Warrior Dash 5K Obstacle Course Run

Barrie ON

Bib # 11645

Official time 42:23

 

Place 1607/6689

Gender Place 462

Category Place 83/792

After reading about this race shortly after last years event I was so excited to sign up for this! I stalked the Warrior Dash website regularly and registered pretty much the day that the 2012 Ontario race was put up. I was pumped for this run, but then after a number of let downs with various partners my excitement level quickly dwindled. By the time Saturday came around I honestly couldn't have cared less if I participated or not. Boo. Going into a run with indifferent feelings is never a precursor to the turnout that I would like. Running is so much more than moving your legs, it's just as much a mental game. My oldest son Kyle ended up running this with me so at least I was excited for that. As a sixteen year old he doesn't bother with me much unless it's to give him money or spend money on him so I pretty much jumped at the opportunity when he said yes he would run this with me.

We were registered for the 11am wave so we got on the road shortly before 8am. I wasn't sure what highway 400 traffic would be like and I had a feeling that between taking a shuttle bus from the parking area and hitting the registration tent it would take a bit of time so I wanted to leave a little early. Of course my husband didn't think that this was a good idea, but that's only because it meant that he had to get up earlier. LOL Surprisingly we cruised to Horseshoe Valley without a single slow down on the highway! That never happens on a weekend in the summer! We found the parking area, forked over $20 (seriously, I didn't realize that we were going to a Leafs game!) hit the porta potties (which were apparently disgusting, the ones at Edgefest weren't even that bad! according to Kyle) and boarded the shuttle bus. In a few minutes we were at the resort and heading over to the registration area. This is where I finally broke it to Kyle that he was registered as Sarah. Other than a quick bitch session that he better not get stuck with a 'chick shirt' he took it pretty well. I was really impressed with how organized the registration area was. I honestly thought that it was going to be a mess with so many people running throughout the day! I got the two registration kits (and unisex tshirts....you're welcome Kyle) and headed back to my family. We put our timing chips (which also double as beer tickets) on our shoes and bibs on our shirts and headed over to the action.

Look how nice and clean we are!

At this point it was 10:10 so I figured we'd go check out the start area and see if we could sneak in with the 10:30 wave. We totally could! Yay! Derek left us here to go and people watch so we stood around, stretched a little and talked strategy. Kyle doesn't run (other than a couple of mile runs for gym) and he was a little worried so I said that I would let him run in front and we'd go at his pace. If we had to walk, no big deal. It was starting to get hot out and I had no water left. My mouth was sooooo dry but there was nothing that I could do now. We were at the front of the corral and I had no way of finding Derek who had my bag. I'd just have to hope there was a water station soon. Finally the gun flame whatever thing went off and the race began. Honestly the race is a bit of a blur to me. There was so much going on to remember and it was marked in miles rather than km's so I'm unsure of what points things happened at. Probably less than a km in we ran into a wooded area where there was a massive mud bog. Knowing that our shoes and clothes were going to get trashed I wore an old pair of work runners. I hate tight shoes so I do not tie my shoes for work very tightly. Nor do I ever untie them. In hindsight I should have thought to tighten these up because not only did I lose one shoe in this mud but I lost two. So there I stood in my socks up to my mid calves in mud with people running all around me while trying to unsuccessfully get my shoes unstuck. Once I finally got them out I ran up into the wooded area, scraped as much of the mud off of my socks as I could and threw my shoes back on. Unfortunately being in front, Kyle had no idea that I had stopped so this was the last time that I saw him until the very end. Hmph! There went my motivation to run this stupid race. Right after the mud bog is where the hills began. I ran up the first one, told a couple of girls who were walking in the middle of the trail to move to the side (which didn't go over very well LMAO), and tried to see if I could catch up to Kyle. Around 2k the first obstacle came up. It was a big boxed in area where you had to hop over wooden fences and crawl under barbed wire(?). The height of these fences was just a bit to high for me so I pivoted on my butt to get over them. Great. Now I had a sore ass for the rest of this run. Getting better and better! All I could think about was A) how thirsty I was B) how heavy my feet were from the mud C) my butt hurt! Just after this first obstacle I noticed a guy with a water bottle. I was so frickin' thirsty at this point I didn't even give a crap and asked him if I promised not to touch it with my mouth could I please have a sip of his drink. In the normal world I would rather turn to dust than to ask a friend for a sip of their drink let alone a total stranger but I had a kid to catch up to! He didn't look happy about it but handed it over and I squirted a small sip into my mouth. Thank you. There were a few more obstacles and hills, which according to Kyle were also obstacles, and then FINALLY in the distance I could see a water station. Hallelujah! I downed an entire cup and went back on my way. At this point I stopped running the hills. There were just too many of them and I am training for a 30K and didn't want to kill myself. I found that the people that would pass me running up the hills would be so gassed by the time they got to the top I would end up passing them as they had to catch their breath any way. The obstacles in this race were actually really fun. This would have been way better if there were not hills involved! In the wall climb I totally kicked two guys butts (thank you beer & wing muscles!) and flew past them as they slowly made their way up the wall. Once I saw the 2 mile marker I realized that I would never catch up to Kyle so I just focused on getting this thing over with. After passing another water station and downing another cup of water my thoughts now moved to A) my feet are heavy from this mud and sand that has stuck to the mud B) who the hell would run this race two years in a row because these hills suck bongos!?!? C) my butt hurts D) is this ever going to end?! After another obstacle or two and a million more hills I finally turned the corner and saw the final parts of the run. The cargo net climb (which is totally high and harder than it looks!) the fire pits and the mud pit. I also saw the annoying guy who had been with me the last few obstacles (he really had to talk himself through them) and thought to myself NO! He is NOT beating me. (Do you ever notice that I almost always pick a person in a race to beat. Don't judge me just because they're usually always old, young or weird LOL) So I ran my ass off, flew up the cargo net, jumped over the fire, leaped into the mud and crossed the finish line with what I can only say was my first smile of the race. I grabbed my medal, a cup of water and two mushy bananas and found Kyle. My darling little angel who had the time of his life and finished about 10 minutes ahead of me (I'm still waiting for the official times to be posted before I believe this!). Derek said that Kyle was grinning ear to ear as he crossed that finish line and hearing that made it all worth while. Sure today my calves are frickin' killing me, but my boy had an amazing time (even running it by himself) and even though while running I wondered who the hell would run this two years in a row, if he wants to do it again next year, we'll be back.

Not so clean now.......looks like I've changed into my mud knee highs.

The water from the fire hoses was too cold so we sucked out and washed at the hand washing stations.

Edited to add that Kyle beat me by 8 minutes! He ran in the course in 34:26 and came 11/792 40 year old women! LOL In his own AG he would have come 22/146! I'm so impressed with him! He came 418/6689 overall! Attaboy, babe!