Month: May 2026

Memorial Day Murph
: PAX: Sora, Colson, and Southie.
1 mile run
100 pull-ups
200 merkins
300 squats
1 mile run

COT.

Backblast: May 23rd, 2026

AO: The Fortress – Grace Church – Perrysburg, OH

PAX:
Photon – Q
Carmen Sandiego
Deliverance
Meatloaf
Spaulding
Stark
Tarnished
Trench – FNG
Ukulele

Workout: 1000th Post: The Steps to Ambassador

FNG’s: Trench

Mission and Principles:
F3: Fitness, Fellowship, Faith
Mission: To plant, grow and serve small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership.
The core principles of F3 are that it is always:
1. Free of charge
2. Open to all men
3. Held outdoors, rain or shine, heat or cold
4. Led by men who participate in the workout in a rotating fashion, with no training or certification necessary. You versus you. Modify or stop an exercise if you need to. The most important thing is that nobody gets hurt.
5. Ends with a Circle of Trust
Credo: Leave no man behind but leave no man where you find him

Warm-up: N/A

The “Thang”:

This was a beatdown that chronicled my journey to 1000 posts in F3 through four very particular steps.
Each step represented a particular exercise or type of work that I learned to perform at all, or learned to perform very well, and each step increased in order of magnitude as well as difficulty in an attempt to emphasize how F3 has the ability to accelerate a man non-linearly when he commits to consistency.

My 2nd post in F3 had me at The Necropolis for a Stark run Q. He had plans to make it to the Perrysburg city pool (prior to Nightmare’s establishment) that day, but had to change his route because YHC was not a runner. I was slow. I couldn’t breathe. And at the end of the beatdown, I couldn’t even run. So he picked up the 6 and walked with me.

Step 1 in my F3 journey was learning to run. To represent learning to run, we ran the large trail around Woodlands Park, which was right around 1 mile.

Early on in my F3 career, I started taking a liking to animal movements. First was bear crawls (as evident by my 3rd or so Q), and soon after, murder bunnies and crab walks. I learned that my shoulder range of motion (thanks, Coconut) and my long limbs (ask Fat Amy) provided me with the tools to perform these movements quickly and efficiently.

Step 2 in my F3 journey was learning to love animal movements. To represent my love of animal movements, I stole one of my top 3 non-Photon beatdowns of all time and ran a portion of Stark’s “No Reps, No Running, No Burpees” beatdown. But I amended it and incorporated only my favorite animal movements from that beatdown…ones that, when arranged in the right order, allowed for incredible efficiency in movement across the parking lot. 5 MOTs, 2 parking spaces each, for 10 spaces total. 10 rounds straight. Bunny Hop, Bear Crawl, (blockless) Murder Bunny, (blockless) Ape Hop, Forward Crab Walk.

Two weeks into my F3 journey, I carpooled with Callahan to The Nest on a holiday for a Raven beatdown whose groupMe event sounded interesting… Something about mountain climbing. Little did I know, that event would end up being an abridged version of burpee mountain. And it absolutely destroyed me. I couldn’t even do the first 8 rounds of 8 burpees per minute. Or the second 7 rounds of 7 burpees per minute. The playlist was lit that day, however…and that beatdown planted a seed in me. Weeks and months later, and I started to like burpees. Even love them. And now? Now I can do 500 burpees in an hour.

Step 3 in my F3 journey was learning to love and embrace the best exercise in the swamp…the burpee. And no better way to represent my love for burpees than to rip off 100 in a row…mid beatdown. So that’s what we did.

I remember the first time I was present at a Thor 100 (2 is 1) SSH warmup. It was at the Fortress…before a Mario Kart beatdown, maybe? And it was as hilarious as it was hard. Fast forward a year later…I had hurt my shoulder and couldn’t do anything upper body. It was my 500th post and I had the Q at The Armory. I started warming up with SSHs and Viper made a joke that we should do 500 of them. And I can’t let a good suggestion go to waste, so we did. 250 (2 is 1) SSHs. Fast forward another year and I ran The Nightmare Before Christmas…focusing on the idea of SSH-ing until you couldn’t anymore, before falling into your own personal nightmare exercise. Fortunately for me, Ukulele was there that day and we pushed each other to perform 500 (2 is 1) straight without stopping.

Step 4 in my F3 journey was learning to love copious amounts of SSHs. Amounts so absurd that people didn’t think that it was possible. To represent my love for ludicrous amounts of SSHs, and another order of magnitude, the PAX performed 500 (2 is 1) SSHs, in cadence, to finish the beatdown.

Step 1: 1 mile
Step 2: 10 parking spaces of animal movements, 10 times
Step 3: 100 burpees
Step 4: 1000 SSHs

Ended with:
Count-O-Rama: 9
Name-O-Rama

The Six – Spaulding

LDP3

Ball of Man

Spreadsheets from the Gloom: 55 and wet, but the rain had stopped. This was a pretty Photon beatdown if I’ve ever seen one; a good representation of my 2.5 years in the gloom, and a reminder of what that kind of consistency can do. I had a concern going into it that 100 straight burpees mid-beatdown would be too hard, and that 1000 in cadence SSHs POST burpees would be impossible, but the PAX proved that concern false. There were at least two…possibly up to 4 or 5 who were able to perform all 1000 SSHs even at the tail end of that burner.

Would I do anything different on this? Yes. I’d cut the run down to exactly a mile. The Woodlands trail loop is about 1 mile, but we ran to and from that loop, extending the run to closer to 1.3 or so. That was an additional 3 or 4 minutes that could have been used somewhere else. The animal movement sets and the burpees were called after the first 3 PAX finished. Next time, I’d like to try and eek out enough time that we can pick up the 6 on those steps and allow all PAX to complete all 4 sections of the beatdown. Aside from that, though…I wouldn’t change a thing. The beatdown was extremely challenging while displaying my journey to 1000 posts. Only thing it didn’t include was a dance routine. But that didn’t mean it didn’t have a tailored playlist. YHC stepped-up his game and created four mini playlists for each of the four steps of the ambassador journey.

Step 1:
“Run” – Foo Fighters
“Harder To Breathe” – Maroon 5
“Easier To Run” – Linkin Park

Step 2:
“Crawl” – Kings Of Leon
“Crawling In The Dark” – Hoobastank
“Animals” – Nickelback
“Animal I Have Become” – Three Days Grace

Step 3:
“Bodies” – Drowning Pool
“Get Up And Jump” – Red Hot Chili Peppers
“Tubthumping” – Chumbawamba

Step 4:
“At The Hop” – Danny And The Juniors
“Jumpin’ Jack Flash” – The Rolling Stones
“Jump Around” – House Of Pain
“Jump” – Kriss Kross
“Jump” – Van Halen

It’s always a pleasure to lead the HIMs of the swamp, but this particular Q hit a bit differently. F3 has the capacity to change a man specifically because of the men within those COTs every morning. And it’s impossible to stand in 1000 of those and not come out better on the other side. I truly appreciate the pushes, the guidance, the laughs, and the prayers of the PAX of F3 Black Swamp. I wouldn’t be where I am without you guys.

Backblast: May 23rd, 2026

AO: The Fortress – Grace Church – Perrysburg, OH

PAX:
Photon – Q
Callahan
Carmen Sandiego
Deliverance
Meatloaf
Poe
Shaft
Spit Valve
Tarnished
Trench – FNG

Workout: 999 Problems But Consistency Ain’t One

FNG’s: Trench

Mission and Principles:
F3: Fitness, Fellowship, Faith
Mission: To plant, grow and serve small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership.
The core principles of F3 are that it is always:
1. Free of charge
2. Open to all men
3. Held outdoors, rain or shine, heat or cold
4. Led by men who participate in the workout in a rotating fashion, with no training or certification necessary. You versus you. Modify or stop an exercise if you need to. The most important thing is that nobody gets hurt.
5. Ends with a Circle of Trust
Credo: Leave no man behind but leave no man where you find him

Warm-up: N/A

The “Thang”:

My favorite Leadership Ruck route…West on 6th street until it was time to turn around. But let’s be honest, people don’t come out to The Fortress rucks for the scenery or the route…they come for the discussion. Topic of the day, ahead of post 1000 for YHC, was consistency and how it relates to leadership. Prompts were the following:

1. What does consistency mean to you in daily life? Where has inconsistency hurt you in the past? What simple routines or bricks have helped?
2. Why does chasing perfection kill consistency? Share a time when steady “good enough” beat sporadic excellence.
3. Why is being unchanging in nature, standard, or effect over time so critical for a leader? How does consistency (or lack of it) build or erode trust in a team, family, or group?
4. How do we build consistency as leaders? What systems accountability measures, or bricks could we put in place to stay consistent when motivation fades?

Ended with:
Count-O-Rama: 10
Name-O-Rama

The Six – Shaft

LDP3

Ball of Man

Spreadsheets from the Gloom: Good discussion during the Fortress ruck, as usual. Great mix of new guys and old. Nice to get an FNG willing to participate heavily in the discussion. No Jay-Z was played during this ruck…because his music blows and he’s a satanist.

Backblast: May 24th, 2026

AO: Pump Station Run

PAX:
Gulliver
Crawdad
Colt 45

Carmen Sandiego (Q)

Our mission is to plant, grow and serve small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership.
Five principles are open to all men, always free, always outdoors, always led by a member of the pax. Only you know your medical history so modify if needed. End in a circle of trust.

Credo is leave no man behind, but leave no man where you find him.

Workout name: Run like you stole something

4 stations.

Partnered up and did the towel run up the hill. 2 times forward, 1 time backwards.

Next we had to jog from one bucket to the next which had golf balls. We picked up one ball and sprinted back to the original bucket and dropped it. We did this until the bucket was empty.

3rd station we did the same bucket exercise but we went up and down the stairs.

4th station we did the bucket exercise on the grass side of the hill.

Last station we did the towel run at the top of the hill with the golf balls. We switched partners.

Ended with Willie Mayes Spider Man Hayes, The Hairy Rockettes and the toe touch.

Count-o-Rama: 4
Name-o-Rama

The Sixth: Gulliver

COT

Ball of man

Backblast: May 23rd, 2026

AO: The Fortress– Grace Church – Perrysburg, OH

PAX:
Photon – Q
Carmen Sandiego

Workout: Black Ops Run

The “Thang”:

Ran down to the treatment plant and back before the leadership ruck. We got drenched. It was awesome.

5/23/26 0630-0730 Guns N’ Roses

F3 mission – To plant, grow and serve, small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership.

5 core principles – Always free. Open to all men. Held outdoors regardless of weather. Led in a rotating fashion by a member of the PAX with no training or certification necessary. Ends in a COT, just as it begins.

F3 credo “Leave no man behind, but leave no man where you find him.”

Pax:
Fat Amy
Viper
Dougie
Waldo
Jersey
Shepherd
Arcy
Hannibal
Gold Star
Crawdad
Gulliver
Madden
Guardian – Q

Started off with 30 SSH IC to get the blood flowing.

Per Waldo’s request, we stayed as dry as possible. Utilizing a die app on my phone, there were 6 different combinations to land on.

Why 6? Well, a conversation amongst a friend of mine and myself landed on the fact that Axl Rose sits at the top of professional singers for who can hit the most octaves. 5.5 from what one search reported. You wouldn’t think that, but, Google says it’s true so it must be.

One overhang was the section for block work (to build guns) and the other overhang was for core work of rosalitas or rosalita whips (roses). The playlist consisted of the best of G&R, Poison, OutKast and Seal. Great mumblechat and solid work was had by all. Except Crawdad bc I forgot he was there lol.

COR
NOR
6- Waldo
Announcements
LDP3
Prayers

Thanks to all who joined. It was a pleasure to lead this morning.

5/23 0530-0620 Rucky ruck ruck @ Battlefield

F3 mission – To plant, grow and serve, small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership.

5 core principles – Always free. Open to all men. Held outdoors regardless of weather. Led in a rotating fashion by a member of the PAX with no training or certification necessary. Ends in a COT, just as it begins.

F3 credo “Leave no man behind, but leave no man where you find him.”

Pax:
Full Pull – Runner
Fat Amy – Runner
Viper – Runner
Dougie – Runner
Arcy
Hannibal
Vespa
Crawdad
Gulliver
Madden
Guardian – Q

We rucked wherever Crawdad led us. 2.5-3 miles. Runners got 5-5.5 miles in.

COR
NOR
6- Arcy
Saved prayer and announcements for BD

Backblast: May 22nd, 2026

AO: Nightmare– Perrysburg Municipal Park – Perrysburg, OH

PAX:
Photon – Q
Guardian

Workout: Black Ops Ruck

The “Thang”:

Rucked around Nightmare. Talked about life insurance.

Beatdown began on the way to the hill. There were a few trips up and fun had by all. There was a FNG

Manchester – Q
Large Mouth – FNG
Rudy
Vespa
Lug Nut
Crawdad
Purdy
Fat Amy
Norm

5.22.26 – Nightmare – HR Derby

Pax List:
Q – Gold Star
Huckleberry
Spaulding
Guardian
French Fry
Meatloaf
Photon
Bourbon

>What is F3? – Fitness Fellowship & Faith
>Mission – To plant, grow and serve small workout groups for men for the invigoration of male community leadership
>5 Core Principles – Free of charge / Open to all men / Held outdoors rain or shine / Led by fellow PAX (you v you) / Ends with COT
>Credo – Leave no man behind but leave no man where you find him.

Warmup – SPMICE
>Star Grabbers – in cadence
>Windmills – in cadence
>Willy Mays Hays – in cadence
>Motivators – 7 count

Beatdown = HR Derby

A pax stepped up to the plate, and took a few swings. How well they hit the ball determined the MOT.
>HR = mosey
>Triple/Double = Imperial Walker
>Single = Walking Lunge
>Strikeout/weak/popup = Bear Crawl

Home Plate: 10 burpee buy-in each round.

20 reps of each exercise on the bases.

1st Base: Legs
> Bonnie Blairs (2is1)
> Smurf Jacks
> No Surrender
> Monkey Humpers (2is1)

2nd Base: Upper Body
> Hand Release Merkins
> Absolutions
> Air Presses (2is1)
> Shoulder Tap Merkins

3rd Base: Core
> BBSUs
> Box Cutters
> Freddie Mercury’s
> ARods

Guardian led off with a weak, generous single for some walking lunges.
Spaulding follow it up with a seeing-eye double up the middle for Imperial Walkers.
French Fry roped a homer to left for a mosey reprieve.
And Huck played the clean up role well, lacing a homer down the line for another mosey in our final round.

COR / NOR / #6 / LDP3 / Announcements / Prayers / COT / Picture