My Rebellious Body

It's been nearly 6 weeks since I ran the South Carolina mudder twice in one day, and my body still hasn't fully recovered.  Partly, I think this is due to my own silliness, but also there are just the general aches and pains associated with getting a bit older.

The biggest issue has been a case of Turf Toe that I "caught" (if that's the right word for what happened) during the mudder itself.  I must admit, I used to scoff at professional athletes who would be out for weeks at a time with a turf toe injury (yes, I'm looking at you Deion Sanders).  Well, having gone through it, let me offer my heartfelt apology to Mr. Sanders.  There's nothing quite like a toe injury to really put you off working out. 

Eventually, I improved - although I'm still not 100% - by taping my toes together to immobilize the big toe.  It's worked, and allowed me to restart the Insanity workout regiment.  Of course, having taken a month off of working out, I probably should have taken a slower start to getting back into it.  I ended up really crushing both my calves, and have been hobbling around for a few days.  That's not even mentioning the fact that my right wrist is hurt (I'm still not sure what happened with this one). 

Of course, this didn't stop me from signing up for the Miami mudder in March.  The plan is to do it on both Saturday and Sunday.  That's the next challenge.  Perhaps eventually we'll ramp up to doing doubles on Saturday and Sunday.  I'm doing the best I can to take care of my body and let all of these nagging injuries to heal, but I also know that I need to keep on it or I will start to slack and won't be able to recapture the initiative.

Updates and Stuff

It's a week and a half since the World's Toughest Mudder, and a little more than a month since the Carolina Mudder, and I figured I would put together a quick update on what's going on. 

First: Carolina Mudder.  Started with the Bad News! team at 8:20 and immediately got hurt on the Arctic Enema.  I hit a chunk of submerged ice and it cut my eyebrow open.  It was bleeding pretty badly, but I kept going because I was so cold.  Got through the next obstacle and was pulled aside by some medics in a golf cart/truck combo.  They suggested that I get stitches, but there was no way I was leaving the course that early (unless I absolutely had to).  They put some gauze and a piece of tape on it, and I kept going.  Luckily, the bleeding stopped pretty quickly, but the bandage fell off about half-way around the course.  I ended up not going to the emergency room at all to get stitches, although, I probably should have since it was a pretty nasty gash.  Ended up buying butterfly bandages and hoping for the best.  Since it's been about a month, though, I can say that I do have a pretty noticeable scar over my right eye now. 

Team Bad News! finished the mudder around11:45.  It was a pretty good lap, and I think we could easily have finished under three hours if I hadn't had to spend 20 minutes with the medics.  The good news was that we finished in time to make the turn and get off for a second lap at the last start time of the day.  The noon start was fun, but it was very slow going.  Only three of the five members of Bad News! made the turn, and one of them probably shouldn't have.  He ended up being pretty banged up, and I think that he probably should have stopped after the first lap.  The thing is that, it meant that we didn't actually do much running on the second lap, which we finished at around 4:30.  We only skipped one obstacle the entire day, and it's gnawing at me a little bit that we didn't at least attempt it.  I guess that's not too bad, though, considering we were pretty crushed by the end. 

The best part of the whole day was running with a pack of people in our second lap who knew that we were doing a second lap.  We got a lot of props from people during that lap, and it felt pretty bad-ass to know that people were thinking of us as crazy. 

It's left us thinking that we need to up our game though.  Now we're trying to find a fourth person to make a team that would qualify for the World's Toughest Mudder next winter in NJ.  Our objective would be to do 4 circuits of the course in the 24 hours, and then see what happens.  That's a whole new level of madness though, and a pretty sizeable investment in materials.  First thing first, our next mudder is scheduled for early March in Miami.  The plan is to do another two laps...

Two Lapper

Just woke up.  It's two days since I ran the Carolina Mudder twice.  First lap started at 8:20 and finished at 11:45.  Second lap started at noon and ended at 4:30.  I must admit, much of the second lap was spent walking - although, I could have arranged a slow trot if my teammates had been up to it.  Only ended up skipping one obstacle (the second Berlin Walls on our second lap).  At least attempted everything else.

Additionally, this was also the first time I was injured during a mudder.  I got a gash on my eye in the very first obstacle, Arctic Enema.  I jumped in and hit a submerged chunk of ice.  Opened up a cut on my right eyebrow about an inch long.  Right after the second obstacle, I was stopped by some guys in a truck and asked if I wanted to continue.  Of course, I wasn't going to quit 15 minutes in - unless I was in serious trouble.  They cleaned out the cut and put a piece of tape on it (which fell off a few miles later).  I realized I had been cut, but didn't really understand how deep it was until I got back to the hotel afterwards.

I'm sore right now.  I'm starting to feel a big toe injury and my left calf really hurts, but all in all, I think this was a good effort.  I think that I actually feel better overall now than I did at a similar point after my first Mudder.

Results!

I played basketball, football and ran track when I was in High School.  Additionally, I spent a good amount of time outside riding my bike, running around, playing with friends, etc.  I wasn't necessarily the most athletic kid (even in my own family), but I wasn't purely an uncoordinated wall-flower either.  Having said that, though, I can say - unequivocally - I'm in the best shape of my life right now.  I'm consistently running 11+ miles (with a high of 13 this past week) and I'm a week away from being done with the Insanity workout regime. 

I've tried to document the fact that I was motivated to start my whole weight-loss/training regime after hitting a high point of 235 lbs, but I never really thought I would go so far into it that I would get into the kind of shape I'm in right now.  I remember being able to run for hours when I was in High School, but I feel stronger, sharper and more in-shape than I can ever remember feeling before.  I'm almost sad to see Insanity's end in sight.  I finish two days before the mudder on the 27th of this month, and I'm already starting to think about restarting the whole thing.  It's been intense (as the name implies), but I can honestly say it's been amazing at the same time.

Mid-Life?

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day - a friend who has known me for a very long time - and she implied that my transformation is the result of a mid-life crisis.  This made me think, because I hadn't really thought of that before.  Obviously, I would guess that most people who are going through these kinds of crises don't actually do so knowingly, so it's relatively easy to imagine that I wouldn't realize that I was going through one. 

Nevertheless, this was the first time that I even considered it.  And if I'm honest, I can't reject the idea out of hand.  Having said that, though, I have reflected on it and I'd like to believe that if any sort of "mid-life crisis" is involved it is only part of a much larger, much more complex process.  The timing is right - if you buy into the idea that mid-life happens sometime around 40 - but I'd also like to believe that I have been on a lifelong mission to improve myself.  I've tried to tackle every problem that I've ever had, and overcome it.  And I have some pretty big accomplishments in my life - things big and small that make me proud of who I am and what I've created with my life.  Also, I've always like to make people question their perceptions about who and what I am.  For example, I remember working at a hotel front desk when I was much younger - while I was working on my master's degree.  At the time, I was very young-looking, and I tended to grow my hair long (more out of laziness than style).  I remember telling my boss that I was working on a particularly difficult paper in one of my classes, and him being surprised that I was working on a master's degree.  When I asked why, he said that he knew I was smart, but didn't think I was SMART.  I still recall that anecdote like it was yesterday because I remember being very happy that I was able to shock him out of his preconceived notions. 

All of this is prelude to saying, I have no real idea if what I've started here is the result of a mid-life crisis or not.  But, I also have come to the conclusion that I don't really care either way.  After all, we have this negative perception of men going through mid-life as they cheat on their wives and buy unnecessary cars, but if that energy can be harnessed into more healthy and positive behaviors, then a mid-life "crisis" doesn't have to be a crisis at all.  Instead, I'd like to think, if anything, to whatever extent it does play a role, my mid-life events are more of a mid-life adventure than a crisis.

Update & Reflections

Ok...it's been a while, and I thought I would take some time to chart my progress.  I'm almost four week's into the Insanity workout, and it's definitely insane.  Having said that, though, it's up to me to make it even more insane.  After all, what I've learned is that anyone can slack their way through any workout regime, if they want to.  Insanity isn't any different.  It's set up to really push you, but I could slack if I wanted - no one is watching me, and I have to find the internal motivation to push myself.  That brings me to my second point: my general reflections.

I started thinking about what I wanted from this process and why I was doing what I plan, and it occurred to me that I need to document less of my activities (outside of Mudder's themselves).  After all, who really cares how far I ran today or how many days into the workout regime I am.  All of those things are simply markers that will help me gauge my progress, but anyone who cares to read this blog probably finds that stuff tremendously boring.

I've decided that I'm going to be a bit more reflective in general, and only provide holistic details about my day to day routines. 

So, what kinds of reflections am I going to make?  I'd like to think that they will be more interesting, but I can't really say that for sure.  The one thing that I will say is that these thoughts will try to focus more on the story of the Mudder-A-Month project and less on the drudgery (but, having said that, I will say that anyone who wishes to get healthy should be prepared to put in the drudgery work to make it happen - these things don't happen by accident).

To start this new approach, I'd like to tell a story about my brother, who was supposed to run a previous Mudder with me but hadn't recovered from a knee surgery in time.  I was disappointed, of course, because I think he would really dig the physical challenge, but I understood.  Once he told me that he wasn't able to make it, I started mentally thinking about how we could run the next one together.  Of course, life isn't neat or tidy, and I found out that my brother wasn't going to be able to run any future races (don't worry, nothing horrible has happened to him).  In order to understand why, you have to know a bit about my brother.  He was a High School football star (I was a player...he was a star).  Once he graduated, he started looking for a replacement for football, and found an organized rugby league, which he played into his early to mid 30's.  Rugby is a beautiful and brutal sport, one that leaves permanent marks on the body. I vividly remember him coming back from a game one Saturday with a cleat mark across his face.  That kind of mark fades, but the cumulative effect doesn't.  When you're in your 20's, you bounce back, but when you're in your 40's it's not as easy - especially when all those cumulative effects start to catch up to you.  It's left him with lots of nagging pains and several surgeries.  Again, none of these, individually, are overly dramatic, but stacked on top of each other they become less of a speedbump and more of an Everest.  The result is that the last time I talked with my brother he had to opt out of any future Mudders...his body just won't allow it anymore.  As the saying goes, "the spirit is willing, but the body's not able".

The interesting thing for me, though, is that he seems legitimately worried about me and the effects that my workouts are having on my body.  I think he's afraid that his 20's and 30's playing rugby are equivalent to my 30's and 40's workout and Mudders, and that I'll end up with similar physical issues in my 50's as he's seeing now.  Obviously, I can't see the future, but I'm not sure that these things are equivalent.  Rather, I think that the fact that I spent my 20's in front of a computer screen as opposed to on the rugby pitch would have had an entirely different set of physical effects, and my efforts now are attempting to combat those issues.  I'm not sure that is a bad thing, but I can say that I'm trying to be smart about my approach to these issues.  I try not to ignore my pains (as a 25-year-old me would have), and I tend to think that will be a benefit to my 50's rather than a detriment.

Only time will tell, though...

Wish Me Well

Alright....I'm almost two weeks into Insanity, and it is pretty crazy.  Having said that though, it's not overwhelming, so today I'm going to add a 5 mile run to the mix (after having done 40 minutes of Cardio Power and Resistance).  This is the first time I'm trying this, so I may not survive...if you don't hear from me, you'll know what happened.

General Fitness

One thing I'm realizing about doing the Insanity workout is that, while it's great for general cardiovascular health, I'm not sure it's going to help me too much with my running.  I think I'll have to build some running into my week on top of the Insanity workouts.  I don't think that will be too difficult, though, since I haven't been overly tired after any of the workouts and there is an extra day built into the schedule for rest.  That should allow me to do a long run on the days where I have Cardio Recovery and on my rest days. 

Insanity: Part II

A couple days into the Insanity workout, and I'm pleasantly surprised.  It doesn't monopolize my time as much as other workout routines are supposed to (mostly because of the intensity of the workouts allowing for shorter workouts).  This makes it much easier to do it in a busy lifestyle.

The other pleasant thing is that I don't feel so wiped out that I can't do other things throughout the rest of my day.  My calves are a little tight from a new type of workout - and I assume that will go away after a while - but the workouts themselves would allow me to go running if I wished to do so.  I think I could probably run 10 miles today if I wanted to.

Insanity

First time doing the Insanity workout this evening.  It's pretty intense.  I'm totally bought in...I can't wait to get up in the morning and do the next day's workout.

Metatarsalgia?!?

So, it appears that I have metatarsalgia, which feels like a very bad bruise on the ball of my left foot.  It seems to have happened during my run on Tuesday in North Carolina, and, if I can say, it is pretty painful.  But only really when I'm walking in my bare feet.  Luckily, it doesn't really impact my workouts if I'm at the gym since my training shoes are different from my running shoes.  That's the thing, apparently this injury doesn't hurt as much with better padding at the ball of the feet. 

It's interesting how much I'm learning about the human body.  I have to admit that I am kind of flying by the seat of my pants here.  I didn't do any research on running beforehand, and I'm attacking these injuries one at a time as they come up.  First I had Achilles Tendinitis, which was pretty painful, then I had a bruise on the top of my left foot from tying my shoes too tight, and now I have this.  The whole thing is a process, and I'm starting to feel like I'll have to get some advice on how to be more proactive about these types of issues before they get too overwhelming. Although, the approach of tackling these problems as they arise may be the best way to go...after all, how many foot problems could there possibly be?  I've gotta reach the end of them sometime, right?

Long Runs

Today I had a run of just under 11 miles, and it really took it out of me.  I actually feel pretty good right now, but my pace was really slow - much slower than I have run other long runs.  I'm trying to figure out if that's because of the length of time since my last run (almost two weeks), the relative high altitude (nearly 3600 feet at it's highest points) or the difficulty of the trail.  I tend to think that it's some combination of all three of these - especially the trail.  The Boone Fork's Trail is a five-mile loop that's much more difficult than other trails that I've run...there are more exposed roots and rocks than can be counted, more cliff climbs than I care to remember, and the general muddy conditions.  This is a much more difficult trail than the Osmanthus Trail that I run in Virginia Beach.  On Osmanthus, I can average between 9 and 9 1/2 minutes per mile.  On Boone Fork, I average between 11 and 11 1/2 minutes per mile.

I must say, I think I need to start working on my speed, but there's got to be something that makes Boone Fork so much more difficult.  I wonder if there's some sort of trail rating system that gauges the relative difficulty of trails on some sort of scale?

Definitions of Exercise

I think my wife and I have different definitions of exercise.  I told her that I wanted to go running this morning, thinking to myself that a 12 mile trail run sounded great on a nice breezy day.  My wife says "Great...you should take our son".  It's not that I don't want to play with my kids, it's just that I didn't really think that he would be up for a 12 mile walk let alone a 12 mile run.  He may not even be up for a 12 mile drive....

Anyway, we negotiated so that I went to a local park with my son and daughter and challenged them to races.  My daughter was much more interested in picking flowers and chasing butterflies (but somehow she still always seemed to win!).  My son was game for the races - at least at first.  But he faded really fast. 

The result is that I only ran about a mile (if that), but I still feel good about it if it leads to my son and daughter getting a better appreciation for running and exercise. 

Nose To The Grindstone

Today was the first day that I was able to get back into the gym, and man it was tough.  My back feels okay, but I really struggled through my 1/2 hour on the elliptical.  I was feeling the layoff, and felt like I needed a nap as soon as I got home.  I'm thinking I want to go for a run tomorrow - even though it's supposed to rain.  We'll see how I feel after a good night's sleep.

End Game

I was thinking today about the what I hope to accomplish from the Mudder-A-Month challenge and from the Tough Mudder in general.  There's no great insight here - mostly I just want to be helpful and raise some money, but there's the ancillary benefit of being motivated to stay fit.  This got me thinking about some of the people that I've seen running Tough Mudders - and not just people my age or younger, but the people who are quite a bit older.  I was wondering if I would be running Mudders when I'm in my 60's.  There's absolutely nothing that would keep me from doing that, I think.  But, it got me thinking about the nature of the person who is doing this kind of thing when they're getting to that age.  Do the start when they're in their late 30's like I did, or is this a lifetime choice of testing themselves from the earliest days?  I like to think that I was an active kid, but the reality is that I was much more bookish than I was athletic.  That's not to say that I wasn't active.  I played sports in High School, and I remember being outside more during the summer than being inside, but the desire to test myself physically seems like a relatively new characteristic. 

I wonder if it will fade as if it were a passing phase, or is this a real lifestyle change?  I guess I'll really only know if I'm 65 and running a Mudder.

Back Woes

My back is officially killing me.  I haven't been able to do much of anything the last couple days, and it's all because my lower back is trying to tell me something - and not too subtly either.  On Sunday morning, I rented a chainsaw because we had some old lumber in our back yard.  This was left over from when we had some trees taken down about a year ago, and we were keeping it for firewood.  It had really just become a eyesore of a pile of pine since it was too big for us to burn in our firepit.  I spent a couple hours out there cutting each of the pieces into smaller portions that would allow us to burn them, but the constant lifting and bending really took a toll on my lower back. 

I'm starting to feel as if I'm making excuses for not working out (international travel, back problems, etc), so I have to really fight through the next few weeks and make a concerted effort to get back into the swing of things.  If it were just me being lazy, then I would be disappointed in myself, but I have had legitimate reasons for not working out.  That doesn't let me off the hook, though.  I need to buckle down and get at it again. 

Now, having said all this, I will be buying my 2013 Tough Mudder Annual Pass this coming week, which means that I'll have to run in at least 4 Mudders to make it cost effective.  That should definitely put a fire under me.

International Workout Results

So, I'm back in the states after a 12 day holiday in Greece, and I thought I would give a quick update on the kinds of workouts that I was able to undertake while I was out of the country.  First off, there's no way to do much lifting unless you want to do body-based stuff like pushups, pullups and situps.  I did my share of those, but I was also looking for a way to do some running as well.  My intention was to find a nice long beach, get out there early enough to avoid the majority of people and then just run as long as I could.  That concept sounded good in theory, but it was impossible in practicality.  The beaches on Paros and Santorini tend to be relatively short (maybe 100 meters long) and are almost always packed with people.  This left me with the idea of trying to find roads or trails to run along.  I wasn't really looking forward to the idea of running on Greek roads, because the drivers are crazy and the roads tend to wind around blind corners often.  But, it ended up being the only thing that I was able to do.  On Paros, I found a remote road that was about a mile long that went from where I was staying down to a little beach.  I ran four laps on that road for a total of about 8 miles.  Once we moved over to Santorini, I found a 3.5 mile loop road that was pretty deserted.  I only ran one loop along that road, but it ended up being about 6 miles total because I had to backtrack and refind the main route at several instances.  I would have liked to have run another loop, but the traffic was starting to pick up and the heat was really starting to kick in.

What's the upshot?  Well, it can safely be assumed that you can find places to run, but you'll have to check the paths and/or roads out ahead of time to ensure that you know your way.  Additionally, if you're going to run, you almost have to be done before 10 am because the mid-day heat is tremendous.  In my case, I was able to do some water work almost every day, but only got to run the two times while I was there.

Water Work

So, I'm having trouble finding places to run while on the Greek island of Paros.  There aren't many trails for running around here, and there's absolutely no chance that I'm going to be doing any road running while the country's crazy drivers are on the road.  I had thought that I would be able to do some beach running, but the beaches on the island tend to be relatively short (less than 1/4 mile in most instances) and are usually packed.  These two things together make it difficult to run along the beach.  But, I think I've come up with a solution - actually, it's a solution that was given to me by a friend: Water Work.  In essence, what I do is try to start a run from knee deep water, and run directly away from the beach until the water is about chin level, I then turn around and run back towards the beach and stop when I get to knee level water again.  This usually is a relatively short distance (less than 50 feet), but each of these laps can be pretty intense.  I ran 50 laps this afternoon, and really felt it afterwards.  It's definitely not the same as running 10 or 11 miles on a trail, but if I can't find any other alternative, then it's better than nothing.  Plus, it has the added benefit of getting some sun and being in the water.

International Travel

I leave tomorrow for nearly two weeks on the Greek Islands (I know, you feel bad for me).  During that time, I'm guessing I won't be able to work out much - at least not with weights.  I'm planning on doing some long distance beach runs though, but that may depend on the quality of the beaches.  After a nine mile trail run yesterday, I'm thinking that a five or six mile beach run, with a little swimming mixed in, might be just in order.

I'm hoping to do at least one Tough Mudder internationally during the Mudder-A-Month project, so this may end up being a nice warm-up to see how doable something like that may be with all of the jet lag and issues of international travel.

Yard Work - A Great Workout

I haven't been to the gym in the last couple days, but rather, I spent some time outside doing yardwork.  It doesn't sound too strenuous to say that I fixed a fence and built a planter area, but if you factor in the 90+ temperatures, and the heavy heat index, it's easy to see how this kind of work could cause you to shed some weight.  The downside is that I caught a bit of poison ivy, which I'm prone to do when I work in one particular corner of my yard, but that will clear up soon enough.

Runkeeper

I've started trying to track my runs using an iPhone app called Runkeeper, but I'm getting a little frustrated with it.  The last three times I've used it, something has gone wrong with the GPS. Once it wasn't getting a GPS signal because of heavy rain (that's understandable), and two times it mysteriously added about a mile to my total distance after I was done running. This may seem like a relatively minor thing, but I'm trying to get a sense of how many miles I run each week and month, and these kinds of issues are really putting a cramp in my plans.  I think I'll have to try a few of these apps out.  Once I've settled on one, I'll post it here.

Non-Workout Days

It's interesting to be sitting in front of my computer on a Sunday, and thinking about the fact that I haven't worked out for the last two days.  It used to be that this would be the norm, and I wouldn't even give it a second thought to spend a day, a week, a month without ever going to the gym to work out.  Now, it makes me antsy to know that I haven't worked out in a couple days.  It's the new norm...and I guess I'm the poster boy of what life can be if you change your habits.

Just to be clear, I had plans to go running this morning, but my back is killin' me, so I had to put that on hold for today.  Hopefully, tomorrow I'll be able to get a run in.

16-Year Old Me

I was thinking as I shaved today about an earlier statement that I made on this blog.  Specifically, I mentioned that I see myself as a 16-year old boy.  Looking at myself in the mirror as I shaved brought that back to mind because I remember what it was like to start shaving around 16 and how foreign it always seemed.  It was the kind of thing that was expected, but wasn't really necessary.  I'm 40 years old right now, and I don't need to shave every day - imagine what my facial hair looked like when I was 16.  The Mudder-A-Month project isn't about trying to be 16 years old again, it's about trying to stay youthful.  The key thing about this project is that it's helping me to feel younger.  I know that the 16 year old me is lost, but that doesn't mean that I can't keep a bit of that feeling alive. 

Why Wounded Warrior?

The next natural question to ask is why I would feel so much motivation to raise money for the Wounded Warrior project?  After all, I'm not in the military myself and never have been.  Both my wife and I are "navy brats", and although neither of us joined the military ourselves, we're the products of military households.  That has given us both a very strong respect and admiration for the work that the people in the military do and the service that they offer.  It's almost cliche to say that they work hard to give us the freedoms that we all enjoy, but the reality is that this is true and the honor and dignity that they show in providing this service is admirable and worth supporting and honoring in return. 

The fact that their service has the potential for physical harm and injury makes their service even more worthy of respect.  I have come to the conclusion that anything that I can do to support them in their time of need - specifically if they've been injured - is the right thing to do. And that is why I feel that the Wounded Warrior project is the right organization to support.

What is the Mudder-A-Month Challenge?

The Mudder-A-Month project is my effort to challenge myself, stay fit, and raise donations for the Wounded Warrior project. 

In order to really understand my motivations for this project, you have to first understand what brought me to this point.  About 3 years ago I left a job that required me to live in one city from Monday to Friday and then fly home for the weekends.  During the week, I didn't eat well.  Mostly I lived off of delivery pizza and buffet lunches.  Like I said, this wasn't the healthiest way to live, and by the end of my two year contract I had ballooned from 195 to 235 lbs. 

It was the heaviest I'd ever weighed, but also was easily the worst I'd ever felt.  I'd lose my breath climbing a set of stairs.  I was having knee and back problems.  I was approaching middle-age, and could feel my carefree youth slipping away one soda at a time, so I decided to do something about it.  I didn't want to be the guy with the beer gut and jowls any more than I wanted to admit that I couldn't play 4 hours of pickup basketball anymore.  I joined a gym where I decided I was going to work out one hour a day (half hour on weights and half hour on the elliptical machines).  I decided I wasn't going to do anything too crazy or "fad-ish".  I didn't diet or track my exercise regime in a little book.  Aside from working out, I gave up fast food and I stopped taking second helpings of what I ate at home.  The weight came off.  I blew right past 195 and eventually hit 180 (although that was unsustainable and I've leveled off around 185).

All of that is nice, I know, but what does any of that have to do with the Mudder-A-Month project?  The answer to that question lies in my need to stay motivated, and an hour a day at the gym can get pretty repetitive.  I started to look for physical challenges that I could train for.  I'm not a huge fan of running for running's sake, so I couldn't see myself being a marathoner or a half-marathoner, so those kinds of things were out.  Then I read an ESPN article about the Tough Mudder, an approximately 12-mile obstacle course based on British Special Forces training.  The thing that was most appealing was that it wasn't a competitive race, rather, it focused on collaboration - helping others and being helped by others.  Additionally, the Tough Mudder organization is dedicated to raising money for the Wounded Warrior program.  All of these elements were very appealing to me, and as someone who will always see himself as a 16-year old boy at heart, the thought of running around in the mud all day sounded like great fun.

I decided I was going to run my first Tough Mudder at Wintergreen in October of 2011.  I talked a friend into doing it with me, and he talked another friend into doing it with us.  None of us really knew what to expect, but we were all willing to give it a shot.  We arrived at the course on a supremely cold morning, prepared for the worst.  Adjectives are difficult to find to describe what we went through that day.  The course was challenging.  The mud, water and ice was teeth-chatteringly frigid.  The hills were hellacious.  And I loved every muddy, cold, sweaty minute of it.  As soon as I finished, I knew that I was hooked.  I ran my second Tough Mudder in March of 2012 at Pocono PA, and my third will be in South Carolina in October of 2012.  In 2013, I will run between four and six Tough Mudders, and in 2014 I will be ready to tackle my "Mudder-A-Month" challenge.

What does the Mudder-A-Month Challenge entail?

During 2014, I will run in one Tough Mudder each month.  The entire thing will be blogged and podcasted, and will be undertaken to raise awareness of, and funds for, the Wounded Warrior project.  The blogging and podcasting elements will follow my training, travel, race-day, and recovery periods.  This will be undertaken as a solo affair, but as each Tough Mudder can be tackled as a team, I wish to invite anyone who would like to run a Tough Mudder with me to join the Mudder-A-Month team. 

Details about how you can participate and/or donate will be forthcoming.