A couple months ago, I received the following e-mail from my friend Greg, “Hey Boz, remember when you said that if I ever decided to run a race that you’d do one with me? Well, I want to run the Tough Mudder. Are you in?”
I would be lying if I said I got excited when I saw Greg’s e-mail. Tough Mudders are 10-12 mile runs with 25 or more military-designed obstacles mixed in. I have run a Warrior Dash race, but a Tough Mudder is basically 4 Warrior Dashes, with much tougher obstacles. Further, as I stared at Greg’s e-mail, I noted that I was in the worst shape I had been in since 2001. But, Greg has always been a much bigger guy than me, and if he is getting in good enough condition to run the Tough Mudder, I figured I should hold true to my promise and join him. Plus, it was two months away, so I’d have plenty of time to get in shape. “Greg, If you are doing it…I am in.”
Well, yesterday morning the alarm went off at 6:30AM and I was probably in worse shape than I was 2 months ago. That’s okay, though, I have been training. Run ½ mile on a flat, paved surface, do some pushups and chair assisted pull-ups, repeat three times. I probably did this workout 6 times total over the last 3 weeks. So, I trained by running a total of 12 miles and doing some pushups and pull-ups. I was ready (insert heavy sarcasm here).
At least I got a solid 3 hours of sleep the night before to get me prepared for the run. I couldn’t get to sleep so I thought it would be best to watch promotional and home-made videos of the event until after 3AM, showing people being electrically shocked and being carted off the course with slings and knee wraps.
Some pre-race pics upon arrival...
Free mohawks at the start. We passed.
Costumes were encouraged...even Zubaz.
Friends Mike and Cami in the corral waiting for the torture to begin.
Tough Mudder sends participants off in groups of a few hundred, spaced twenty minutes apart. The event’s MC instructed us to drop to one knee in the muddy and rocky corral, gave us some instructions like “Make sure your race number is written on you, we want to be able to identify your body” and “Don’t go through the electric shock if you have metal in your body or a heart condition.” We then recited the tough mudder oath and yelled “hoo-rah” about 100 times - It never gets old.
We sang the national anthem (mudders do not sing well), but I question whether Taps would have been more appropriate.
The loudspeakers blared Eye of the Tiger, the MC guy had us yell "Hoo-rah" a few dozen more times, and we were off.
That's all the pics I have for awhile as I put the camera away before the race. If that disappoints you, I'll just say that I'd rather run 10 consecutive Tough Mudders than to face my wife and tell her that I dropped her camera in a mud pit.
After running for ¾ of a mile through somewhat uneven cross-country terrain, which I would have killed for later, we arrived at our first obstacle, the Arctic Enema. We jumped into an ice bath, waded for a few feet, and then climbed up a short wall to get out.
Wait, the sign says to go under the wall, not over it. But, the base of the wall was underwater, meaning that we had to dive headfirst into the frigid liquid to get past the wall. Diving underwater for a couple seconds woke me up far more than my 20 ounces of Folgers did earlier than morning. Fortunately, I didn’t pull hard enough when trying to hoist myself out of the ice bath, so I got the privilege of staying in there another 15 seconds while waiting for a mass of humanity to pass me so that I could give it a second shot.
After a bit more running, we came to probably the 2nd easiest obstacle of the day, a big mound of hay bales, stacked 100 feet (or maybe it was just 12 feet) high. One quick burst later, we were over the hay bales and back on our way.
Next, we came to a mud tunnel. We had to crawl underground on our hands and knees in the mud through the tunnel, and our reward for this effort was to be dumped out into a trench of cold and muddy water.
Shortly thereafter, we experienced one of the courses’ many mud pits. We would step into about 3 feet of muddy water and walk that way for 50 feet before climbing up a hill of slippery mud to escape the pit. These mudpits got old after awhile. It seemed that whenever the organizers couldn’t think of an obstacle to put in place, they’d just throw another mud pit in there. However, sometimes the organizers would get bored and put uneven footing in the mudpits so that you’d be wading along and then find yourself slipping and splashing into an even deeper hole.
We next came up to a vertical cargo net. I don’t know how else to describe it other than it was a net that went maybe a dozen feet straight up in the hair and you had to climb up one side and down the other. There were people lying on the ground pulling the net down a bit, presumably to make it more taut. After reaching the base, Greg and I took our turn laying on the ground and holding the net for a couple minutes, and then we were on our way. Had I known what lay ahead, I probably just would have stayed lying on the ground holding that net for the rest of the day.
I think it was about then that we saw the 3 mile marker, along with a sign congratulating us on finishing the famous Warrior Dash, but reminding us that we still had 8 ½ miles to go. The organizers liked to rip on the Warrior Dash, “The Tough Mudder ain’t a race where you jump over a bush and feel proud of yourself.” I have nothing against the Warrior Dash, but it is more of a fun run, whereas the Tough Mudder is anything but fun. It would probably put hair on the chest of someone with alopecia areata.
We came up to another wall next, although this one was probably closer to 10 feet high, and there were certainly no ledges on the wall to help one along. No running start in the world was going to get my large rear up and over that wall, so I found a couple guys who were boosting others over the wall and asked them to also help me. They didn’t seem that excited to do so, but I promised that Greg would be pushing my rump from behind and all would be well.
I was excited to overcome that wall, only to find out that there was an exact replica waiting for me 20 feet further down the course. I asked the same guys if they would give me a boost again, and they pointed to another couple guys and said, “How about they help you this time?” I asked the pair of 165 pound dudes if they would help propel my 250 pound frame over the wall, and you’d think I had just asked them if I could eat their firstborn. They reluctantly agreed and I completed the second wall.
As Greg and I ran on, I squawked a bit about the attitude of those last two guys. After all, when we were in the corral, we all recited the Tough Mudder oath, “I pledge that I will help my fellow Tough Mudders complete the course.” Where was our MC with his megaphone to remind them of that? But, any angst I had was quickly vanquished by 3 realizations: 1) they actually did help me, and that was the most important thing, 2) the oath doesn’t say you have to be happy doing so, and 3) I was about 50% heavier than those guys, so I wonder how I would have felt if a 375 pound sweaty and dirty dude had come up to me asking for a boost.
Somewhere around mile 4, we entered some really rough terrain, and did not escape it until about mile 9.5. It was as if the tough mudder organizers had asked Paul Bunyan to chop down a bunch of trees and leave the branches laying in the running path. And of course, it was never flat; it was always uphill or downhill. I’m not sure which was worse. Going uphill stinks, because, well, we are going uphill. But going downhill, we had to use every muscle in our beings to balance ourselves and keep from slipping, falling, and landing on a tree stump.
It was during this middle part of the course that it also began to rain. The combination of rain, wind, and 55 degree temperatures made for a nice chill. Periodically we’d get to trudge through another mud pit to ensure that we were even more wet, cold, bogged down, and caked with mud.
One somewhat fun obstacle was the mud moguls. We would run up to an 8 foot high mountain of slippery mud, climb over it, and then slide down into a pool of cool, muddy water. After repeating this several times, we were through with that obstacle and my legs were trashed. For some reason, Greg loved that obstacle and had finished all of the moguls before I was ½ way done. For just a moment, I did not like Greg.
Certainly my favorite obstacle of the day was the swinging rings, kind of like you see at a school playground. Although, instead of falling a couple feet into some nice soft sand at the school playground, you fell into a three foot deep pool of muddy water. So, why was this my favorite obstacle? Because when I fell halfway through (okay, after just a couple rings), I was in warm water! I felt like ordering a pizza and just hanging out there for the next couple of weeks, but I imagine the other mudders would have ridiculed me and stolen my pizza.
Sometime thereafter, we came to the Boa Constrictor Pipes. Imagine a pipe maybe 2 feet in diameter, with only the bottom cut out so that it can be filled with mud. We had to slither through the pipe, slightly downhill, for about 20 feet. Then imagine your view as you slither - the end of the pipe probably ½ full of water, making one question whether you are simply going to skin up your arms and legs only to drown. Well, I didn’t drown, and then after slithering through some muddy water under some barbed wire, it was back up hill through another pipe. The opening to this pipe was also ½ under water, meaning that I had to put my face in the water before climbing uphill through the pipe. I am generally somewhat claustrophobic, so completing this obstacle was one of the highlights of my day.
Next, we came up to one of the worst obstacles of the day. You had to traverse 50 feet through a pool of thick mud. Not too bad, right? Well, there was barbed wire maybe 18 inches above the mud, so you had to lay flat and slither through. Not too bad, right? Well, there were many electric wires hanging down to zap you if you dared allow your body to stick up more than about 12 inches out of the mud. Greg volunteered to go first, which was perhaps his worst decision of the day, and I followed. Near the end of the pit, I heard the awful zapping sound. Greg’s head had brushed a wire. I called out to him to ask if it hurt (hoping it was a very light shock), and Greg grunted, “Yeah, and I lost vision for a few seconds as well.”
With that endorsement and seeing just how low the electric wires at the end of the pit were dangling, I froze. I was hoping to find another path to take, to wake up from this horrible dream, or that maybe someone would be kind enough to simply euthanize me, when a female voice behind me called out, “C’mon dude, you gotta keep going.” With that I slunk as low as possible in the mud and slithered my way out, somehow escaping the wrath of the electric wires…for now.
Due to the very heavy rains the night before and the rain during the race, the course had now become extremely muddy. Imagine having to slog uphill and downhill through mud a couple inches deep…mile after mile. On a couple downhills, we followed the lead of those in front of us and gently slid down on our derrieres. It may sound like fun, but we had to slide slowly and carefully, as this wasn’t a smooth waterslide. This was a slide with stumps and rocks sticking out and threatening to pierce you in places you don’t want to be pierced.
The mud was even more evident when we came up to the Berlin Wall. This obstacle similar to the previous wall, except for 2 factors: 1) it was a couple feet taller, and 2) it was so muddy at the base that people couldn’t even get their footing to boost others over. After watching several people jump in vain at the wall or attempt the boost technique, only to fall precariously into the mud, Greg and I decided this was an obstacle we would have to walk around. The organizers told us there was no shame in skipping an obstacle if we didn’t feel safe – it wasn’t that we didn’t feel safe, it was just that we knew our team of 2 would still be out on the course come the 4th of July if we were determined to finish this obstacle.
The Cliff Hanger obstacle came shortly thereafter; it basically was a tall and steep hill of mud. This one looked daunting coming up to it, but a couple minutes of crawling on hands and knees and we were through. Although it wasn’t as tough as most obstacles, it still contributed to the gradual deterioration of any muscles which were still functioning.
The course organizers must be fairly religious, as they inserted a Jesus Walk obstacle into the course. This was similar to other mud pits, although it was refreshing that you could walk in fairly shallow water. That is, of course, until you pulled a Peter (disciple for you non-biblical types), lost your faith, took a wrong step and plunged upper torso first into three feet of cool and muddy water.
We next came to an area with surprisingly stable ground (still hilly of course). Our reward for finding this area was to carry a large log for ½ mile. Greg’s log was probably 9 inches in diameter, a fact I failed to notice until he nodded at my log of choice and commented, “I didn’t know they made 5 inch logs.”
Soon after that, we went through by far this easiest obstacle on the course, the cargo nets. There were 50 feet of cargo nets on the ground, and you simply hoisted the net above your head and walked through. We waited for another group to catch up to us to make it even easier as “many hands make for light work,” and at this point of the run, anytime we could lighten the load, we did so.
Mile 8 was really miserable – probably the worst on the whole course. Most of it was walking up and downhill in a few inches of mud. I put the over/under on the amount of times I would fall at 5, and I actually achieved the under, even though I still fell 4 times. I talked with people who had run the course the day prior, before the rain, and they said the only mud they faced was in the mud-designed obstacles. Oh well, that which does not kill you, only makes you muddier.
Just when it seemed the misery, rain, wind, and cold would never end, around mile 9 we emerged from the land of mud and returned to the land of somewhat flat, and only partial mud. The promise of being closer to the finish along with the lack of mud really made this a more enjoyable part of the course. So, we decided to run for the first time in a while. We reached the top of a hill and started yelling out “Drago!!!” (No one except people who have watched Rocky IV will appreciate that last sentence) However, our Rocky Balboaness was immediately curtailed as we both developed leg cramps – Greg in his right calf, me in my left hammy.
With about a mile to go I climbed up a mud hill to get to the next obstacle and my left hamstring really cramped up. That permitted me to sit on the top of the mud hill for a couple minutes in the cold and windy rain to massage my painful leg. After the leg cramp subsided, we encountered the Funky Monkey, another area where fit dudes swing from bar to bar, and behemoths like Greg and I reach for a bar and fall into the water. But again, it was warm water, and life was temporarily good.
We emerged from that obstacle and immediately came upon Everest, a quarter-pipe (skateboarder term). All I know is that you had to run up a muddy and slippery ramp, which then inverted at the top (about 12 feet high). Seeing a line of about 150 people waiting to try to make it to the top and seeing fit guys fail miserably was enough for Greg and I to skip our 2nd obstacle of the day. We didn’t like skipping obstacles, but at some point we just realized that some things just weren’t going to happen.
We actually skipped the next obstacle as well - a series of wobbly balance beams hovering above, you guessed it…mud. Normally I would have been game to walk 5 feet before losing balance and plunging headfirst into the muddy water, but with my cramping hamstring, I wasn’t sure how I could make it into or out of the obstacle without enduring another cramping session, so we walked around an obstacle for the third and final time.
Now only ½ mile from the finish, we climbed up a 20 foot wall, which was generously leaning ever so slightly in our favour (I put a “u” in there to excite my British readers) and which had a couple inch wide muddy ledge every three feet or so. I used my right leg to pull myself up and dragged my left leg behind me. In hindsight, that was the obstacle where if I slipped I could have really crashed down hard and gotten hurt fairly badly. With my mind as numb as my body, I really wasn’t thinking straight at this time, so thankfully I made it to the top. Upon reaching the summit, we were on our small ledge with water 20 feet below us. The staff told us we couldn’t dive but encouraged us to do flips. No thanks, I think I’ll just jump.
The only bad thing about this obstacle, or so I thought, was that it cleaned us off, and I was hoping for a muddy picture at the finish to make it look like we actually did something.
The final obstacle was the famous Electroshock Therapy.
As you can see in the picture, there are a bunch of electric wires hanging down, but only some of them were “live.” I suppose I could have crawled beneath them, but everyone else was running through them. So, when in
Rome...do stupid things.
Nothing happened as I staggered through the first few wires, so I figured I was home free. Then, I got a little zap, but kept limping along. About 15 feet from escaping, I got zapped twice in a row and decided enough was enough and simply took a dive into the mud. I crawled the rest of the way through the obstacle. Greg and I decided to ignore our cramps and run to the finish. As we rounded the final corner, both of us took one last tumble in the mud before crawling to safety, righting ourselves, and jogging through the finish line. To say we were elated would be an understatement. To say we were so excited that we wanted to give each other a cold and muddy hug would be an overstatement.
The staff donned me with a headband (you can’t buy ‘em, you can only earn ‘em,), put a t-shirt in my completely mud-covered hands (ummm…you guys heard of bags?) and handed me a cold Dos Equis Amber.
We had to sign a three page Death Waiver to participate in the event, and one of the clauses says that Tough Mudder does not encourage drinking alcohol after the race. But after crossing the finish line, one of the first things they do is hand you a beer.
We drank it down, used some very cold water to hose off, and put the course in our rearview mirror.
After 11.5 miles in 3 hours and 45 minutes, with only 2 bananas and water as nourishment, I said to Greg, “Let’s find a small mudder and eat him.” Greg instead took me to a restaurant and we ordered bacon cheeseburgers. For all I know, it was E coli infested, but I didn’t care, it was the best burger I have ever tasted.
After a fitful night of sleep due to sore muscles, scraped up legs and knees, and heavily chafed arms, I have two final reflections for the two of you that are still reading.
First, that was the most physically demanding thing I have ever done with the exception of running a marathon. Am I glad I did it? Absolutely. The confidence I gained from persevering through the misery and conquering my fears of claustrophobia and heights is something that no one can ever take away from me. Will I do another one? What do you think I am, stupid? (Actually, get back to me on that one)
Second, and most importantly, I couldn’t be any more proud of my friend Greg. He has done an admirable job of developing a healthy lifestyle (with the exception of his pre-race heaters) and losing a ton of weight. But, even though he is currently in better shape than me, he still faced a much more difficult task. I have had the good(?) fortune of running 5 marathons. I built up to those events by running a series of shorter races. So, I have had years of building mental toughness.
Greg, on the other hand, had never run further than 4 miles in his life. Yesterday, he finished 11.5 miles in absolutely miserable conditions. He went from zero to sixty without missing a beat.
When we got back to Greg’s home after the race, his lovely wife and four kids were all waiting for him in the kitchen. One of his kids gleefully exclaimed, “Dad, you didn’t die!!!!”
I jumped in and said, “You guys should be really proud of your dad. That was an extremely tough race. I built up to it by running a lot of races over the past 10 years, but your dad took it on in his first ever race. He is really tough.”
I wish I had my camera ready at that moment, as the way his kids’ faces swelled up with delight and pride was something I won’t soon forget. They were so proud of their dad, and he had set such a great example for them.
Thanks, Greg, for inviting me to join you in your first ever race. It was a honor. And a very muddy one at that.
Author’s final note: I know one is supposed to use variety in writing, but I used the word “mud” over 60 times above. You know what? I just don’t muddin’ care.
