Will write this now before a comfy night back home encourages the fond memories to slip
Went down expecting lots of beastings and running and that's exactly what we got. Didn't run nearly enough in preparation, 'practising' a 1.5 mile run doesn't cut the mustard at all. Embarassed by my 1.5 mile time, but since it might provide a source of amusement it was 14:03 minutes (!)
The format of the insight weekend has been covered a few times already. Main points to reiterate are:
Pressup position, down, up, halfway down, up, halfway down, down an inch
Surprisingly, given the previous reports, none of the 27 lads jacked it in and went home. Got on well with all of them and I look forward to seeing the same faces again in the future.
Warmup for the 1.5 mile was an 800m jog, stopping every 10 seconds or so to drop and knock out 3-12 pressups, then 1.5 miles in 15 minutes, then 1.5 miles best time. The course was around a park, half on muddy grass, half on the pavement.
Pressups and situps came next, done in pairs. Managed 45 good pressups and 66 good situps. Best lad there was a scouse boy, about 5'6 and tough around the middle who belted out 76 pressups and 96 situps (went back on the train with him and his brother, good guys).
There were presentations that were timed to follow scoff so you shouldn't worry too much about watching what you put in your stomach. We were given around 2hrs after food before any tests each time (not including friendly beastings, you will learn to enjoy these
)
Assault course we did a mere two times. This was after the pullup test(knuckles out, palms in, using biceps) fatboy me managed a whole 1 pullup, best pullups were 15 and 16 reps.
The assault course was a lot of fun, sort of like being 5 years old again and heading to an adventure playground. Lots of interesting 'warmup' exercises first and rolling around in the mud as the rain really started to bucket down. At least it wasn't snowing though.
Next day (Sunday) we woke up at 7 to find a couple of inches of snow lying and more coming down. Outside and lined up. One lad had half his hair dyed pink and the bald PTI had been enjoying having a crack at him with any retort resulting in everyone running around and 'down an inch'. We were starting to enjoy the whole game and as we went up and down in the snow before the log race we graduated from wallies, useless f*cks and muppets to 'you f8cking bunch of lunatics' as we kept laughing. PTI was laughing too but he's a sadist and was enjoying it for his own personal and bald reasons.
Warmup for the log race involved sprints, pressups and rolling around in the snow. Log race itself was about 1.3miles on a track that was flat, down incline, back up (halfway point) then flat. One of our's came off the log after the halfway point and a PTI took over, F8cker dragged us forward, I'm crap at running and I came off. This was the worst part of the weekend for me, felt utterly gutted as was just managing keep up with our log team with only minor retching.
There was a wee chap that didn't finish the 1.5miler. About 5'3 and a proper tubby little man. He finished the log race.
The presentations covered regimental weapons, signals and recent operations, as well as a good bit about p-company.
All the staff were legends, nothing but respect for them. Also I feel the other lads on this insight course put a lot of effort in and the team spirit was excellent.
Not being one that responds well to the usual propaganda I was pretty moved by events this weekend, same goes for all the other lads. Two of them were judged ready to go to RSC now for testing, rest of us have varying degrees of training to get to the level (myself especially).
Anyway
Pressup position,
halfway down, down an inch, down, up, halfway down
