Approaching Each Obstacle: Part 2

This is a follow-up post to Part 1. As with Part 1, I'll be a bit more specific about my approach to the obstacles that a Mudder might include.  In this case, I'll take the obstacles as they happened in Society Hill, SC last October.  I'll describe each obstacle, give my impressions, and then define my approach to that particular one.

Official Course Map from Toughmudder.com

1. Log Jammin': This obstacle is made up of a series of log walls that you have to navigate.  The walls themselves are high, but they are staggered so you have to do some crawling.  The intention is to get you to climb over one wall, then go under the next, then climb, then crawl, etc.  If it's busy, and lots of people are going through, then you'll have to suck it up and do the climbs and crawls, but there is another way if the challenge isn't all that busy.  I'll do pretty much anything I can to avoid crawling (if I can), since I hate getting my knees and legs all scratched up, so my method for this obstacle is to climb over the walls, and then lay down and roll under the crawling walls.  This works pretty well if there aren't many people there, but you should be careful to look at the ground where you'll be rolling.  I actually got a pretty big rock to the lower back on this obstacle in SC, so be careful.
2. Mud Mile: This tends to be a large open pit filled with mud.  In SC it was a little bit different, but not so much so that it makes a difference.  The key is to just keep moving (you'll want to make sure that you have your shoes tied on tight though).  I will say, the SC mudder was the muddiest mudder we've participated in, and it really showed up on this event.  I had a blast getting into the mud and slogging my way through.
3. Dong Dangler: This event requires you to get across from a stand on one side of the water to the other shore climbing across a wire strung between two locations.  I've seen two ways to do this.  The first is to hang below the wire and shimmy hand over hand.  The second is to balance on top of the wire and pull yourself across.  The first option requires a good amount of upper body strength as your entire weight is suspended and all of the effort is put into moving the shoulders and holding on with your hands.  The second requires you to straddle the wire with one leg hooked on.  The SC mudder was the first that I attended that actually had this obstacle, so we went with option number one.  Needless to say, it didn't go very well.  We all made it a good distance across during our first lap, but barely made it any of the way on the second lap when upper body strength was gone.  I vividly remember thinking "just get past the rocks at the starting point so you can let go and fall into the water".  Prepare to get wet, though, because I didn't see many people making it all the way across.
4. Underwater Tunnels: This is a little misleading, because there aren't actually any tunnels involved.  Rather, you have to swim out to a series of barrels floating on the surface of the water (don't worry, they're tethered in place) and then go under them in sequence.  It's not too tough, but if you're not a good swimmer, then you may want to skip this because the water is deep enough that you'll have to swim.  The key for me was using my hands to hold on to the braces holding the barrels in place and use them to pull my way.
5. Kiss of Mud #2: Same as Part 1, but it's much more likely that the crowd will have thinned out a bit by now so rolling should be possible. 
6. King of the Mountain: This was more fun that I thought it would be.  It's a series of two "mountains" made out of hay bales.  Each side was stepped, so you can climb, but my approach was to lift with my arms and then twist so that I ended up sitting on the edge of the bale.  Then I would get up and do it again with the next step.  Going down the other side was a pretty simple slide from one level to the next.  The final part of the obstacle was the large roll of hay (maybe 5 feet tall) that you had to climb across.  They gave us plenty of room to get a running start, so it wasn't too difficult to jump, grab on and pull yourself over, but one of our team members (none of the authors of this blog) was so beat by the time he got here that he couldn't get over and an un-named mudder got down on hands and knees to let him step up on his back.  Talk about taking one for the team...
7. Hangin' Tough: The Rings Obstacle.  If you are of a certain age, you'll remember having to navigate the rings in gym class.  This is basically the same thing, just over water.  There are about five or six rings hanging down from a wooden structure, and you have to swing from one to the next to make it across.  I've seen people actually put their whole arm up to the elbow into the rings and hold on that way, but we chose the simpler grab with the hand approach.  Brian made it across during the first lap (although he did lose his balance on the other side and fell into the water, so I only give him partial credit), and he saved a dude's life on this obstacle during the second lap.  Since neither Danny or I made it across in either lap, Brian is the unequivocal winner of this obstacle for SC.
8. Funky Monkey: This is the bane of my existence, and there is visual evidence of my failure.  It sounds easy enough...monkey bars in a slight inverted V shape.  You get from one edge to the other without falling in the water.  The first mudder we did in Wintergreen had this, and I missed a bar and fell pretty quickly.  The second mudder in Pocono I made it to the very last bar, which I missed and fell.  As disappointing as that was, I was horrified to see my failure advertised in the official Facebook pictures of the Saturday Pocono mudder (I'd link to it, but the memory is too painful).  Imagine hoping that your picture would be one of the chosen ones to be included in the official set of Facebook photos, and then seeing that the chosen image is actually of your biggest failure.  Unfortunately, SC didn't go much better.  I actually made it most of the way across, but a guy next to me was swinging pretty badly and caught my leg (throwing me off stride).  I have yet to make it all the way from landing to landing, but I absolutely plan on crushing this event in Miami.
9. Boa Constrictor: A set of tube tunnels that you have to get through.  The first ones are angled downward towards a pit of water, and the second set are angled up from that pit.  The ones going down are pretty easy...get in, and you can almost slide down.  The ones going up are more difficult.  The tubes are too tight for most people to crawl, so you end up having to scrabble using whatever method you can to get up.  I tend to struggle on this because I try to bring my knees up.  It works, but it's slow going.  I know other people who go up on their sides or on their backs, but I've never been able to master that.  In SC, at least during the second lap, the mudder support crew put in place ropes on some of the inclined tubes so you could pull yourself up, but that seems a little too much like cheating for me so we didn't use them.
10. Everest: The quarter-pipe that you have to climb.  I've seen two distinct approaches to this.  The first, which most people employ, is running and grabbing for someone's hand.  The second, which is used when people are having real difficulty or are in special need, is that a group of people will lay down on the quarter-pipe to create a makeshift ladder that people can climb.  I've come to realize that the key to this is that you need to run through the obstacle.  Don't run to the goal...run through the goal.  Don't run just enough to get to the hands (or the support 2X4 along the edge).  If you run just to reach those, you'll probably fall short.  The key is to run through those things.  Don't think of reaching for a hand...keep running.  Don't just try to reach the edge...keep running.  We all made it up this obstacle both laps at SC, and it's become much less daunting.
11. Electroshock Therapy: This has been talked about before (Brian has a whole post about leadership lessons to learn from it).  The thing to realize is that you will be shocked, but you have to keep moving.  As with electric eel, the faster you move, the less the effect will slow you down.  As this is the last obstacle in every Mudder, we've gone through it in several different ways.  We've gone fast, we've gone slow.  The only thing we haven't done (yet) is to go through with your arms spread wide out.  The shocks aren't all that bad, in that they don't last long, but the will get you. If you want to minimize their effect, go fast.  If you want to savor it a bit, walk through and embrace the effects.

Anyway, that's the end of my post about how I approach the various obstacles at Mudders.  I'm not sure there's much to learn here about leadership or education, other than maybe to embrace the challenges that come your way.  Prepare for them, obviously, but embrace them regardless.  It's only by confronting them head on that you can actually succeed consistently.

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Approaching Each Obstacle: Part 1

I thought I would put together a slightly different type of post this time.  Up to this point I've focused on general issues I've confronted while either planning for or participating in a Tough Mudder event.  With this post, I'd like to be a bit more specific about my approach to the obstacles that a Mudder might include.  In this case, I'll take the obstacles as they happened in Society Hill, SC last October.  In this case, I'll describe each obstacle, give my impressions, and then define my approach to that particular one.

Official Course Map from Toughmudder.com

1. Arctic Enema:  I talked about this in an earlier post, but in short, this is an industrial-sized dumpster full of icy water.  You jump in one side and get out on the other end.  In the middle there's a wood board that forces you to duck under water to get across.  This is a pretty horrible experience if you don't like the cold.  My approach has always been to jump towards the board and use the momentum of the jump to go under it.  Once under water, I take one big swim stroke to hopefully reach the other end.  Once there, get out as quickly as possible and start running to warm up.
2. Kiss of Mud #1: The TM crew are usually pretty good about putting another obstacle within a very short distance of Arctic Enema in order to give you something else to focus on (other than being horrendously cold, that is).  In SC that was Kiss of Mud.  This obstacle asks you to get down in the mud and crawl under barbed-wire for about 50 feet.  It's not a horrible obstacle if you have upper-body strength.  If the area is relatively clear, I've seen more experienced mudders roll, but that only really works if there isn't a backlog of people trying to get through.  If you are forced to line up, there's really nothing to do except use your arms to pull yourself along.  The big issue with this is that over the course of the day (and especially into Sunday), the mud will get carried away as people go through.  This usually leaves pretty rocky grooves where people have crawled.  This is absolute murder on forearms and knees, so try to get there when and where there is actual mud - it's messy, but it's much better than tearing up your arms and legs on rocks.
3. Spiders Web: This obstacle is a climbing net that's about 20 feet tall.  You climb up one side, flip a leg over and then climb down the other side.  This is much easier if the net is taut, which will usually be accomplished by people laying down and holding the net tight once they have gotten over the top and down the other side.  This really helps quite a bit, so make sure that you take your turn holding the net.  You usually don't have to do this for long, but let a couple people come over and someone will tap your shoulder to take your place. 
4. Berlin Walls #1: This obstacle is made up of two "sets" of walls that you have to climb over in quick succession.  The first ones are the shorter of the Berlin Walls.  I don't know exactly how tall they are, but I want to say that they're about 8 feet.  If you have the upper body strength, you can usually just jump and do a pullup, flip a leg over to straddle the top and then drop down on the other side.  If you don't have the upper body strength, then you'll probably need help from a couple people to lift you up using whatever method works best (I've seen some people literally climb up people's backs, but it's usually just a quick hand lift).  In my case, I usually just do the jump and pullup, but that depends entirely on where these are on the course. If they're later on, then upper-body strength may be an issue.
5. Hold Your Wood: This is usually a relatively short loop (somewhere between 1/8 to 1/2 mile, I would estimate).  You pick up a log at the beginning, carry it around the loop and drop it again at the end.  There will be longer logs if you want to carry them as a team, and shorter logs if you want to go solo.  I've done both, and the biggest piece of advice I would give is that you make sure the log is long enough if you are going to do the team option.  Three of us did this with a log that was too short, and it was even more awkward than it had to be because it was impossible to really get our steps in sync.  There are logs of all shapes and sizes, so don't worry about being picky.  I will probably try to do this solo from now on just because it's easier to manage a log without having to worry about syncing your steps, but there are plenty of people who prefer the group effort.  I've heard that the group effort is easier if each person holds the log directly above their head, but I usually just sling it on my shoulder and switch sides whenever I need to.
6. Dirty Ballerina: This is a series of ditches filled with mud that you have to jump over.  I think the ditches were maybe three or four feet across, so the jumping wasn't too hard.  As long as you can do a standing jump of that length, you shouldn't have any trouble with these.  My approach was to go to the farthest edge of the ditches and jump along that edge.  I did this because I was assuming that most people would go the shortest route possible, and if I went the longer route then the landing spots would be less worn out.  This really made a pretty big difference on the second lap in SC since most of the grass in the landing areas had been worn away by then, but if you take a few extra steps along you can find better footing.
7. Electric Eel: This is a huge pain in the butt.  This is another crawling event, but instead of through mud, you crawl through water, and instead of under barbed wire, you crawl under electrified wires.  There is no way to avoid this...you WILL get hit by electrical jolt(s).  The key is to go fast.  The quicker you get through, the sooner you'll be done.  You'll still get hit, but you'll be moving past them rather than sitting under them.  One of the most difficult things about this challenge is that people invariably try to go slow to avoid the wires.  This backs everything up, and ends up not helping them very much.  My advice: find an empty lane and go fast.
8. Trench Warfare: Here's another event that gets harder the later in the weekend you go.  In this challenge, you crawl through a trench that's been covered over with plywood so it's like you're crawling through a tunnel.  There are usually at least one bend along the length of the tunnel, so you are in pitch black for a while.  If you have claustrophobia, this is a very tough obstacle.  The reason that it gets worse over the course of the weekend is that the loose dirt gets carried away by participants and you end up with rocks jutting out that are murder on your forearms and knees.  There's really no trick to this though.  If you have the upper body strength to keep your forearms and knees off the ground, then you'll benefit, but it would be tough.
9. Walk the Plank: I touched on this obstacle on a previous post as well.  You climb up an incline to a platform about 20 or so feet above a pater pit.  Your job is to jump into the water.  This used to be a "free for all" kind of thing where people would just kind of mill about on the platform until they got the nerve - which lead to Brian's awesome backflip - but in SC they seemed to want it to move more methodically.  So they had a guy up there with us who would orchestrate everything with a countdown and all that.  I'm not sure it's a huge improvement, but it did seem to move a bit more smoothly.  The key for me is to jump as quickly after getting onto the platform as I can.  Obviously, don't push your way to the front, but if you're at all afraid of heights you want to spend as little time thinking about this as possible.  It's not a bad obstacle, unless it's really crowded.  The platform isn't all that worrisome, but you definitely want to make sure you're safe with the spot in the water you choose.  The last thing you want to do is jump on someone else.  So the lesson about not dawdling applies to those people in the water as well...get swimming towards the exit as soon as you come up.  Don't try to tread water unless you absolutely have to - you'll definitely be unhappy if someone else jumps on you.
10. Cliffhanger: This obstacle was a little different in SC from the pictures that I had seen at other events.  Normally, it's presented as a steep, muddy incline that you have to work your way up.  It was that, but it also had a cargo net laid out to help you climb.  This was definitely one of the muddier events, but it wasn't all that hard to climb.  Without the cargo net, though, I'm not sure many people would have made it up the incline.  If there's a net, use it.  If there's not, teamwork is the key...you have to fight for hand- and footholds, and take it one step at a time. Try to find a pace that works for you, but definitely keep moving.
11. Berlin Walls #2: This is the same as the earlier Berlin Walls, only taller.  I think these are 10 feet tall, which makes it more difficult to do a standing jump to grab on to the top.  There is usually a very small toehold that you can use, but it won't help you too much if you think you'll just stand on it.  In the past, we used the teamwork method to get over these two walls (that is, two guys lifting a third up).  As we got stronger, though, we found we could take a running start at the wall, use the toehold, and jump up, grab hold, do a pullup and throw a leg over.  That was usually enough to get us over.  Just be careful, these are usually pretty brutal since you've gone a good distance and you're spent by the time you get to them.  In SC they actually put them at the top of a slight incline.  It wasn't too much the first time, but the second time around we were too spent to run up the incline to the wall (this was, in fact, the only obstacle we skipped on our second lap - we did help a couple dudes over, but then we went around because we were absolutely exhausted).

Anyway, I'm in danger of making this post too long to actually be readable, so I'm going to break it up.  I realize that there's not much here in terms of lessons that are directly applicable to education or leadership, but if you haven't done a mudder yet, it's definitely worth thinking about how you would approach the obstacles involved.  I guess that's a lesson that would apply to almost any endeavor, though.

I'll do these 11 obstacles in a future post:

1. Log Jammin':
2. Mud Mile:
3. Dong Dangler:
4. Underwater Tunnels:
5. Kiss of Mud #2:
6. King of the Mountain:
7. Hangin' Tough:
8. Funky Monkey:
9. Boa Constrictor:
10. Everest:
11. Electroshock Therapy:

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