Stronger By The Minute: Carroll Mud Run

Four of us participated in the Carroll Mud Run on Sunday, June 9th. After seeing a Facebook share of the event, I talked to two co-workers about it, emailed the race director about supervising my five-year-old in the kid's one mile event, and then Julia and I were registered!

The race director shared in enthusiastic emails that packet pick-up was going to be at Liberatore's Restaurant in Eldersburg, Tuesday through Thursday leading up to the race. Julia, Reed, and I drove out to the restaurant on Tuesday, after school to pick up race packets (seven in total!). We enjoyed half off our delicious meal, easily got our packets, and stopped for a sweet treat at Dairy Queen before heading back home.

Liberatore's owner & race helper (google images)

Yum (google images)

The four of us were getting pretty psyched for the race, even having a pre-race pow-wow in my classroom to finalize plans for Sunday morning! Meet at 7:30 am, stick together for the race, and have fun!

Pre-race photo!

Sunday morning arrived, we met at 7:30 and introduced our husbands and children and waited for the race to start! After a few last minute instructions the 5k racers were sent running on the paved path, all 20 of them. We were in the first wave for the Mud Run 5k and we were at the front of the starting line, all of a sudden we were off!!! We missed the first right turn (oops!) and had to cut through the parking lot to get back on course. The three mile course was great; bleachers, over/under obstacles, log carry, hay bale jumping, under ropes, through tunnels, in the mud (and getting hosed), spiderweb, army crawls, 8-foot wall, and little and big snakes! Whew, it was definitely not an easy Sunday jog! We were told to be prepared for hills; and yes, there were hills, lots of them. We stuck together for all of the obstacles and broke into groups of two for the running portions. Nearing the end of the race, we all grouped back together to cross the finish line as a team; totally awesome! I'm so proud of Karen and Caitlin (their first race!) and Jessica; it was the first obstacle/mud run for all of us.

google images; LOTS OF HAY

google images; Spider Web

google images, Our wall was WAY taller!

google images; we had NONE of that!!!!

We had stellar support from our husbands and little mud runners. After finishing we got some bottles of water, bagel halves and chatted on our way to prep the kids for their mud run.

Post Race Photo- see my 'shiner?'

The kids race was the first portion of the adult run, minus the log carry and little snake. Ten to 12-year-olds ran in the first wave, and the younger, non-competitive children (with their parents) ran in the second wave. L and A ran ahead, and J and I took our time hanging with each other completing obstacles together. She did amazingly well, and thoroughly embraced the mud (she did practice a bit the day before at my cousin's wedding, after all). We ran her race together and she crossed the finish line to get her medal. It was fun to see A on the course, and L apparently did a cannon ball into the mud; boys!

She loved the mud; her brother had other thoughts about it!

I'd say the race was a huge success for everyone involved. There were over 500 participants, from what I could tell from the race bibs. No major injuries; as my husband gave me explicit direction, "Do not get hurt! Don't break an ankle!" According to his standards, my black eye is acceptable; and we'll go over obstacles one at a time from now on... Oh, and it seems as if our BHES crew will be bigger next year!!! Woot Woot!

Additional photos from the race... ENJOY!