So my crazy friend talked me into doing the Warrior Dash which we completed today. It was a very hilly 5K with 14? obstacles, most of them were tough to me. I am not a beginner, I have ran several 5Ks, I run a very slow 12 min. mile. I can do push-ups, sit-ups, tough circuits etc. I can swim a mile. I have powerful legs. What can I not do? Pull-ups. I am fit, but I weigh a lot. If you can not do a pull up, you may want to consider skipping this one.
The first 1.5 was very hilly, no prob for me, we walked up the hills and ran down them. I had trained to do this. We were doing great. Not in the beginning of the pack, not at the end. Then came the obstacles:
1. I called the first obstacle over and under they call it Barricade Breakdown. Difficulty for me was medium. You need some arm strength for this. I have some arm strength, some.
2. Teetering traverse or an angled balance beam. I'm good with balance. I was confident. And then I got up there, it was high!! Mentally I was messing with myself, when I told myself you've got this, I did. And I walked right up and down those angled balance beams. Difficulty, medium for me
3. Giant Clifhanger was a reality check for me. A 15 ft. rope wall. There was nothing for your feet to help you, there goes all my leg strength, this became completely upper body arms. I got up to the top and there was nothing to push off or grab onto so a hung at the top, 15 ft. up and panicked. I contemplated sliding back down, panicked some more. Nice guy helped my crazy friend over the wall, and she stood there, hanging out on the top until I had rested (as much as you can rest when are hanging by your arms 15 ft. up, have I mentioned how much I weigh? No? Oh yeah, I'm not gonna tell you.) All the sudden I got angry, determined and just powered up over that wall. I could not do that when I was panicked. Then I realized this is a mental just as much as physical and I also realized that I was scared of heights. There is definitely no room for fear in this race. Difficulty= how in the hell did I do that? for me. We bonded with a couple of other runners that also struggled over that. We were now a team of 4.
4. Crawling through dirt under a fishing net? (the order of the obstacles is fuzzy) This one wouldn't have been bad, but it was so dry and dusty, I was inhaling dirt, my knee hurt. Oh yeah my back was hurting from running down those hills. I decided I was getting old.
5. was a horizontal rope wall. I crawled across it. It was a little hard on the knees but OK. Difficulty for me- medium.
6. What was next? the tires? That one was easy Yay!
7. Swamp, there was an over the head drop off, but there were ropes so I floated and let my arms take me across. Difficulty-medium I fell in the mud at the end. Mud is tough stuff!
8. Rope wall with boards for your feet. This has difficulty levels we chose the shortest rope, some of the ladies were smart thinkers! Difficulty-hard for me
8. Crawling under barbwire. I guess that was easy?
9. A wall with a small ledge for your feet and a rope for your arms. I can't really explain it. You were above a swamp. Difficulty- medium
10. A rock climbing wall with a fire pole to slide down. It was slick with mud. Crazy friend and I just hung out at the top contemplating going down that pole. It took us awhile to get up the courage to go down the freakin pole! We did it at the exact same time and both landed on our butts. Fortunately they put some hay at the bottom to cushion our fall. Difficulty-hard for me
11. A 20 foot rope climbing wall. It was high. Nuff said.
12. Warrior Roast, you jump over fire.
13. Mud pit, all I know is I got in, I got muddy, I had a hard time getting out. A nice guy gave me a shove up the side but then left me there to slide back down. I fell several times climbing out of that sucker.
FINISH LINE!!!! If I never see another rope wall it will be too soon. That was the toughest thing I've ever done that pushed me physically and mentally, oh yeah.....except maybe childbirth. None of which I would do again. Well maybe.....
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| Me and my teammates that helped me through. I couldn't have done it without them! |
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