Mud Run!

So...I'm turning 30 this summer. And for my upcoming birthday, I asked--no, I begged--to be given The Gift of Mud Run. And my amazing family made it happen! My mom flew out to watch the kids while we muddied it up, and Dave ran with me. IT. WAS. FANTASTIC. We emerged (literally emerged--some of those mud pits were as thick as brownie batter and up to my armpits) exhausted, exhilarated, bruised, bleeding, unbelievably sore, filthy, and totally, completely happy. 

Details below.

This is us, fierce and ready, before leaving for the Run. Don't we look fierce? And ready? And yes, that is a Super Sunburn which I acquired the day before the race, at the beach. I'm not gonna lie--it did not feel good when I was crawling on my belly, under logs, scraping it with sandy mud. But...I am an idiot about sunscreen (I somehow think--EVERY SUMMER--that just because everyone I live with has brown skin, I must, too) and must face my own consequences, and also, the pain was a small price to pay for Muddy Warriorism.

The course was a 5.2 mile run with 35 obstacles. And a whole lot of mud. The obstacles included things like crawling over or under huge logs, perched on top of muddy water pits, swimming through a water hole, wading through mud bogs, climbing cargo nets and huge dirt mounds, scaling 15-foot walls, swinging like Tarzan from ropes over mud pits, walking on muddy logs like balance beams over muddy water, etc. 

We were part of a four-man team comprised of us, our good friend Josh, and Dave's coworker, Marie. The rule on all the obstacles was either that you had to complete it as a team (read: scaling the huge walls with no hand/foot holds) or that once one person had completed it, they could go back and help the others (read: Dave had to give me a boost over almost every huge shoulder-height log, which he somehow managed to glide over independantly).

Here is our team, exhausted and happy, almost at the end. Don't we look exhausted? And happy?

This was one of the last obstacles. Between our mud-caked hands and the thick layer of mud on each beam, it was supremely slippery. Treacherous, maybe even. Oooooooo. 

I know I keep saying this, but I just love this man.

The Run is put on by the Marine Corps and had over 8,000 runners. I ran the whole thing with a huge permagrin on my face. Halfway through Dave looked over at me smiling and running and told me it was like I had turned 12 again. I burst out laughing because I knew how downright gleeful I felt. I just kept feeling...young, and like this is the kind of thing we would have done when we were best friends falling in love in high school, and I'm glad we are still doing them. I felt so grateful and happy to have a capable body--I've come a long way in the last ten years in how I view my body. I used to want desperately for my body to be tight and thin, and now I realize how inconsequential those things are. My body can run, climb, jump, swim, grow babies, be intimate, see autumn colors, feel baby skin...I don't love my body for how it looks, anymore. I love it for what it can DO. And the Mud Run reminded me of that. I love the body God gave me.

I had to run our clothes and shoes through FIVE laundry cycles before the water was cleanish. It took me 4 days to get all the mud out of my ears. It's been 8 days and I still have bruises and scabs all over, and my hair still feels...weird. 

However, at 12:01am on Tuesday, I will be sitting at my computer registering us to run it again in October. Just for the mud fun of it.