Left the house about 6am. Was about a 4hr drive. However, while I did stop at 2 of the rest areas, I made the mistake of not stopping at the third, figuring it would be like the Tuxedo sprint and in less than an hour I would be parked and have lots of porta-potties.
Well, it wouldn't have been bad if I didn't need to go so bad. It ended up being another of the "let's figure out where I'm supposed to park" deals coming from my direction. There were people parked all along the sides of the road, then what looked like ONLY VIP parking at the registration area, then a lot of people walking down the road from an unknown location... Then definite parking to the left, but the sign saying to go straight and then finally finding an actual parking spot at what felt like 10 miles down the road. Apparently it was only 2, and I'm not sure why people were walking, the shuttle buses were running very quickly. But at the time I arrived, I REALLY had to use the bathroom and wasn't sure how it was going to work so I made the call to just leave what I didn't need in the car, and anything else was going with me in the Camelbak.
So about 10 minutes later I was at the registration desk, though there weren't any bathrooms there either. So another 10-15 minutes later and I was through registration, partway up the hill looking to the right where I was told they were, but then finally found them far off to the left.
It was QUITE warm. I heard 86F. And pretty humid as well. Know what's even better? When you've really got to pee and you end up standing in the portapotty for 5 minutes. It was over 100F in there, as soon as I got in the sweat was steadily dripping off my head and when I finally got out, it felt SO much cooler(though it was still nasty hot).
On the portapotty note... I was amazed at the amount of Spartans who don't understand porta-potties and latches... It's pretty simple. You look for one that's green and go in. Red means it's occupied. However, when I tried to do this, I opened the door on one male and one female Spartan who failed to latch the door. And when I was inside with the door latched, some guy came up, tried the door, it didn't open so he tried again and forced it open. At which point I had to reach behind myself, UNlatch the door so I could close it, then latch it again. *sigh*.
After that it was largely standing around for an hour before the start time. I should have brought another bottle of water to drink because I was hesitant to use up my Camelbak water before the race.
But then we were off up the hill. Nothing like climbing mountains with that hot humid sun beating down on you. But it was going pretty well. The swim section was new and was a bit interesting cause there were too many people in there including people with life jackets just laying on their backs kicking so I was getting hit from ahead and behind. But it was nice and cooling!
Thought I was drinking enough as I was taking a decent drink of my Nuun water like before and after a Clif Shotblock like every 15 minutes and a glass or two of water at each of the stations, but around maybe half way or so, I started to feel my calves acting up on the way down the mountain. This is the first I've ever had them start to cramp. I ate two of the mustard packets that had been recommended for this situation And continued on. They never completely cramped on me, but I could feel them getting stiff and I thought I might have been out of luck right after the fire jump, they really came close to a full on cramp as I was waiting for my medal.
But anyway, around this halfway or so point I was thinking I might be done around 3, but got to the bucket carry and was told they were pausing the race. Now, it had been thundering for almost an hour at this point. So it was not real clear as to just when they might decide to go again. Nor were instructions/explanation very clear... The first I heard was that the bucket carry was stopped, but you could do your burpees and continue on. Then that the course was stopped. Then that you could go at your own risk, then immediately no you can't. So ended up sitting for like 15 minutes and of course my body decided it might as well start shutting down since we were no longer in race mode... And given that the forecast was calling for MORE thunderstorms at this point I figured who knows how long we'll be here. Might as well eat a Clif bar. And of course as I was halfway through they started up again. So I've got my 5 gallon bucket full of gravel, climbing the mountain and half a Clif bar sticking out of my mouth. In retrospect I should have just dropped the Clif bar cause I think between the sitting and eating a whole bar at once, I didn't start getting close to recovering till towards the end of the race. Also didn't help that this was the start of like twice more up the mountain and a lot of the weight carrying/pulling stuff. It also meant that because of the pause but everyone still moving to obstacles that EVERY obstacle was backed up at least 5 people deep. And then they still weren't letting people do the rope climb when I got to it. Though the next time down the hill it was open again so I was kinda disappointed I didn't get to try it. But I still burpeed the spear throw and the log hop. Oh, I was so close, I just got leaning off to the side and missed the very last log! and I did 30 somethings, but they were REALLY sloppy burpees from the way I was feeling.
Anyway, it was good, but that pause at the middle which seemed just stupid(Umm, we already signed waivers that we might die and I'm sure we're more likely to get killed driving to/from this event than struck by lightning and what's the difference if we're moving or sitting still on the mountain?), well it just really killed my motion and I ended up with a 3hr 47 minute time which I think was about 45 minutes longer than it would have been... I didn't run down much of any of the remaining hills which is where I make some time.
Oh, there was a lot more water at the bared wire crawl too. You pretty quickly learn to just ignore any sort of worry about nasty water, etc. Cause it's like 10-15 minutes of rolling through foot deep puddles, lots of rocks, etc under the barbed wire. Everything is just completely filthy when you emerge. On this note, I tried using the Shotblocks in a ziploc bag, but while it kept them from getting too bad, it was definitely still muddy in there. Thinking I may switch to something more single use like Gu's for VT just to avoid this issue... Not sure.
But then the race was over, I did a quick hose down at the showers and it was another quick shuttle back to the car. I changed quick and was on the road. At which point in the first hour I did a good bit of yelling and swearing at a couple of idiots that were really causing me time. I want to get home to my girls by like 8, not after 9! The worst was a like 5-10 mile stretch of single lane construction with a 55mph speed limit so it shouldn't have been bad, but for some reason this rimmed Jeep with a U-haul trailer was topping out at 30mph and then slowing to like 20mph when the road had a turn in it... UGH!
Still, I made it home around 9:20 very tiredly.
But I now have my second piece of the Trifecta!
Killington is like ten days!
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