Dashing Warriors

A couple of months ago, I somehow managed to convince my friend Josh that he should join me in running a Warrior Dash. I may never be able to convince him to do anything ever again.

“Hey Josh,” I’ll say, “You should really consider breathing in oxygen and then breathing out carbon dioxide. It’s good for you. You’ll like it.”

“Eff you, Hope,” he’ll say, “Efffff youuuuuuu.”

Which is to say that running a Warrior Dash is (un)surprisingly difficult.

It would have been tough on a good day. The course starts off with a sprint up a very steep hill and then continues for 3+ miles through the woods, up and down more hills. Every so often you have to get past an obstacle. Some of them are a little silly (the bungee cords that we had to crawl under barely slowed me down), some of them can be scary (jumping over fire was fun, but definitely took more than a little willpower on my part) and some of them are just plain tough (alternating jumping over four foot barriers and then crawling under barbed wire several times didn’t seem so bad until I ran a few feet after the last set and realized that my heart was pounding). Like I said, it would have been challenging on a good day.

Saturday? Not such a great day.

It rained all morning and there were several thousand people who raced in waves before us (we were in one of the last groups of the day). The combination of the two left the course a muddy, muddy mess. We knew we were going to get dirty (most Warrior Dashes end with a slog through a giant mud pit), but we were not expecting to be wading through the mud for the majority of the race. I was able to run for most of the dry bits, but when the mud got too deep I had to slow to a walk. Not only did I keep losing my sneakers in the mud, there were giant ruts covered by muddy water and I was worried about wrenching my knee or breaking an ankle. Even at a slower pace, I fell several times.

(I woke up this morning and realized that I’m covered in bruises).

(I think my coworkers suspect that someone has been beating me).

All of this is my way of saying that I freaking loved the Warrior Dash. Which is to say that I’m a crazy person. A crazy, crazy person. Josh has already informed me that he will never be doing anything like this ever again. Me? I’m already thinking about how I can train better for next year. I finished the course in a little over an hour, which means that I traversed the course at a tortoise-ly 17 minute mile pace. I placed in the bottom half of finishers, although I was in the top of the bottom, if that makes any sense (I was just below the halfway point in the finishers list). And I did manage to finish in the top half for my age group. Next year, I want to kick some major booty.

Warriors!

Next year, Kristian is going to insist that we take my car instead of his.

And he probably won’t spend so much time cleaning it that morning.