon pile by L&N and got ourselves a brick. Moseyed with our bricks over to the 11th street garage. Here we had 4 cones spaced out on the opposite end of the garage. We did suicides, running to the 1st cone and back, then to the 2nd cone and 1st cone and back, and so on til we hit all 4. Each cone had an exercise assigned to it.

  • Round 1 (with our rocks): Cone 1= 15 curls, 2= 15 tricep extensions, 3= 15 shoulder presses, 4= 15 goblet squats
  • Round 2 (without our rocks): Cone 1= 15 LBCs, 2= 15 Merkins, 3= 15 American Hammers (4ct.), 4= 15 Hand Release Merkins
  • Intermission: Took a break from suicides with 1 minute wall sits, 5 reps of slow merkins, then another minute of wall sits and 5 more reps of slow merkins
  • Rinse and Repeat: We did all the above one more time through

MARY:
Ran back to under the bridge, did some flutterkicks and grasshoppers, ended with the word there and then took our rocks back
COUNT-OFF & NAME-O-RAMA

CIRCLE OF TRUST/BOM:
Mr. Wedgie talked about being a bit of an overplanner at the Quacken yesterday. I had been reading Proverbs earlier and one of my favorite verses that Wedgie reminded me of is “In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps” (Prov. 16:9) I think this can often sound like “My plans are useless because at the end of the day God decides what happens”, but the accurate way to hear this is “my plans succeed because the Lord allows them to”. My campus ministry has made all sorts of plans to accommodate for the restrictions on campus in order for us to continue to minister to UT students, but at any point in the future we could be told to limit our numbers even more, to no longer meet on or near campus, or that we aren’t even allowed to come to campus at all. So right now we’ve been spending a lot of time praying about and reminding ourselves that our plans are worth pursuing, but that should our plans change we should be content and remember that the Lord is still sovereign. So I encouraged all of us to continue to put effort and thought into our plans, but to hold onto them open handed and be willing to see them change