Well this challenge was definitely an ordeal…very frustrating in that it was not a test of fitness more of phsiology…I’ll explain more…

Was so looking forward to this challenge:
1. Not done a challenge for ages (last one I actually got to was Pembrokeshire
2. Road trip

Malcolm and Hannah arrived chez Caz around 1845 on Friday and it was straight out for the Giffnock North Burns night – great fun if not a little late to bed. The 4th member of our party, Dan, finally negotiated directions to mine the following day at 0845 and after a hot roll we were hurtling down the M74 by 1000.
The drive went in a flash, full of excitement and merriment and before long we were parked up and ready for registration at Tough Guy. Here we met up with the final member of our merry band…Andrew (Malcolm’s cousin, Hannah’s brother) who had driven up from Dorset.

After registration it was time to check out the course…well the Killing Fields (assault course which was the 2nd part of the course, the first part being an obstacle cross country called ‘country miles’). It looked awesome…40ft A-frames, trenches, ropes…then we clocked what was filling the ditches and trenches…frozen solid water. Throwing stones would not break it! And a lot of the obstacles had a ‘water feature’ as part of it.
Oh well, time to go back to the car and check in at the B&B in Bridgnorth which we did without incident, and after a 24oz steak it was an early turn in.
After our last meal (breakfast) we headed off to our impending trial.

The boys we’re competing in the Foxhole team (which means going in a ditch, holding a duckboard over you while the first few hundred runners run over the top of you) and Hannah and I went into our start pen. Has to be said, not a lot of girls there…at least it made a change from other races in that there was not a massive queue at the loos!
After a duck fight, the starter gun sounded at 1100 and we headed off down into a field with coloured smoke flares going off to start the country miles part of the course.
Now this part was fun…a regular cross country with a spattering of obstacles including ice-cold water filled ditches, cargonet tunnels and mud…there was even a nice section (The slalom) which involved runinng up the same hill 7 times! Ran the whole time with Hannah which was nice, think it was about 6 miles but due to the terrain took about 1.5 hours.

Then it was onto the Killing Fields which started with the Water Jungle…zigzagging up and down a ditch filled with water (in some parts neck high)…this was quite tough, plunging into ice-cold water about 10 times and then hauling yourself out at the other side, but there was a great sense of commarardery and everyone helped everyone else.
Anyways obstacle after obstacle we went and the cold we taking its toll…was drenched, head to toe covered in mud and teeth were chattering…each time you approached water was a new sense of dread. After running through the burning bails of hay it was obstacle 7…the torture chamber. I can honestly say I’ve never been so uncomfortable and scared in my life. The route of this was underground with about 100 other people, belly crawling through the pitch black, disorientated in the mud while overhead were dangling wooden things to hit your head on and oh…electric fencing! Got shocked about 5 times…never felt anything like it in my life…and knowing the only thing for it was to move forwards and experience this more…horrendous! Out the other side was up sewer pipes, had lost Hannah by this point, and then spirits were lifted…Mia and Irene on the sidelines cheering me on…AMAZING and just when friendly faces needed to be seen!
Onwards through swamps and chest deep water and the shivers were really setting in. Marshalls directed me the easier way of a couple of obstacles, then 3 before the end while I was warming myself up, mentally preparing myself for the next obstacle I got pulled and sent to hot showers. Totally gutted but it was the right thing…was completely frozen to the bone and could hardly see through my chattering, with hypothermia a severe risk of running the course I took heed and gave in. (There is, in the end, a bigger picture to these challenges)

Big respect though to the other guys who all completed…massive achievement, especially Hannah who must have found certain obstacles nigh on impossible due to her little frame. Am gutted but alive apparently there was someone who broke their ankle in the first 5 minutes but still completed.
Got home about 1030 thoroughly exhausted…what an experience…never to be repeated! Can happily endure physical exhaustion for a very long time but extreme cold I have now learned my body cannot tolerate. I think the most annoying thing was that it was not a case of physical fitness…at no point did I think that my legs could not carry me, it was just simply that my physiology did not allow forward motion
Oh well…back to the normality of proper training.
Next event…one for you all to get involved in if you can…24 hour spin-a-thon at East Kilbride!
Love C
Xxx