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| The obligatory awkward running shot |
Yesterday, after a break
in which I was exploring various other hobbies including climbing,
caving and studying my arse off for exams, I took up the OCR mantle
once again! The lucky pick was the 'Back 2 The Trenches' race which,
despite its dubious use of numbers in the place of perfectly good
words, seemed affordable, exciting and well organised. So I took the
plunge and booked!
One of the other main
reasons I was interested in this race was that it was marketed at the
'softer' end of the obstacle course race, i.e. less twenty foot jumps
and buckets of ice, and more mud pits and woodland hills! There is of
course a place for all levels of OCRing in the market, and I
personally like different levels at different times. Today was a fun
day!
When I arrived there,
straight away the parking was very organised, with at least three
marshals immediately giving instructions to all the cars. The event
village itself was really small and a very nice atmosphere. Everyone
was happy to chat to others, and as always with these events there
were dogs and children aplenty milling about. The food stalls were
limited to one burger stall and one standalone drinks cart. Despite
the limited options there, I didn't really see any queues, probably
because it was such a small event.
I was a little worried
regarding my wave time as it seemed mixed up and I wasn't sure if I
was running at 10am or 11am, but they let me go off at 10.40 anyway
with no problem once I chatted to the organisers. The warm up was led
by a slightly aging but game bloke in army uniform, and included
enough dynamic movement that I was sweating and ready to go by the
end of it! He also had the unenviable job of attempting to crowd
control the runners into the race area, achieved by lining up about
ten people at a time in a ditch and then releasing them once the
previous wave had cleared the first obstacle.
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| Scaling the wall |
Ahh yes, the obstacles.
That's what you really came here for, isn't it? Well, there were
about fifty six of them on the twelve kilometre course. These
incorporated a nice variety. The mud and muddy water pits were
prevalent, and a cool thing was that the marshals had no problem
getting muddy helping up runners who were struggling or on the very
slippery pits. There was also quite a big focus on object movement
around the course, which is normally only relegated to one obstacle
on many races. These included tyre carries, tyre drags (I always
picked the heavier tyre because it made me pretty sad that they were
automatically giving tiny 'girl-tyres' to women) and a sandbag carry.
There were multiple back
slanted boards to cross, as well as the easier ladder types. A lot of
these obstacles relied on teamwork between runners, and to this end I
helped a few people and also got boosts on some of the taller boards
that may have been tricky on my own. Thanks to the people that helped
me with these! Later in the race there were rows of covered hay bales
to cross, which I absolutely loved
as you can sort of fling your body at them in abandon without
worrying too much about injury. Also, plenty of tunnels, net and
tarpaulin crawls and ducking in and around logs and tree roots
featured! This is one of the good things about being quite a wee girl
running amongst some beefier people. The obstacles designed to allow
them to squeeeeeze through are a quick slip through for me!
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| I cannot even explain this picture 0.o |
One
of the most entertaining obstacles was the long hill slide.
Basically, they put a long piece of smooth tarpaulin right down over
the hill, cover it in water and washing up liquid and you slide down!
When I first came up to this obstacle the queue was ridiculously
long, I think just to some mismanagement (the person running it was
waiting until once person was right
down the hill before letting others go), but soon afterwards a new
marshal began running it who got several people going down it one
after another and the queue shortened significantly. I could see they
had chosen the spot really well, and there was only smooth mud with
no rocks (a problem I had encountered on one of these slides before),
so I wasn't really frightened to slide. There was also a shorter
slide into water a little while later. I really enjoyed the gymnast
rings obstacle as well, and really surprised myself by getting across
with no struggle or drop! The other obstacle of note was the slack
line you had to cross, which I managed to do by hanging underneath it
and monkeying across it. Honestly, so much of movement which is now
natural to my body owes its origins to the awesome Parkour
Generations who I trained with for a couple of years. Although I
didn't continue to train with them due to cost and time constraints,
they were the first group to actually teach me body movement, and a
lot of it has stuck with me!
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| Getting a boost |
In
between obstacles, there was plenty of running to be had, through
trails, hills, fields, woodland and in and around the event village.
Enough so that I was having to intersperse optimistic hill sprinting
with less ambitious walking sessions. At one point, I didn't realise
a person behind me was using me as a pacer during a woodland section,
and when I finally stopped he was like “awww, you had a good pace
there”. Sorry!
My
final dash to the finish line after just over two hours was
triumphant as I bounced over the last hay bale and sprinted to the
end, and finally got proof of my achievement – my medal!
So,
although there were many good points about this race, there is a few
points that I would mention. You need distance markers to help
motivate runners, as well as making sure that marshals are clear as
to the stage of their race the obstacle they're managing is in. I
think the event village atmosphere would be enhanced by some music
and commentating on runners as they finish. Like I mentioned, the
management of the water slide obstacle could have been better, but
this was modified even whilst I was there.
On
the plus side, I thought there was almost no queuing on the rest of
the course, water stops were well spaced, marshals were friendly and
helpful and there was access to post race snacks immediately!
I
would definitely run one of these races again, especially for a fun
day combining mud, sun and sweat! And it looks like we only have
three months to wait until the next one! Bring it on.
Flatt7
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| Medal time at the finish line! |
