After three months of field conversion and assorted maintenance projects had run their course in Kenan Stadium, six PAX slipped inside the gates by dark of night for a 45-minute inspection tour.

            The AstroTurf playing surface can stand up to the most rigorous tests applied by F3 standards of Four Corners, lunge walks and Carolina Dry Docks.

            The ancient and weathered stairs remain ship-shape and dish out major stress the last 10 or 12 steps as the risers increase in depth.

            And no amount of pink clouds emanating from an eastern sunrise can dull the ache of a Monday-AM beatdown.

            The Thang:

            Warmup SSH x 20, windmills x 10, squats x 10, arm circles forward and back x 10, merkins x 10.

            Move into the stadium and down to the field, spread out among the aisles on the north side and run the stairs for 20 minutes, doing 10 merkins at the top and 10 squats and bottom before moving to the next aisle.

            Then two rounds of Four Corners—running each of four sides of the playing field and stopping in each corner for an exercise. Champ and Mate took the leads, with assorted routines including CDD, merkins, WWIIs, Russian hammers, tuck-jumps, LBCs and V-ups.

            Then we did one lap of the field, lunge-walking the end zones and sprinting the length.

            And we capped it off by returning to the North Gate for a quick session of Mary: long-slow flutters, Freddie Mercurys and Heels-to-Heavens.

            Good thoughts today to Mate on impending news of his job amid a merger of his incumbent bank and place of work and another institution.