Rugged Maniac – Denver 2011
I've never run a road race or anything like it in my life. The only thing that comes close was Jr. High track at Eastern, and the farthest that I ever cared to run was one lap around the track. I was pretty good at that at the time, but that was almost 30 years ago.
With that in mind, I'm not altogether sure what possessed me to try this, but some folks on my team at work started talking about this race that they were going to do here in town called the Rugged Maniac. They had done some similar races earlier in the summer, the Warrior Dash and the Tough Mudder, and listening to them discuss those, I was a little jealous that I hadn't signed up previously and given it a shot.
Yesterday was the day to be one of the crazy Maniacs doing the race. Thankfully, it was a nice day. About 80 degrees. That's notable because I've seen snow in mid-October here in Denver, so I was thankful that didn't happen!
To give you a sense of what the race was like, I've added a quick promo video and a few of our pictures below. Suffice to say that yesterday kicked me in the pants and I'm still feeling it, but I'm glad I did it. I might not do this particular race again, but I'm thinking that it would be great to try some of the other similar races again next year.
On to the pictures:
A little pre-race bravado:
After several mud bogs, I decided I wanted to backstroke this one...
The end of the race. Battered, bruised, and beaten:
But not without a little celebration with my friend Jose (who beat me by at least 15-20 minutes!)
And some post-race group shots in front of the port-a-johns:
