VRUC (Vaguely Ridiculous Unofficial Challenge)

When: Monday 24^th July – Saturday 29^th July

The PAX: 171 in total

Warm Up

For almost a year, my experience of F3 was one of consistently working out twice a week. However, a strange thing had begun happening in the last 6 months….2 had become 3, 3 became 4, and on it went – the more I posted, the more parts of Carpex and beyond I saw, and the more great people I met, and so inevitably, the more I wanted to go…..before long, I had conquered a v-six pack.

Building on that, and inspired by chatter with some of Carpex brothers (special thanks to Goose & Franklin), when a unique opportunity presented itself with my wife and children overseas, out of which the VRUC was born:

The Thang/s

AO	Q	PAX
A-Team	Pet Sounds	20
FOD	Shut-In	24
Rush-Hour	Asystole	3
Shaken Not Stirred	Hi-Liter	32
Thunder	Butt Joint	11
Bounty Hunters	Pet Sounds	22
Afterburn	Coco	7
Danger Zone	Shank	9
Arena / Healing Transitions	Frey Daddy	20
Phoenix	Hi Liter	23

COT

• Announcements – loads! Here are some of the highlights I can remember…check local comm’s for more/accurate detail:
  • F3 expansion continues
    • South Wake are launching 4 new sites in the coming weeks
    • FIA pre-launch was a success in Carpex + will officially launch Aug 12^th
    • VQ week next week
  • Many fun/painful events being lined up
    • Sept 8/9^th Blue Ridge Relay has many F3 runners involved
    • October 7^th CSAUP around Carpex AO’s
    • October 16^th South Wake Ruck along ATT
  • Also, lots of great fund raising & volunteering work continues, with a big focus on Back pack buddies right now.
• Prayers – so many lives touched by the men of F3, too many to mention individually – sadly a number of bereavements, including children and infants were heard this week, as well as prayers for new babies, upcoming births, surgeries and major travel, and praises for F3 men doing great work in our communities (from week long volunteering programs to projects on a needs basis) and untold numbers of unsaid prayers and praises.

NMS

• A Team was special this week, as Pet Sounds brought a whole pile of bricks to inflict pain on the PAX with, and then Ascot took all the bricks home with him to finish of a building project!
• Shut-In forced PAX into what seemed like a 2 mile bear crawl round FOD on Tuesday morning – thanks for that!
• Asystole found a new level of Burpee pain at Rush hour – with 11’s (yes 11’s) of Burpees and Pull Up’s sandwiching a 300 yard hill run between the exercises. Nice……Freebird and I then ran way longer than planned on an EC run.
• SNS on Wednesday was well marshalled by Hi-Liter who led a varied workout having scoured the Exicon for the most painful sounding exercises.
• Womble Park in Holly Springs was next up on Wednesday night for Thunder. The South Wake crew, led by Butt Joint shared two great twists to familiar exercises – the Burpee Ring of Fire and the Indian Run with Film Quotes.
• Tiring a bit by Thursday morning, so had to dig deep for Pet Sounds wheelbarrow challenge….thanks to hotlips for practically pushing my rather stiff wheelbarrow across the turf. Another new exercise for this week, with Pet Sounds partner-leg-butt-pushes (or something like that).
• The only running workout in my week, Afterburn, was intended to be a light relief…however Coco had different ideas. The run was extended to 7 miles and included traffic light burpees, just to mix it up. Thanks Coco! The Churham crew then kindly invited me to their F2 event at the Glass Jug….amazing how quickly a nice cold IPA goes down after a long run….great location & good to meet more guys who weren’t able to make it out to Afterburn.
• Friday, and on the home straight…7 down 3 to go….Danger Zone had unusually low numbers this week, with only 9 PAX….I think that word must have gotten out that Shank was planning a hi-intensity work out. Thanks Shank.
• Healing Transitions / Arena on Friday afternoon was a hot and hard session led by Frey Daddy, and is a great example of the good we can give back to the community.
• Finally Hi-Liter acted as zoo-keeper for the animals at Phoenix on Saturday morning to round out an amazing week.

Thank you all – it’s a privilege to be with such inspiring people. I’ve taken much more out of this week than a lot of painful workouts….its ultimately been about the whole community side of what we do, the fellowship, faith and giving back where we can, which is what keeps me coming back for more.

I hope in some small way, by sharing this challenge it will help others to keep coming back too.