5 years! As I reflect back and think about what that means, I feel proud. Proud for all that I have accomplished following an injury that might have caused many to “hang it up.” And hang it up I might have done if not for the strength and accountability of our group. I’ll have a special place in my heart, always and forever, for Kilo, as he is the one that told me, “no matter what bro. Stay engaged.” You see, you never know how your words and actions can inspire others. His simple sentence and bit of motivation helped to give birth to the pull-up challenge that has now seen the completion of its 5th year. 5 years!!
What started out as a CSAUP (completely stupid and utterly pointless), who would ever follow along with this idea, has turned into a badass, only elite apply, next level of greatness event. And it just keeps getting better with each passing year.
This year we had 30 sign up to accept the challenge with 24 being able to see it through to the end. The PAX finishers: AirRaid (R), Brown Water, Clap Trap, Cochran, Dauber, depends, DeVitto, DiGiorno, Dinghy, Jazz Hands (R), Lockbox, Masse’, Mom Suit, Mr. Hat, Mr. Kotter, Newman, Pope, Portabucket, Rip Van Winkle, Ruby (R), School Zone, Snaggletooth, StickUp and YHC.
Honorable mention goes to DeVitto, Digiorno, Pope & Stick Up who have been with me every year since inception, 2020.
Then we have guys that signed up for their 2nd or 3rd or 4th tour that had so much fun and experienced such gains on their year one that it kept them coming back for more.
Most important of all though, are the guys that experienced this for the first time. It’s so cool to stand witness to do dudes first thinking, “this is gonna be tough, I can’t even do…pull-up” To, “okay, I’m a month in and have surprised myself” To finally, “I never thought I could do so many pull-ups. I feel so much stronger. My M is all of a sudden giving me more [attention]” (well…I hope that’s the case for you’s guys. Still trying to figure out what works for mine…)
Out of the gate, during our first month we knew we were in the presence of greatness as these beasts posted such incredible #’s, we were all humbled and inspired knowing that after years of consistent pull-up challenge work, we too might be able to achieve greatness. Having met goal of 2024 pull-ups from January 1 – February 4: Cochran – 2049, Dauber – 2200, Pope – 2340, DeVitto – 2584 and Digiorno with a crazy 2,650!! By the way, almost all of these guys kept on going till March 31st.
Together, as a group, through countless wins, successes, life challenges, consistency and fortitude, pull up by pull up, your boys knocked out well over 70,000 pull-ups in 3 months!!! When you see these fellas out ITG, be sure to give them an “atta boy!”
There is so much meat and potatoes that I could add to this. So much magic that happened that is deserving to be typed out and shared. But if I did that WordPress’d probably kick me out for too much content. I’ll just say IYKYK and you know who you are and what you did…and if you don’t, there’s always 2025.
Until next year…
BigBird
F3 Louisville 