Jen told us the other day that we have almost done 1000 or 10,000 (I can’t remember) workouts since we started NP Canada. That’s 3 days a week since week 2! Most of those mornings are pretty good but let’s be honest, having sunrise on your face, a stadium full of yahoos and shaky legs from the best workout in NP land comes just a handful of times out of those 18,000 workouts. We had kids, grandparents, newbies and oldies. Sorry dogs, you missed the f’ out. This was one of those mornings that I dreamt of when we started this simple little group. A ton of people with a ton of different backgrounds having a good, hard-ass sweat together. I feel a bit repetitive when I write this in blogs… but seriously, thank you! Thanks for getting out of bed and helping to create this amazing atmosphere of positivity and work. Without this massive community, we never would have made it through a few of those winters and closing in on 25,000 mornings together.
Hello Darkness Our Old Friend
Like any good love, you embrace the brightest sides of your object of desire as well as the deep dark corners of it. In our love affair with the beautiful and lovely Commonwealth, we embrace lactic acid, muscle spasms, max heart rates and staring at strangers butts all while fawning over how great this Stadium experience is.
Boom!
I know for a fact that when I turned 10, my birthday wishlist did not have a 5AM wake-up involved. Transformers ✔️ Lego ✔️ Swiss Army Knife ✔️ … but no request to go run with my Mom’s friends. 🥴 Aram, our birthday BOOM this morning, did put the NP request in over a week ago so that he could start his special day off right. I don’t even have anything clever to say, only that I think that is SO RAD! The energy that you all create with the pre bounce buzz, the glorious Fuck Ya, positive vibes and encouragement…all of this has created a space that is special enough to have the kind of magnetism powerful enough to make a 10 year old’s birthday wishlist. So thank you! Whether you come all the time or once in a while, your presence and your energy has incredible value. 👍🏽😁
History WAS Made
History was made this morning!! For those of us that were determined enough not to hit snooze and drag ourselves out of bed this morning, we witnessed something spectacular! “Tell Me More!”, you say… Well, an athletic feat that we believed to be impossible was turned possible by none other than step forward King, Nadim Chin. “Did he perfect his own amazing move?!”, you ask… Well, that’s the most baffling part! He put on a performance of epic proportions in Jen’s excerise, the tuck jump. For one entire non-stop minute, Nadim had perfect 90 degree tuck form, 3 feet of vertical and feet rebounding off the ground at a rate of 154 JPM (jumps per minute). Nadim, we bow down to you and your tuck jump mastery. Instead of sharing stories about the time I saw Glenn Anderson score the Stanley Cup winner, I’ll be telling dinner parties about what I witnessed this morning at the Legislature grounds. For those looking for a Tuck-off… I dare you to try the King! 🤴🏽
Ya Filled Me Bucket!
Thank you NP Canada. You really blew me away with your kindness and literally filled my bucket all morning. It is a gift to be able to see this amazing collection of souls come together every week and even after years of stairs, hills and step forwards, I am still in awe of how cool this simple concept is. There have been stories shared over the years of how this morning workout has changed someone’s life, there are many stories that will not be shared but the impact will never-the-less have been powerful to that individual…and some people are here just for a simple sweat. ;). For me, this group has been an incredibly positive light in my life. It shows me the good in people every morning that I see people give a high five, a quick hug or pat on the back or share a word of encouragement near the end of a hill. When I see the clusters of people having a catch up, planning a race weekend or brunch it warms my heart to know that NP was the vehicle to those friendships. Your gift of sport to the kids at Free Hockey/Footie is the gift of these things I just mentioned. Through sport and team, they will experience this connection with their buddies. I could talk for hours about the value of health, self confidence, inclusion, etc. that sport will bring to them, but really it will be the memories of having a blast with their friends playing a game together that will have the greatest impact. So thank you. Thank you for spreading more goodness than I could ever have imagined when I first brought this group together in Edmonton. You are an amazing group of humans and you’re lighting more people’s lives up than you will ever know.
We don’t need no stinking newbies
Today everyone was an oldie and in retrospect, we should have cheered for your attendance with the same glee as those waiver-needers when they show up. We give these fresh faced kids all the attention of a new puppy, when Old Yeller has been getting out winter after winter and saving Bobby from the well. Let’s hear it for Old Y-dog for once! Here’s a cheer to those who are on NP morning #2 or #549, you both have that look like you’ve been through some serious shit. Badge days full of snotcicles and frozen ass cheeks, pushing cars out of Emily’s park, kamikaze tobogganing, soap in your eye on a slip and slide, crashing drones and getting lost in corn mazes… you’ve been to the other side and back and I raise a glass to your return.
How Can A Blog Add Value To Your Life?
Fact: It was cold today.
Fact: People that came to run stairs this morning are pretty badass.
Fact: You probably don’t need me to go on about the above two facts in this blog.
In trying to find a way to make your day a little better through the power of the blog, I offer the following;
Amazing Belgian Waffles – Seriously, they are amazing. Don’t devalue the super whisked egg whites!
Where art thou, dear winter? We need thy badge!
There is no worse range of Celsius than -15 to -29. Once you hit -15, your snot kinda freezes anyway and at -29, Jen automatically turns into Mean Jen and ruins young children’s dreams of badgedom. Here is a chart to help explain this shitty zone.
- -14 “Hey, what a great morning! It’s a dry cold”, says Trent in his shorts.
- -15 Snot starts to freeze and Trent is in Eskimo sweatpants.
- -18 Nadim’s IPhone stops working
- -20 Buffs fully engaged, can’t tell who anyone is, awkwardly have full conversation without knowing who you’re talking too.
- -23 Snow squeaks louder than a Poison concert. Once you notice it, it bugs the shit out of you for the rest of the Season of Dark.
- -27 “I swear, my weather app says -30”, lies everyone unconvincingly.
- -28 We’ve honestly never had a -28 day…not sure what happens here.
- -29 Kids cry. Tears freeze. Mean Jen evil laughs in their face.
- -30 Boom! Record attendance, Instagram full of frozen face selfies and Trent is back in shorts! Best Morning Eva!!!
So here’s to at least a few -30+ (or is it – ?) days in our near future and to good humour when we find ourselves in the zone of poo.
The Case For 5
In order to make it to our 6am bounce, my alarm is set for 5. A lot of people might say that it’s crazy to be awake at 5am but I am here to make the case for why it’s a fantastic time of day to be up.
-The morning news has already started and you’re one of the first to know about all of the outrageous things going on in the world of sports, politics, traffic and weather! Wow!
Ice Shanks
Things got real this morning as Edmonton’s snow-warmup-melt-freeze cycle produced some wicked ice shanks that fit perfectly into my hips, tailbone and elbows during ground exercises. Everyone that showed up is officially 8% more badass than you were yesterday because of the simulated Siberian jail riot. Kudos to the Ninja style bounce and hushed words of encouragement…as of now, Nadim hasn’t received the grumpy neighbor email demanding justice and Jen’s email so that they can complain to the true leader.