Training in my “Get Dirty” shirt. 😀

With the Hog Wild Extreme Mud Run coming up a week from tomorrow, I can say I am really stoked and a little nervous.

I blogged a couple of weeks back about addiction and mentioned that during mine, I did something to my back. At the advice of a good friend of mine, who is also a nurse, I went to see my doc, who told me she felt like I’d sprained my back basically benched me until I could see an Ortho. I saw the Ortho last Tuesday morning, and she told me that my disks are all where they need to be, and to basically take it easy, low impact until the race. I had been fairly worried that I wouldn’t be able to do the run, so this was good news.

So I have been really thinking about the course since Extreme Promotions posted the course map and a list of the obstacles.

I am going to share the map, and my thoughts about the obstacles here:

So, yeah…Wow! 😉

1. Squill Pig Tire Deal: Run through a few hundred tires in slippery mud carrying a greasy pig – Okay. To be honest, I believe this scares me the most. Is it a real pig? Is it a little real pig? Do they bite? I’ve heard stories out here in hog country about people being eaten by pigs, and while it is poetically karmic? I’m still pretty nervous about this.

2. Slop-N-Slide Mud Dive: dive into a mud pit and then crawl under barbed wire through the mud – I think we’ve all got this down pretty well. The key is going to be simply STAY REAL LOW.

3. Tall Squall Wall Climb: Climb straight up a sky-high wall and then back down – I am hoping that the overhead  and bench presses I’ve done will give me enough strength to get over this one. Just sayin’.

4. Pre-Slaughter Wash: swim through the water climbing over slippery obstacles – It’s been pretty cold here for late March/early April, and I’m kind of wondering about how cold this water is going to be…

5. Seegars Fence Mountin: Climb up and over a huge mountain made of fence – Climbing…I used to scale chain link as a kid, so this should be okay. Right?

6. Crazy Hog Tunnel Crawl: crawl through tunnels in the mud – Totally ok with this, altho I suspect my elbows will need a ton of moisturizer when it’s all over with.

7. Seegars Fence Trench: Crawl under Seegars fence through mud (ranging 0-12″ off ground) – Wondering how anyone can crawl under fencing zero inches off the ground. Hmmm….

Please notice the distance between obstacles #7 & #8.

8. Lumberjack Log Climb: Climb over and across a huge log pile – Totally doable when dry. May present a challenge soaking wet.

9. Pork Cleaver Log Weaver: Balance yourself on log beams over a mud pit – Balance. I fall a lot on regular ground. Sure hope this training has improved my balance a little bit. This is still cause for concern, but not like the concern I have about the pig…

10. Seegars fence Hurdle’s: Jump and/or climb over fence hurdles ranging in height from 4-10 ft – Umm… Ok…Oh shit.

11. Pork Fork Tire Pendulem: Run through a tunnel of hanging tires swinging like pendulums – I suspect ice packs will be needed at some point before the day is out.

12. Slippery Wild Pig Climb: climb up a huge, steep, slippery hill and slide down other side – This just sounds like good ol’ dirty fun.

13. Sideways Wall Rock Climb: Climb sideways on a long rock climb style wall – This will be new and exciting. Oooh, note to self – get nails shortened a LOT before race day.

14. Reverse Wall Hog Fall: Descend own a steep slope backwards using a rope to guide yourself – THIS is going to be sweet.

15. Bar-B-Que Grill: Grill yourself as you run through burning fire pits – This will surely warm us up if that water is as cold as I suspect it will be.

16. Hill’s Tire Climb: Climb up a muddy hill through tires – Look, if we can do it with a greased pig at the beginning, this should be a piece of bacon without, right?

17. Aftermath Bath: Wade through muddy water with the Finish line in sight – Wading…I know how to do that.

So you see? This is going to be a very interesting choice for my first 5K run.

Afterward there is eastern NC bbq at the Pig in the Park Festival (which I covered for a local news outlet last year), and I KNOW that food is good. We also get a drink ticket for a bar hop downtown, which will be more than a little appreciated after the day’s festivities.

So now all I have to do is stay calm, relax, and will my back to heal itself up QUICKLY!

I’m kind of wondering what kind of calorie burn this will have, as I’m sure not going to try to wear my HRM, even if it is waterproof, LOL.

Till Next Time…