Getting muddy for clean water

My campaign with 20 liters is still going on.  We are at 70% of our goal (which is $3200).  Which I am impressed with and happy!  I will have this going on until we are at 100% of our goal.  :)

I got to participate in my first mud run this past weekend.  The church that hosted was raising money for clean water also... a different organization and country, but who cares!  I'm glad that they are spreading awareness and helping meet the needs of those who are without.  It was a 5K run with 9 obstacles... I thought the 5K part wasn't going to be a problem, but I was SO TIRED.  It was a 2.5K loop, so we did all the obstacles twice.  I ran with a friend of Gaetan's, Parker, who was really good at the obstacles!  We had a lot of fun, got super muddy, and the church raised $35,000!  Which is awesome!

Me and Parker before and after the race.  Notice his not so white shirt anymore...

L to R (clockwise):  Getting out of the last obstacle.  Going into the last gap. Getting across the last gap.  Getting out of the last obstacle.  Finishing!!

The first obstacle was called little dipper.  It was seriously less than 70 yards into it and it was this hole that was about knee deep of water (and mud).  Just getting things out of the way early!  My friend Ashley came (she was going to run it with me but they sold out so they closed down registration) and we joked that I should try to jump the hole but I didn't think I was going to make it... I told her if I tried I would fall down... and I did ;)  So instead of it being knee deep I got soak up to my waist haha.  And that water was COLD.

The second obstacle was called the vertical plague.  Now, the course was in the woods so it was more of a trail mud run... but this was quite the hill!  I was surprised at how hilly the whole thing was, but this was a pretty substantial hill.

The third was called tire trouble.  One of the sponsors of this was a CrossFit gym and they brought their huge tires that we had to run over.  It wasn't so bad, but the tires had different toughness so some of them where real squishy and others hard, so the footing was tricky.

The fourth was called snake belly.  They had these long tubes that you had to crawl through.  Not so bad because I'm not that tall ;)  I pretty much bear crawled through it because I didn't think it would feel so nice on my knees to crawl.

The fifth was called the Big Nasty.  And in my opinion was the hardest.  I have no idea what they did to this mud but it would be more accurately described as quick sand.  I took two steps in and I sunk in thigh deep!  I saw this guy who was stuck and had 3 people trying to help him out... I sympathized.  People lost shoes in there it was so insane!  I tipped over because it was so hard to get out and I had probably an inch of mud caked on both sides of my hands and up to my mid forearm.  It was intense.  That obstacle probably took the longest just because you would get stuck and then you would have to pretty much wait patiently as you let the initial suction loosen up.

The sixth was Jericho which was a wall they had made that you had to climb over.  Not so bad.  The seventh was Paul Bunyan's revenge.  There were probably 6 piles of down logs that you had to jump over.

The eighth was called the last gap.  You ran up to this big pit that had slides into this waist deep pretty stinking cold water.  It was kinda nice though because it washed off most of the big nasty.  You had a little ways to go through the deep water (it was deep enough some people swam!) and then you had a hill to go up and down into more water.  This repeated 4 times.  Running through water is exhausting!  As you went on though the water got more and more shallow.

The nineth was pole pit.  They had made these make shift bridges that you had to crawl under.  It was deep enough that I could have my arms straight out and could barely touch the bottom.  So it was this strange kind of treading water/swimming/running.  That was probably my least favorite because there was a high probability of getting muddy water in your mouth... and in your ears and hair. haha.

Overall we had a blast!  I think next year we are going to get a four person team together to do it.  We did it in 37 minutes, which wasn't to bad all things considered!  :)  I had a lot of fun and I'm glad that it could go to a good cause.

JVG