The BackBlast:

Intro:

YHC brought some extra Holiday cheer to this edition of The Swanson. PAX were encouraged to wear their finest Holiday attire and YHC may have gone a bit overboard. The cold was bitter, the wind was blustery, and the PAX were ready to warm it up with a short mosey to the …

Warm-o-Rama:

• SSH x15 IC
• String Rippers x15 IC
• Mountain Climbers x15 IC
• Reindeer Takeoffs*
• Sun Gods, x10 IC FWD/REV

The Thang:

1. A mosey to stashed presents along the way. YHC directed a PAX member to unwrap the gift** and all PAX performed the gift. Gifts were:
   1. Santa Squats – Santa performs these every day in prep for the big day of carrying a giant bag of gifts all over the world.
      • 20 squats stopping half-way down, 20 squats from all the way down to half-way up, 20 full squats***
   2. Little Merkin Boy
      • Hold plank position for entirely of “Little Drummer Boy” song, performing a merkin on each mention of “pa rum pum pum pum”.
   3. Howling Elves****
      • PAX get in circle and bend down into MH position. Each PAX takes turn doing 10 MH in the circle. 3 rounds were completed before the elves had enough.
2. Santa’s Bag of Goodies, White Elephant Style
   • PAX took turns taking “gifts” out of Santa’s bag of goodies or stealing previously selected gifts. All PAX partook in a given gift. Gifts selected/stolen included:
     • 15x groiners
     • 10x no surrenders (crowd pleaser on concrete)
     • 15x box jumps
     • 25x dips
     • 8x 8-count body builders
     • 20x mountain climbers
     • Hill run (forward down, backward up) x3
     • 25x plank jacks
     • 20x LBCs
     • 20 yard lunge walk
     • 15x copperhead squats

6MoM:

• Gingerbread House Plank – YHC dished out sidewalk chalk to all PAX. PAX held plank while YHC commanded features of a gingerbread house to be drawn out, mid-plank. Features included:
  • Frame (walls and roof), door, left window, right window, chimney, candy cane on roof, wreath, path to door, Christmas tree at start of path, sign your name.
• American Hammers x20 IC

COT:

Prayers to Gump and Excitebike dealing with injuries. Get well! Miss you guys!

Rando 12-20 is out. Details on Slack. Get after it. Looks hard.

Coffeeteria followed the beatdown in the parking lot *****. Thanks Ditka! Discussion led to new things to try at home … Canadian dinner rolls and Green ham sandwiches. Thanks Short Circuit!

YHC read the story of “The Christmas Guest”, a great Holiday story about spreading love and caring in the Holiday season. Johnny Cash tells it great …

https://youtu.be/tTwAKf0OLo4

Naked Man Moleskin:

* PAX started by “prancing” in place. On YHC commands, PAX “dashed” in place, followed by PAX taking off in “flight”. Rinse and repeat several times. This was a crowd favorite. Flo in particular actually showed up on DIA’s radar.

** Short Circuit really struggled with his gift opening. I imagine Christmas gift unwrapping takes hours at his house to get all those presents unwrapped.

*** Not sure that Ditka ever got to half-way down the entire time.

**** Normally known as Howling Monkeys, but today the elves were getting it.

***** Rainbow Sprinkles left quicker than a toupee in a hurricane, only to return with a giant puffy jacket on.