Vote: 5 out of 5 Fitness Dojo Roundhouse kicks. You need to do this!
Disclaimer: I am leaving out some of the obstacles so the experience is not ruined for you. Sign up for an event and enjoy it!
The day started out driving up to Englishtown, NJ around 6:30am. This would give us enough time to get there and get checked in…possibly warm up time for our 8:30am start time. I will say that the check in was a lot easier this year than Tri-State tough mudder in 2010; a lot more organized. Due to our start time we did not hit any traffic coming into the event, but did hear that later start times encountered a huge delay gaining entrance because of the roads into the raceway. On a side not our GPS routed us into a neighborhood and dropped us right in front of someone’s house. About 10 other cars of Tough Mudders followed in behind us.
8:30am Start time ->49 degrees Fahrenheit -> clothing on our team consisted of shorts, Under Armour Cold Gear Long Sleeve shirts and Team shirt on top. Some Mudders chose gloves but none of our team members did and had no problems.
The race began with the national anthem, a reciting of the Tough Mudder Creed and music from Rocky to get the blood moving, by this point we were pumped. The sun was barely out, but just enough to keep the frost off. As the horn blew to start the run, people were cheering and screaming. Its a pretty good feeling that everyone needs to experience. As you run down the quarter mile after the monster truck, you try not to inhale smoke from a thrown canister, but it always gets in your lungs (I call this obstacle 1. Run without air). Within the first mile you have to drop into a dumpster full of ice and water, mostly ice. To make matters worse you have to go under the water to get through the dumpter obstacle…entire body under. This obstacle sets the stage for the rest of the race. Nothing like 49 degree air and and I heard the water was about 50 degrees also.
Having a freezing body is great for when they make you go into the lake multiple times just for fun; by this point the water isn’t so bad. When you are ready to ”Walk The Plank” into the lake, 15′ is a lot higher than it sounds if you have never jumped off something that high before. Tip here is to just jump and not think about it. I saw too many people psych themselves out by thinking about it too long. After your in the lake you need to swim about 50 yards to the other side. They have a rope for guidance but it can get backed up. Pretending to be David Hasselhoff and saving team members is always allowed. It gets a good cheer from the spectators.
After a short run, a couple of walls and a giant wall of hay you hit the mud mile, just imagine a mud pit that feels like it won’t end and not knowing where your foot is going to end up. This was one of the muddiest pit to date. Make sure your sneakers are tied tight or you will lose them in this obstacle. One team member almost lost his shoe and had to exit the pit halfway for a break or it would have been gone forever.
Once you exit the mud mile the next obstacle is a motocross track…just continuous hills up and down. Mud is everywhere and there are no lack of hills. Like a little kid burning ants with a magnifying glass, the creators of Tough Mudder turn the sprinklers on to add to the effect. At the end you get the choice of A-frame type cargo net structure to climb up (climbing with PBR in hand does not help) or a very large muddy hill that tries its best to keep you from climbing it. This hill was the largest of the event.
As you leave the motocross track we were off to some more running. This is a good opportunity to clean the mud off of your entire body and warm up a little. Again I’m not sure if this is allowed, but one or two team members may have had a beer to help warm up. When you hit the Berlin walls, it always helps to have assistance if you are smaller or not as strong especially with the taller walls they put in this year. Remember to land and bend your knees. I saw a few people twist ankles and hurt their knees.
After getting beat by the Berlin walls your next feat is to overcome a half pipe. This was fun and took a few times. There were two sections: wood and slick. The slick part was exactly that slick. Many Mudders attempted the slick side first and if they couldn’t make it, they moved over to the wood part. We had team members do both, some right up the wall and some needed a little help. Our team then helped a couple of gents and gals over the wall. One instance stands out of them all: one guy was almost up and started to slip back down, about 6 of us Mudders all worked together and pulled him up. It was an awesome moment during the event and is what Tough Mudder is all about. After he made it up, someone yelled yeah team red (our team shirts were red). This was a great obstacle for camaraderie.
There was then more running until we came to an asphalt race track where we had to carry a tire around the track. At this point the muscles were a little sore and the tire loved to rub into your shoulder. Anyway you can, just carry the tire around the track and throw it back on the pile when complete. There is a photographer there so make a good pose with your tire. Some of the more adventurous Mudders carried two tires, we decided to go this route on Sunday.
As you make your way around the race track you come up to ”Firewalker” time for another photo opportunity. Then balance beams where some team members might try to throw you off balance and get you wet/cold. Consider it a cool off for the second motocross track which again seems like an eternity of hills, mud and sprinklers to the face.
Again there is more running and some obstacles until you hit the monkey bars. If you can’t make it over the monkey bars expect a cold bath which is just in time as you just started to get warm again. The team at Tough Mudder loves to throw in as much water as possible just in case you didn’t get enough.
Finally as you are running down the home stretch around mile 12 you come upon electro shock right before the finish line. No matter how many times you have run this race the 10,000 volts still stings and can throw a grown man to the ground. When you cross the finish line with a team or as an individual you will have felt something like nothing else. You have just completed a gruesome, hard 12 miles with the rest of the family of Tri-State Tough Mudder 2011.
We high recommend this event to anyone that would like to challenge themselves and be able to say they completed a Tough Mudder. We have run many different events and so far this is our favorite of all Mud/ Obstacle runs. The courses are very well thought out and planned. Our team feels that anyone with the right training and support can experience and complete a Tough Mudder event.
Sign up as a member here. Its Free and you get access to Free workouts and training programs for events such as Tough Mudder. Team Martial Arts Fitness Center and Fitness Dojo welcomes anyone that would like to join our team and share this experience with us. If you are ready to accept this challenge and help our team grow then we want you. Members of all fitness levels are welcome and we are committed to helping our team members be their best no matter what their fitness background is.
Fitness Dojo is in no way affiliated with Tough Mudder. Check out their site for more info www.toughmudder.com
About Fitness Dojo: Collectively they have ran in 14 Tough Mudder races and enjoyed each one. Team members have ran in over 50 events this year alone, including Tough Mudder, Mud Runs, Warrior Dash, Beach Runs, Broad St, Ben Franklin Bridge Run, Half Marathons, and more. They train by doing exercises and workouts from this site and with Martial Arts Fitness Center (www.mafitness.net). Every day members of Fitness Dojo train to become Tough Mudder Badasses, to live healthier lifestyles, to personally challenge themselves and because its fun to work out.
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