5 friends, 6 months of training, 12 miles, 20 obstacles, 8,000ft, we did it!
Chris got a team together back in March, and since then we have completed many workouts together. We did only one group workout, a total blast. We hosted, and did "normal" exercises like lunges, squats, burpees, etc, and mudder exercises like pushing a water jug on wheels up our driveway, climbing up a steep hill as a group, running around the property with weighted packs (or kids on our back), and a Chris constructed balance beam.
Months passed, pushups and pullup numbers increased as our strength improved. We both ran longer and felt stronger.
Wynter offered her services while we were going to race. We went to a beautiful wedding the night before, drove up to South shore, and stayed at their house. My mom was there too!
We headed to bed and had about the best hour of sleep of our lives.. Then Owen woke up... And kept waking up tooting... It was like he was a newborn! Around every hour... Arg! He slept in bed with us, and we are still blaming the apple chips he had for dessert??? Oh well, the last time he woke up at night was our last night away about 3 weeks ago.. Guess he is a routine type of dude.
So we woke up for real around 6 and had some breakfast and a little bit of coffee. Chris and I headed off around the west side of the lake. Neither of us had done the drive before, and at 6am it was absolutely gorgeous. We pulled into northstar around 745 and got organized. We were to meet up with our team at 8.
Our team didn't meet up until 845 due to some potty breaks along the way. Chris and I relaxed by an outdoor firepit and calmed our nerves.
Our team arrived. We were all united and still a little confused. We needed to register but there were 2 long lines... We figured out that the long lines were the Lines to the gondola and the chair lift to get up to the registration and start, bag check, etc. When all was said and done it was about 945 and our start time was 10. We had an awesome cheerleader, Char, who is also the wife of one of our teammates. She was going to take pics through the race. We were getting ready to go to the start when I saw another familiar face- Jaclyn! She surprised us and came to cheer us on and take pics as well!
We headed off to the start and before you even get there you have to climb over a 7 feet wall. It was do able but got me thinking... "What did we sign up for?"
10 came and we were off! We decided to hike the hills and jog the flats or downs to preserve energy and stay strong. The first obstacle was a mud crawl with barbed wire about 18 inches from the ground.
We hiked up... And up.... The first 6 miles were uphill and at least 1 mile was straight up. The reward was the beautiful view at the top of northstar...Next time I will chairlift to the top!
The second obstacle (which came around mile 2) was a base jump into cold water. We think the stage was about 15-20 feet up. All I know is that when I got to the top it was higher than anything I had jumped off of before. With a "you can do this" from the volunteer, I had no choice... Jump! Free falling... Sinking.... Chris and I surfaced at the same time and he said something not very nice but I was thinking it too!! I lost my dollar tree silly glasses and my team headband on the jump, and that was the first crazy obstacle. We talked later about how we sank lower than we had expected, since we were fully clothed, shoes on, and at a height.
The log carry came next, not bad. I selected a log lighter than Owen so I knew it wouldn't be a problem.
It gets a little blurry through here, but the next hardest challenge was the ice... The obstacle is a 15 ft icebox. Literally just enough water in the ice to prevent it from freezing. Halfway through is a board with barbed wire on the top (to prevent climbing over) so you have to swim under... The board you have to swim under hangs lower than you would prefer as well, so you have to swim down in order to clear it.. After submerging twice in the water, clearing the board, I honestly stopped functioning. Never had my whole body in complete ice water... My brain slowed working for a while, so thankful my team helped pull me out on the other side. I felt like I was cramping up in all edges of my body. So weird. From then on we were never dry again. That was about 30 mins into the event. It was a cold rest of the day. There were heat blankets which helped but then there would be another wet or icy event. (pulling a blanket over me now, just thinking about it..)
The monkey bars aka funky monkey proved our least successful obstacle. Chris went first, and only made it a few rungs as he found out that they rotated... At an incline! Yikes. During training we both worked on our pullups and did the monkey bars quite a bit when we would take Owen to the park. I too couldn't make it across them, so I let go and dropped into the water. I thought the water was deep, and landed straight down on my knee. The water was only about 3-4 feet. Oh my I was in some pain... Chris and Dan helped pull me out of the water and I couldn't walk right away. My knee was swelling up and I was shocked-- and mad that I didn't know it wasn't deep. Once the initial shock and pain wore off a nice mudderer gave us some medical tape. Chris taped up my knee and off we went. No major injury, wee!
We had so much fun with our team "runnin fast and breakin wind". Our team member Matt really made the second part come true, ha! We all
Have kids around 2 so it was neat to be around others who also put fitness on their priority list along with their family of course.
Also, our sisters and parents took care of each of our kids that day. How awesome for families to come together and support each other!
We all made it (bumped and bruised, and sore but intact!) and we're so glad we did it.
Would we do it again? Yes, but I'm
Not interested any time soon!
Would I train differently?
I felt very prepared, focusing on upper body strength and running.
Would I recommend this to others?
Yes! A team approach is so much fun to go through it together.
Chris and I were so happy to complete
This challenge together, and after
we were so starving too, we stopped for a big burger on north shore. After we ate it, we continued around the lake, clockwise, to bring the day full circle. We recapped our day, full of fun and sweat. What a beautiful finish, driving around such an amazing lake. Loved our day, rewarding it was.
Let me know if you ever want to mudder, they travel all around the us and world!
