Crawling into bed at midnight, exhausted, on Friday night set the tone for the whole weekend. #2's pump had not been delivering the insulin effectively and she had had high blood sugar for most of the day. This tends to have two effects
1/ Because her body cannot process enough sugar to efficiently run the muscles and brain, she burns fat and muscle which makes her feel like she has the flu, and is irritable as a result
2/ She is annoyed because she knows the side effects of being high, and is therefore irritable.
She is also 12, going on 13, and has a propensity to be irritable. On Friday she had changed the pump's cannula and connection 2 or 3 times before bed, and I was hopeful when I checked her at midnight that it would be working properly, as I did not particularly want to wake her up and face another Defcon 1 meltdown. It was. I retired exhausted after a knackering week.
Saturday was a blast - Mrs R took #1 out for a bit of mother/daughter 1 on 1 bonding. It went well. I had #2 and #3 and a friend of #2. We walked around MC, had a massive burger (well, I did) and an ice cream (kids only) which were delicious (I tasted them to make sure they were ok for the kids to eat).
1/ Because her body cannot process enough sugar to efficiently run the muscles and brain, she burns fat and muscle which makes her feel like she has the flu, and is irritable as a result
2/ She is annoyed because she knows the side effects of being high, and is therefore irritable.
She is also 12, going on 13, and has a propensity to be irritable. On Friday she had changed the pump's cannula and connection 2 or 3 times before bed, and I was hopeful when I checked her at midnight that it would be working properly, as I did not particularly want to wake her up and face another Defcon 1 meltdown. It was. I retired exhausted after a knackering week.
Saturday was a blast - Mrs R took #1 out for a bit of mother/daughter 1 on 1 bonding. It went well. I had #2 and #3 and a friend of #2. We walked around MC, had a massive burger (well, I did) and an ice cream (kids only) which were delicious (I tasted them to make sure they were ok for the kids to eat).
On the left you have a normal burger for #2. On the right was my burger. Delicious, and washed down with a pint. Well, I was carb loading for the Spartan Race.
In the evening a group of us went to see Kylie - the show was great, although sitting down on pain of being ejected from the auditorium was weird. I rather enjoyed the costume changes, though, and it did not matter that Kylie was miming (the tell tale was when she stopped moving her lips but the singing carried on, or perhaps she is a great ventriloquist). Predictably we went on to Sass and finished at 3am. Ouch.
Fortunately the Spartan Race wave we had booked was not until 1.30pm, so I had time to sleep in until 8.30am before tea and porridge. Stu kindly drove the four of us the two hour-ish drive down to the Paul Ricard Circuit at Castellet. We discussed tactics en route, with the plan to stick together no matter what. No man would be left behind.
We arrived around noon and were greeted by the sight of people COVERED from head to foot in mud. COVERED. We were cringing away from them as we made our way to registration, as we did not want to get dirty! It was about a 1km walk to the registration from the car park, and as we got closer you could hear shouting, chanting and loud music. A great atmosphere. We were scheduled in the 1330 hrs wave, the elites had set off at 9am, and there was a steady stream of people heading to and from the start - clean and dirty. We passed a reservoir with people crossing it, looking like they were swimming but in weird jerky movements.
Registration and bag drop was a simple process. In fact the whole experience was slick and practised - car park attendants directing us according to our wave, picking up the bibs, the bag we received including the number on a headband, it was all "frictionless". After a brief stretch we headed to the start, and immediately took our positions.
To get into the start pen you had to clamber over a 6 foot wall. I was quite pleased to manage that with relative ease and not falling over and making a complete prat of myself in front of hundreds of other people! Then a warm up process led by an inspirational bloke with a microphone that included piggy back fighting, sitting on the floor and people crowd surfing, and a few burpees. The four of us in my team found ourselves face to face with a Roman legionnaire (one of a few lined up in front of us) carrying an enormous stick with 2 huge padded ends. There was a brief countdown and all of a sudden everyone behind us surged forwards pushing us into the guys with the padded sticks who were trying to push us backwards.
We burst through the Legionnaires and trotted off onto a trail. The initial path was "breaking us in gently" according to Stu. We went on a zigzag path up and down a steep bank, sometimes technical with loose stones. The field spread out a bit, and we were able to get into a gentle jogging pace. The beauty of doing it as a team was that we thought would be handy for some of the tougher obstacles. As a result we were tied to a pace at which the slowest amongst us was the most comfortable, and that was a very easy pace. We had a bit of barbed wire at mid shin height we had to crawl underneath, through some mud, as one of the first obstacles, followed swiftly by trees piled up a bit like ladders, we had to climb over, but tough because of their big girth as it was difficult to hold on to anythiung. These increased in height, and there was some help required by some to get over the tallest - about 10-12 feet high.
We then had to swim through a muddy quarry, fully clothed including trainers, and I tried not to take on board any muddy water as well as to avoid getting kicked in the head by the person in front. After that a ladder up a wall, but the first rung was at 6 foot. At the top of the 20 foot wall was a drainpipe we had to slide down like firemen, but because we were soaked the drain pipe did not slow us at all and we thumped into some straw. More mud crawling under barbed wire, then wading through a shallow river with water about knee height for 200m. We then had to climb a wall with two poles set up against it leaning at an angle. There was a technique to holding eeels. At the top was a narrow pipe which we had to slide down the inside of to land on a mat.
Onto the race track, grab a race car tyre, carry it for 300m, climb over a couple of crash barriers with it, and put it back where we started. Run 500m, grab a massive log, do a 3-400m loop with it on tough trails, then dump it where we started, and on another 500m to the monkey bars. These were quite hard as we were a bit wet, and also quite tired from the incessant obstacles. There was a runway next to the monkey bars with a Mig jet warming up its engines. Very impressive. Dom and I went together on the monkey bars and unfortunately collided which meant Dom fell. I continued to the end and unfortunately Dom was made to do the burpees - 30 of them. We waited whilst he did them and watched the Mig take off.
By this point we were down to a walk between obstacles as Tom could not manage anything more, but noone was in a massive hurry. There were walls to climb up and go under alternately. Then the lake crossing - there were wooden beams about a foot under the water every 6 or 7 feet. The water was almost pure mud, and there were heaps of people crossing the lake. It was necessary to sort of swim forwards feeling with your hands to locate the pole and then flip over it, onto the next all the while being pushed from behind and kicked from the front! Another 300m, and then disappear down an overflow pipe - bent double and in pitch black I held my hand in front to stop myself from bashing that person and could feel the hand of the person behind on my back. The pipe actually took us under the road. At some point there was a rope we had to climb up and ring the bell - I was amazed and really pleased to be able to climb that given the mud and water on me. More walls to climb, and then tractor tyres to pull and push, a weight towing loop with dips cut into the track to make sure the weights kept catching and it was necessary to jerk them out. Tractor tyres to flip up and down a hill. Then a sandbag loop of 500-600m down and then up a steep trail. This was tough - the sandbag was heavy (20-30kg?). One chap's girlfriend had a meltdown and he ended up carrying hers! People were sitting down on the trail, and one chap was being attended to by medics at the top, with heart monitor nodes attached all over his chest. Dom and I reached the top, dry mouthed, and cheered on Stu and then Tom. More jog/walking through trees and then a net to climb. The obstacles kept coming thick and fast. A weight on a rope you had to pull up to the top on a pulley and then let down slowly - for fear of burpees. Every time you missed an obstacle you had to do 30 burpees - a pressup, squat and star jump in one. Knackering.
There was some technical trail which I quite enjoyed, more barbed wire to crawl under, and then spear chucking. There were 3 hay bales lined up with a wooden spartan face to aim at. You had one go at the bale. My spear hit the face and bounced off - turns out if you lodged it in the bale that would have been ok! I had to do burpees - 30 of them, and was knackered afterwards!
I cannot remember every obstacle we did - there were ropes to help us up and down wooden planks, made harder by water spraying off the top. One of the worst ones was an almost vertical plank the other side of a wall, with a big queue of people. When my turn came I peered down the 20 foot drop. There were three ropes drilled in to it secured by a big screw at the top and the bottom. The idea was to grab the rope and gently lower yourself down. Tom went next to me and thumped down the plank into the straw at the bottom, did an undignified roll in front of a few spectators and stood up. I grabbed the rope, swung my legs over, but because the rope and plank were soaked and muddy, my hands slid down the rope at great speed, leaving plenty of skin on it, and my right butt cheek caught the screw at the bottom. No blood, thank goodness as the rope was wrapped round it, but plenty of bruising. Quite a refreshing take on health and safety!
The third to last obstacle was a really long mud crawl under barbed wire. It was packed with people, and the best way to get through was to roll side on. The sight of people covered in mud rolling along was really funny. We all got coated but I made some new friends in there! We then had to climb over a 45 degree angled wooden plank holding a rope and using our feet to climb up. They had positioned hoses on the top to make it harder. Dom got up to the top followed by me and we helped Stu and Tom over the top. It took a while! Then we had to climb a massive wall to get to the finish. I gave Tom and Dom a leg up, Stu got some help from someone else, and all of a sudden I was on my own! The wall was so big I had to jump to reach the top. I managed to get my arms over it but was so muddy that I could not get any purchase with my feet and I slowly slid down. I tried again - getting my elbows over it, but could not get the purchase needed to get over it! Stu dashed round the side and gave me a leg up, and I got over! Then we jumped over the log fire to finish off - four of us in a row, the only bit visible were our smiles! We picked up really nice finisher t shirts and snazzy medals, Coke, bananas and a sticky bun which was posted into our mud covered mouths by a volunteer.
In the evening a group of us went to see Kylie - the show was great, although sitting down on pain of being ejected from the auditorium was weird. I rather enjoyed the costume changes, though, and it did not matter that Kylie was miming (the tell tale was when she stopped moving her lips but the singing carried on, or perhaps she is a great ventriloquist). Predictably we went on to Sass and finished at 3am. Ouch.
Fortunately the Spartan Race wave we had booked was not until 1.30pm, so I had time to sleep in until 8.30am before tea and porridge. Stu kindly drove the four of us the two hour-ish drive down to the Paul Ricard Circuit at Castellet. We discussed tactics en route, with the plan to stick together no matter what. No man would be left behind.
We arrived around noon and were greeted by the sight of people COVERED from head to foot in mud. COVERED. We were cringing away from them as we made our way to registration, as we did not want to get dirty! It was about a 1km walk to the registration from the car park, and as we got closer you could hear shouting, chanting and loud music. A great atmosphere. We were scheduled in the 1330 hrs wave, the elites had set off at 9am, and there was a steady stream of people heading to and from the start - clean and dirty. We passed a reservoir with people crossing it, looking like they were swimming but in weird jerky movements.
Registration and bag drop was a simple process. In fact the whole experience was slick and practised - car park attendants directing us according to our wave, picking up the bibs, the bag we received including the number on a headband, it was all "frictionless". After a brief stretch we headed to the start, and immediately took our positions.
To get into the start pen you had to clamber over a 6 foot wall. I was quite pleased to manage that with relative ease and not falling over and making a complete prat of myself in front of hundreds of other people! Then a warm up process led by an inspirational bloke with a microphone that included piggy back fighting, sitting on the floor and people crowd surfing, and a few burpees. The four of us in my team found ourselves face to face with a Roman legionnaire (one of a few lined up in front of us) carrying an enormous stick with 2 huge padded ends. There was a brief countdown and all of a sudden everyone behind us surged forwards pushing us into the guys with the padded sticks who were trying to push us backwards.
We burst through the Legionnaires and trotted off onto a trail. The initial path was "breaking us in gently" according to Stu. We went on a zigzag path up and down a steep bank, sometimes technical with loose stones. The field spread out a bit, and we were able to get into a gentle jogging pace. The beauty of doing it as a team was that we thought would be handy for some of the tougher obstacles. As a result we were tied to a pace at which the slowest amongst us was the most comfortable, and that was a very easy pace. We had a bit of barbed wire at mid shin height we had to crawl underneath, through some mud, as one of the first obstacles, followed swiftly by trees piled up a bit like ladders, we had to climb over, but tough because of their big girth as it was difficult to hold on to anythiung. These increased in height, and there was some help required by some to get over the tallest - about 10-12 feet high.
We then had to swim through a muddy quarry, fully clothed including trainers, and I tried not to take on board any muddy water as well as to avoid getting kicked in the head by the person in front. After that a ladder up a wall, but the first rung was at 6 foot. At the top of the 20 foot wall was a drainpipe we had to slide down like firemen, but because we were soaked the drain pipe did not slow us at all and we thumped into some straw. More mud crawling under barbed wire, then wading through a shallow river with water about knee height for 200m. We then had to climb a wall with two poles set up against it leaning at an angle. There was a technique to holding eeels. At the top was a narrow pipe which we had to slide down the inside of to land on a mat.
Onto the race track, grab a race car tyre, carry it for 300m, climb over a couple of crash barriers with it, and put it back where we started. Run 500m, grab a massive log, do a 3-400m loop with it on tough trails, then dump it where we started, and on another 500m to the monkey bars. These were quite hard as we were a bit wet, and also quite tired from the incessant obstacles. There was a runway next to the monkey bars with a Mig jet warming up its engines. Very impressive. Dom and I went together on the monkey bars and unfortunately collided which meant Dom fell. I continued to the end and unfortunately Dom was made to do the burpees - 30 of them. We waited whilst he did them and watched the Mig take off.
By this point we were down to a walk between obstacles as Tom could not manage anything more, but noone was in a massive hurry. There were walls to climb up and go under alternately. Then the lake crossing - there were wooden beams about a foot under the water every 6 or 7 feet. The water was almost pure mud, and there were heaps of people crossing the lake. It was necessary to sort of swim forwards feeling with your hands to locate the pole and then flip over it, onto the next all the while being pushed from behind and kicked from the front! Another 300m, and then disappear down an overflow pipe - bent double and in pitch black I held my hand in front to stop myself from bashing that person and could feel the hand of the person behind on my back. The pipe actually took us under the road. At some point there was a rope we had to climb up and ring the bell - I was amazed and really pleased to be able to climb that given the mud and water on me. More walls to climb, and then tractor tyres to pull and push, a weight towing loop with dips cut into the track to make sure the weights kept catching and it was necessary to jerk them out. Tractor tyres to flip up and down a hill. Then a sandbag loop of 500-600m down and then up a steep trail. This was tough - the sandbag was heavy (20-30kg?). One chap's girlfriend had a meltdown and he ended up carrying hers! People were sitting down on the trail, and one chap was being attended to by medics at the top, with heart monitor nodes attached all over his chest. Dom and I reached the top, dry mouthed, and cheered on Stu and then Tom. More jog/walking through trees and then a net to climb. The obstacles kept coming thick and fast. A weight on a rope you had to pull up to the top on a pulley and then let down slowly - for fear of burpees. Every time you missed an obstacle you had to do 30 burpees - a pressup, squat and star jump in one. Knackering.
There was some technical trail which I quite enjoyed, more barbed wire to crawl under, and then spear chucking. There were 3 hay bales lined up with a wooden spartan face to aim at. You had one go at the bale. My spear hit the face and bounced off - turns out if you lodged it in the bale that would have been ok! I had to do burpees - 30 of them, and was knackered afterwards!
I cannot remember every obstacle we did - there were ropes to help us up and down wooden planks, made harder by water spraying off the top. One of the worst ones was an almost vertical plank the other side of a wall, with a big queue of people. When my turn came I peered down the 20 foot drop. There were three ropes drilled in to it secured by a big screw at the top and the bottom. The idea was to grab the rope and gently lower yourself down. Tom went next to me and thumped down the plank into the straw at the bottom, did an undignified roll in front of a few spectators and stood up. I grabbed the rope, swung my legs over, but because the rope and plank were soaked and muddy, my hands slid down the rope at great speed, leaving plenty of skin on it, and my right butt cheek caught the screw at the bottom. No blood, thank goodness as the rope was wrapped round it, but plenty of bruising. Quite a refreshing take on health and safety!
The third to last obstacle was a really long mud crawl under barbed wire. It was packed with people, and the best way to get through was to roll side on. The sight of people covered in mud rolling along was really funny. We all got coated but I made some new friends in there! We then had to climb over a 45 degree angled wooden plank holding a rope and using our feet to climb up. They had positioned hoses on the top to make it harder. Dom got up to the top followed by me and we helped Stu and Tom over the top. It took a while! Then we had to climb a massive wall to get to the finish. I gave Tom and Dom a leg up, Stu got some help from someone else, and all of a sudden I was on my own! The wall was so big I had to jump to reach the top. I managed to get my arms over it but was so muddy that I could not get any purchase with my feet and I slowly slid down. I tried again - getting my elbows over it, but could not get the purchase needed to get over it! Stu dashed round the side and gave me a leg up, and I got over! Then we jumped over the log fire to finish off - four of us in a row, the only bit visible were our smiles! We picked up really nice finisher t shirts and snazzy medals, Coke, bananas and a sticky bun which was posted into our mud covered mouths by a volunteer.
It was great fun. We took 3hrs 43 mins - not a fast time by any means to cover 13km, but the fact we did it as a team and did not leave anyone behind meant that the pace between obstacles was slower, and we waited for everyone to do burpees when necessary. Happy to have all finished, we hosed off and drove back the 2.5hr drive home with 3 wrong turns! Fortunately we had thought to pack cornish pasties and beer in an Esky.
I arrived home to the sight of Mrs R arguing with #1 about something and nothing, but was very tired and full of the experience. I had had a great day doing something completely different with my mates in the countryside, got muddy, had a jog and a swim and a fabulous workout!
It took a while to recover and in fact my ITB's seized a bit so saw the Befit physio, Naomi, to get them sorted out before getting back on the NYC marathon training regime of 25km this morning. I am also glad my shots are up to date given the amount of skin I appear to have left at Paul Ricard in return for the mud I appear to have brought back with me - and keeps appearing relentlessly, even now!
I arrived home to the sight of Mrs R arguing with #1 about something and nothing, but was very tired and full of the experience. I had had a great day doing something completely different with my mates in the countryside, got muddy, had a jog and a swim and a fabulous workout!
It took a while to recover and in fact my ITB's seized a bit so saw the Befit physio, Naomi, to get them sorted out before getting back on the NYC marathon training regime of 25km this morning. I am also glad my shots are up to date given the amount of skin I appear to have left at Paul Ricard in return for the mud I appear to have brought back with me - and keeps appearing relentlessly, even now!
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