Tough Mudder Seattle 10.6.13
Fun runs and challenging obstacle courses seem to have gotten really popular and are the latest rave for all of us that like to make fools out of ourselves while running, or think normal running just isn't challenging enough on its own. Or I just never paid attention to all of the races before I started running. Either way they’re fun and well suited for me. I did the Warrior Dash last year, a little over a 5K with some obstacles and mud, and a line of duraflame logs that you had to jump over. It was fun but nothing too challenging. I wasn't intimidated by any of the obstacles and I could have completed the course by myself, although it was more fun to run it with Alicia and Melissa. The mud pit was a little heavy on mud in the mud to water ratio so that was legitimately challenging and everyone had to help push/pull people through that. A bunch of my other friends decided the Warrior Dash was too easy so they signed up for the Tough Mudder. A 10 - 12 mile course with obstacles that included cold water and electricity, as well as a lot of mud, walls, and other things you need a team to help you through.
The Tough Mudder was the week before the Leavenworth Half Marathon though, my first half marathon and an event I was taking several months to train for. Given my history of tripping on level gym floors, I didn't want to take the chance of getting hurt the week before the half marathon, my priority. And let's be honest, getting electrocuted didn't sound like fun so I was happy to avoid it. I succeeded in avoiding the Tough Mudder for that first year, until the day after the event when everyone was raving about how awesome it was and was signing up a team for the 2013 event already. Sara was especially enthusiastic, and having sort of learned to not just always blindly follow her into things, I talked it over with Danielle who seemed less crazy about the whole thing. However, she said she had a lot of fun and encouraged me to do it. And I was always told I could just go around the obstacles I didn't like - yea, like people (including myself) would actually let me skip obstacles, but that's what I told myself as I hit the submit button. I got suckered in by all of the hype and cheap price and signed myself up to challenge the Tough Mudder in May 2013. Luckily something happened and they pushed the event back to October so I had even more time to try to block out and live in denial of what I had just done.
Over the next several months I whined a little (or maybe a lot) about having signed up for the Tough Mudder, but there was no good reason to back out. I mostly avoided thinking about the event until a few weeks before the big day. I finally joined in one of Sara's Tough Mudder workouts since it was leaving from my house and I had gotten back into running enough that I was OK doing 7 miles. I still skipped some of the exercises we did at the parks for my shoulder, but at least I was trying. I did one more workout and then the list of obstacles for this year's course came out. The expected electricity obstacles were listed and while I wasn't fond of the idea of getting electrocuted, especially after hearing about it from all of the previous year's participants, those weren't the most intimidating obstacles for me. A little background on myself - I never learned to swim. I sort of figured it out by myself when I was about 12 or 13, but I spent most of my childhood avoiding water activities because I didn't feel comfortable. When Aaron and I were in Hawaii, I had a hard time putting my face in the water when I was wearing a mask and snorkel. Yea, I probably shouldn't have signed up. Tough Mudder has a lot of water based activities, and there were four on the list that I was anxious about. Two are designed to reduce the amount of breathing room you have - the Boa Constrictor and Cage Crawl. While they didn't excite me I figured I could still get through them. Walk the Plank I felt fine about - I've jumped in water before, and most recently from a small cliff on a white water rafting trip, so I thought I could handle it. The one I was really unhappy about was Arctic Enema. The prior year the board in the water was really low. I was not only going to have to face my personal challenges with heading under water, but I'd have to do so in ice water. If I'm actively swimming around, my lips are generally blue. That's not even taking into consideration my circulation issues, so this obstacle would be my biggest challenge. Sara organized a team pasta dinner the night before where I enlisted Robert as my Mudder buddy to help me get through the obstacles. We had 16 people on the team so Sara assigned captains of groups of four to make it easier to account for everyone after each obstacle. I was on Robert's green team along with Sara and Matt. As we were brainstorming green things to wear, it was somehow suggested that I wear Sara's frog onesie. I of course accepted, intending to take if off before the scary water obstacles - namely Arctic Enema.
I rode down to Black Diamond with Sara, Matt, and Laura. Our official start time was 9:40am but we got there early so that Matt could get a mohawk. Tough Mudder donates the entry fees of those who get a mohawk to the Wounded Warrior Project. It was quite the event and I was impressed with how well run everything seemed to be. We got our numbers, wrote them all over each other in sharpie, and waited as the team trickled in. I put my frog on and had someone write my number on that too. Finally it was time for us to start, so after dropping by bag at the gear check, we shuffled into the starting area with the rest of the 9:40am group. To get to the start you go over a wall. There are three heights but Robert was the ultimate Mudder buddy and insisted I go over the highest wall. In true form of wearing a frog onesie, I lifted my arms over my head like a little kid and Robert picked me up and put me on top of the wall. The first of many times that day. Once on the other side, the emcee energized the crowd and went over some ground rules. Finally it was time to go and I started running for the last time as a clean, green frog.
The first official obstacle we came to was Glory Blades. The guys were awesome and lined up to give everyone a hand over. There were two tilted walls so at the first, I again lifted my arms up in signal to Robert, who picked me up and put me on the wall. At the next wall I did it to Justin, surprising him, but he played along. After all of the teams were accounted for (green, blue, lavender, and pink) we took off for the Kiss of Mud. This was a short mud pit under barbed wire. I could mostly crawl on my hands and knees so I escaped still mostly green - but not for long as we reach the Mud Mile. I'm not really sure they need an obstacle dedicated specifically to making participants run through mud, as it's a common theme encountered throughout the course. We went up over mud hills and down into muddy water. Throughout the day I'd dunk my hands in the muddy water, thinking I'd wash them off a little, only to have them come out more muddy. I now had a lower half brown frog suit and upper half green frog suit. There was a bit of running, generally through mud, between the obstacles. Fortunately it was a gorgeous fall day with the sun shining and Mount Rainier in the distance.
Great view of Mount Rainier during some of the run
The first several obstacles were fairly close together near the start. I had not actually studied the course map so I only sort of remembered what obstacles we'd encounter, but not in what order. This was probably for the best as I spent less time dreading the next one. I did not realize Walk the Plank was the fourth obstacle of the day. Time to face water fear number 1. I didn't think too much of it, but Sara had Matt and I stay close with Robert since we're both not the strongest swimmers. Laura wanted me to leap into the water like a frog, but I only sort of did that. Robert jumped with me and luckily hung out until I could get out of the water. I unfortunately got a mouth full of water, and trying to swim in my frog suit was a little more difficult than I expected, so he lent me a hand to pull me to the net. I made it out of the water, I survived! I was sopping wet so as we waited in line for the next obstacle I tried to wring out my frog suit some. Since I had made it through the most difficult obstacle in terms of wearing the frog suit, I decided to keep it on for the whole course.
Walk the Plank
The next obstacle was Cliff Hanger, a fairly steep muddy hillside. Most groups formed a human chain up to the cargo net. Justin, B-Herc, Robert, and Matt were often out in front to help get the team through whatever obstacle we encountered. As I made my way up the muddy hill right behind Robert, he was soon giving me a hand to the net. I slipped a little but he literally just grabbed a handful of butt and pushed me back up the slope. I was on the net and soon walking up the rest of the hill with the team.
Cliff Hanger
A little more running brought us to the next obstacle, the Boa Constrictor. This obstacle wasn't nearly as bad as I expected as the tubes were mostly empty of water. I didn't have to worry about not getting air.
Boa Constrictor
We were out of the tubes and running to the next obstacle, the Electric Eel. Another obstacle I'm glad I wasn't expecting. I chose a lane next to Robert and started down. The wires seemed to be wide enough that I could avoid them for the most part. At the end they hung low but some teammates once again gave me a hand and quickly pulled me through. I only got shocked once while moving through the obstacle and it really wasn't all that bad.
Electric Eel
We got some of the tougher obstacles knocked off of the list before the big running part. Next was an obstacle I was really looking forward to, Hanging Tough - the rings. I like the rings and always did them at the playgrounds when we found them. Unfortunately I got to the third ring and no matter how much I swung myself, I couldn't reach the next ring. After several attempts I finally gave up and dropped into the water, disappointed to have not finished the obstacle successfully.
Hanging Tough
Next up was the Warrior Carry, another event we had practiced during out Mudder Workouts. I started on Sara's back, and half way through we switched. We had seen Arctic Enema when we did the Electric Eel so I was expecting to encounter the obstacle soon, but we had to run a ways before we got there. This was by far the obstacle I was dreading the most so I stopped some teammates to formulate a plan to help me through it. I wanted someone on the other side to help pull me under the board. Justin and Robert jumped into the icy water first to wait for me on the other side of the board. Kevin jumped in with me to make sure I got there. Luckily the board wasn't nearly as low as the previous year so Justin could reach his hand under to help pull me. As soon as I was on the other side, Robert pushed me through the water and Chris helped pull me out. The guys were awesome and I escaped being in the icy water for hardly any time at all. Of course as we waited for everyone to make it through the obstacle, I discovered my hood (the frog head) was filled with ice cubes.
The course for the most part was kind of fun in that you seemed to get really muddy, then wet to sort of wash it off, then you'd run around and dry - then repeat. For the most part I think the frog onesie actually helped me stay warm. It was awkward to run with it sopping wet and sloshing all over the place, but it was worth it. I definitely got a lot of comments on it, including people wondering how I wasn't over heating. After the Arctic Enema we had the three or so mile trail run. At least everyone would get a chance to warm up again. The trail run was longer than I expected but not too bad. We were in a pretty constant line of people so we didn't move too fast. We went over and under logs along the way, and exchanged high fives with some of the Mudders we passed by. I was pretty hungry and the half of a banana I got before the Warrior Carry just wasn't cutting it, so I was thankful to get back to the obstacles and food. A little over half way through the trail run we got to the Berlin Walls, a set of two very high walls.
Berlin Wall
Robert and Justin helped most of the team over, while some of the guys were able to help pull each other over the wall. The team had soon ascended both walls and we were back on the trail. We emerged from the trees to Funky Monkey, Sara's favorite monkey bar obstacle. Last year the bars were spaced a ways a part and they spun. This year they didn't spin and were more reasonably spaced. Sara was almost across before I even got in line. I went after Kevin and he thankfully got all the wet mud off of the bars so I had a fairly easy time across.
Funky Monkey
Once across it was back into the trees for some more running, which brought us to Hold Your Wood. Robert picked a log out for me and we joined the line of people traipsing through the woods carrying logs. This carry was a lot longer than I expected and I was OK leaving my log behind in the woods. Some more running brought us to some high logs to get over. Robert found me and again, just picked me up and put me on the logs. He definitely looked out for me throughout the whole event.
One of the many high logs they had throughout the course, since you know, running covered in mud isn't hard enough
Next up were some bananas! I was pumped and grabbed two halves this time to help refuel. The next obstacle awaiting us was the Cage Crawl, the last water obstacle I had to endure. Someone said there was more clearance above the water on the right side so I went down there. I still only had just my face out of the water, so the sensory deprivation of hearing was a little strange. Sometimes the fence was covered over too, and I couldn't really look to see where Melissa was ahead of me so I was trying to keep a good pace, but not too fast that I might hit her. Of course the guy after me caught up and was pushing me out of the way at the end. It was a little more mentally challenging than I expected personally, but I was done with the water obstacles and back to running up and down the muddy slopes on the way to our next obstacle.
Cage crawl
The Seattle Tought Mudder course is at Palmer Coking Coal Company, so as a unique obstacle, they put some big trucks and tires on the course for us to crawl over and under. The rocky dirt wasn't fun, but the kids shaming everyone into climbing over the tires instead of going around them was kind of humorous.
Dump Truck Crawl, just to make the running between the main obstacles more interesting
Once through that we had some good, thick mud to run through bringing us to a fairly steep mud hill. I was able to sort of controllably start down the slope, but then started an uncontrolled mud glissade to the bottom.
Steep muddy hill for fun, unavoidable mud glissade?
The next obstacle was Twinkle Toes, a couple logs tied together that you had to walk across. I get to practice this in the alpine a lot but generally the logs are luckily more stable. I made it part way across before giving up and jumping in the water.
Twinkle Toes
We were in the home stretch now and only had a couple of obstacles between us and the finish line. We rounded the bend and headed for Everest, a quarter pipe. Several of the guys made it on their own, and then waited to give the rest of us a hand up. I waited for almost everyone else to go before taking my turn. I ran up, reached for Matt, and slowly slid out of his hands and back down the ramp. On attempt number two I think I managed to grab Matt and Justin but again, slipped out of their hands. Finally, on my third attempt I got Matt and Robert and they pulled me up. According to Matt I was cold and slippery, kind of frog like?
Everest
The last obstacle was Electroshock Therapy. I decided it'd be a good time to put my frog head hood back up. There was a fairly clear path through the hay bales and wires for a good chunk, so I followed Sara into the wires. I think I got shocked once but made it out mostly unscathed.
Electroshock Therapy
I almost slipped on the mud beyond the wires but was able to recover and cross the finish line to receive my Tough Mudder orange headband. We had made it! We got all 15 people through the course and no one got too badly injured. Everyone enjoyed a victory beer and then made their way over to the hoses to wash off. One of the nicest parts over the Warrior Dash were the stand of hoses that you could personally use to de-mud, as well as changing tents. Turns out, frog onesies keep you relatively clean underneath. Tough Mudder was a lot better than I expected and a really well run event. The weather was great, the obstacles weren't as bad as I think they were the year before, and my team was awesome. I ran between obstacles but I think the team did most of the work of getting me through all of the obstacles and I'm super grateful for their help. Also a big thanks to Ryan for all of the awesome pictures he took throughout the course and for letting me use them in this post.
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