For the last year or so I have been casually training to become stronger and more agile. I realised I adore climbing up, on, under and over things so Obstacle Course Racing seemed like a perfect fit.
I've been training at a local gym about once a month at their "train-til-you've-had-enough" OCR events. I've been tracking my progress and have been improving!
It helped when I came home and told @new.things that I needed a way to train for OCR at home and he built me a mini set-up complete with a hoist (to lift), a tyre (to flip) and a rope (to climb).
It was great. Now I could change the weights to suit me and train a little bit most days. Once I did that I saw huge improvements at the gym training days.
It was very gratifying =)
I had planned to participate in several actual races over the last year but there's not a heap of them, they're not always that close by and they're often more than $100 per person to enter.
Oh, and sometimes you have to swim through mud as part of the race! (Funny at the time, but the insides of my body screamed gross!!!! when I was doing it and I'm less interested in overriding my body than I used to be in my twenties).
Hence, I was stoked when I found out that the gym owner who I see once a month ish for her training sessions was going to hold her own race. Yaaaaaaay!
There were three race lengths: 21km, 10km and 5km, each with a bunch of obstacles that were a reasonable match for the length of the race.
Given that I'm nowhere near as fit as I used to be 10 years ago when I was training for ultras, I opted for the 5km distance. It was the latest start (yay for slow mornings!), the cheapest entry and the one that felt like it could be fun instead of a chore.
When I turned up on Sunday morning I was surprised to see only 10 or so people at the race brief. Only two of us were women. I politely introduced myself to the other (young!) woman and immediately got the sense that she was super competitive; she wanted to beat the men.
Since my health has not been the best for a while now I figured if I could finish and have fun, that would be a win. Anything else was a bonus.
As the men took off, I let them go, finding my own pace and knowing I'd run into the back of the line at the first obstacle anyway. I knocked off each lap and each obstacle with as much focus as I could muster, as much gratitude as I could remember to feel and as much presence as possible.
When my punch card fell off its clip, nowhere to be found, I dealt with it. When I failed the spear throw (which I knew was far more likely than nailing it), I just got on with the race. When I realised I was no match for the strength of my fellow female competitor, I chose to appreciate her power and be inspired by it instead of feeling less than.
And then I realised she'd dropped out. I wasn't sure why. But suddenly it was just a bunch of guys way ahead of me, one tired young man who'd been partying behind me and no women in sight.
I ploughed on, knowing that this race was always about me practising my skills, moving my body, getting outside with like-minded people while we all attempted to have fun, together.
And then it was done. I had finished but still wasn't totally sure if I'd "won" and whether that meant anything anyway. What I did know is that I needed to sit down, drink water and cool the f*ck down.
I was cooked!
After smashing the rest of my water, I guzzled my pre-made green smoothie and then it was time for the awards ceremony. To my delight, I had in fact "won" (for my gender and race length) and the best bit was that it came with a $50 prize. Yaaaaaaay!
You can call me "Paid Athlete". ;P
I'd covered my race costs (my event was only $35) and gained enough to pay for half of my next training session. I got to stand on the podium (aka a plyometric box :P) and receive the applause of happy and encouraging (or at least, polite) fellow OC racers. And I got a shiny medal that I totally didn't need but appreciate anyway =)
There's a part of me that thinks this win is bogus; there was only one other woman competing and she pulled out (because she didn't like the running and just wanted to climb on the monkey bars, rings and walls to practise for Ninja Warrior).
But another part of me reminded my good self that the win is legitimate because:
- I trained when no-one was looking
- I registered for the event when most people are unwilling to try new things
- I showed up to the event even though I was feeling lousy that morning, and
- I stayed in the game even when I was coming last for about half the race, when my punch card fell off its clip and when I failed obstacles I knew I'd have to do penalties for.
Sometimes wins are glorious. And sometimes we win just because we were willing to keep showing up for ourselves and what's important to us.
Now, back to training.
CC.