Not your mudder's workout

Today I felt all kinds of bad ass. It didn't start out that way though. I was supposed to go to Xfit for the partner WOD and ended up sleeping until after 10. Oops. But that ended up being a good thing because since I had missed Xfit and tomorrow is Easter, it forced me to go do a trail run. It was POURING. But I figured what better practice for the Tough Mudder than slogging through -- you know -- mud to see how well I would do.

It was AWESOME. I had a whole thing going. At every mile I did a "challenge" to add to the intensity.

Mile 1: 25 pushups (man-style, baby)
Mile 2: 1-minute squat hold
Mile 3: 1-minute plank hold
Mile 4: 25 squats
Mile 5: 25 pushups (still man-style!)
Mile 6: 90-second squat hold
Mile 7: 90-second plank hold
Mile 8: 25 squats

YEAH!!!!!!!!!! It felt awesome to hear the audio cue when I had hit each mile and hit the ground. My hands were muddy and covered in gravel. I was hardcore!

The best part was that even with all the extras thrown in I averaged 11:01/mile for the 8.06 miles. A year ago when I first started doing this trail anything under 13 min/mile was a big deal. It's not a fast route. My GPS said I did a total of 890 feet climb in elevation. I'm not sure if that's accurate but I'll go along.

Here's the elevation chart:



I know the Mudder is going to be insanely hard. It's a total of 2000 in elevation climb plus 30 obstacles. But I feel better about it than I did 2 weeks ago. I'll do the trail next week, maybe go for 10 miles, maybe make the challenges at each mile harder, and hope for the best.

This sounds stupid but I feel so lucky that a workout like this is possible for me. My mother (and everyone else's mother) had the Jane Fonda record with the legwarmers and leotard. Today I was doing straight-leg pushups in the mud like a Marine. The 70s/early 80s were rad and all but I will happily take the mud over tights any day.