Warrior Dash

[Bike Chick]

Well DS and DDIL have talked us into doing the Warrior Dash in September. I think we had a moment of weakness!

Has anyone ever run this race and how do you train to prepare for it? I'm a bit worried about climbing over junk autos and the cargo net. Especially since I'm running a HM three weeks later. I can see me breaking an ankle in the net and not being able to run for 2 months!

Any words of advice?

[Jen12]

I wanted to do this, but couldn't recruit anyone else to do it with me and it didn't seem like a fun race to do solo.

I'm sure you'll be okay. I think if you go slowly and carefully...maybe start at the back of the group because you know there are always the more aggressive "competitor" types up front...you'll do fine. If it was super dangerous it wouldn't be quite so popular.

Have fun!

[Jolt]

I'm signed up to do the New England one in a couple of weeks...I'll have to let you know how it goes! I haven't really done any specific training for the obstacles, aside from the fact that I run trails and find random obstacles on those runs .

[Bike Chick]

Be sure to let me know how it goes, Jolt. It looks fun and you are right, Jen, it wouldn't be fun to do by yourself. That's the reason my DIL finally twisted my arm enough to get me to do it. There are 6 of us total and you make a good point that if it was really dangerous, it wouldn't be so popular.

[OakLeaf]

I blew off the one I was signed up for last weekend because I had a cold I couldn't shake, I relapsed every time I went for a little run, and I just wasn't emotionally invested in the Warrior Dash. (Finally got over it, so it was probably the right decision.)

Trying to decide now whether to sign up for one they're having in the fall, only a little bit farther from me.

[GLC1968]

I'm signed up for one this fall (6 weeks prior to my first HM!) but I'm not sure if I'll do it or not. I haven't been able to convince a single soul to do it with me, so I can't imagine it'll be much fun alone. I can't even convince my husband to come and watch, for pete's sake!

I think you'll probably be fine as long as you pay attention to what you are doing and you aren't out there for blood.

[Jolt]

OK...so I knew the course was supposed to be muddy, but I wasn't expecting most of it to be ankle-deep mud!! Talk about slippery. I actually did better than I thought considering the conditions...52:38:85. The first part was frankly really scary because of how crowded it was...each wave can be up to 600 people and that first section was through the woods with lots of hills, twists, turns and logs/trees/rocks to maneuver around, in very slippery mud with a gazillion people really close. Running through the woods is fun; doing so in what feels like a stampede where you're all sliding around is frightening. I thought for sure I was going to wipe out and then get stepped on or have somebody land on top of me; a couple of minor wipeouts and collisions did happen but that was the worst of it. Fortunately after that section we spread out some. I walked more than I ran (as did a lot of people, probably most)--a lot of the mud was just too slippery to run in, and there were some pretty steep hills. In the places that were runnable, I tried to run fast. I'd say the easiest obstacles for me were the wall we had to climb over with the rope and the one where we had to go up a ramp, go across a narrow beam and go down the ramp on the other end. The hardest one by far was the horizontal cargo net (the vertical one wasn't bad) right before the finish--it just felt really awkward because I ended up with too much of my weight on my arms and the thing kept shifting because other people were on it. I'm sure there was probably a better technique for getting across that than what I did. The funniest thing was that after the regular cargo net, there was a steep downhill that most of us slid down on our butts! One more thing...I don't know if this is the case for the other Warrior Dash races but at this one the traffic/parking situation was horrendous!! It took me an hour to cover the last mile to the parking area.

[Tri Girl]

congrats on your dash!! While that looks like a lot of fun, I'm far too clumsy to be running around on an accident-laden course.
Great job out there!!!!

[OakLeaf]

Woot! Good job!

[Crankin]

Jolt, one of my 20 something co-workers did the same dash you did. She knows I ride, as we went to school together, but she was impressed I knew about the mud, etc.
TE helps in so many ways.

[Bike Chick]

Congrats on your Dash, Jolt, and thanks for the report! This is filling me with confidence for September! Did you have trouble keeping your shoes on?