* From: Amy LaPanne
* Event: Tough Mudder Saturday 6/6
* Date: 2015-06-06
* Event Details
Great location that made the most of Mount Snow’s terrain. We got general parking for $10 in advance, and since we had an early heat, we got a really good spot and I didn’t feel like I needed to spring for VIP parking.
Facilities were good overall. Bag check was a piece of cake as we stuffed all of our bags into one huge bag and checked it. Picking it up at the end of the event was the easiest of any race I’ve ever been to. No wait, no hassle, no hard-to-find bags. There were plenty of portapotties and they weren’t too horrible (which is a compliment). LOTS of food vendors offering all kinds of stuff – Italian sausage, waffles, different beers and so on. It was easy to find something delicious and I didn’t think the prices were unreasonable.
Nice race schwag – other than the cotton blend finisher’s t-shirt, which was nothing special. We got our headbands, a little towel, a couple of different protein bars, beef jerky and some powdered drink mixes. I think it’s the most schwag I’ve ever gotten after a race.
The festivity area outside the course was easily the best of any OCR I’ve been to. There was a lot to do and see, and you could easily watch people still out on the course.
* Race Details
The course was every bit as challenging as a Spartan Super, but thankfully without the burpees. There was a lot of up & down the mountain. The race course was posted in advance, which I liked since this was my first TM. The elevation was impressive. Not as steep as Killington, but the course planners made the most of the elevation changes.
From what I’m told, the obstacles were not as good as in years past, but I thought most of them were good and offered some new challenges for me. Some were not challenging at all (sliding down a tube into water, crawling under a net, barbed wire crawls), and some really pushed my limits (walk the plank, cry baby). I couldn’t jump off the plank into the water at “walk the plank”, but I give myself a ton of credit for getting to the end of the plank since I’m terrified of heights. Cry baby is the new “tear gas” obstacle where you duck under water to go under a wall, then climb up and crawl through a box that’s filled with a very thick eucalyptus sort of fog to the end of the box. I found it irritating to my eyes but I sure could breathe a lot better when I got out! “Electroshock therapy” was nowhere near as bad as I had expected, nor was Arctic Enema.
One major obstacle problem was Everest. We waited 40 minutes to try to get up that wall and it was a disaster. The number of people waiting and the length of time of the wait was insane. Eventually, workers got up there and screwed wood planks at the top to try to help people to get up, and by the end of the day ropes were hanging down for people to grab on to. I get that they wanted to make the obstacle harder, but this was a train wreck and it needs to be changed for future races. I was glad that they did recognize the problem during the race though.
I was also impressed by the number of aid stations that offered electrolyte drinks and small snacks along the way. Also impressive was the number of medics all over the course. I didn’t see anyone get seriously hurt, but help would have been right there if anyone had needed it.
* Rating
Excellent
———-
* From: Nicole Sibley
* Event: Tough Mudder New England 2015
* Date: 2015-06-06
* Event Details
Summer 2015 marked my third Tough Mudder. As in past years, the event was at Mount Snow in Dover, Vermont. Tough Mudder is the big box store of obstacle course races. As someone who more and more likes to #racelocal, Tough Mudder has become a bit of a departure for me. However, I look forward to the event each year because Tough Mudder is different. There obstacle are more “fear factor” than physical challenge, and it’s not the same obstacles you’ll see everywhere else. There is also a great emphasis on doing obstacles as a team. Many of the obstacles would be almost impossible without a person or two to help you out. Tough Mudder is untimed — it’s an event and challenge, not a race — and this really fosters the “no Mudder left behind” mentality.
This past year especially, Tough Mudder has gotten a bit expensive. I was able to purchase my ticket early, which was key to me going this year. Spectators and parking costed extra. I will continue to never understand why one might charge for spectators — these are your future racers! Tough Mudder has always gotten top marks from me for parking. This year though, I’d rate parking a B-. They broke parking up into premium and general parking. The general parking was around a ten minute walk away, and basically all the lots near the entrance, where we were able to park last year for the normal price were vacant. Kind of odd. There also wasn’t any good signage from the general parking to check-in, so that took a bit of figuring out. Once we realized that things were just in the exact same place as last year (minus the fact that parking moved), things were fine.
As per usual, check-in took around ten minutes. Considering how many people they have to get through the gates, I think Tough Mudder is pretty effective at this. Soon we were in the main festival area, I had inked my forehead with my bib number, signed-up for the Legionnaire privileges, met up with my team of John, Dan, and Jane, and headed over to the start line.
* Race Details
For 2015 they were doing something a bit different at the start line. Instead of sending you straight over the first wall and into the corral, we first did a group warm-up segment with some jumping, jogging in place, butt kicks, and hip circles. Kind of odd but an effective way to get people ready to go. From there it was over the first wall and into the corral to listen to the main motivational speaker for Tough Mudder, Sean, who is responsible for sending off all the Tough Mudder participants at each race.
I had admitted in the past to a certain lack of fondness to the chest-thumping style of “HooRaah” that takes place at the starting line for OCRs. However, I am going to give Tough Mudder this one because Sean was amazing today. His speech wasn’t too long, and it served to put me in a good mood. I had had a challenging week or so and was extra in a funk when arriving at Tough Mudder because I had forgotten my wallet at the house, causing us to have to drive home, spending and extra thirty-five minutes in the car and almost making us late. I was filled with serious ennui, and what Sean said really helped me refocus on the race ahead. I did not realize how much I needed this motivation today.
Tough Mudder did a bit of retooling for 2015 changing up some of their obstacles and creating new 2.0 versions as well as adding some other obstacles. They advertised that everything on their courses for 2015 would be 100% new, and while that wasn’t true, there was enough variety to definitely mix things up.
Tough Mudder is a ten mile course and is much less obstacle dense than some of my favorite courses. There is without a doubt a lot of hiking at Tough Mudder. The obstacles tend to be clustered towards the bottom of the mountain for spectating, and there can be a lot of up and down without much to do. I actually think that Tough Mudder did a pretty good job with the obstacle layout this year. Placement was solid and there was enough to do on top of the mountain. My only gripe would be that the first couple of miles were pretty sparse and things got a little tedious; however, the course was a huge improvement over last year’s course and definitely fun.
The course requires a lot of hiking. We probably did somewhere around 5,000 feet of elevation change, and some sections were quite steep. When thinking about physical challenges, the mountain is the biggest one is many cases.
I’ll review the obstacles one-by-one with descriptions of each below. (Note: Some descriptions of these obstacles refer to video or photos. To view those, visit: http://perseid85.blogspot.com/2015/06/tough-mudder-new-england-2015.html)
Kiss of Mud 2.0: It took about a mile into the course to get to our first obstacle. Kiss of Mud was a traditional crawl through the mud and under barbed wire. It wasn’t too long or too hard and there weren’t too many rocks. A pretty basic obstacle. I’m not sure what the change was between the original and the 2.0 version.
Bale Bonds: For this obstacle, we had to run over a pair of hay bales. They were pretty trampled, so it wasn’t much of an obstacle in my mind. Maybe it’s because I’m used to the endless tall well-bound hay bales at Shale Hill, but this was a snap.
Liberator: The Liberator was the first really interesting obstacle of the day at around 2.5 miles in. This obstacle had you scale a wall using pegs. There were toe holds to help you so you didn’t have to use your arms, which was a big help and definitely decreased the difficulty factor.
Quagmire: Another standard OCR obstacle. We had to climb down a mount of dirt into waist deep water and go to the other side and climb out.
Beached Whale: A new obstacle for 2015, Beached Whale is a giant inflatable you have to climb over. Sounds easy, right? Nope. Team work was definitely required. I ran at Beached Whale and managed to pretty much just bounce my face right off. The contours made it hard to get purchase at all. We ended up doing what everyone else does which is having a teammate at the top pull people up from the bottom.
Everest 2.0: Everest is the signature half-pipe obstacle Tough Mudder is famous for. The new version is taller and with a rounded lip at the top (instead of the easier to grab right angle). They ended up adding ropes so that people could help their teammates up. The video on my blog shows it perfectly.
Birth Canal: Another new obstacle. For this one, you have to crawl under a liner filled with water. It was heavier than expected. However, it was open on either side, so if you had problems, you could just go right out. Again, I didn’t have an image, so here’s one from Tough Mudder to give you the idea. This one was interesting and, again, different, but not as scary as advertised.
Funky Monkey 2.0: The best obstacle of the day! Funky Monkey 2.0 is hard. Seriously. You have to do uphill monkey bars, then transfer to a trapeze, and finally do a pipe down. This is a true physical challenge. I was solid on the monkey bars, but transferring to the trapeze was hard and transferring to the pipe was even harder. You had to have sufficient momentum to make it. I actually almost slipped off the pipe at one point and had to hold on with all my grip strength to make it to the other side. Well worth the price of admission.
Prairie Dog: Scoot down a medium narrow tube into a pool of knee high water. I had though we’d just slide down the tubes, but they weren’t wet, so I was forced to wiggle my way along.
Skidmarked: Tough Mudder’s answer to the inverse wall, Skidmarked is a 10′ wall angled towards you. This one is definitely taller and more challenging than your average wall. I ended up kind of climbing up using the supports until I could grab the top. Teamwork helped!
Devil’s Beard: This obstacle had us crawling downhill underneath a net that was pinned to the ground. The net was pleasantly unscratchy, which made this a kind of fun obstacle. I enjoyed it more than I normally do obstacles of this type.
Balls Out: Another fun new obstacle! Using ropes that were hanging along an angled wall, we had to traverse the wall laterally. I didn’t have too much trouble with this one. My Icebugs helped as did the fact that I had done something very similar at Battlefrog. Grip strength and having good momentum were key for this one.
Warrior Carry: The Warrior Carry is more a symbolic gesture (in honor of the Wounded Warrior Project, Tough Mudder’s chief charity) than an actual obstacle. You and a partner take turns giving each other a piggyback ride across a small stretch of course. I partnered up with Jane, which worked great.
Arctic Enema 2.0: Arctic Enema remains pretty much the only obstacle that absolutely terrifies me. For the original, you had to jump into a container of ice water, go under a board, and then get out. For the 2.0 version. You had to slide into the water, completely submerging at the bottom of the slide, then climb over a board, get back in the water, and then exit. The entire things gives me serious pause. As my roommate, Serah, said, “I’ve never seen that look of terror on your face for anything. And it’s just some water with ice in it.” No, no it is not. The cold is the worst! Every year, I am convinced I won’t do it. Of course, ever year, I do.
Walk the Plank: I basically stayed frozen from Arctic Enema at mile 8.5 or so until the end of the race. It didn’t help that the next couple of obstacles featured more water. Next up was Walk the Plank. This obstacle is basically just an exercise in gravity. Climb up to the platform and jump. I was super hopin that King of Swingers would have been in this obstacles place, but no such luck. Either way, I find this one to be just fine. The key is getting to the top and jumping right away before you realize how high up you are.
Cry Baby: This new obstacle strikes me as rather odd. You had to go under a dunk wall and then crawl through an enclosure filled with what they advertised as a tear-gas substance. I’m pretty sure that what we encountered was air filled with something like Vick’s Vapor Rub. If you took shallow breaths and kept your eyes mostly closed, you’d be totally fine. My nose had been stuffy from some light allergies, and this obstacle kind of helped out. Interesting, very different, and definitely not as intimidating as advertised. I am so fascinated by Tough Mudder’s creative team — who comes up with these things?
Berlin Walls: Another Tough Mudder staple is the 10′ Berlin Walls. The two options here are team work or scrambling up the side like I did. Unlike some races, Tough Mudder doesn’t say that the supports aren’t to be used when climbing their walls. Since it’s part of the obstacle, I say it’s fair game, and it’s a way I can have something my short girl arms can reach and grab.
Dead Ringer: The special Legionnaire obstacle for repeat Mudders this year was Dead Ringer. This proved my only failed obstacle of the day. Dead Ringer is an American Ninja Warrior style obstacle where you swing from peg to peg on moving rings. Serah got a video of my first abortive start. I tried again and made it not quite half way before slipping off. I need to practice at my friend Matt’s house — he has all this cool American Ninja Warrior stuff in his backyard and can give me some pointers.
Electroshock Therapy: As always, the last obstacle of the day was Electroshock Therapy. I’ll be honest. This obstacle never made any sense to me. Running through a field of dangling live wires as you stomp through mud and dodge hay bales is insanity. (The non-PG friendly version of myself said that Tough Mudder should get rid of this obstacle and just get a set of rulers so we can all sit around and take measurements.) Unpleasant. Of course getting zapped is unpleasant. I raced through as fast as I could with fellow teammate, Dan. After all, the finish line was on the other side.
Made it! Tough Mudder 2015 finisher. I had earned yet another headband.
After a quick team picture, we headed over to a special new obstacle that they had put in Mudder Village. This obstacle was called Ring of Fire. It was free for Legionnaires and $5 for first time Mudders and anyone else. I was kind of emotionally done for the day with throwing my body around, but it did look cool…
So now I have this video of “that time when I slide down a pole from 30′ up through a ring of fire and splashed into a bucket of cold water.”
Tough Mudder 2015 is in the books! The innovations promised on the course are what brought me out again this year. I was excited to try the modified and new obstacles. The variety did not disappoint, and, like I’ve said before, Tough Mudder is very different from an other race on my calendar.
That being said, I am not sure if I plan to do Tough Mudder again in 2016. Honestly, it will depend on my race schedule. While I like Tough Mudder, it’s getting expensive, and I’ve also come to find that the course is less obstacle dense than I prefer. It’s a lot of money for a lot of walking. Plus, how many times do I want to run through electrified wires anyway? However, the obstacles are top-notch and very diverse, so if Tough Mudder HQ ends up having another set of really cool obstacle for next year, I may very well be back.
* Rating
Average
