I had never run a Tough Mudder event prior to taking on the crown jewel of the Mudder offering on Nov 4-5 down in Granbury, Texas.
To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have taken up this endurance race if the Thursday prior hadn’t been the first Unbreakable Pass Holders event hosted by Joe DeSena, founder of Spartan Race, and attending goes towards extending the pass for another three years. The timing of the two events gave me the opportunity to jump into this event having already driven the 9.5 hours to Texas for Thursday’s event.
Anyone unfamiliar with Tough Mudder, it leans towards the “team” aspect in that some of the obstacles require you to garner assistance from other runners or volunteers. As a person who tends to run my own race, going either faster or slower as necessary, the idea of leaning on others for obstacle completion was foreign to me.
World’s Toughest Mudder (WTM) is the 24-hour endurance test of the franchise, and though it still requires assistance at some obstacles such as Everest or the Dublin Walls, the majority of the 5-mile loops are a mental and physical endurance test, especially at night. So, I decided to go for it and see what it was all about being a Mudder Virgin.
My journey started with the Wednesday drive from Nebraska to Texas with a 7:30 am social hour on Thursday followed by a 39-degree chilly workout with “Coach” (Envision a Beast-mode Officer Dangle with a handlebar mustache for you Reno 911 fans). After an hour of burpees, hero-carry, push-ups, air squats, lunges, planks, flutter kicks, bear crawls, high-knees, and jumping jacks (led by Joe) we spent the rest of the day getting a walk through the course and first look at some obstacles (and the associated penalty laps) then meeting with the heads of Spartan and Tough Mudder getting some background on what to expect for 2024 as an Unbreakable Pass Holder.
WTM kicked off at Noon on Saturday from True Grit Ranch, complete with Coach leading some warmups, inspirational words of advice and the ceremonial popping of the orange smoke as the Elite racers led us out on to the five-mile course. The first hour of the event is a straight run through with none of the obstacles open. For fast elite runners, they could get two laps in without having to do an obstacle. This was different to me coming from the Spartan world where every obstacle is open immediately.
As the hours clicked off, two obstacles would open per hour at random locations around the course. By 10:00 pm, all 20 obstacles had opened, and “Black Ops” was officially underway as racers negotiated the course by headlamp until sunrise. Due to the timing of the weekend, the 24-hour race became a 25-hour race at 2:00 am when daylight savings rolled back an hour to 1:00 am.
My race started out a little on the aggravating side as on the first lap I rubbed a blister on my Achilles. I was wearing a new set of compression socks from Hoplite and my standard Salomon Speedcross shoes. I figured I had things a little loose and applied moleskin in the pit area following the first lap. Heading back out I felt a hot spot forming on the ball of the same foot. Not how I planned the first 10-miles to go. When I pitted again, I dried my feet, switched to Boore Performance Clothing socks and Craft Spartan Race shoes, added more moleskin to the issue areas and went back out. By now some of the obstacles were beginning to open up and the challenges increased. I will need to investigate the Hoplite socks a little more to see if there was a stitch or some other manufacturing reason for the blisters and try them again at a Spartan Sprint.
I won’t get too deep into the weeds on the specific obstacles, but safe to say, they did make the penalty loops significant in terms of adding time and miles to your loops. And as the water obstacles opened, the length of time being wet continued to extend as the sun fell on the ranch.
Here is where I have to detour into some of the other “fun” things associated with the race. The Challenges. The random challenges near the pit entrance offered up opportunities to make bad decisions! Following the third lap I opted to take on the “Hot & Heavy” challenge. Rolling a dice, the number corresponded to an increasing level of hotness 6 bottles of hot sauce presented for tasting. I rolled a 6. After counting out loud to 20-Mississippi for the judges I was awarded a challenge patch and made a run for the pit tent with a burning mouth!
Leaving a trail of snot and tears along the way, I made it back to the pit and suffered for about 20 minutes before the burning subsided. That was not the best idea, but I did it and survived.
The sun was setting, it was now time for Black Ops. Changing into thicker CW-X compression pants and a halfsie wet suit, we affixed the required glow sticks to my back, and I tried out an arm band light I had for probably 9-years but never used. Little did I know, this would save my lap since the headlamp I selected would crap out around mile 3 either due to battery issues or water got into the housing. On the final mile, I would place the arm band light around my forehead so as not to get DQ’d for not having a headlamp in the dark. (I don’t think the rules said the headlamp had to help ME see!)
Completing my 20th official mile I took on another of the random challenges, this was grabbing a metal washer tucked behind live electric wires while standing in a pan of water. I have long arms…no problem, no shock, Shock and Awe patch earned! I decided to take a rest and let the muscles in my back simmer down, get warmed up from such obstacles as “Melting Point” a variation of Arctic Enema which is a pool of water with a couple hundred bags of ice dumped in. I would head back out after sunrise to complete my 5th lap and finish as a 25-miler in my first WTM outing. This is the longest single event I have completed on my journey thus far. My previous long was the World Championship Spartan Beast at Lake Tahoe in 2017 which my Fitbit at the time clocked off at 17+ miles.
I continue to not be happy with my grip and shoulder strength on over-head obstacles. That needs to be worked on more.
My final obstacle of the weekend was the 9.5-hour trek back to Nebraska. The slightly uncomfortable hours of sitting along with the angry right hip and hamstring as I exited to pump gas was a bit of a mental challenge too!
Will I do another WTM? 2024 will take place in Central Florida and the 12-hour/8-hour endurance challenges will take place in the Chicago-area. Daren P. who was a race partner at this event has already planted the seed of taking on the Chicago challenge as part of the “Unholy Grail” (completing both events on the same weekend) that leads us to the 3-Race “Holy Grail” total at WTM (for completing all three events). Should I do it? Leave me a thumbs up comment if you want to see me tackle the Unholy/Holy Grail Challenges.