Part One of my Year of Personal Challenges saw me freezing my nuts off in a bath, surviving on eggs and disgusting bean based patties, plodding out 100 dark miserable miles and then contorting myself to undo the damage caused by those 100 miles…
Four down, eight to go….
At this point in the year, I had already learned a few things about myself, firstly, these challenges looked more glamourous and appealing on paper or a social media post than they did at 5.30 am, when it’s dark outside, the stiffness, the aches and pains of your body are outweighing your motivation to continue. Secondly once you commit in public, there’s no going back!
With the first and, in my opinion, the most miserable third of the year ticked off, I moved into the latter part of spring with a fresh challenge…
May – Run a Race
This may not seem like much of a challenge, but at this stage in my life, I had never run a race… As you know I could run, I would pound out the miles on my own agenda, pushing myself to achieve what I had set out to achieve.
Up to this point in my life I had never really had the confidence to sign up to a race, but when my cousin suggested to her husband that I was probably stupid enough to take part in a 20 mile obstacle course race with him, it came at the perfect time as I had nothing in the planner for May.
If I was going to face my insecurities around racing, I may as well do it properly, 20 miles of running, nearly 10 miles further than I’d ever gone in one hit before.
SO, I agreed, with 100 miles under my belt I felt confident that I had the endurance and stamina to do it, so what else needed work? The 200 obstacles… So, I set out a functional fitness training programme, I knew that there would be monkey bars, objects to carry, balance beams, cargo nets and big obstacles to actually get over!
Along with a couple of 5k runs a week to keep up the fitness in the legs I worked on my grip strength, pull ups, muscle ups and overall functional fitness. By the time the date came around I felt ready. I was nervous as hell, but I was ready. Thank you Muscle Forest!
The race itself was organised by Rat Race and was held at Burghley House in Lincolnshire, the team at Rat Race had constructed a 20 mile route complete with the 200 obstacles.
My cousin Rick and I arrived in the evening and pitched our tent before heading down to the town to carbo load on beer and pizza, Stamford is a lovely historical town, and we had a nice evening trying to forget the events of the following day.
After a half decent night’s sleep the light shone through the canvas and woke me, it was THE DAY, I cleaned my teeth, thankfully had a BM and waited for our start time.
The energy in the camp was odd, a mix of excitement and nerves, there were some pro’s there, all geared up ready to go, I just hoped I had the right shorts on… then I hoped I could just finish… My nerves really kicked in, I hid it as best I could with a smile and faked excitement. I just wanted to start!
While we waited for our slot we watched the earlier waves set off, they were quick! Damn quick! But were they starting too fast?? My overactive brain was doing me no favours; I had to have a word with myself…
I could run, I knew I could, I’d just done it every day for 31 days for crying out loud, just keep putting one foot in front of the other until you’re back at this spot! The book about Ernest Shackleton came back to me, “Through Endurance We Conquer!” – YES… Endurance, I have that, I will conquer, just keep plodding on at my own pace and I CAN DO THIS!
I turned to my cousin and said,” I’m not the quickest, I can go all day at my plodding pace, you don’t have to wait for me, it’s fine…” He said “nonsense, we’ll stick together!”
Our wave was called, we warmed up and got properly psyched! Then we gathered for the start…. 3…. 2…. 1…. GO! We were off, along an avenue of tree’s we turned a corner and out into the open fields and down a hill towards the farm land, dead ahead were the first obstacles, hay bales, we climbed over and under, some as high as 3 metres, not a problem, we were only a few hundred metres in, after these hay bales it was time to settle in, the first run was about to begin, a steady run through the park of about 1.5 miles which took us to a group of what I would say were childish obstacles, space hoppers through foam which weren’t great for my stiff hips, I did slip on my arse a few times…. These weren’t exactly taxing though, more annoying than anything, but I was in a good place.
We continued the run for a few miles before we arrived at a woodland area which had timber climbing frames, balance beams, cars stacked on top of each other, cargo nets and much more designed to slow us down! I had no worries, I’d trained for this!
We reached our first aid station, and I took a flapjack and water, the second-best flapjack I have ever had, top position goes to my friends Sharon and Chris, I hope they are reading this, they deserve all the praise they can get! They are just so bloody good!
We continued on and were faced with a lake! Instructed to jump in and swim, we did as we were told and swam! It was cold and filthy from all the mud from the woodland obstacles, but it was a nice break from running, the cold felt good on the muscles, and it gave me a boost, a boost which was needed for the next challenge, a big jump from a high platform, aptly named MAN Vs LAKE.
I’m not as good with heights as I used to be, I’m not scared of them, I’m just petrified of falling off of them! I never used to be this way, but age has caught up with me and I’m more aware of my mortality and that things can and will hurt you! We scrambled up, lined up on the edge, I looked down at the murky plunge pool beneath, I watched my predecessors climbing up the cargo net dripping wet and shell shocked…I closed my mind and jumped….
I’m not sure how I feel about that feeling in your tummy when you are falling, I kinda like it, but also at the same time, don’t, I imagine my guts moving to places in my torso that they shouldn’t be in… I often wonder if astronauts feel this feeling 100% of the time in space…?
I hit the water with a clap, the light extinguished as I plunged into the dark brown abyss, I don’t remember if I touched the bottom, but I know I went deep… I resurfaced with a gasp and made my way to the cargo net to scramble out, buzzing with adrenaline, I wanted to go again, I was into it, I was buzzing….. I WAS ON FIRE!
From this point onwards I don’t remember finding anything hard, I was into my groove, I plodded along for mile after mile, each mile drying my clothes as I went, relishing every obstacle, each one a challenge of what I was capable of… I was enjoying this, why hadn’t I taken part in something like this sooner??
This feeling continued until mile 17 where the obstacles became closer together, and the one I’d been practising for… the 130 metre long monkey bars!
I climbed up onto the box and began to swing, my one thought, get to the end! There were rest stops every so often which I took advantage of for a quick moment, (I’m no superhero) but I kept going and monkey barred the entire length…
At one stage something gross happened… You may remember as part of my training I worked on my grip strength, well this gave me some epic calluses on my palms… I was proud of them, my Daughter now calls them “Daddy’s Owies!” anyway, I was swinging and I could feel a bit of discomfort, I could then see blood on the bars I’d just swung from, a callus had come loose, my hand slipped and in slow motion a chunk of hard skin detached from my hand and somersaulted its way towards me, straight into my mouth!! Straight to the back of my throat!! I quickly reached up to grab on to continue as I coughed the chunk of meat from my throat to spit out, I still had about 12 metres to go, the blood not helping my cause, making my left hand slip with every swing… I apologise to whoever came after me….
To this day I am proud I made it across the monkey bars, it sounds childish and doesn’t sound like much because I took the weight off a couple of times but I still went the distance! A huge thanks to my cousin for egging me on the whole way!!!
Seeing only 3 miles left, I thought that’s it, I’ve done it, only 5 k to go, I did this every day in March… But nah! It don’t work like that, your body starts to tell you that it’s not really down with what you’re doing and you should maybe stop…
Mile 18 was when it hit, we had just completed the heavy caries and crossed the bridge into the main grounds of the house, I pressed to accelerate up the hill then BANG the cramp hit me, I fell down rubbing it hard, (my calf that is) I managed to stretch it and rub it out (still talking about my calf) but the cramp was still there, lurking in my muscles, I needed electrolytes!
Painfully there were no aid stops between this point and the finish line, there was nothing left for it, but to soldier on… By this point we were back in the grounds of the house, the crowds were massive and there was a buzz! This injected some energy back into my tired struggling legs, I dug in deep and pressed on, less than 2 miles to go…
Rounding the corner there was a dip which brought with it one final ascent before the big one… a gladiator style travelator, colossal cargo net and a huge slide to the finish! I’d nearly done it! Taking care not to invite the cramp back I coasted down the hill and pulled up the other side, the roars and cheers of on lookers got louder and louder the closer we got.
Then, There it was, the obstacle that had one purpose, and one purpose only… To stop you getting up and over it! The bit of kit that ended so many contenders dreams on Gladiators when I was a kid! The TRAVELTOR!
The slope towered above me, the conveyor belt going round and round in the direction I didn’t want it to go in, looking imposing! As was the designers want. It’s victims lay all around, pausing for breath having been chewed up and spat back out by the travelator…
I looked to my cousin and shrugged, “here goes” I said, took in a deep breath and put everything I had left into my legs, I pumped hard, every step was countered by the backwards momentum of the belt, the only way over this thing was power and determination, I screamed as I pounded my feet into the belt springing up as high as my burning legs would allow me… The top came into sight, I reached out to grab the top, I got purchase, heaved myself forward and leapt onto the top!
I had made it! I lay on top, my lungs on fire, my legs were jelly… I breathed a sigh of relief… But, it wasn’t over yet… The marshal shouted to me to stand up and get up the cargo net. This thing was colossal! I ran and jumped up to it and climbed, the roars of spectators could be heard all around as I scrambled to the top!
My cousin stood at the top next to me and we looked down the huge slide to the finish line, the marshal nodded for us to go and we jumped, sliding down the final obstacle where at the bottom we picked ourselves up and ran across the finish line!
Crossing that line felt incredible!! Relief, pride and exhaustion, there may have also been a bit of disbelief that I’d actually done it!
Rick and I shook hands, paused for a photo and went in search of a shower and a beer.
Five challenges down….
Seven to go!
I have to admit, this one ran away a bit… I really enjoyed writing it and it didn’t take long to do, but before I knew it I’d gone far deeper into the story than I had planned. (I didn’t even talk about the walkers that kept overtaking us…. Get in touch if you want to know!) This blog was supposed to cover May, June, July and August, yet somehow may has taken over the entire thing, I guess 20 miles and 200 obstacles requires a bit of explanation…
Going back to crossing that finish line, it made me realise that I am far more capable than I ever gave myself credit for.
Like most people, I think I spent years putting limits on what I thought I could do… But, when I deliberately put myself into these difficult situations I started to discover that I could actually go further, longer and harder than I thought.
In fact, when things get really grim, when the weather is awful, your legs are screaming, you’re lost, fed up and your brain is telling you that “maybe this isn’t such a good idea!” That’s usually the moment you learn the most about yourself.
So that’s the lesson from May’s challenge, Push yourself, try things that scare you, do the uncomfortable stuff because you might just surprise yourself.
Push yourself!
TM
If you have enjoyed this blog, you may also enjoy the following posts. If you think others would too, please consider sharing it with friends and family.
https://timbermane.co.uk/the-year-of-challenges-part-i-ice-hunger-100-miles/
https://timbermane.co.uk/breaking-the-ice-getting-comfortable-being-uncomfortable/
https://timbermane.co.uk/fitness-fatherhood-and-muscle-forest-this-dads-fitness-journey/
