What a Party!
I have been hearing about this “Warrior Dash” for some time, and it’s clearly struck a nerve among the Generation Active set, starting stateside 4 years ago when it was launched. Thanks to some clever social media marketing, the organizers out of Chicago (Red Frog Events) hit the proverbial Home Run on their first attempt in Canada. The event was capped at an ambitious 12,000 athletes (I use this term loosely people) and well over a month before lift off the event hung a SOLD OUT sign on their website. Like a stone gathering speed down a hill, this was THE race of conversation all spring at our booth. With a very busy day already planned, I decided I just could not miss spending the day here, but was I really interested in actually entering the race and getting down and dirty?
After....note the stickers, amazing...still there.....
Not really to be fair, but then I have been there, done that (including a Mud Run years ago), and I have found my clothes, shoes and socks before beyond recognition. One Adventure Race called Logs, Rocks and Steel was a 6hr affair and my buddy Steve and I didn’t even finish! We were knee and waist deep in one place on the water slogging our canoe through a swamp, it was truly disgusting. Another 2-day Adventure Race many years ago was a 10hr day that included a complete change of clothes mid-stream, the mud was so thick it took weeks before my bike was clean again. Another 24hr Mtn Bike race where I completed 4 laps included a 2am affair where my lights gave out on me, so 2x I went end-over end on the handlebars in the middle of a forest. My contacts were changed for glasses after I was rudely awoken at 1:45 am (“Peter, wake up, your leg is coming up”). I had grass and dirt somehow wedged in my glasses, between the frames and lense. How the $#^% did that happen???
I also completed a 160km Bike Ride for Charity, 145 of these km’s in the pouring rain. That was a long day. And an Ironman Triathlon in a desert (Arizona).
So, when I heard that Warrior Dash was ONLY 5km, I wasn’t about to rush madly and commit myself to the race, afterall, I do attend a lot of these and don’t even try to compete or complete then all. But, with this stupid competition now almost a month completed, 45 races in 45 days, my weekends usually had to include at least one race to keep pace:
Race #1 – Huntington Disease 10km Run – June 28th
Race #2 – Tim Horton’s Peach Bud 5km (2 days later)
Race #3 – Canada Day 5-miler (2 days later)
Race #4 – Gay Pride Run 5km (4th race in 6 days)
Race #5 – Warrior Dash 5km Obstacle Course
Race #6 – Dowtown Dash 5km – July 14th (rode bike 50+ km’s first)
Race #7 – Run, Wine and Dine Half-Marathon (whine is a better word, for 45 minutes)
Well, I don’t need to say much more, the pictures speak volumes. It was both tougher than I expected (due to the heat and hilly course, plus at 3pm I was up since 5:30 and on my feet all day) and more fun than I expected. The atmosphere made for good times and fond memories, the obstacles weren’t that challenging. In fact, a few more sprinkled in the beginning would have been fun. The post-event shower by firemen, in a slopfest of a cesspool filled with bananas, shirts, shoes (probably 8,000 people were cleaned up here before we were) was unique, to say the least.
My french intern, my cousin, my clients Sean and Matt from Chico Racing, we all had fun indeed, my cousin bought a Warrior Dash mug even! Definitely a new “to do” event for any endurance athlete’s list, and guys, if you are single…..well, just imagine what the venue was like with 65% of the attendees female, most had to clean up, strip and get semi-naked for the mud to come off.
Caesar would have been envious, thrills for the people and good times all around.
PD
aka Jefferson Mascot
World Record Holder
