“Catch a moon rabbit.” – Stephen King
For those of you who haven’t read Eyes of the Dragon, the context is one of the later characters and one of the main characters racing back on a sled dog team. That quote is what’s said to the lead dog — it’ll make sense shortly…
After the painful crab walk in Chicago, I started trying to figure out World’s Toughest Mudder (WTM). This included going down the rabbit hole of all the details around the race. One of which showed that I needed to also do an Infinity (8 hour) race before WTM.
So in very short form, I started trying to find guides and how to get between Pittsburgh and Cooper’s Lake. As painful as the Chicago crab walk had been, it did have a silver lining (as I had mentioned in the last blog). Several people from Chicago who were in the Pittsburgh area saw me struggling through it, unwilling to quit. So when I asked for guides and help, many were willing to do so. Also, a friend of a friend (Jenny) volunteered to be a Sherpa.
Going into the race, I was under the impression that I only had to do two loops to obtain the minimum 13 miles. Even though it’s listed as 15K and 5K, the 5K loop has been 3.5 miles of prior races. So I didn’t see too much problem for them to add .1 for the 15K loop. However, pre-race, we were told that it was strick Kilometer to Miles conversion, so you really needed 2 5K loops after the initial 15K loop for it to count.
Also prior to the race, several of those helping me (both of the official guides and one of the support crew) said they were planning to race in costume the following day. This led to one of them (Ben) deciding to do the Infinity race in costume, to which I said ‘come dressed as a guide dog’. While he didn’t have that costume, at least both Brittany and Rob were (ears, tail, etc.)
** LOOP 1 – 15K **
After Sean’s normal pump-up (video is on IG at @nocrappyexcuses), we were off. Before arriving at the first obstacle, we had to go through creeks and ravines.
When we arrived at Kiss of Mud, Rob and Brittany helped with the positioning so I could get under the barbed wire fence. They and at least one of the support crew from the side helped with positioning so that I wouldn’t have the fence. While this crawl was far more mud that Chicago 2024, it was still far less rocky than Chicago 2023 had been.
After more running through creeks and ravines, we next arrived at Skidmarked. While I didn’t realize it from the pre-race descriptions, this was the obstacle I ran into significant issues with at Chicago 2023. That was because I messed up with the leg positioning at the top (as I did with Pyramid Scheme at Chicago 2024). This time, I had a harness and rope along with the knowledge of what I needed to do to not screw it up from the top. Even with all of that, I still almost screwed it up — but made it work.
Next up was the first Devil’s Beard of the course. Having the group with helped to make it through the obstacle.
Next up was an obstacle that I intended to bypass for safety reasons and complete “alternate” penalty for. I had fallen twice at Chicago 2023, so I didn’t want to chance falling again. But Ryan helped to “persuade” me into at least trying it. And while it wasn’t great or pretty, we did make it over with the harness and rope.
Next up was the Block Ness Monster, which is a fun water obstacle. It’s also a great opportunity to get some of the mud off. With the help of others, we were able to get the blocks turning and over both.
After Block Ness was a Mud Mile that was more challenging than RTM Chicago had been. This was because the pits seemed deeper and the water level was lower. Also, unlike RTM Chicago, there weren’t ropes within the pits to help you climb out. It took all of the group and others to help get through the obstacle.
After Mud Mile, the course split and we headed towards the woods. But before getting there, we encountered Laying Pipe. This was a holding and swinging obstacle. While I tried a couple of times, I just couldn’t get it to work, so I had to give up a penalty bracelet.
For safety reasons, my guides were told race morning for us to skip the next obstacle (Texas Hold Em). So we headed into the woods and “concrete mud”.
What I mean by that is the path through the woods was a 4×4 trail, which had ruts to begin with. It had been raining overnight, so it was a solid, muddy mess for about 4.5 – 5 miles, with obstacles put in. There were a couple of points where it tried to suck my shoes off. There was also one point where we needed the rope to get over a slippery mud slope/hill.
In the middle of the concrete mud, the first obstacle we encountered was Cry Baby. This was a 20 ft crawl through a pipe filled with methan gas. While that would have been challenging enough, the ground which you had to crawl over was littered with sharp rocks. Honestly, the crawl was several times worse than the actual gas.
The next obstacle we encountered in the mud was Hero Carry. As this was not possible due to my / size, we had to go with the “alternate” option.
Next up was Pitfall, which was a watery pit that then had holes within it. Prior to the race, we had decided that one of the guides would go in front to find the holes and be able to guide me through them. That worked out fairly well…
The next obstacle was Just the Tips. As with Laying Pipe, this one was a no-go, and cost another penalty bracelet.
The next obstacle up was Electric Eel. At RTM Chicago, I had gotten shocked a couple of times when I had more flexibility in my lower body. With how the legs were at that point, I believed I could get shocked several more times (far more painful in water), so I opted to give up the penalty breacelet.
The next obstacle was Hangin’ Tough, another upper body/swinging obstacle. After the experience on Laying Pipe, I had to give up the peanlty bracelet.
The next obstacle was Ladder to Hell, a climbing obstacle. With the guidance of the guides, I was able to find a safe path over and up and we continued on.
The next obstacle up was Funky Monkey. This is one which I will always have to skip for safety reasons. While I know I’ll get better with the stable swings (pipes / rings / bars) over time, trying to judge a rotating set of bars with the vision I have is a no-go. I did give up the penalty bracelet here.
As we finally came out of the mud somewhere between 8.5 and 9, Brittany saw Lumberjacked and the grassy area around it. Jenny was also in that area. While I don’t remember if it was before or after Lumberjacked, she told us that the plane had been delayed by 55 minutes at that point. In 40 years of flying, that has been the one and only time that I’ve ever been excited to hear about a delay! It also gave us a little breathing room to get the third loop in.
Out of the 4×4 tracks, the first obstacle was Lumberjacked — essentially two 8-10 foot sawhorses. The guides and others on course helped me to get up and other both of them.
Next up was Everest, which I have continually had issues with. This was the obstacle in Chicago that led to the crab walk. I did have to give up a penalty bracelet here.
Up next was Arctic Enema into a second Devil’s Beard. Going into the race, I had put on a set of Under Armour because it was colder in the morning. Having that paid off extremely well during the rounds of Arctic Enema — especially as they kept adding ice into it. Once through and up, we completed a second Devil’s Beard like the first.
The last obstacle was Electroshock Therapy, and I gave up a penalty bracelet.
After getting through the penalties and getting some fuel in, we headed out for the 5K loops.
** Loops 2 and 3 – 5K **
Loops 2 and 3 are very similar to loop 1. The obstacle list went from Mud Mile into Lumberjacked for the 5K (skipping everything mentioned between).
I did have to go with the “alternate” penalties and giving up penalty bracelets more on these 5K laps. The most notable thing from these laps was Mudderhorn on the first 5K lap.
When we arrived at it, my left leg was having problems getting “lift”. But I still went up onto the slick wall and into the cargo net. When I got onto the net, I started having trouble going up. I was concerned that I would fall, so I started trying to come down. But with the slide wall, there wasn’t any real way to get down. So for about 5-10 minutes, I played pickle on the obstacle — stuck between wanting to go down and up. I did finally find a walk to work through the pain, and with help from the guides, made it over. But it was a struggle.
Also, when we made it to the split and went into those woods, I was told a 3 mile sign was at the apex of the 180. However, it was far more than .1 mile (528 feet) between that sign and the finish.
As we were doing the 5K loops, Jenny helped tremendously by keeping track of the time for us. This helped with knowing where and when to really push. WIth the penalties after the 3rd loop, we still finished with twenty minutes to spare.
As I was changing, all of the emotions hit me. It was nice to have that semi-privacy to let go of everything that I’d had pent up over the last two laps. I was so tense about trying to get through those 2 5K laps and obstacles in roughly 3h 20m.
Thank you to Rob, Brittany, Ryan, Ben, Steven, and so many others on course for their help. Thank you to Dan, Scott, Ben (Spartan), and Joan for their help behind the scenes. And thank you to Jenny and Dan for their hospitality and to Jenny for being a super Sherpa. 🙂
With both the Infinity and Toughest checked off, the final step to obtain a Holy Grail is WTM.
