June Two. Day Two to the Dash.
National Running Day is over, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still get out there and run! If you did it yesterday, go do it again today! Here in Chicago it’s pretty nice right now. Not too hot, and perfect for going outside and working up a sweat! I will be leaving the house shortly to do just that. Thank goodness the Warrior Dash has obstacles to break up all that running! Yesterday was not my proudest day of exercise. The good part is that I managed to get my son out there and moving, but, the sad and pathetic part is, that I struggled with a measly ¼ mile. Really. I was a plodding old lady. Apparently running once a week for varying distances and so inconsistently is not the way to train for anything. Maybe my theory about eating all the junk in the house and drinking all the wine before starting the summer shape up was not as brilliant as it seemed. I probably should have just threw all the crap away. Oh well, too late now! We did manage to squeak out 2 miles though. So we are about to go do again. I really only need about 3.2 miles in a row. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Be back later.
Update. NOW it’s gonna rain…ratsafratsa…And the Final Warrior Dash post until next years event (or at least sign-up)
It’s like thunder, lightning…the way you love me is frightening…that’s from a song, but the storm is moving in. It’s like the weather was waiting for me to finish running today. “OK, Thunderheads, she’s done. She finally got her lazy butt up and around, send in the clouds and let her rip!” Bastard Atmospheric Conditions!
Anymuddyway…These are the final pictures from that damn little mud camera with the amazing ability to take blurry pictures of hot firefighters but somehow focus in with razor sharp acuity on my ginormous ass going over a wall. (If you wanna see the butt pictures–you gonna have to search the website–I put them in a separate post–Ha!)
Here they are. Thanks A & J!
Our kingdom for a wish…
Before the race. Strolling the course. Posing so bravely.
Ooooh! Fire! Hurry!
Scary! And actually it was a little bit...it was hot, high, and 7 in the morning. We have to jump over that???
The mud. Looks nice with no one in it. Kind of like a spa!
The start.
People running with us. I'm kind of hungry...
Imagine that running on the flat ground is the easiest thing you do all day!
The hills! Killer! Seemed easy until about the twentieth one!
The junkyard cars.
Cheesecake!
My favorite part! In the forest! The steep terrain and jagged rocks! I really did like this obstacle!
Climb over a spool. Walk the plank!
From the bottom...
...and from the top!
Look at that man! Just hops right over! Where are the girls?? You gotta go look...'cause they are not in this section!
In the tubes...a mere competitor...
...Out the other side...a WARRIOR!
Swampy. Our first taste of mud and what's to come!
The mud pit. Down and dirty and in it! We are there.
We are so over it!
Firefighters. Big Hoses. Water. Yes, please.
See you all next year!!
Every excuse in the book…
For why it took me a dismal 47 minutes to run around 3.7 miles.
1. The air temperature was 87 degrees at 3 pm.
2. There was no wind.
3. And no shade.
4. The sun was blazing down like hellfire.
5. I had a rock in my shoe.
6. And a cramp in my leg.
7. And a weird pain in my ankle going down to the bottom of my foot.
8. I have my period.
9. I have my period.
10. I just ran 5 miles yesterday.
11. The direction I ran has more of an uphill slope almost the entire way.
12. I still have a scorching sunburn on my chest from the weekend. (Sport bra was rubbing and causing blisters)
13. My earphones kept falling out.
14. Or pulling too tight at the neck. (Tucked in my shirt collar and thru the sleeve to my arm band)
15. Wispy hairs kept sticking to my face.
16. Sweat was dripping in my eyes.
I could probably keep going but it won’t change the fact that today’s run was made on sheer willpower alone. Seriously.
I had zero desire and zero strength to get around. At the one mile to-go mark (going backwards from the norm), I wanted to stop. And I don’t mean just stop running. I wanted to completely stop and lay down on the track. I was actually arguing with myself about NOT stopping. Telling myself, I could not just stop right there and I really couldn’t sit down much less LAY down on the trail. Besides the car was still a mile away, and how did I think I was going to get there?? I’m like, just go. Just keep going. Breathe in, count steps, count breaths, whatever…here comes a tree, here comes another tree, ¾, ½, ¼, here’s that garbage can, here’s that pink kid croc shoe that somebody must have lost yesterday, I can see the car, keep going, don’t throw up, here’s the port-a-potty, the parking lot, the car, you made it!
And now I am home again. Almost forgetting…that’s how it gets you! Exercise is only hard at the time. Otherwise it feels pretty good.
And since I’m feeling successful and numb, here’s those pics I mentioned earlier. See how I buried them way in here! You gotta be a fan to get the good stuff! Thanks Jay for taking such a flattering picture! And thanks Amanda for that concerned face while helping me over, making it look like I weigh 300 pounds! I love you guys! Ann Or Ex E Uh! Next year! (I posted them full-size for that extra added chuckle)
I'm much more flexible, and not THAT heavy, but I still couldn't have made it over myself. Next year. Little jog, little skip, up and over! Take that, horrible waterproof disposable low speed film camera (with unfair sharpness and clarity).
In my defense, my butt is not really THAT huge. It LOOKS huge, that is true. But it's the angle. The shorts. The other shorts. I am MUCH better looking in real life. And thinner. I swear!
And we are back…it’s Wednesday afternoon, pre-running post…More Warrior, with updates!
As I was flipping thru the internet I noticed that the Helmet Cam video is on You Tube now! Thank goodness! I can’t get the other formats to work or convert or whatever people do to make things show up here. So I am posting that here. It’s long, but it gives a really good playback of what we were doing. Makes you wish you were there huh??
I went to my sister’s yesterday to babysit for her and her house full of children, including my own, because this year her birthday NEVER ends!
The hubby went and bought her tickets! Awwww….
It was a secret, she didn’t know she was going to the SOX game AND sitting behind the dugout–so close to the players she could feel their sweat (Eeeww for me, Yay! for her). She’s kind of a fanatic. At any rate, they took, like, 200 pictures of players I couldn’t identify on threat of death if they were standing right in front of me with their jerseys on, much less standing at home plate facing the other way swinging a bat! But whatever…she had a good time. If she sends me any of her favorite pictures I can add them here as kind of a Sox player-sister-tribute thing. So look for that later too!
Now that’s it. Happy Birthday. It’s over! Sheesh…
Also, they got the pictures back from the Mud-Cam and some are really good! Some are really bad too. Two in particular have me going over the Wall with my ass looking like I put two beach balls in my pants! It’s funny but not TOO funny. I confiscated the actual prints and they are currently residing in my fridge and food cabinets with a serious note to myself asking if I REALLY want to eat anything inside these areas of the house?? Maybe I should go have a big glass of water, run around the block, and reconsider eating any kind of solid food for the next few weeks. But I’m waiting for the digital to show up in my e-mail so I can post, so we’ll see if those two make it to daylight…maybe if I get a few subscribers??? Hint, hint. (Pathetic grab for attention!)
How long can I drag out this Warrior Dash to get more hits for my site? At least a few more days!
We have to go hit the trail now. Third day of the new fitness regiment. Mason doesn’t want to–he’s still sore, and Stevie doesn’t really get it yet…so this should be fun! Mommy has to be the bad guy. Exercise is good! In a month or so they’ll thank me!
I will post later with any new pics and such. Stay active!
Warrior Dash Helmet Cam
If this actually works…my sissy, her husband and myself are at the 2:00 mark. Right near the guy with the blood on the horns of his Warrior Helmet. It’s a lovely video of our backs walking toward the start! Then Mike pretty much zooms away from us!
No.
I don’t have enough skills yet to make this work!
Warrior Dash Results plus Shameless Self Promotion (Subscribe To Me! Link is on right…)
As expected, I did not win the Warrior Dash. It’s ok. I kind of figured when I didn’t hear my name called on Saturday. And now looking at my dismal hour plus finish…haha.
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Really, it was over an hour. But not because I couldn’t do it. Mostly because I got stuck in an obstacle jam at the jumping Wall (not enough space for all of us to go over in a faster fashion) But I’m not complaining. I don’t really care anyway about the time. The whole thing was a blast!
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I’m still finding pics and video on the internet from it. Looking at everyone’s stuff I already found us in a few. I’ll post as we see. We still have one more camera that my brother-in-law took with thru the mud and gunk!
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On the Facebook site, you can really see some of the obstacles in other people’s pictures. The Swamp looks particularly gross and muddy, and the Hills look fun even thought they were killer. Up, down, up, down. I put that the Forest Trail Hills were my fav, but those grass hills are a close second!
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Well, back to the real world now. I have to go register the kids for school and hit the trail with my son! The road calls.
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This is the NEW FEATURE post, begging…that I typed last night while most normal people were sleeping. Didn’t want you to miss it! And you wouldn’t…if…??? And that’s all I’ll say.
Here is another random phone camera pic because I like to have them on the site!
Warrior Dash! Video! As promised!
These are all pretty short so take a look!
Number 1: Starting the Race
Number 2: The Second Loop–Looking Tired
Number 3: THE MUD!
That’s all for my videos, but I found this one after I posted mine. This was from another competitor who was way ahead of us in the end, but he just so happened to be starting in our same wave. He has some good video of our start from the back as opposed to our footage from the front. You can kind of see us in front of him in line a little bit here and there, but Mason is in the video for a nice cameo at about the 1:25 mark. This runner also has some good shots of the fire and some of the energy before and after the race!
We will be back next year! I hope you enjoy the videos!
Happy Birthday Amanda!!
It is Friday the 17 th! My sister’s official birthday! And I see we are reading this webpage a little more regularly now. Thank you! AND making comments. Thank you again!
So, I never got back here yesterday because normal people stuff takes up more time than I thought, which is probably why I don’t do it on a regular basis. But I payed the bills, bought some groceries, tidied up the house a bit…we even had an overnight guest (the kids friend). Next up is laundry—have to get that dang pile down, posting more exciting things from yesterday when I was out in the world (Dodge Challenger…oooh) and basically waiting for my sissy today to come over!
The plan is for her to come here. We are going to have as nice birthday dinner while we can still eat through our mouths and not the feeding tube they will have to put in along with the full body casts that they put on when you break every bone in your body doing some crazy athletic race-type event because you think it’s cool. Then we’ll leave at 5 in the morning tomorrow and prepare for an all liquid diet for the next month! Kidding, I’m sure. We are highly trained athletes. Used to extreme adventures and bad terrain. WE ARE WARRIORS!!
Here are some true excerpts from the e-mail we got:
Warriors,
Brace yourselves for the wildest 3.75 miles of your life, a battleground full of dangerous and insane obstacles! Warriors, prepare to battle.
That doesn’t seem to bad, right? Then it’s all blah, blah, details about packet pick-up, parking, etc… And then this:
Danger Warning
Please understand portions of Warrior Dash are truly extreme – your best judgment and respect for every participant is expected and appreciated.
This is no joke: there really will be fire, swamps, extreme hills, etc. We urge you to take special caution when entering the forest immediately before Splintering Spools because the hill is extremely steep (too steep to run down) and there’s limestone jutting out of the hill in several areas.
Excuse me, while I go poo in my pants. “Splintering” spools doesn’t sound too bad, you know, splinters in my knees and hands maybe…unless it’s like giant shards of wood sticking out…It’s the “steep hill” and “jutting limestone” that concerns me. I would like to NOT crack my skull open on a piece of extreme rock. Fire, swamps…I guess if I’m wet already I can’t technically catch on fire right??
At any rate, I’m getting a stomach ache thinking about it!
So, HAPPY BIRTHDAY SISTER!! We are going to have SO much fun tomorrow!! I’ll make sure Mom gets us a room at the hospital together!!
Here are some flowers from my front wildflower landscape thing I tried to create! Aren’t they pretty? Won’t they be soothing to look at through giant, swollen, teary, puffy, black and blue eyes?? Ha.
For all you other folks who can only imagine…check out the web here for the actual event,
And here for the Face Book Link.
I don’t have it but some of the comments are funny.
Here’s your pictures Amanda! Happy B-day! Love, Me!
just shy of pretty 