Free Fitness Movement. All you need to do is show up!
Oh, oh, oh
Sweet tribe o’ mine
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Sweet love of mine
As I am sure you can imagine, writing this is bittersweet for me. I have shared so much with all of you, and so many others, over the past few years. I can’t even begin to imagine how many burpees we have done and how many times we have run up those stairs. The hugs, the high fives, the laughs and the requests for demonstrations on how to do a burpee.
Yesterday was Valentine’s Day, but that comes around every year. On the other hand, we are blessed with the Winter Olympics just once every four years. And so, that took precedence as the theme for this week’s workout. With just two workouts left before I retire, Michelle and Dan agreed to leave the workout planning up to me – I assume they reasoned that there was a limit to how much I could fuck things up.
We let new leader Dan Beresh loose for his first blog post this week, and it turns out that he’s got a few things he needs to talk to us about.
“I was going to write about my experience as a member of NP and now a leader.
I was going to wax poetic about how awesome NP really is.
But no. Sam and Michelle had a different idea. Its true that I gave them a list of options. “Option H,” said Sam. To be honest it might not have been H. It might have been G, or J, which as you probably know are pronounced interchangeably in English and French. Because you’re Canadian. Or you just know things. Work with me here. Some of this blog post may be made up. “Option H,” said Sam, his big British voice commanding me to write. “Okay, yes sir!” I squealed, from the corner of the cavernous dungeon chamber. And then I wrote. HOW CLOSE TO STAND DURING THE BOUNCE How close should one stand during the bounce? Should one shy away from the leader? Cower in the corner, like poor Dan? Let’s get real. There is no corner. How close? If you’re asking the question, it’s because you COULD be closer. You know what the winter months are like. Here are some words to describe potential feelings: Ice Bath Arctic Vortex Frosticles If you are wondering if you should get closer, the answer is always YES. UNFATHOMABLY UNDENIABLY UNCOMFORTABLY CLOSE. *physical uncomfort, not mental or emotional, you should be squished but above all it should be fun, maybe stay on the outside if you are claustrophobic or otherwise anxious* What is all that body heat doing when it leaves your body? NOTHING. Put it to work! Share it with your NP family. Especially if you’re in Canada. Where it is currently the beginning of February also known as HIBERNATION. Yeah sure, we work out and work our asses off, but we’re also a community. So when your leader starts the bounce, get everyone in there and make it feel like we’re all in this together. Isn’t that what life is about? D” ANNOUNCEMENTS: – Next week – PR Day. It will be too cold to tag, but you can still earn your tag. Your PR tag. – PR Day social. See social group for details.I’m bringin’ #verbals back (yeah!)
Them other tribes don’t know how to act (yeah!)
I think it’s special, what’s behind your act (yeah!)
So #verbal around and burpee with the pack (yeah!)
Yep, that got progressively more and more desperate, but the point remains the same: we want to bring #verbals back. Christmas may be over, but that doesn’t mean that the giving has to end. What is a #verbal, I hear someone cry. A #verbal is a commitment that you make to show up to a workout. You can give a #verbal to a friend, to Michelle or I, or even to the tribe at large. You can give it in person (verbally), you can post it online, you can text it, you can write it in the snow or even in a hand written, hand delivered love letter. Whatever is most convenient for you.
I think potatoes might just be my favourite carbohydrate. In one of those odd conversations that you’re only likely to ever have with fellow runners, I was recently asked which source of carbohydrates I would choose if I could only eat one for the rest of my life. It’s an undeniably difficult question, but my reasoning was that potatoes are the most versatile of the lot. That little story is entirely unrelated to Wednesday’s workout, except that it involved potatoes, and this week truly proved the versatility of potatoes.
If you’ve been to November Project Toronto at all in the last year you’ve probably met Ban. He shows up, he throws down, he brought his kid once, he rarely seems to wear gloves, and he has a smile for everyone. He’s someone you’re always happy to see. Which is cool, because we live in the same area and often bump into each other on the street. A couple of weeks ago Ban posted about his one year anniversary (if you haven’t seen it yet, go find it) on Instagram, and I reached out to ask him if he would write a post about his experience over the past year, what prompted him to show up for the first time and what keeps him coming back.
This Wednesday, after Beau had worked up an appetite for his second Thanksgiving dinner of the year, we took a moment to join tribes across the world in giving thanks. Specifically, we gave thanks to Bojan and Brogan, the guys in this video and this video, for everything that they have done for November Project over the past six years. In a very democratic process that really tapped into sentiment within the tribe, I wrote out ‘THIS FAMILY’ on sheets of paper the night before, and made you all hold them up for a photo. Because I truly am thankful for this family that November Project has given me, not just here in Toronto but across every city within the movement. Full details on this Thanksgiving mini-project can be found here.
Race day. Sunday. I’m not going to wish you luck. At this stage, I don’t believe that you need it: you’ve made your own luck. YOU have spent weeks, months even, putting the work in. YOU have made sacrifices and YOU have been disciplined throughout. YOU have trained for this. YOU are ready. Trust that training, believe that you’ve given yourself the best possible chance to achieve your goal, and feed off the energy around. Now, at the start line and along the route. Everyone is psyched for you.
PR Day is the workout that we love to hate. It’s a hard workout, there’s no denying it (personally I love it, but then I don’t do it every month). However, we know it can be hard to motivate yourself to push hard enough to shoot for that PR each month, so we want to offer a little incentive. As of next month, we’ll be throwing out a fresh tag for a PR.
Run lap. Burpees. V-ups. Push ups. Squat jumps. Plank for the remainder of the seven minutes. Repeat. Literally seven minutes in heaven.
We mixed things up today and threw in a little more running. Which was perfect timing, since before the workout I’d been discussing with Alison how we do far less running than most tribes. The flipside of that is that we do many more burpees. I like to think that we do burpees more regularly than any other tribe in the November Project movement. And I take more than a little pride in that.