On Being a Warrior, and the Adventure Therein

On Sunday, July 31, 2011 at the Genesee Valley Park System in Mt. Morris, MI, I embarked on an epic 5k adventure that culminated 7 months of exercise and weight loss.  I ran in the first Michigan Warrior Dash with my brother, Josh.  My mission - finish strong, and don't finish last.  In the infamous words and massive banner of George H. W. Bush, "Mission Accomplished"!  Not only did I finish strong, but I managed to beat hundreds in my age group, and thousands on the day in a very respectable middle of the pack.

I feel I should lead up to this day a bit, give a little background.  Back in December of 2010 my 2nd son was born.  I decided I should probably get a physical, being over 30 now, just to check up on my vitals.  Turns out, that was the best thing for me to check up on.  They were bad - high blood pressure (155/95), high cholesterol (I don't remember the number, but it was just reaching in the "risky" category), and high weight (297, ugh).  I decided that now is the time to cut the crap and get the body in motion.  I was not going to be on meds for something that should be controllable through exercise and diet.  Of course, I also decided I better wait out the holidays...

Pushing a hammock to it's limits...

Fast forward 6 months to mid-June.  I have been using my gym membership regularly, and have a doctor-requested mid-year checkup.  This goes very well - I've lost 35lbs, gotten my blood pressure back down to 132/80, and he was happy enough with those results that he didn't feel it necessary to check my cholesterol again.  Hooray for exercise and diet!  It was around this time that I began hearing about the Warrior Dash, and some friends from Facebook who were going to run it.  I looked it up, read some eye-witness accounts, and watched a few YouTube videos - which all made it look like a ton of fun.  One problem for me, it was a 5k (3.1 miles), and I've never run that far in my life.  On top of that, it was 6 weeks away.  Feeling emboldened by my success so far, I decided to see if my brother would be interested in running it with me (he ran a 1/2 marathon recently, and has run several 5ks...I thought he'd be good to go).  He was stoked that I wanted to run a 5k, and signed up with me.  My whole family has been pretty supportive (as usual), so we centered our yearly family camping trip around the Dash, and made it so.

Having not run in years, and never distance (lets face it, running blows.  It's boring and hard), I started off on the treadmill in the gym.  Through the last 6 months I had been using an elliptical machine for 25 min, 3x a week.  I thought that would transfer over to treadmill time, but I was wrong.  The treadmill was much more difficult and stressful on my body than the elliptical.  At the same time I switched to a treadmill, I decided to change up my workout routine as well, to 4x a week.  With the treadmill being more difficult, it took me a week to build back up to 25 minutes at 5mph.  I ran for 2 weeks on the treadmill, and had planned to begin running outside in July after our vacation (whole other blog post on that coming...).  Just before vacation, I injured my knee - severely enough that I could barely walk.  I discovered that I had actually hurt my hamstring at the point where it connects to the shin, just under my knee.  This sucked, and took me out of running for 2 weeks.

Coming back from vacation I had 24 days left to prepare, and had yet to even run once outside - let alone for 3+ miles.  The good thing was my knee felt better after letting it rest through vacation.  So I woke up in the morning, and headed out the door looking for a distance I knew to be roughly 1.5 miles.  My house sits up on a very steep hill, and the river park I decided to run through is also fairly graded.  I ran down my street, and thus down hill, and down the river (also down hill) to a point I had mapped out to be roughly 3/4 mile away, and turned around.  Heading back was a disaster, and climbing Mt. Freaking Everest at the end nearly did me in.  I thought I'd have a heart attack on that hill - but I managed to very slowly get back home.  I also decided that I would start from then on at the park instead of at my house, and skip that ridiculous hill.  I mapped new distances to run (via MapMyRun.com) and used Google maps for visual cues on distances that would be 1.5, 2, 2.5, and 3 miles away, and each day I tried to run farther and farther.  Eventually, about 10-12 days before the race, I was consistently running 3.25 miles each run.  I found a great app for my iPhone (RunKeeper) which allows for my music to play and keeps track of time, pace and distance for me.  It took me about 37 minutes to run 3.25 miles, and I couldn't figure out how to go any faster.  Enter my brother-in-law, Jamie.  He suggested I do some training exercise on the track called a fartlek (sprint/jog/walk in a circuit).  I did this twice, then ran 3.25 miles again - and shaved 2min off my time!  I couldn't believe it worked.  The running outdoors also worked wonders for my weight, as I have now lost nearly 50lbs.  This lead me up to the day before the race, and my family and I headed to Mt. Morris to camp.

I hear the train a comin', it's rollin' 'round the bend

We spent all day Saturday at Huckleberry Railroad and Crossroads Village.  It was hot, un-air-conditioned, and a very long day where no less than 2 people were stung by bees.  We did get to ride the old steam engine train, which Seth and all the nieces and nephews loved (except Slade), and saw a not-so-funny comedian and ventriloquist show which Seth was brave enough to participate in (as were my niece and nephew).  Being in the sun was very draining, and we all went to bed fairly early that night - besides Josh and I had a 830a heat to make!

In the morning Josh and I rode together to the race site (we had to be there at least an hour before our race time) along with Josh's wife, kids and the oldest nephew Travis.  We parked and headed to the check-in, got our bibs (a number you pin to your chest) and time chips (a pretty cool little plastic disc the size of a quarter you weave in to your shoelaces), and slowly sauntered over to the starting line.  As we were applying our race-imposed stuff to our bodies, we missed the first heat...but had plenty of time to prepare for our own heat.  We were close to first in line, and very near the starting gate.  There was a DJ playing tunes and keeping us updated on time along hundreds of people milling about preparing to run (each heat had 600 people running at once).  Many people were dressed in costume or wearing paint of some sort, and all were fairly jovial despite what lay ahead.

The starting line

They fired the start (literally, the starting "gun" was 2 giant flame-thrower cannons), and we were off.  Immediately, many people surged ahead of me.  I didn't know it at the time, but quickly came to realize these were people who had no idea how far 5k was, or how to pace themselves for it.  I found myself overtaking a lot of people about 3/4 of a mile in, which was difficult due to the sheer mass of bodies and space allotted for running (the whole course was roped off).  The first leg of the race was 1-1.25 miles before the first obstacle, which was "road rage" - a series of tires laid flat that you were supposed to high step through, and cars pointed end to end you had to climb over.  This is where I saw a fantastic fall by a chick who tripped on the very first tire that came to her, and she dove face-first into them.  There's always something funny about watching people fall a-la AFV style....

Next, we ran about 1/4 mile to "dead weight drifter", which was the edge of a pond, roughly waist to belly button deep, where you had to wade through and jump over 5 floating logs.  After this, we ran on again to "barricade breakdown" which was a series of waist high and knee high walls that you had to go over and under.  Running on again, the next obstacle was the "great warrior wall" which was a wall, about 15 feet high with horizontal slats and ropes hanging down, that you had to scale and then climb down the fixed ladder on the other side.  "Chaotic crossover" came next, which was a horizontal cargo net, then on to "teetering traverse" which were skinny chicken-walk like boards about chest high you had to run across.  The last in this roughly mile long series of first obstacles was the "blackout", which was about 100 foot long of trusses clad with black plastic set about knee high you had to crawl through.  Apparently, more people are claustrophobic than I'm aware of, and this scares people.  To me, it was a low 100' long dark sauna to crawl through, with 150 people grabbing you because they can't see where they're going...

This all leads us to the worst part of the race - a disgusting mud bog laid out in a swamp about 3/4 of a mile before the finish line.  It was about 100 feet long, and waist deep with stagnant water that smelled like a cow pasture, and was thick as pea soup.  After struggling to get through this (due to the super-slippery mud and random roots/stumps/logs that would trip you up - although it was amusing to see the random person lose their footing and go under that mess) you had to scale a muddy, super slippery slope.  This led to a series of moguls that went on for roughly 1/4 mile, and really sapped any energy you had left.  Once you got out of that, you had to weave your way through "arachnophobia", which was a bunch of bungee cords all tangled up through the trees.  Once you got through that tangled mess, you went on to "vertical limit".  This was a rock wall of sorts that you climbed up, then slink down a knotted rope on the other side.  Since this was after the mud bog, the rope was caked in mud, and you slipped right quick down it.

Coming over the cargo climb

These series of obstacles led to a roughly 1/4 mile jog that rounded a bend and brought you close to the end. With the sounds of the DJ pumping tunes and the crowds cheering people on, you came to the biggest obstacle, the "cargo climb".  This was a wall of cargo nets roughly 20 feet tall that you had to climb up and over.  Once you completed this one, you had to hop over 2 roasting fires, and then dive in to the "muddy mayhem".  This was about 18" of muddy waters you had to crawl through.  To make sure you crawled, barbed wire was strung low over the pit.  Get out of the mud, and sprint the 100yds to the finish!  As you crossed the line, you were rewarded with a medal, some cold cups of water, and a banana or granola bar if you wanted it (I did not).  After I caught my breath and calmed down, I found my family who were watching at the finish, and they congratulated me on a job well done.  I then made my way to the semi-truck water tanks to rinse off in the ice-cold "showers".

So c'mon, jumpin' the fire!

 In the end, I finished with a time of 49:32, garnering me 490th place in my age group out of 855 and 4555th out of 9774 total for the day.  I say, not too damn shabby considering 7 months ago there was no way I'd be able to do this.  Hell, 6 weeks ago I wouldn't have made it....My brother did very well.  He finished 14th in his age group out of 715 and 167th overall with a time of 30:29!

I just finished, still all muddy

So here I stand, a warrior having completed (and competed) his dash.  What's next, were do we go from here?  I'm not sure, but I see Harbor Springs has a run in October...who's coming with me?!  Having something to work towards definitely keeps my feet moving...

All cleaned up...well, rinsed at least

A writer for the Detroit News happened to run in our 830a heat wearing a headband camera, and wrote up a bit about the Dash, with video.