AO: Refuse to Lose
Q: Gulfstream ,
PAX: Big Tuna, Scrum, Dial-up, Gapper, heatstroke, Handy Manny, Hacksaw, Gulfstream
FNGs: None
COUNT: 8
WARMUP:
Meh!
Some SSH, Low Slow Squats…

THE THANG:

BOOM :boom: Like a guided missile launched from the gates of Valhalla, eight iron-willed HIMs — glorious, grey-bearded, EXPLODED out of the AO at Charlotte Motor Speedway as the pre-dawn darkness shattered around them, rucks loaded like ammunition crates strapped to the backs of middle-aged warriors who absolutely refused to let Father Time win without a FIGHT. The asphalt was their battlefield. The oval was their colosseum. Q had a plan, and that plan was VIOLENCE…the good kind, the kind that makes you better, stronger, and limits flexibility the next day.

First painstation DETONATED into existence:
25 merkins, chests kissing the ground like they owed it money, arms burning hotter than a NASCAR engine on lap 399. The PAX grunted, the PAX groaned, but these PAX DFQ.
Then the second painstation ERUPTED like a Michael Bay third act:
25 merkins AND 25 squats, glutes firing like twin turbo boosters, thighs screaming the ancient hymn of the FNG who bit off more than he could chew but chewed it ANYWAY. Third painstation? Oh buddy…
25 merkins, 25 squats, AND 25 overhead presses…1000D kissing the sky above Charlotte, the ghost of Dale Earnhardt himself nodding in approval from the heavens. The spirit of Dale was summoned as he followed no man the PAX let t known their displeasure of component sequencing…reps were OYO. And then — AND THEN — the fourth and final painstation hit like a slow-motion explosion in 4K IMAX: 25 merkins, 25 squats, 25 OH presses, AND 25 curls — biceps swelling to the size of lug nuts, souls simultaneously leaving and re-entering bodies, grown men whimpering quietly and calling it breathing.

But it wasn’t OVER. It was NEVER over. Because the Q, that magnificent sadist, had one more gift wrapped in barbed wire and bad intentions yet the PAX were hanging on like a hair on a biscuit.

MARY:

The Burner: 50 in cadence flutter kicks, legs pumping like pistons, cores clenching like they were trying to hold the entire Carolinas together, eight middle-aged men flat on their six on the sacred pavement of the Speedway, staring up at a sky that was just beginning to crack open with dawn light, thinking simultaneously “I should do kore of these.”

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Harrisburg Obtacle course June 5
GORUCK July 4

COT:
For Ruthie (sp?)…Healing prayers
All spoken and unspoken prayers
Always an honor to lead RTL