Race Report - Marine Corp Mud Run 5K

Due to the growing popularity of the Marine Corp Mud Run, the race has been split into 30 minute waves.  This helps to alleviate congestion at each of the obstacles.  Since the race was about an hour drive, we signed up for the 9:30 wave. 

Kelly always likes to arrive ridiculously early, so I figured this way we wouldn’t have to get up at an ungodly hour.  Little did I know I would both come to regret this decision and learn why she always pads her arrival times.

My GPS is a few years old, and Kelly has a smart phone, so she decided to program the address into her phone.  It lead on an entirely different route, but since my GPS hasn’t been updated ever recently, I decided to trust her directions. 

Unfortunately, Kelly is a horrid navigator and entered the address in wrong.  We were about 15 minutes off schedule before we realized the error.  Add that to the long line parking, the long line at registration (and poor signage causing us to stand in the wrong line for a while, we knew we wouldn’t make the starting line by 9:30.  Once we finally made it to front of our proper lines (okay so maybe I convinced a guy in the front of the A-F line to pretend to me be) the registration desk suggesting we ask previous wave races for safety pins because they were out.

Seriously.

THANKFULLY this is a chip timed race, and when we finally made it to the start line, race officials helped us pin our bibs and helped us get on our way.  I let Kelly set the pace, and she really pushed me to my limits.  We came upon the 5(?) foot high wall fairly quickly, and she hopped over it a bit easier than I did. 

 

By the next obstacle, we’d caught up with the slower people from our group.  You know the ones.  The girls who got talked into doing the mud run but never stopped to consider it’d mean getting down and crawling through the mud under some rope.   A few went in the obstacle before us, but when a couple decided to think about it before heading under Kelly & I had no problem going around.  We passed the others on the run to the next obstacle.

Most of the obstacles were the same from previous years, however the mud slides into pits were a bit less friendly than in years past.  This year a wooden beam was at the bottom to meet your buttocks before sending you flying into the mud.  Also the over/under pit included a completely submerged “under” obstacle.   Many debated this one, so I hopped around, held my breath, closed my eyes and just went for it.  While the new sand pit wasn’t all that difficult, the feel of the sand sticking to the wet mud was extra icky.

We passed more people running, Kelly cartwheeled over the dry log jump, we waded through the water and took the obstacles as they came.  Nothing eventful and I’m glad to say that the fields didn’t really upset my allergies as much as I’d feared.  Most of the race felt sluggish, but the stats are my best ever so I can’t really complain.

Gun Time: 54:13

Chip Time: 39:22

Overall: 410/1066

Age group: 24/99