Sixteen PAX including two FNGs (17-year-old twins Headlock and Skipper) arrived with a spring in their collective step in the cold dawn Monday at Fetzer, buoyed by the double-shot of a Tar Heel basketball victory and Duke loss just hours before. YHC thought it the perfect time to pull out an oldie-but-goodie that traces its Churham roots to the old Saturday morning workout on Duke”s East Campus. It”s call “The Beast” and it revolved around the Number Six.
Warmup: SSH x 20, IW x 10, Windmills x 10, Squats x 10, Arm Circles x 10 forward and backward, Merkins x 10.
The Thang:
Three cones were set up on one of the soccer fields about 15 yards apart. The Pax lined up across one boundary, ran to the first cone and did six merkins, to the second cone for six more merkins, to the third for six more, then came back to the second cone for six more, to the first cone for six more, then back to the starting line for a final six merkins.
That circuit was repeated a total of six times, adding one new exercise for each circuit and repeating the earlier exercises as well. The order after Merkins was Carolina Dry Docks, Squats, Parker-Peters, WWIIs and Burpees. The mode of travel from one cone to the next included running, lunge-walking, bear-crawling and crab-walking.
The last circuit, then, was six merkins, six CDD, six squats, six PP, six WWIIs and six Burpees at each of six stations. That added to a cool 216 Merkins for the day.
“Amazing how something so simple can be so difficult,” noted one of the spent PAX afterward, adding, “What a great way to start the week.”