This is my 3rd year running the Gladiator Rock N Run, and as usual, I was able to recruit some friends to come out and try an OCR for the first time. Something about this race is just beginner friendly, so I always end up running it with a larger group. My cousin Sarah and her friend Kelly were out there with me again, we have all run it since it started here in 2012. Here's a picture of our group BEFORE the race:
This OCR is a pretty quick 5K, so I got up early and ran 6 prior to the race. By the time I got there, I was warmed up and ready to go! The atmosphere at this race is always fun, everyone is there to have a good time and enjoy themselves. The face of this race is Dan "Nitro" Clark, who was my very favorite American Gladiator when I was a kid. I got some pictures with him at my first race in 2012, and we got another one this year:
So down to the details of the race! We started at around 9:15a and most of our group did a great job of running most of the race. We were all determined to stay together and race as a team, so we had fun taking some walking breaks and laughing about what I had gotten some of them into. There were about 17-20 obstacles and most of them were repeats of last year: tires, cinderblock burpees, tunnels, bear crawl net, dumpster, cowgirl carry, couple of mud trenches, rope climb, slippery wall (the beast), cargo net climb, over and under, 12 foot wall climb, fire jump, monkey bars, etc. There was a pretty gunky mud crawl that people were losing shoes in, so we all just started crawling through it and everyone else followed our lead after that. I helped pry one girl's shoe out of the muck on my way out - helping people is 1/2 the fun! I was disappointed this year that they didn't have us to the "swim", which is really just a walk through the lake about chest deep with a couple of submersions under logs. It also felt a little short this year - I think the final mileage ended up around 2.98 or so. I REALLY missed the 300 yard mud pit from last year. In general, it felt a little watered down, BUT there was a pretty big storm that came through a couple of days before, so it's entirely possible that limited their abilities to build it out as bad ass as they planned. I hope that's the case, because I really love this race and would like to see it stay here and get more awesome. I was also surprised to notice no one in line to start when we were leaving around 11a. They typically run waves pretty late, so I hope that wasn't indicative of attendance in general. Another favorite for me of this race - the tshirt. They have consistently put out the best race tshirts ever. The first year's shirt was designed by Affliction and it's STILL one of my favorite shirts ever. This year's shirt was pretty bad ass as well, although they did skimp a little on the sizes. Glad I ordered a large!
Here are some pics from the course:
Jumping the fire at the finish line!
Telephone pole carry - we combined with another team
Coming out of the dark, muddy tunnels
Wall climb!
MUDDY FINISH PHOTO
Clean up in the lake - showing off the bling!
This was a lot of fun, I always love racing with my friends and I ALWAYS love running with first timers. We really had fun and worked as a team, which is what OCR is all about for me.
Next weekend is a big one for me. I'm headed to Burnet, TX for a double Spartan weekend. I'll be running the Spartan Super on Saturday and the Spartan Sprint on Sunday. The Super is 8+ miles with approx 20+ obstacles and the Sprint is 3+ miles with 15+ obstacles. This will be 2/3 of the way to getting my Spartan trifecta this year - I am scheduled to run the Beast in November, which will complete it for 2014! Texas Trifecta! I'll be running this solo - not really solo, I'm on a large team that I know from FB - but I won't have any of my normal running buddies with me. I'm excited about getting out there and seeing what I can do on my own and so grateful that I've met some fun people that will be there so that if I need a hand over a wall, I won't be completely alone. Ha ha! That will get me to the halfway point of this year - no races currently scheduled in June - but my plan is to keep my miles up, get out for some more OCR specific training sessions and get stronger for the larger races in the fall. Here's the updated schedule:
May 17, 2014 –
Spartan Super
May 18, 2014 - Spartan
Sprint
July 5, 2014 – The
Patriot Games
July 13, 2014 – Too
Hot to Handle
September 6, 2014 – Superhero
Scramble
September 13, 2014 –
Savage Race
October 5, 2014 –
Tough Mudder
November 1, 2014 –
Spartan Beast
In looking over my blog, I just realized that I've never done an actual race review of my Spartan Beast races. I think the trauma was just too much at the time. Don't you worry, I'll have a full write up for you after next weekend. Wish me luck!
No comments:
Post a Comment