Summer of Mud...

Guess what!?

I did another Mud Run!

Shocking isn’t it.  I know.

I don’t usually do runs back to back weekends but there was a good deal for the Summer of Mud  - the Irvine Lake Mud Run I couldn’t resist!

As per usual Fatima also signed up, but we also got my co-worker/friend Taylor to join me again as well!

The only bummer about this race was we had a late wave because we signed up with the Weeple Army group and that’s when the “Timed Teams” raced.  This got us off to a rough start.

Taylor arrived at my place and we carpooled up and met Fatima.  We saw some Weeples gathering (I opted to wear the bright neon green Weeple Army shirt in spirit) and joined them.  This fellow was to meet us with all of our bibs and shirts.  He was late.  I was starting to worry because I’d never relied on someone else to get my stuff.  Some guy snapped a photo of us waiting.

Taylor and I of course did a pre-race shot.  I realized I forgot to get one with Fatima! :(

Finally the dude showed up, they pitched a pop up and we just hung around.  For what felt like forever.  No more late waves!  But - it was cool to chat with a few of the folks.  We walked around and there wasn't too much vendor stuff but a few.   I did enjoy watching this darling little badass challenge people to Burpees and Push ups:

We also did a Weeple Army Team Photo:

Finally our wave time was up at almost 11 and here we are waiting to start:

By the way - this blog has so many photos because there was this very cool guy named Dannie and his lady who took all the pictures and posted them the next day!  Here is a shot of them:

And we were off.  It started out right off the bat with a trek through some mud.  Here are a few early on shots he took:

Taylor was super nervous since this was his 1st OCR but you can't tell in any of the photos!  He kicked major ass until the last obstacle which we'll get to later.

I have no idea what the hell I'm doing here..stretching after a tire run? Ha ha!:

Now, as per usual I can't remember all of the obstacles, but I will tell you - there was a lot of this:

Can ya spot me?

At one point there was this freakin rad slide.  There were guys that actually grabbed your arm and pretty much sling shotted you out of the thing.  If you were a bit larger you had 2 guys on you.  I had quite a hot guy fling me and did my best little "Wow you must be getting quite the arm workout" flirty line.

To which he smiled.  *blush* then FLING!

 Unfortuneatly this is where I also lost my sunglasses.  I'll admit - super friggin bummed but I didn't even think to hold on to them.  Le Sigh.

Here's Fatima:

Then I had to share Brad's photo.  This was one of the more rambuncous athletic kids of the bunch and he carried this Weeple Army flag the whole time:

There were also a lot of walls to climb over.  Mostly low ones so I hopped over like a pro (yes I did get a bit cocky on those).  My favorite though was Taylor's 1st attempt he did the most awesome - tried to hop/crawl over sort of fell but hung on sort of thing.  His face was priceless but he did get the hang of it after that.  I really wish we could have got a photo of that! :)  None of the walls were very difficult though, if they were high there were steppy things.

We also went under some netting a few times in mud water:

There was a set of monkey bars which of course got me super excited.  They were so long!!!  I posted this photo to give you sort of an idea.  This isn't even the whole thing.  I was thrilled when I hopped up, got my monkey swing down and made it all the way.  Most people didn't make it and I had a little moment of glory with these 3 beautiful men that were watching us and then they all high fived me when I finished.  I think the girls behind me were maybe their girlfriends and none of them made it.  He he he!!  I was beaming.  I also of course chose the photo of our more athletic dudes. 

There were about 3 times we ran through tires (the cuties of course):

There were also these giant spools we had to jump over.  I loved those!  Super fun and I thought they were going to be at Gladiator and were not so I was thrilled to see them here.  Here's a photo of our photographer and this cutie (married with the darling little girl - already checked) posing fabulously:

So here's my photo on the spool...I was caught by the professional but his prices are outrageous so I was able to screenshot these out of my email he sent me.  Not great quality but something!

There were balance beams which I attacked with a vengance after the last race incident and I am proud to say I made it across both of them!  There were two sets of poles and not many were making it across.  I was so stoked when I did!!!  I did see some nasty falls though.  One of our team mates actually fell and cracked her jaw.  She was ok but damn did it look painful!!  There was also a gal that fell straight down and if she was a dude would have been singing soprano.  Lord that looked like it hurt!  The shot below can give you an idea.

And my balance shot!

After this there was this really super slippery muddy water walk.  I ate it a few times and people were stumbling all over each other.  Hilarious!

There was one back up at an obstacle and it was a rope climb over a rock.  It was kind of odd, but fun none the less.  Some people skipped it that didn't want to wait but a good amount of us did it.  I sailed up and Taylor shouted "Jesus you are a monkey!"  he he he!

Now after this was probably one of the more difficult obstacles.  I think it's actually called never ending mud.  You crawl under the barbed wire then trek through the mud which seems like forever.  The thing is - the mud is sooooooo squishy!!!  People were getting stuck, falling, losing their shoes and slipping all over the place.  By the time you were done you were exhausted.  There was one point where a three person pile up happened and I don't think they could get up because they were all laughing so hard.  It was so much fun and so rad to see everyone falling and laughing their asses off.  I grabbed a shot of the barbed wire crawl and a great one of one of our team mates cracking up after a spill.  I actually didn't fall which surprised me and I did have a hell of a fun time!

After this were a few more walls then the last obstacle.  The last obstacle was about 6 or 7 muddy hills into water, muddy hills into water, repeat.  This is sadly where our friend Taylor biffed it.  The 1st hill we slid down on our butts and it scraped the crap out of us.  So the next time we opted to sort of surf down the hill because they were so slippery.  Taylor rolled his ankle at one point and it turned out to be a pretty severe sprain.  Now everyone at work is razzing me saying I broke Taylor.  Poor guy!

I think that shot above is actually when he did it!  Poor Taylor!!

Dannie of course caught me at my very best:

After this the finish line where there were a bunch of bubbles which I thought was kind of cute.

We got a few finish line photos which I hope come out on the professional level and I'll post those when I get them.  

The line for the showers was so damn long.  We waited for days and then I sent Taylor to the medical tent.    We were also a bit disappointed because they ran out of the cool bottle opener medals but we still got a nice one:

We pretty much headed out after that since it had got so late now due to the long wait and later wave.  I got Taylor's proud injury shot here and even though he got hurt he totally kicked ass!:

 And we of course had to do a selfie:

All in all this race was a blast!  It's a really good one for 1st time OCR person because the obstacles weren't super difficult.  We did travel with a really fun group but even solo I think anyone would enjoy this as long as you don't mind getting dirty!  I'll for sure do it again, just an early wave!