Tough Mudder

Or… The day I carried a 106(.6)kg Union Jack Or… Hills, hills, hills.

I signed up for my first ever Tough Mudder back in May, a birthday gift from my mum. Having done 2 GORUCK challenges (now 3) and some other events, I figured it wouldn’t be too difficult for me to check the box in this event. I was wrong. Oh, so wrong.

***
For those of you that don’t know, Tough Mudder is a 10-12 mile obstacle course. The obstacles vary from mud, water, electricity (I’m not joking), fire and rope, amongst other things.

Me and Rob decided to ride up on his motorcycle from Norwich to Yorkshire – it was hammering down and it took us 5 hours. We arrived at 21:30 and were greeted by some good friends of ours as well as some new friends that we were introduced to. We camped with Warner, Matt, Sonya, Ben and Chris. These people (bar Warner, who set off at a later heat due to waiting on a friend to arrive) were the people that I would race with and were the team that would get me through the event. Without them, I’d have sucked to be quite frank.

The next morning, after a terrible nights sleep, but a delicious breakfast, courtesy of my team mates, we graced the start line at 9:20. I was wearing my GORUCK t-shirt, new balance compression leggings and my Vibram Fivefinger KSO’s. I was promptly informed that this type of running shoe for this type of event was not a great shout due to the lack of grip. I would struggling in the mud with these. Unfortunately, these were all I had so I had to suck it up and make do.

The highlight of my morning was Ben’s Union Jack outfit and Matt’s tiny yellow shorts. I could tell from the start it was going to be a fun event!

The first obstacle was Glory Blades. This was a wall at an incline that we had to climb over and slide down the other side. Not too difficult an obstacle to begin with, but one that would require the help of my team, due to my lack of upper body strength.

Next came Arctic Enema. A big deep pool full to the brim with icy cold water and ice cubes. We had to jump in and duck underneath a peace of wood lying over the top, only to emerge the other side greeted by a camera! This was certainly an obstacle to wake us up and get us into the spirit of Tough Mudder.

According to some experienced Mudder friends of mine, this course was one of the more difficult ones due to the fact it was so hilly! I’m not complaining though, there were some beautiful views from the top.

After a few shuttles up and down some incredibly steep hills, it was time for Dirty Ballerina. This was the first sign of fear and hesitance that crept up on me, unexpectedly, during the event.

The obstacle is simply 3 or 4 dug out trenches that you leap over onto a muddy platform. Doesn’t sound too difficult right? My team mates all tackled it with ease, but for some reason, every time I went to jump, I hesitated! The fear of landing on the platform and then slipping into the trench was causing me to hesitate.

I couldn’t help but laugh at myself as it was not a hard obstacle, but I still couldn’t bring myself to jump. That’s when Ben came to my rescue and together, hand in hand, we leapt over the Dirty Ballerina together.

Next came the Boa Constrictor. You’re supposed crawl head first through a tube, on a slight decline, into a  muddy pond covered with barbed wire and use a rope to pull yourself out. Nice and simple and we had a good laugh at this one. One thing we laughed about was me deciding to go in feet first! Worked out ok for me though and this was not the only obstacle that I took an unorthodox approach to…

Naturally, Rob decided to use this opportunity to get another pic of Matt’s bum (and VPL).

The next section was one of the highlights of my day. It was the hero carry. 50/50 buddy carries for about 30m each.

Being a little one, people normally insist on carrying me either 100% of the time, or giving me someone little to carry. Despite my size though, I can somehow carry quite a lot of weight, only for a short distance, but it is just one of those things I’ve practised. Rob knows how grumpy I get when I don’t get to carry anybody (Jess Smaaaash!) and so spoke to Ben whilst I was unaware and asked him to let me carry him. Obviously, Ben was a little sceptical, but trusting Rob, he let me do it.

Hence, the day carried a 106(.6)kg Union Jack. (And the day he carried me back).

At this point, it was time for me to face one of my biggest fears and one of the obstacles I dreaded most upon signing up for Tough Mudder. Electric Eels.

I have a huge fear of being shocked (probably due to the fact I electrocuted myself so many times as a kid) and crawling through a shallow pool of water under dangling electrically charged wires was not my idea of fun.

My team mates found my approach both hilarious and impressive. While most people low crawl through quickly, I crouched and weaved at a painfully slow pace. Or not so painfully should I say, as I only got shocked once on the bum on the way out! Success: Jess 1 Electric eels 0.

My face in these pictures will never fail to make me laugh.

Next, the Hero Wall.

‘The Hero wall is no place for an improper touch’ Read: ‘The hero wall is THE place for an improper touch’ And improper touch we did.

(Also, Will and Warner caught us up at this point for a quick hello goodbye – was nice to get a pic with them)

After some help getting each other over the Hero Walls, we proceeded onto the Island hopping obstacle. I was a little nervous about this one, since I am not a strong swimmer (I can hardly swim at all), and the water was around 10m deep if you fell in. Rob taught me the technique for getting across, so all I had to do was not fall in! Thankfully, I got across.

The next few obstacles involved more mud, more water and plenty more laughs. I won’t go into too much detail about them but I will post some pictures here to fast forward a little to the end few obstacles.

^ This was one of my favourite obstacles, as it was a low crawl through really squishy mud under barbed wired, that got lower and lower to the floor. There was no choice but to almost put your face in it. There’s no escaping the mud here!

The next obstacle was another water one. This time, we had to swim underneath horizontally arranged barrels, from one side of a lake to the other. Once I got nearer, I decided to skip this one as I’m not a strong swimmer and didn’t think I’d make it across without causing chaos. I walked round to the other side of the lake and there, Rob instilled confidence in me and made me feel like I could do it. I went back around, and with great hesitation I got into the lake. The obstacle volunteers allowed me to go in alone so that the scuba dive team and lifeguards were able to keep an eye on me at all times and make sure that I was ok. I didn’t realise at first, but it turns out the whole crowd of Mudders behind me were calling out my name and shouting words of encouragement. Here, the true spirit and camaraderie of Tough Mudder came shining through and I felt honoured to be a part of it and proud of myself for completing the obstacle when I didn’t think I could.

Following this would be my lowest point of the event; Walk the Plank. This entailed jumping off a plank around 15ft high, into a deep water pool. Unexpectedly, I was overcome with fear. As I stood at the edge of the plank and the lady counted down from 3, I found that I was frozen to the spot. I just couldn’t jump no mattered how hard I tried to make myself. After a few minutes, the volunteer told me that if I didn’t jump, I would have to get down. I chose to get down since I was so scared. I was crying by this point, half in fear and half in frustration for the fact that I couldn’t jump. I’ve never jumped off a plank or diving board into water before but I didn’t think it would be a problem; there wasn’t far to swim and it wasn’t open water, just a man made pool with tarpaulin inside. I would pencil dive in, bob up to the top and climb out. But no matter what I told myself, I couldn’t jump.

I climbed down and Rob came over. ‘I know you can do this, Jess. I know you can. You can do this.’

I looked him in the eye and knew he was right. I climbed back up to the top of plank. ‘3… 2… 1…’ nothing. I couldn’t jump. By this point Ben and Matt had already jumped and came back around to hold my hands and jump in with me. I can’t thank them enough for this. That being said, I still couldn’t jump. By now, a slightly cross volunteer came over and said ‘you’re shivering, you’re going to get hypothermia, it’s cold up here and you’re already wet from the other obstacles. Either jump in or get down.’ I got down.

I have never been so disappointed in myself; I was right near the end and I’d skipped an obstacle. I was crying, quiet, shaking from the cold and overall disheartened. My team mates were amazing as ever, and encouraged me and told me it was ok, they were scared the first time too. Ben and Sonya took my hands and we ran down the hill together towards the next obstacle, Mud Mile.

I spent most of the mud mile sulking and beating myself up about what had happened at the last obstacle, but I soon moved on, once I realised how difficult and funny it was to try and run a mile over slippery muddy hills in Vibrams! If I wasn’t slipping over, I was getting stuck. I soon perked up again and was ready to take on the final few obstacles.

The Funky Monkey was next. I knew at first sight there was no way I could complete it, but it wasn’t because of fear, it was this time due to strength. I wasn’t upset though, as I gave it my best. The idea was to do the monkey bars across an inclining (and then declining) set of that rotate. If you slipped and let go, you landed in water. I grabbed one that was a few rungs in and couldn’t swing to the next, so I fell in. I swam across and proceeded to watch my team mates try and tackle it. Like me, three more of us fell in (although a little further along than I did) however, Matt finished it whilst also making everyone watching laugh due to treating the obstacle like a stroll in the park and doing pull ups half way along!

#

We had finally arrived at the penultimate obstacle; Everest. There’s a technique to Everest that I didn’t see myself picking up on the first go. The idea is to run up a (roughly) 15ft slope that gets progressively steeper. It’s very slippery and there’s nothing to grip on to. Wearing muddy Vibrams, I didn’t think I’d make it at all, let alone the first time, but I did! Again, Rob told me the tactic, I applied it and it worked! The trick is to keep running at the same speed (fast) from start to finish. A lot of people start to slow down towards the top and reach out for the hands of mudders that had already reached the top, ready to pull them up. DO NOT do this. Run at a sprint the whole time even when you feel like you can slow down, and aim to pull yourself up alone. The hands will find some part of you to grab and pull up.

The final obstacle was the one I feared the most. On learning about Tough Mudder last May, witnessing Rob do it, signing up for it myself and then taking part, this obstacle never left my mind. Electro Shock Therapy. If Electric Eels wasn’t enough to freak me out, this certainly would be. My team mates all knew how scared I was just by looking at me, so Ben and Matt took a hand each and without much thought, we just ran in. Ran into the wooden structure infested with dangling electrically charged cables ranging from 10 to 10000 volts in charge. There were hay bales dotted around so I couldn’t crawl and avoid them.

Almost as soon as we ran in, one of us got shocked which meant we all went down. I was terrified. I lay there, still, too scared to move, almost accepting that this was my fate and I would just spend the rest of my life laying here being shocked. The whole time I was down I was being painfully shocked all over my body; my arms, my legs, my back and my head. Ben came over, still being shocked. ‘Jess move! MOVE! Get up!’ I just laid there. In the end, he grabbed me and dragged me through. The both of us were being shocked the entire time, but somehow, Ben stayed on his feet.

By this point I was screaming. You’d think I was being burned alive, I was screaming like a petrified child. I just wanted to be out of there.

We finally made it through the other side and Ben, Chris, Sonya and Matt were all there hugging me and filling me with words of encouragement and kindness as they had been doing the whole entire time.

We had finished and it was time to collect our headband, t shirt and beer.

I only knew Ben before the start of this challenge, but by the end of it, I’d made three new incredible friends who I am so lucky to have had the pleasure of running with.

I’m not sure if I’ll do another Tough Mudder, I probably will, but it is not for the faint hearted I will tell you that! I faced many fears and overcame nearly all of them. I am very proud of myself and also learned a lot about myself which is my only objective whenever I take part in a challenge.

Tough Mudder? Check.

– Jess

‘Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.’ – Lance Armstrong.

The Best Omelette Ever.

So recently I’ve been trying to get back into the swing of paleo – starting with my main meals.

I was experimenting with omelette ingredients the other week and discovered the best omelette in the world. It might not sound like much, but it’s amazing!

I have had this for lunch probably… 7 days out of the last 14, I can’t get enough of it!

Ingredients:
Half and onion (more if you’d like)
3-4 mushrooms
2 rashers of bacon
3 eggs
Sprinkling of salt
Butter/margarine/almond oil/vegetable oil (I used margarine as that’s all I had – not paleo, so I would suggest substituting with almond oil)

Instructions:
– Put a knob of margarine or a teaspoon of your chosen oil in a hot (non-stick) frying pan and wait until melted or hot
– Add the chopped up onions and fry until soft
– Add the sliced bacon and mushrooms
– While the bacon and mushrooms are frying, beat the 3 eggs in a jug or bowl and add the salt
– Once the bacon is almost cooked and the mushrooms are soft, add the beaten eggs to the frying pan
– Move the pan around so the egg mixture evenly covers the pan – kind of like an egg pancake
– Once the top of the omelette is almost solid (not going to run anywhere while you attempt to flip it over) take a spatula and flip the omelette over. Don’t worry if it breaks up, it doesn’t have to turn out neat and tidy, just tasty!*
– After a few seconds, the bottom of the omelette should be sealed.

Serve up onto a plate with a side of your choice if you fancy one (I find a salad or sweet potato fries** works well) and enjoy the best omelette in the world! 🙂

*If you prefer, you can take the pan off the heat and grill the top to seal it instead, I don’t have a grill in my new flat so I just fry both sides.

**I will pop a recipe for these up at a later date

Feel free to comment with any feedback about my recipe, tweaks you’ve made or your own favourite recipes! Sharing is caring! 🙂

– Jess
‘Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live.’ – Jim Rohn

On Trial: Training.

On Trial is an event lasting up to 48 hours, ran by Primal Events (www.primalevents.co.uk). I followed the first event on May 25th of this year. It lasted 30 hours and involved carrying a railway sleeper that weighed half a tonne between 7 people, and chopping 10 tonnes of wood over 8 hours.

Naturally, I then decided it would be a good idea to get involved in the very next Primal Event, well… sort of.

I should mention that Primal Events is a company founded by a dear friend of mine called Karl and recently, my boyfriend Rob has been taken on as another class leader – a role in which he is in his element!

It was only on Friday, late in the evening, that I realised what was going to happen this weekend. As far as I was aware, the boys would be going up to Kinder Scout (a mountain in the peak district) for a training session with some other people and I would be spending the weekend with Karl’s fiancée, my good friend Lyndsey, at their house catching up and drinking tea. How very wrong I was. I Facebook messaged Lyndsey on Friday afternoon to ask what we’d be up to this weekend, she replied saying she was taking part in the training session.

To cut a long story short, I found out that the training session was in fact a 12-14 hour long taster of On Trial, starting at 4pm on Saturday evening and that I would be bullied into taking part this weekend (I may be exaggerating, I think you can probably tell by now that I don’t need much convincing to take part in something that will likely leave me immobile for days to follow, the masochist that I am).

Before I knew it, I had packed my GORUCK Radio Ruck, donned a t-shirt, silkies* and running shoes and was on my way to the Peak District!

Had I signed up for the event via the website, I would have received an email, in Spanish (I will explain why later), with information including the start point location and time. I would have also received a kit list which included such obscure items such as a deck of cards, glowsticks and rope.

I turned up at the starting point with Rob and left him with Karl to arrange the start of the event. This challenge was their baby and I knew right there and then when I saw the look in their eyes, this would not be easy.
I met with some of the other guys; Hamish, Thomas and Brendon, in the cafe, and we exchanged greetings and talked about what events we’d taken part in previously.

We made our way to the start and met the other 6 participants, 3 of whom were friends of mine; Lyndsey, Sarah and her husband Ben. The remaining 3 were Andy, Toby and Linzi (or Foster as we referred to her to save confusion with having two Lyndsey/Linzi’s) who is a stay at home mum and, by her own admission, doesn’t do very much otherwise.
The challenge began, we were greeted by Karl and Rob who proceeded to inform us about safety during the challenge and made us hand in some form of ID as well as filling out waivers. Throughout this time, all I could concentrate on was the line of 10 sandbags staring at us from Rob’s feet. Rob had 2 of these in his garage at home and I knew from that that I was hardly capable of lifting one, what on earth was I going to do with these?

After the registration was completed, we were promptly introduced to Rob’s ‘sandbag babies’. If we split one at all throughout the duration of the challenge, we’d have hell to pay – he told us. We were each handed a Sharpie and made to write our mother’s names on the sandbag. If for whatever reason we didn’t want to write our mothers names, we could write our father’s or children’s. I quickly wrote ‘Sharon’ on my sandbag in all capital letters.

With that, we were told to pick up our sandbags and follow Rob. I struggled to get mine up onto my shoulders, but somehow managed. The challenge had really begun now and I felt it instantly. After no more than half a mile or so of walking, I really began to suffer, the mental torment also began. ‘I can’t do this, I’m already suffering, how will I last 12 hours? If only we could stop for a minute, just to rest for a few seconds, maybe I could quickly recuperate or readjust, if only I could rest for a minute’. These thoughts were all occurring to me and far too early on for my liking. Just as I was really starting to give up hope, Rob told us to stop and drop our sandbags. Thank goodness. We had stopped outside a pub called ‘The Nags Head’. He proceeded to tell us a story that we had found out together earlier on in the day from a local sales assistant in an out door shop; apparently, years ago, The Nags Head had ran out of Geoffs favourite beer (a customer of theirs) so he took it upon himself to trek over the mountain to The Snake pass Inn to collect a keg. The owner of The Nags Head said if he made it there and back with the keg he could keep it. Since then, a race has been developed in commemoration of Geoff’s efforts**.

After resting for a few minutes, it was time to move on. I was feeling slightly more confident having had a short rest, but that quickly wore off once the sandbag was lain on my shoulders again.

We walked for some time more, I just kept my head down and tried to keep up with the rest of the group, and then we stopped at the bottom of a huge hill. A HUGE hill. We were told we were going to be carrying out a fitness test, much like that of the military. It started with a 3 mile run (no sandbag, of course). We were told to carry this out in shuttles, up to a point of Rob’s description and back 3 times. The first half mile there was difficult as it was deceivingly steep, meaning the way back was ok as I was almost able to sprint and let gravity take it’s toll. Karl and Rob kept on repeating ‘it pays to be a winner, whatever you do, don’t come last’. They were marking down our results, the reason of which we were not informed. That certainly made us uneasy, and also competitive with each other. That being said, everyone was encouraging one another which was nice and bonded us as a team from early on.

After the 3 mile run, we were given the opportunity to rest for a minute or two to take in some water and food. This was brought to an abrupt end as we were then told we had 2 minutes to get up the HUGE hill, touch the wall, and run back down. I got half way up and was so close to turning round and just quitting, this has never been something to occur to me during a challenge before, at least not so early on. Karl and Rob were shouting at us about how it had already been two minutes and we hadn’t even made it to the top. I was disheartened and felt it was pointless to continue knowing I hadn’t a chance of making the cut off and I would be somehow punished. Suddenly, the voice of a small child I had watched a video of on YouTube singing an adorable song popped into my head; ‘don’t stop, don’t give up, don’t stop don’t give up, keep trying, keep trying, you’ll get it right, you’ll get it right’***. This motivated me to the top of the hill and back down, and when I got to the bottom, some of team mates were already there and were cheering me for making it. This boosted my morale and made me feel better about myself, I was ready for the next challenge.

The next part of the challenge consisted of pairing up and doing as many sit ups in 2 minutes as possible and then burpees, press ups, squats and shuttles up and down a small portion of the hill 4 times. Again, our results were being documented. It was at this point that Karl was beginning to get into my head, Rob knew he wouldn’t be able to as I knew him on a personal level (as I did with Karl, but in a different way). Karl would say things like ’54 sit ups? You need to get your shit together, that’s a shit score’ and ‘Jess, why aren’t you squatting properly? Not even one of those is counting, you might as well not even bother’. I was proud of how I was doing so each knock from him made me more and more insecure.

Once we finished our fitness test, it was time for more… yeah, you guessed it… PT. Karl laid out a tape measure up the hill to a certain point and we had to crab crawl up, bear crawl up and low crawl up as quickly as we could, our results still being documented and still being told ‘it pays to be a winner’.

I felt like I was doing well, I wasn’t coming last and I seemed to be keeping up with some of the stronger looking guys, I was happy with how I was doing. At least that was until Karl shouted some sort of put down or another to me, he knew how to get into my head and he wanted me to quit. I was close. He’d shout ‘oh finally Jess, you’re starting to dig, finally decided to start doing something did you?’ I found a moment during this to confer with Lyndsey and ask her if she noticed Karl picking on me, she told me at this point that she felt Rob was picking on her so we decided they’d swapped partners to bully. We later found out that we weren’t getting special treatment, everyone felt bullied. The boys were doing well, they seemed to find all of our buttons and knew which ones to press and how to get to us.

Whilst at the bottom of the hill taking on more water and food, we were told to grab our sandbags and get to around half way up the hill as quickly as possible. I ran to collect my sandbag but couldn’t find ‘Sharon’ anywhere… I was panicking, ‘Rob and Karl have taken it, they’ve taken it because I wasn’t keeping my eye out, I’m going to be punished, everyone has theirs except me, why would they have taken it?’ I decided to face the music and approach Karl. ‘Karl, I don’t know where my sandbag is, there’s only one left and it’s not mine’. He proceeded to scream up the hill ‘Everybody check your sandbags! Whoever has the wrong one, get down here NOW!’ Foster piped up, ‘I’m sorry, I just wanted to get here quickly, I didn’t check’ she made her way down the hill and I stood there waiting to see what would happen. Rob then shouted down ‘the two of you with the wrong Sandbags, do 10 overhead presses’. I shot a look to Karl, a look that said ‘What? But that’s not fair!’ I quickly realised that the guys didn’t care if it was fair, I had to do what they said. I looked at my sandbag and said, ‘Ok’. I picked up my sandbag and tried with all my might to get it above my head but I just couldn’t (I asked Rob how much the sandbags weighed after the challenge and he said 60lbs/27kg, I was super proud of myself as I’ve never carried this much before). Karl said it was ok and just to do 10 squats with my sandbag instead, Foster and I obliged.

The thing we did before moving on was called ‘die motherfxcker, die’ or… as us Brits like to call it (courtesy of GORUCK’s Cadre Beaux)‘butter butter jam’. This entailed a team leader being nominated by Karl and guess who he picked, yeah, muggins here. I had to lead my ‘troops’ up the hill in 5 groups of 2, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta and Echo. I’d say ‘Alpha, prepare to move!’ whilst all the teams shouted ‘die motherfxcker, die’ (they chose to shout this as there were no kids around, there was however, a less than amused dog walker). I would then shout ‘Move!’ they would get up and run up towards the ‘enemy’, Karl, until he was pointing at them with his ‘gun’ and then they would get down, during this phase they would shout ‘I’m up, he sees me, I’m down’. It was a game Karl and Rob had learned from a GORUCK challenge and made things just as physically challenging but fun at the same time. It was during this time that the rain set in, if you could call it that. It was more like buckets of water being poured from the heavens. I lay face down in the grass wearing nothing but my silkies, a t-shirt and a windbreak, soaked through and thought ‘what am I doing here?’ This was definitely not one of my finer moments in life and I was surely feeling sorry for myself.

The fitness test had come to an end and we set off through the rain (and now thunder and lightening too), once again with our sandbags, to the next location. This was another hill. Surprising really, considering we were on a mountain. Next followed more PT and more shuttles, this time up another hill. Less distance than the last, but just as as steep. It was at this point that we lost our first two participants. Sarah and Lyndsey were out and I was scared. Me and Foster were the only girls left, I was determined that one of us would finish and I was sure it would be me. At this point, I felt a familiar twinging in my inner right ankle, my posterior tibial tendinitis was beginning to rear its ugly head for the first time in months, I ignored it and continued on.

By the time we got to our next destination, darkness had descended upon the mountain and the rain was still hammering down. We arrived at a river, rushing aggressively downstream. We were asked by Rob if we wanted to wipe the slate clean of all penalties we had racked up by giving them something in return. We reluctantly said yes and Andy was made to get in the river, he was wearing nothing but shorts and t-shirt and had a rope tied round him with Rob and Karl anchoring him. He emerged and we thanked him. Karl and Rob now demanded that some of the men line up in the river against a fence that went across the width, as something stable to lean against. The rest of us would be helped across by them. Brendan, Andy, Ben, Thomas and Toby lined the way for me, Foster and Hamish to cross. I stepped in first and almost instantly was knocked off my feet by the current. I was dragged into Brendan who grabbed me round the torso but I felt the river violently trying to rip me by the legs from his grasp and under the fence. I panicked and he could tell by my face. ‘I won’t let go Jess, I’ve got you, you’re ok.’ I continued to panic. ‘Please, don’t let go, I’m going under, don’t let go’. I tried with all my might to pull my legs in from under the fence, the depth below of which I was unsure, but I had no control over my body. My life was in the hands of a man I’d met just 4 hours earlier. If he let me go, I was a goner for sure. He passed me to Ben who lifted me like a baby out of the river and thrust me against the bank, my feet were still in the river and even then, I couldn’t pull them out. Rob dragged me from the river bank and I stood up and burst into tears.

I suddenly started wretching and I felt my chest tightening and my breathing shorten. I was all too familiar with this feeling. I was having a panic attack. ‘Are you ok? Jess, are you ok?’. There were faces all around me in the dark asking me the same question and telling me to breath, but all I could do was cough, cry and struggle to breath. Karl sent everyone away, including Rob, thrust a flapjack into my hand and wrapped his coat around me. ‘You are shivering far too much Jess, get some layers on.’ I clinged to him like a child, hoping he wouldn’t let go and he didn’t. After a few minutes, I got a grip and calmed down. I was embarrassed that so many people had seen me this way, I wanted to be on my own but I knew I had to get back to the group and carry on. I put some compression leggings on, finished my flapjack and caught up with the group.

Looking back, I know I was safe in the hands of the guys, I just hated the fact that the situation was out of my control. I’m a very independent person and I hate having to rely on others. Relying on them for my safety was something I just couldn’t stand and it ultimately took its toll on me.
The next part of the challenge was extremely well thought out and tied things together. The challenge was carried out on the 27th of July, the same date as the Battle of Talavera, a battle in which Britain and Spain united to drive France out of Spain.****

We were told that this is why the email was sent out in Spanish for us to translate. We were then told we would be playing a game. Karl would stand at the top of a hill and be the enemy, we would charge towards him in pairs yelling a war cry of our choice. If we didn’t yell enough, we’d become a casualty and the others would have to carry us. During the charging, two people would have to carry a sandbag each up the hill. Our choice of war cry, decided by our team leader at the time, Toby, was ‘For the Empire!’ He explained his choice of war cry in historical terms but I’m afraid I was still slightly in shock from the river episode so I wasn’t paying attention all too well.

After the 3rd time of running down the hill my inner right ankle was on fire, my tendinitis was back with a vengeance. Brendon had kindly been holding my hand down the hill, as that’s when it hurt alot (up the hill wasn’t too bad) but after setting off up the hill for the 4th time, I told him to go on without me.

“Are you done?” Karl said. “I’m done.” I sat down and massaged my ankle. I was overcome with a strange sense of numbness. I’d never quit a challenge before. I’d never quit anything before. I didn’t know how to feel. I was happy I completed the entire part of the challenge with the sandbags, I was happy I didn’t quit due to mind games or to physical exhaustion, I was sad that something beyond my control was the reason I had quit, I was sad that I had quit. I sat there, Karl resumed his friendship with me and handed me some paracetamol and Ibuprofen. “We’ll be passing the cars soon along the way, you can join the girls there.” After just 5 hours, My challenge was over.

Meanwhile, Foster had been complaining about quitting but never once did, all she needed was a bit of encouragement and she was back in the game. I am pleased to report that she completed the challenge. 12 hours of physical and mental abuse in torrential weather conditions. The stay at home mum. The one who gets out of all she can at boot camp. The one who thought she wouldn’t last longer than an hour. She finished. I am infinitely proud of her and can’t wait to see what else she can achieve in the future.

The challenge progressed with more twists and turns including translating a task written in Spanish using nothing but Spanish phrase books, the entire team being bound together with rope and made to bear crawl and other such crazy tasks, of which I am gutted I could not be a part of.

The moral of the challenge for me was the 6 p’s. Perfect planning prevents piss poor performance. I should have strapped my ankle, I should have worn walking boots, I should have took pain killers with me, I should have packed more appropriate clothes.

I am all for a challenge that teaches me something and this one most certainly has. I can’t wait to come back bigger and stronger next time and tackle this challenge.

For now, it’s back to the weights room. I.E, my back garden.

– Jess
‘By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail’ – Benjamin Franklin

*Silkies – The best thing ever
https://www.goruck.com/gear/Details/ranger-panties
**For more info, visit http://www.kinderbeerbarrel.org.uk/
***https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uUlOAyQsn4
**** I’m afraid my history on this particular subject is limited to none, please excuse any inaccuracies I may have proclaimed.

The Color Run – London, 14th July 2013

The Color Run (sponsored by Dulux in aid of Stand up to cancer – a subsidiary of Cancer Research) is something we’ve both wanted to do for a long time, simply because it looks like so much fun. Jess and I had discussed traveling to Munich next year to take part, but before we’d made arrangements to do so, Jess found out that there was an event happening in London on 14th July. We live an hour away, so it was perfect. We got ourselves signed up and spent the next couple of weeks getting more and more excited!

I knew a little more about what The Color Run would involve from their website, obviously we already knew it was a 5k fun run with a lot of colourful dye involved, but the site explained how at each kilometre a team of volunteers would be there throwing dye over you. There’s a different colour at each post and then after the run it turns into a sort of festival, with music and everyone throwing paint everywhere. Really, what more could you want?! Something that really impressed me about the event, was the run pack that we received in the post a few days before the event. You get your event tshirt and race number, but you also get a poncho (which I assume is to protect car seats etc on the journey home), a transfer tattoo (awesome!), a sweat band and they even included four safety pins in each pack to attach your number, how thoughtful!

Originally, Jess had planned to ruck the 5k with weight, so we turned up in our nice clean The Color Run t shirts with our rucks – Jess’ with weight, mine without. I wore my Inov8 trainers and Jess represented barefoot runners in her trusty Vibrams! We got to the start line and were amazed at how many people were there, thousands of people had turned up to the event from all over the world and there were people of all ages too. It was great seeing kids as young as two getting involved!

They staggered the starts really well so we weren’t all falling over each other and they had plenty of entertainment whilst we were waiting too; there was music and volunteers were giving out free gifts like sunglasses and hats and getting the crowd hyped up for the race. Once the race started and the music was playing, with everyone cheering and getting excited, all we wanted to do was run! Fortunately, we spotted Jess’ parents once we started, dropped our rucks off with them (as we decided to run instead of ruck) and off we went…

We ran at first, in all our excitement, to get to the first colour post as soon as we could, but throughout the race we were eager for it not to end too soon. 5k isn’t far and we wanted to make the most of the experience! The first colour was pink and as we approached we could see the powder in the air and we could feel the level of excitement soar. Wveryone speeds up and once you arrive there are tonnes of volunteers throwing dye over everyone, it’s as fun as you imagine it to be. Jess dropped to the floor and started rolling around in the powder and everyone was picking it up off the floor and throwing it around. It’s the most carefree and fun loving run I’ve taken part in. As well as pink there was purple, yellow and orange so you complete the run looking like you’ve got into a fight with a paint box. We both had it all over our faces, arms and legs by the time we finished.

The Color Run is advertised as The Happiest 5k on the Planet and I can honestly say that being at the yellow post with the air full of bright yellow powder, and children rolling around in it, and people throwing it from all directions, was a moment that will stay with me forever. Jess was wearing Rob’s GoProHD Hero 2 and recorded parts of the day (video to be uploaded once edited) and in the video you can hear Jess say “yellow is the happiest colour” as we approached the post and then later I say “yellow is my favourite so far”. The entire run was so much fun, but this moment stood out to both of us. It was incredible.

The volunteers were great too, they were having just as much fun as the rest of us and it all just added to the atmosphere. Every colour post had a sort of mascot, a character to represent the colour, and they also had fun signs as we approached.

Something else I think is worth mentioning is that they also had a water station about halfway through, and it was needed in the heat we had. The whole event just felt really well thought out, we were continually entertained and the excitement never lost its momentum.

I recommend that everyone signs up to the nearest event and experiences it for themselves!

Then we hit the finish line and the fun continued! Everyone received refreshing drinks of coconut water and packets of fresh dye upon finishing, and then we joined the finishers from earlier on in the day in basically, a huge party. There was a DJ and everyone was dancing and throwing dye, it was like being at a festival.

^Jess trying to track down our buddies in the crowd (nice white patches from her GoPro straps)

Jess, the water baby that she is, was elated to see people being hosed down in the heat so she ran through the water as soon as she saw it!

We met up with friends from the GORUCK community and covered each other in more and more dye until we were all purple then had a dance with the crowd.

^This is us with Jenny and Jason, who we met through GORUCK, after we had a dye fight with the packets they gave us at the finish line

This picture of the two of us pretty much sums up the day, so I will leave you with this to sum up our post.

– Yas

“Happiness consists in activity: such is the constitution of our nature; it is a running stream, and not a stagnant pool.”
– John M. Good

My Circuit

So I recently read this article:

http://www.itstactical.com/fitcom/functional-strength-fitcom/can-you-physically-save-yourself/

It’s absolutely fantastic (as is the whole website), especially if you’re not sure where to begin in terms of improving functional body strength and fitness.

I constructed one of my training circuits based on this article and I’m really enjoying it and noticing the difference so far. (The DOMS the next day are all over my body, as opposed to in once isolated muscle group… yowsers!)

Basically, the 7 functional body movements are squatting, lunging, pushing, pulling, bending, twisting and gait.

So here it is:

PUSH – 8 Count Body Builder – 3×20
TWIST – C Sit Up Position With 25lb Medicine Ball Twist – 3×20
PUSH – 25lb Shoulder Press – 3×20
BEND – 25lb Deadlift 3×20
LUNGE – Lunge with 25lb Medicine Ball Twist – 3×20
SQUAT – Squats with 25lb Medicine Ball Frontal Arm Raise – 3×10
PULL – Negative Pull Ups – 3×5 (super useful for puny peeps like me who aren’t quite there with pull ups yet)
GAIT – Sprint to 25lb Medicine Ball Throw 3×20

Give it a try and let me know what you think in the comments 🙂

P.S If you don’t know what any of those exercises are, hit me up/google it.

– Jess
‘The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person’s determination’ – Tommy Lasorda

Run For a Million.

So, one of the things I failed to mentioned in my GORUCK AAR was that a (generous) portion of their takings go to the Green Beret Foundation. This is a kind of Help for Heroes charity in support of American Special Forces.

One of the big boys at GORUCK, a high miler, high challenge, badass, big man is Mark Webb. He is known and loved by all at GORUCK including GRHQ themselves. I personally haven’t met Mark, but I love him because he’s from a little town 2 miles away from where Rob is from. He now lives in America, but we can forgive his betrayal…

Mark has decided to put on an event, also in support of GBF, that involves a virtual race. I was buzzing when I read about it because it’s an event that I WON’T miss out on, just because I don’t live in America.

The idea is you sign up for one of the distances listed (ranging from 1.5k to 100miles), run it, and receive goodies. You obviously have to capture some sort of proof of your time and distance whether this is by using a smartphone app, GPS data capture tool or just a picture of your watch and a Google maps image of the route.

For doing the race you get a patch and there are some other things in the pipeline too. You can also get a t-shirt from the website if you so desire.

I personally think this is a great way to get everybody far and wide involved in a challenge for a great cause.

There’s a video on the website of Mark explaining more about the event, so please do check it out if only in curiousity and if you are interested in signing up, do it! There’s a distance for everyone!

http://runfor1m.org/

– Jess
‘If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. If you can’t walk, then crawl. But, whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.’ – Martin Luther King Jr.

Jess has gotten techy!

So I’ve been playing around a little and hopefully, everything we do here will go to Twitter and FB and everything from Twitter should come to here!

That’s the plan anyway…

I’ve also created some pages which you will find on the right underneath our ‘Yasmin & Jess’ section, this will filter blogs so you can just check out specifics 🙂

Hopefully it will work out!

– Jess
A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others – Ayn Rand

Born to Run – Christopher McDougall

I rang Rob one lunch time in, what can only be described as, a strop.

I had just been told by a physio therapist that I was not to do anymore physical endurance challenges, including the GORUCK challenge, the Fandance and the Spartan Challenges. I was less than impressed and slightly freaking out. I had just discovered a new hobby that I had quickly developed a passion for and I was now being told I couldn’t continue with it.

My hip is slightly tilted, my knee points inwards and as a result of that my inner thigh muscle is shortened only pulling my knee in further. This has also resulted in balancing all of my weight on the inside of my foot, also known as over pronating, so my arches are virtually non-exisitant. As a result of these bio-mechanical faults, I regularly develop tendinitis in my posterior tibial tendon on both sides as well as shin splints.

Much to my dismay, Rob was hardly phased by this news. “Don’t worry, Jess, they say stuff like this all the time, it’s just nonsense, you can carry on just change the way you run and you’ll be fine.” What? How he could he think he knows better than the physiotherapist? This man was medically trained, if he says I have to run smaller distances whilst wearing orthotics and says that I need custom orthotics in my shoes on a daily basis, that is surely the way it has to be.

I pondered what Rob had said and compared it to what the physio had said. Did I want to listen to a man I had just met who told me my fitness life was over and I would most likely be in a wheelchair by the time I was 30, or did I want to listen to the man telling me the things I wanted to hear? Rob is in incredibly good shape and treats every injury he gains like a small bump in the road, shortly recovering and carrying on bigger and better than ever before. I trusted him, but I also trusted the physiotherapist.

I saw Rob the following weekend and he handed me a book called ‘Born to Run’. “What’s this?” I asked. Rob replied, “just read it, you should look at barefoot running, get yourself some Vibram Fivefingers like me and read this book, your arches will reform and you’ll be fine in no time.” Hm, seemed a bit too good to be true, nevertheless, I was willing to try anything at this point.

***

Born to Run is a book written from the perspective of the author, Christopher McDougall. It begins by telling us of his travels to Mexico in search of a character named ‘Caballo Blanco’. I don’t mean character in the sense of a fictional being, I mean character in the way that you would describe someone unlike those you’d met before. He is truly one of a kind and makes the book what it is. Caballo Blanco left civilisation and decided to live amongst a secret tribe of ultra runners called the Rarámuri, also known as the Tarahumara tribe. This was a tribe of people that could run for 100s of miles at a time as though it were nothing. Their pace never slowed, their form never slacked, they just ran. For fun, for security, for all sorts of reasons. It was their purpose in life and the way they lived.

It was whilst reading Chapter 2 that I decided this book may actually provide me with the answers I’d been searching for. McDougall’s search began in the same way as mine, by asking his doctor ‘Why does my foot hurt?’ After being given the same spiel as I, McDougall ventured further into why something that came so naturally to us and our predecessors is deemed ‘bad for us’ and something that our bodies are incapable of carrying out without injury. Why is it that people keep telling us we shouldn’t run?

McDougall introduces us to a number of people that he met along his journey’s throughout the book. He tells us of his journey to becoming a better runner, he gives us insight into the lifestyle of the Tarahumara, he lends us his knowledge of events carried out across the world and generally opens up our eyes to the world of running as we’ve never seen it before. As something beautiful, spiritual and most importantly, necessary.

There is an invaluable amount of information in this book, and it is both inspirational and motivating – there have been more occasions than I can count on one hand where I have got up straight after reading a chapter and headed out for a run.

The main reason I decided to write this article, was because of the section of the book that changed the way I run today. Towards half way or so through the book, we are introduced to ‘Barefoot Ted’. He is a chatty, inquisitive and bubbly character. Ted runs without shoes, one day he just decided he didn’t need them anymore and he has ran this way ever since without injury. He has since released a line of sandals modeled after those of the Tarahumara, called Luna Sandals (https://www.lunasandals.com/). It is at this stage in the book that McDougall explains to us the life of a barefoot runner, the way he has noticed Ted to run and the Tarahumara. The way that we run at speed naturally but have been trained out of since the introduction of running shoes.

The idea of barefoot running is to remove the impact of landing on the heel, causing us a jolt of shock impact on our joints, and have us land on our midfoot instead, transferring the impact gently along the length of our foot from ball to heel, and into our calf muscles.

These few chapters outline why running shoes cause us many injuries and why it is the feet actually prefer a bit of a beating and the freedom to move around, as opposed to being supported in the ‘crutches’ that are running shoes. It explains how Kenyan people, the Tarahumara and various other people still run like our ancestors, and are able to do so consistently for hours without pain or injury, and it contains various other details that would be a revelation to anybody who hasn’t read the book. McDougall also introduces us to Vibram Fivefingers in these chapters (http://www.vibramfivefingers.it/), some of the few and best available running shoes for barefoot runners. They look like gloves for the feet. A thin, rubber sole to protect the sole of the foot from terrain damage and a canvas type breathable material on top with a velcro strap. They have individual toes, hence why they look like gloves, and aren’t very attractive at first glance. Rob has some so I was aware of them before I read the book, but I decided to buy some for myself a couple of chapters into reading the book.

***
It was at this point where my mind had gone from around 85% made up to 100% made up. That’s it, I’m taking on barefoot running seriously now. I’d bought myself some Vibrams a couple of chapters into reading Born To Run, after somebody on the GORUCK Tough Page (a page on Facebook you get allowed into after completing a GORUCK challenge – see previous post for more details) posted a link to a sale of them. I had waited this long, since I am on a student budget!

I was beyond ecstatic when my parcel arrived and I immediately put them on and set out for a run. I was made all to aware by Rob at how one can do too much too soon when changing from heel striking to barefoot running, so to only do a mile or so at first and perfect the technique. Otherwise, the foot can be prone to a stress fracture and the calves can be put under a little too much pressure, cramping up for a few days.

I massively enjoyed my first barefoot run and have since been building up my technique and stamina with barefoot running. I have not had tendinitis for months now, having been prone to it every 2-3 weeks before, and my calves look fantastic. I feel stronger, happier and have never enjoyed running so much in all my life. I did my first official 10k the other week for the Race for Life (http://raceforlife.cancerresearchuk.org/index.html) and afterwards I felt I could have run for miles more. I do still wear my new balance running shoes with orthotics in for longer runs while I’m still building up my technique and stamina, so as to not injure myself, but I soon aim to have fully converted to barefoot running and take on my first marathon. Who knows, maybe I’ll end up doing ultra marathons!

All I can say is, you are capable of what you believe you are and no one can tell you otherwise. I recommend this book to everyone, runners or not. It is amazing the amount we don’t know and the amount we can learn about our body and its capabilities.

Jess
‘Whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right.’ – Henry Ford

Twitter.

Follow us now! @CrawlRunFly

The GORUCK Challenge.

To paraphrase GORUCK themselves, the GORUCK challenge is an 8-10 hour introduction to yourself. You are lead round in a ‘class’ (ranging anywhere from 7-30 people) by a current or ex member of the American Special Forces (namely green berets and recon marines) who are referred to as the ‘cadre’*, whilst carrying a ruck (preferably a GORUCK, I personally use a Radio Ruck and we have become inseparable) that contains a number of bricks depending on your weight. People weighing under 150lbs will carry 4 bricks and those who weigh over will carry 6. You are also required as a team to provide a team weight, weighing 25lbs, that is passed around the team throughout the event. The GORUCK challenge is a team event, never a race.



During the challenge you will undertake various different PT exercises from bear crawls to inch worm press ups and overhead squats. There are also mission based challenges with time hacks (I will go into further details about these whilst talking about my challenge).



To summarise: you start as a class of individuals and finish as a team. The less of a team you work as during the challenge, the more you will be punished.

So, back to my AAR.



I first heard about GORUCK through my boyfriend, who heard about it through a fantastic website called ITS tactical (http://www.itstactical.com/). He registered for the first GORUCK challenge ever to take place in England; London, class 259. I shadowed him and was crazy shocked by the amount of, what can only be described as near torture, this group of men (and one incredible woman) went through. The class was led by Cadre Beaux. I won’t say too much about him in case you are looking to do a challenge, I don’t want to ruin the surprise! I watched this class turn from a group of strangers into a team, some of whom have now become life long friends.



Anyway, it was November 2012 and me and Rob (my boyfriend) had just returned from New York where Rob had completed Worlds Toughest Mudder. We had those post challenge blues we’d become all too familiar with by now and were reading the GORUCK website longingly, as we often did. Suddenly, something caught our eyes that left us silent for a few minutes, but completely on the same wavelength. ‘Las Vegas, 31st December, 2012.’ That’s right –  a GORUCK challenge was being led on New Years Eve in none other than bright light city itself.



We’d been saving for two years to spend that Christmas and New Year in Norway, I had always wanted to see the Northern Lights, but since we started saving, the prices to do so had almost doubled leaving us deflated and disheartened.

I turned to Rob, ‘Rob… you could totally afford to go there and do the challenge!’ His response was, ‘no Jess… we could BOTH afford to do this!’ Within an hour of finding out about the challenge we had booked flights, challenge and accommodation and were heading to Vegas in December for 5 days to see in the New Year GORUCK style!



***

It was 8:30pm and Rob and I had made it to the ‘ruck off’** to meet our future class mates and get acquainted before the challenge and after an hour or so, we started to head down to the start point.



There, Rob and I met Jill and T.J, a married couple who had kindly offered to sort our bricks out for us, since we hadn’t been able to bring them over from England ourselves, (have you ever seen 6 bricks wrapped up in gaffa tape? TSA would tear us apart if they found those in our luggage!).



Once we had strapped in our bricks, we all stood patiently, waiting to see which of the cadre listed on the website would show up to lead our 10pm class. A small amount of time passed and we were all standing there nervously, except for the ‘alumni’ who had already completed challenges before and knew roughly what to expect (Rob included). And then we looked up to see a dark figure in a cap and a hoody make his way towards us.



”Hello class, I am Cadre Joel, I will be your cadre for the commencing challenge. I will first tell you a bit about myself…” He proceeded to tell us about his history in the special forces and what it is he does now. He looked at me, I’m not sure why me in particular, it could have been something to do with the fact that I was the youngest looking class mate, with 2 blonde Pippi style plaits and a bright pink windbreak, or it could have been something to do with the fact that I looked like I was about to… please excuse me… poo myself. Either way, the words he said next would haunt me for the rest of the challenge. “You nervous?” I nodded tentatively, he snickered “you should be…”. Holy crap, what on earth had I got myself in to?!

Next, the cadre decided it would be fun for us to bear crawl down the road, up onto a bridge that crossed over a dual carriage type of road, and down again. After about 5 minutes, I had already injured myself twice, once by pressing the palm of my hand onto a sharp stone whilst bearing the weight of my ruck and myself, and once when my bag swung off my back and hit me in the elbow. How was I going to cope for the next however many hours? I was already hurt and struggling and we’d barely left the start point! Whilst these thoughts were occurring to me, a Mexican wave of ‘stops!’ starting from the back and ending at the front had led us all to stop and glance back to see what the problem could be.



”Why is your teammate so far back?” The cadre demanded, less than amused. None of us could answer. One of the girls had had some difficulty of which I am unsure, and had ended up further behind us. We had left her. Our punishment? Lose a strap on our rucks. We now had to carry the rucks on our back, whilst still bear crawling, with only one strap. Miraculously, I made it to our destination in one piece and was still determined to carry on.

We then proceeded to do the welcome party, an amount of PT ranging from 1-3 hours, at the cadre’s discretion, that would separate the weak from the strong, the ones who wanted it from the one’s who didn’t. I am pleased to report that we all made it through the welcome party in one piece.

The next few hours consisted of us being allocated a team leader and assistant team leader from within the class who would find out from the cadre what our next task was. We’d have various amounts of miles to cover in various amounts of times and if we didn’t reach the destination in time, we would have to do some form of PT as punishment. Humorously, one of the things that sticks with you after a challenge, is to look for things of suitable height along your journeys to rest your ruck on and relieve your shoulders for a short while. If I happen to pass a bollard or fence even now, I still think, ‘ooh I can rest my ruck there!’ Before I realise I have no need to.



Along the way, we found a shopping trolley. ‘Let’s use this!’ Someone suggested, ‘we can put our rucks and the team weight in it and take turns to push it!’ ‘Is that allowed?’ Someone else asked the cadre. He shrugged and said ‘you figure it out as a team.’ I instantly knew this was a trick by him. I should mention at this point that the cadre had banned the alumni from talking to the ‘newbies’ at the start of the challenge until further notice, so as to not give anything away.

Surely we were never going to get away with something that would make the challenge easier?! A team vote was suggested. ‘All those in favour of keeping the cart, raise your hands.’ A number of hands went up.  ‘All those in favour of leaving the cart, raise your hands.’ My hand as well as Rob’s and a number of other GORUCK alumni’s went up. Unfortunately, we were outweighed. We kept the trolley.  There were times where this was useful, one of our teammates had cramp in both calves for a good while and was unable to keep at the pace we needed to be at in order to make our time hack. For a short time, we pushed him and were content with our decision to keep the cart. Later on in the challenge however, we were surely made to regret this decision.

‘Ok, I want you to start collecting stones to put in the cart. If it is not full by the time we reach our next destination, you will be punished.’ Fantastic, more weight. We obeyed and reached the next destination with a trolley full of rocks. We were then told we could choose to leave the cart. By now,  we had learned our lesson and couldn’t wait to be rid of our burden. The vote was unanimous, we had chosen to leave the cart. ‘Alright, in order to leave the cart, you must do 100 monkey fxckers.’ 100 what now?! He demonstrated the exercise, one he had learned in Dive School, and we obliged, reluctantly. Thankfully, we could now move on without the cart!

Some time earlier, we were all relatively quiet due to a drop in morale. We had almost forgotten that it was New Years Eve, so when we saw the faint shimmer of glitter in the sky on the Strip, seemingly 100s of miles away, we all stopped in a moment of confusion. ‘Are those fireworks? Is it midnight? Does this mean it’s the New Year?’ These were all questions that were asked by us for a brief moment. ‘Seems that way.’ Replied the cadre. Oh… ok. We then moved on, barely giving thought to the fact that we had just spent the turn of the year pushing a trolley full of rocks through a questionable area of Las Vegas.

This missing out on New Years in Vegas was definitely redeemed for me around 4am, when I was lucky enough to watch the sunrise on Charleston mountain. Whether I was just happy to see the sun, delirious or genuinely impressed, this was one of the most epic moments of my life. Seeing the sun cast an outline of gold along the edges of mountains on the horizon was beauty that I have never seen before or since and it certainly made up for the missing of the fireworks. My morale had increased and I was ready to tackle the rest of this challenge.

A couple more hours passed and my morale had quickly dipped again, even though the sun was now up I was still unsure as to how long the challenge had left and whether I would be able to finish. Then, up ahead, I saw it. ‘Welcome to fabulous Las Vegas!’ That famous sign we all know and love, staring at us from up ahead. I spoke with the girl next to me, another Brit who had moved to America not long before. ‘This must be it surely, it’s been around 8 hours now and the challenge is supposed to be 8-10. If he has brought us here, it must be to finish. It’s the perfect ending place!’ I was naive to think this, surely I should have known that ‘perfect’ actually meant ‘too good to be true’. Nevertheless, I powered on up ahead towards the ‘finish’. We arrived and started having our team pictures taken both with and without the cadre, I was excited and felt a massive sense of accomplishment, this is it! We’ve finished!

‘Ok class, time to do some alligator crawls.’ Ok, so he’s making us do some more PT before we get our patch, that’s cool, that final push, no problem! We then proceeded to carry out the most abysmal alligator crawls the world has ever known, but I didn’t care, I was in high spirits and ready for my patch.

‘Right, you have 1 hour to get to the Four Seasons hotel.’ Oh, right, ok, maybe he wants to get to a nice hotel to finish so we can finish off with some drinks, that’s fine, I can push a little longer.

Destination reached.

‘You now have 1 hour to get to the Luxor’. You’re joking? I’m dying on my feet here! Oh well, one last push, I can do this.

The Luxor came and went. As did the Vdara, the Aria, Caesars palace, The Bellagio, The Stratosphere and a bunch of other hotels whose names I could not care for since that day.

By the time we got to the Stratosphere, I was close to tears. Rob and I were now at the front leading the way, as I was struggling so much that I was made the pacemaker. My feet felt like they were on hot coals and that I was bleeding from the nails, I was hallucinating from sleep deprivation, I was sobbing like a baby and I just wanted to go home. Rob was now holding my hand, he had the American flag in the other (we are required to carry it round with us throughout the challenge) and I later found out that he had bicep cramp but didn’t want to let go of my hand to swap, as he could see how much I was struggling and he wanted to be there for me.

Finally, 4 hours later, we arrived at Hennessy’s Tavern, the pub we had had the ruck off in, what seemed like years before. I sat on the wall and placed my head in my hands. This was it for me, if we had to walk just 1 mile further to the place that we’d started, I was out. I just couldn’t do it anymore. Rob was called over to the cadre as the newly nominated team leader.

I remember the next thing he said like it was this morning.

‘Do you want the good news first or the bad news?’ My heart sunk. Great. We’re going to the Neon Museum, our starting point. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. ‘Um… the bad news first.’ One of us uttered. ‘Ok… well the bad news is… there is no bad news, you’ve just completed the GORUCK challenge.’ I burst into tears. To this day I cannot pinpoint the emotion I was feeling at that point, relief, anger, excitement, happiness, sadness. I don’t know, a combination. Rob ran over to me and hugged me and I sobbed into his chest for what seemed like hours.

When Cadre Joel handed me that patch that day, my whole life changed. My outlook towards people, life, attitude, everything. I cannot tell you how life changing taking part in a GORUCK challenge can be. It’s not just about some exercise and a patch, it’s about creating bonds with people that will last a lifetime, it’s about achieving things you never thought you could, it’s about putting into perspective things in your life. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done.

I’ve since done another one and am signed up for a 3rd. I hope to do a 4th as well, finances permitting. I can’t wait. I am GORUCK tough now,  and I always will be.

– Jess
‘To live would be an awfully big adventure’ – Peter Pan.

*cad·re [ˈka-ˌdrā] noun A key group of military personnel able to establish and train a new unit.

** The ruck-off is basically a pre challenge meet up of the team, organised through Facebook, where you get to know one another and share a drink or two either the night before or the night of your challenge, depending on the starting time.

For more info, visit www.goruck.com