It Feels Good to be a Gangster

Victors.  Champions.  Warriors.

I came.  I saw.  I took a cup of water in the face because Rose had a mini-tantrum.  I conquered.  Awwww yeah. Warrior Dash 2012.

Can I say that I freaking love Warrior Dash?  For those of you who have been denied the knowledge of the existence of such an event, let me first apologize for how broken your heart will be when you discover what exactly you have been missing.

Warrior Dash is a 5k-ish run filled with 10-12 obstacles that will test your strength, endurance, and aversion to mud.  There are two story cargo nets to scale.  Fires to leap.  A pit of mud under barbed wire through which to belly crawl.  Also?  It is totally fun.

I somehow convinced Rose to do it with me this year.  Next year I'm coming after YOU (yes, you) so you better start training now in order to be ready.  (Or like a month before, whatev's.)

Since Brian needed the minivan to ferry our barrel of monkeys around town (or out to Pizza Hut because Papa "cooked" dinner), Rose agreed to drive the two and a half hour commute to Warrior Dash.  Thanks to that sweet ride, I have fulfilled my quota of Little Wayne and Young Jeezy for a while.  Rose does not share my intense personal love for Needtobreathe, but that's okay, because Little Wayne provided some inspiration a la songs I totally didn't understand but felt hardcore and plenty street while nodding my head and gritting my teeth as I listened. (Wesley Snipes is totally telling me I may have listened but I didn't hear it.  Sheesh.  Chill out Wesley Snipes.)

This is not me.  It's Curtis James Jackson III.  But picture me making this same face while listening to music in Rose's car and nodding my head.  You're a little intimidated, right?

Rose has a friend that lives a few minutes from the race grounds, so we went there first to pick her up.  Kathleen graciously offered to be the official photographer, and made available her shower after the race.  (And?  She's totally doing the dash next year.  Because she saw in person the sheer awesomeness.)

Because every WD is different, the map of the obstacle course I ran can be found here.  It was a little different from the WD I did in 2011.  Mainly, there was a lot less mud, which was mildly soul-crushing.  It was probably due to the fact that my first WD was held on a BMX course and that day it rained buckets.  This dash was held in a beautiful park and some of the trail was actually paved.  (It was like WD-lite for those parts.)  Plus our weather was suburb; sunny, cloudless, and 75 degrees. What it lacked in mud it made up for in hella hard water obstacles.

If you clicked to see the map, you would see right away there was about a mile run.  This was dusty, as it was a trail run with a few hundred people.  The fine people of the WD offered us water at the one mile mark, and after another quarter of a mile came the Deadman's Drop.  This obstacle is awesome because it requires climbing up and over a wooden wall about 15 feet high and sliding down an almost 90 degree wall of plywood on the other side.  If you were me, you were probably glad you wore your running capri's because the huge line of people at the bottom of the wall couldn't look up your shorts at the nasty granny panties you were wearing they seriously cut down on splinters.

Barricade Breakdown.  Over a four
foot wall, under a two foot barricade.
Five or six times.

The next obstacle was one of my favorites.  It was the Barricade Breakdown, followed by the Chaotic Crossover.  Since I've done them both before, I had a technique that involved not being scared and flying through them, occasionally going, "whoa - dude" whenever I slipped.






I'm not gonna lie.  The next obstacle, the Deadweight Drifter, was sum bul-loney. There, I said it. The idea of the obstacle is to get over five floating barricades in waist deep water.  At the last WD I did they used giant logs that we team-worked (totally a verb) pushed down and hopped over.  It was, as described, in waist deep water.  This year's obstacle used huge plastic flotation devices in water well over our heads.  There was no way to get up on top of them without some serious brute strength. Or, if you lacked that, mental consideration. This is where Rose proved her weight in gold.  I never expected to walk away from WD saying, "Thank God I had a cheerleading coach with me."  But Rose got stuff done.  Before I knew it we had a team of five or six working together.  Rose would do some fancy cheerleading foot boosting move (genius) to get me on top of the flotation device, and then I would pull her up.  It was by far, the hardest obstacle I've done.

There was another water obstacle with those same stupid floating things, but this one was in waist deep water, and the only sick thing was sinking into shin deep muck.  This is where I reveled a bit in all the mud.  This is where Rose took the opportunity to inform the world that her nails were totally done.  (In her defense, she then mentioned that she sounded a bit like a little um, female dog when she announced it, so that was kinda like she took the nail complaint back.)

The next few obstacles were good; mostly walls to climb, cargo nets to scale, balance beams to cross, and barbed wire to crawl under (over gravel - not too cool).  Rose and I walked all most of this portion.  Rose was feeling a bit *cranky* and said several hilarious things that she has forbidden me to post in this blog.  So you can thank her for ruining everyone's good time.  This is also where she threw a cup of water in my face.  Maybe because I finally told her, "Yes, everyone is totally looking at how bunched up your granny panties are, what the heck is wrong with you for not wearing a thong to WD?" For no reason at all.

We also discussed our mutual fear of leeches and she confessed that she was thinking of them during the two water obstacles we did, but out of love for me did not mention it out loud.  I was very grateful.  Then our very next obstacle was this:

This is an actual picture from the WD we did.  (Someone else took it, I just stole it from the Internets.)  Notice the ideal leech breeding ground?  Perfect timing for discussion of leeches?  We have it.

For the final three obstacles, Kathleen was able to capture on film the beauty and athleticism we displayed as we conquered The Dash.  Prepare to be awed.

Rose is in the black (really purple) at the very top.  I am below in pink.

"Hey Kel, is that you smiling while you leap over some roaring flames?"
"Why yes, it totally is me smiling.  Also, I perfectly timed it to block Rose's face with my arm.  Way to ruin a potentially awesome(r) shot."

Swimming through mud under barbed wire?  Check.

Big Muddy Finish

Warriors.  Mud beards. Snap into a Slim Jim!

So, Warrior Dash.  In conclusion, Kelly means "warrior woman."  I think it should really be called "Kelly Dash" but I'll be the first to admit "Warrior Dash"  just has better flow.  And after all that Little Wayne and Young Jeezy, I should know a little bit about flow.  Until next year, WD.



For the first time ever in Sublurban Mama history, I am having a contest.  WOO-HOO!  While waiting in line to take a picture with the Warrior Dash sign, we stood behind this young man:

The heck?

Whoever can figure out what his tattoo says is the winner of a lovely, never been taken out of the packaging, Fuzzy Viking Hat. (OOOO - say it like you're in a game show audience.)  It retails for $10.00 y'all.  For real.  So get crackin', because this tat is driving me crazy.