August 18th, 2020 By Dutch Boy

For the past week or so, YHC has been promoting the Iron Pax Challenge, and that we’d be working to crown a Highlands champion in some form during Sept.

A couple of preblasts were written, and YHCs giant weinke even got posted on Slack last night. Still, some Pax ventured into the gloom this morning not knowing what was in-store. Also, some (okay, just YHC) almost forgot to venture at all.

YHC can’t speak for what happened between 5:30 and 5:38, as I wasn’t there. Was there a disclaimer? Maybe. Did someone explain the routine? It seemed like it. Was there a warm-a-rama? Who knows.

When YHC arrived (after a text from @pavarotti asking where I was) I found 16 other men already circled up taking on…

The Thang

The goal: as many reps as possible in around 42 or 43 minutes of the below exercises. Note that we flipped the rows and burpees after about 2 rounds.

•   10 Bent-over rows
•   15 Burpee Coupon Jump Overs
•   20 Coupon Curls
•   25 Coupon Squat Thrusters
•   30 Reverse Crunches

When 6:14 hit, recover, recover was called and we all got to be done.

COT

COM

Moleskin

• Thanks to everyone that posted this morning. I never expected more than five or six guys to want to participate. Though, to be fair, it seems like a handful of Pax who did post weren’t too enthusiastic about said participation.
• As mentioned, this was a primer for Iron Pax which kicks off next week. So, next Tuesday at 5:30 we start keeping score. Next week will be Week 0 and will serve only as a tiebreaker if we need one. Check out the preblast, and sign up for both the Highlands and National contest: https://f3-meca.com/2020/08/13/preblast-iron-pax-challenge-at-highlands/
• I know there is a lot of feelings around MeCa about Iron Pax, most of them not good. I’ve heard them, and I get them. However, this doesn’t have to be about the national contest. That’s why I wanted to make this contest Highlands-focused. We can push each other each week and we can all get better together. Will we win the big prize? Probably not. But we’ll all know we did the work and did it right. Most importantly, we’ll have done it together leaving no man where we found him. Do the hard things. They suck, but that’s why we do them (shoutout to @spud who I stole that line from).
• Great news from @sandman this morning about his M. Let’s keep lifting them up and praying for continued progress. We are all still here for you brother, so don’t hesitate to reach out.
• Finally, a thought about my tardiness. I try and keep them lighthearted and informal. I don’t take myself too seriously in any aspect of my life (much to my M’s chagrin sometimes). But I felt terrible when I rolled over and realized the clock said 5:33 and there I was still in bed. I was going to chalk it up to a fart sack and take the stick the Pax would throw at me for not showing. Then @pavarotti text me asking where I was and I realized that just because I was late didn’t give me an excuse not to show. I’d made a commitment and the Pax deserved my honoring of that commitment. Someone said something during the beatdown — as a joke I think — that they were disappointed I thought about just not coming at all when they were all there for my workout. That hit me hard, and I didn’t take it as a joke. Just because you make a mistake doesn’t mean you stop the work. It doesn’t mean you phone the rest of whatever it is in. You pick yourself up and you push forward, acknowledging the failure and getting better from it. That’s how we grow and get better as men and as leaders. Thanks to everyone for that reminder this morning. I’m sorry I was late, but I’m damn glad that I came.

Iron Pax Challenge

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