After months of saying we would sign up, myself and Natalie from the
Birmingham store eventually took the plunge and secured our place in the inaugural ‘
Total Warrior 10 miler’. (We chose the 10 miler as a ten mile road run is easy, however, I think we slightly underestimated this as 10 miles off road in the fells of the Lake District with 20 obstacles thrown in is a little more challenging to say the least)
After a hard days work, we made the 3 hour drive to Shap in the Lake District, with one support crew/fan in tow.
Location of the event is perfect, Shap is small village with countless camping spots, pubs and cafes for a pre-race breakfast.
On the Saturday there had been the 6 mile shorter event, so by the time we got there a lot of ‘Total Warriors’ were celebrating in the pubs.
After talking to people who did the 6 mile event, and how bad it was, we began to think we had underestimated the course, but as I said to Natalie “we either do the hardest one or nothing at all.”
Race registration was at 10.30, so as I had came to the rescue the night before putting the girl’s tent up, I packed both of ours away ready to go. Then it was off to local café for a sports nutritionists’ dream of a breakfast, a big sausage and bacon pre-race sandwich.
The event is 1.5 miles away on privately own land just past Shap, and very easy to find.
After we had parked up, sneered at those doing stretches and registered, we were ready and waiting.
After joining a gaggle of 11.00am starters, we were intrepidly waiting for the off.
And so after a few smoke bombs were lit the event began.
The first few miles were all good fun, and having gone through some extremely steep hill zigzags and a fire gauntlet, it was straight forward hills, hills and more hills, up until the highest point at 4 miles. During the hills most people had to take walking breaks because of the nature of the ground and incline. This section was undoubtedly the hardest, peat and boggy ground, very undulating and just when you thought the hill was conquered, there looms another just 100m away.
Once we had summated and stopped to help find a fellow competitors shoe in waist deep bog, it was time to start our very welcome descent.
Just as steep as on the way up and ending at the lowest part of the course, this was the freewheeling enjoyable part, although concentration was needed to avoid coming a cropper on the terrain. This took us down too the water stop and 5 mile point.
After that the fun started. Firstly with a barbed wire mud crawl, straight into mud filled tunnels. Then up an down across hills through a 20 feet wide 7 foot deep river crossing and 6 feet mud filled pool. This part of the course meant doubling back upon yourself numerous times and encountering a further river crossing, cargo scramble nets, 7ft walls and 30ft hay bail climbs. Finally into the last leg after a mad dash up a muddy rock incline came another climb, which at the top held a massive waterslide. Dazed and confused I started running the wrong way but was pointed the right way up to the penultimate hill, after heaving myself over the slip hazard with ropes, off down the hill to the bottom of the final climb. Now just the last leg of incline was between us and the finish. Legs aching and lungs burning, we round the bend of the final hill into the finish area, only to find that we were to run through some electric hanging wires as a final treat.
Glad to have finished and feeling as if we thoroughly deserved it, it was time to collect our victory beers and have an unfairly cold hose down to get clean, before making the drive home.
Ours first ‘off-road endurance’ event, we stuck together as a pair and enjoyed every second of it. Very glad it didn’t end at 6 miles. The event was run brilliantly and we will definitely be back for next years with our ‘Total Warrior’ games faces on! Challengers welcome.
Paul and Natalie
Birmingham Store.
