Tough Mudder 50

So after a great run on Saturday, where I pushed myself through everything and only avoided pitfall and Everest so that I would keep my hands dry for kong, which ironically I slipped off the third ring as my hands were too dry and dusty from the mud but I said to myself no I'm going for this, i wet my hands to get a bit of grip and made it across, even going back and having a play when I'd finished, making it across twice and then two and a half times, l had high hopes for Sunday being a good day.

We arrived on site and I quickly got into my outfit for the run complete with bow. A quick hello to Owen and Laura then across to the main village for our bibs and face marking. A quick greeting to other familiar faces and into the warmup pen, I got to be on stage warming up the crowd, though the warm up woman thought I was Aunt Sally from Worzel Gummidge rather than Dorothy from the wizard of Oz.

As it was a milestone event, Gil did a fabulous start area warm up, with me in the centre, then I got to do the countdown and high five / hug the mudders setting off, which was cool. I caught up to the back of the wave and plodded on, running and walking, lots of people liked the outfit, which was nice. Once I hit the mud, I knew it would be much harder wearing the dress. When we got up to mud mile part of it was closed, as someone had gotten stuck the day before. We met up with Thomas and Jake at hero walls.

The course wound around the grounds of Loughcrew really well, with the half event being incorporated in the full course in the best way I've seen as yet, if there was any criticism it would be having a single lane for cage crawl as that meant there were some larger queues waiting for people to get through. Thankfully the weather stayed really nice for both days and the threatened rain never turned up.

I was trying to emulate Owen walking the block for blackness without falling in the water but I managed it once before ending up in the water, i dont quite remember wgat happened as I went in the water for the second block but I smashed both shins against the edge and a surge of adrenaline raced round my body and I felt incredibly cold even though I knew the water wasn't cold, it took a little while for it to wear off but I knew I wasn't cutting the course or quitting, as I wanted to finish my 50th event properly, so we continued on (as a sidenote, I dont recommend this, as there is little muscle in the shin area so my leg has swelled and is painful to walk, stand or have in a vertical position).

I went through pitfall but kept my hands away from the mud and I looked at Everest and I immediately said nope, not a chance, it was dangerously slick looking and knowing my luck, I'd have injured myself.

I climbed up to the rings of kong and got to the third ring which was covered in mud but after picking myself up, went round and got across, then Gil had me going through electro shock therapy, I noticed the wind blowing the wires so I went down the side of it avoiding the wires so avoided being shocked, before being crowned with the black and gold headband by Gil and crossing the finish line under the arms of an archway of mudder and volunteers, which was great fun, so I'm the 6th person to reach 50 events, which has taken 4 years, 7 months, 22 days since my first one back in November 2012, with every year increasing the amount of events I'm going to take part in, this will have been the busiest year, with a bewildering 22 events.

So as a proud holder of a black and gold headband, I'm curious as to when the next colours will be coming out an what they will look like, I'm hoping they are a combo of silver black and gold black but reversed, so that silver/gold is backed with black. Though well see if enough people start reaching 50 events but with the numbers already past 25 it won't be too long till a lot have passed the 50+ mark.

Tough Mudder 47/48 - Scotland

What a weekend, the weather was scorching hot, the course was undulating and hilly in places, the friends were many and the event was really good, with a couple of exceptions, one of my favourites so far. As the event isn't too far from mine it didn't take too long to there, even having to stop off to ensure we didn't get there too early.

We'd entered the tougher wave, which is the first wave to set off on the Saturday morning, with prizes for the top three finishers. I have no chance to win but you do get a different headband and t-shirt which is always nice to have. We set off and maintained a steady pace with me thinking as I always do that I should have trained on hills to make it easier, I should really have trained full stop but that's a whole different thing. Mud mile was deceptive, as it was really dry until you hit the mud, so after rolling through which is easier than crawling, I was covered in mud, which was really heavy and meant that running was harder, it meant that my energy was being drained, so climbing skidmarked was really difficult.

It was starting to get really warm so artic was a nice refreshing dip, pyramid scheme still had the ropes on it to get up, which was helpful. the rest of the course was well laid out, with enough hills to make it challenging, they had penalties if you couldn't get across funky money which I didn't but as time was getting on there was no penalty to do. I ended up using the rope at everest which was hard but I;m still wary of that since last year at the Midlands. We collected our legionnaire headbands and only kong left to tackle, When I got up there the young lass volunteering said "you've got this" with my brain thinking I probably don't, as I felt tired but as I reached the forth ring, I thought perhaps I do have, reaching the fifth and getting to the other side had me feeling really ecstatic, so much so that I was telling anyone I knew that I had managed to get over.

Off for volunteering which was tiring given how hot the day was, thankfully I didn't burn too much but I did feel sick and tired and had to take shade from the sun.

We didn't get out as early on the Sunday but we had decided to take part in the help 100 mudders over an obstacle, so we headed out between waves, to get up to skidmarked, I of course didn't get myself over before helping 100 people get over it, which meant that I had no energy to get myself over like I usually do, still I discovered helping 100 people of various shapes and sizes was really hard, if people pulled themselves up and over that helped more than if they were shorter and lighter, I think looking back I might so that again but work on lifting weight, like a sandbag repeatedly, might help with this.

Got pulled down off pyramid scheme again but noticed someone running up the side, which was quite dry so we used that to get over. we helped a few more people over and through things, I almost made it across funkey monkey, only just missing the last bar to get me on to the other side, which I was pleased at managing to almost get over, we kept plodding on and then helped a whole bunch of people at blockness monster which is my current favourite obstacle, I didn't manage kong and looking back I should have given it another go but there is always next time.

I thoroughly brilliant weekend aside from the burning temperature, midges and some obnoxious people being loud late into the night.