Survival

Problem one, I’ve left my shorts at work, so I borrow a pair from L, they’re not girlie ones thankfully. Problem two, what trainers to wear? Old ones I reckon, I’m not dipping my decent ones in the Trent.

Shoes decided upon, I strap my timing chip to them, which is supposed to go through the laces but as I have elastic triathlon ones, I have to use a second lace to tie it on. Hope it’s secure; I don’t want to lose it in the river.

L cycles off to find a good spot to spectate. She seems to be more hyped up about this event than I am. She did want to do it herself but couldn’t find anyone mad enough to do it with her. Of course she wouldn’t have been on her own because our team would have been there but she reckoned she didn’t want to do it with a bunch of ‘golden boys’. Whoever they are. I don’t think we have any of their records.

I drive down to the start and rendezvous with my two team mates from work and 2,500 other nutters. The rain has stopped and the sun has even come out, thankfully there doesn't appear to be any ice on the Trent. We are in wave number 5, the suitably named black wave, at 11am.

Just as we are called to assemble for our start the first runner from the initial 10am wave returns, practically vaulting up the eight foot high ‘Wall Of Fame’ as if it wasn’t there and finishes in a time of 48 minutes. Wow.

Now we’re on the start line with the announcer telling us we’ll get wet, we’ll get muddy but we’ll have fun. Hmmmm. Then we’re requested to perform the jigs that they call a warm-up. They tell us to do star jumps and press ups, but as we’re all stood shoulder to shoulder with our fellow competitors, that’s not really practical. Injuring a comrade with a star jump wouldn’t be good form in a race where they advise you to enlist the help of others to get over some of the obstacles.

Well here we go, the Survival Of The Fittest 10k 2009. We leg it to try and get to the front, where there’s less congestion for the first obstacle, the Haybale Scramble, a 3 metre high wall of haybales. Once up and over we reassemble as a team and run off up the road to the next challenge which is a mini assault course just outside the City Ground. I can’t get over one of the solid walls they’ve put there, until the required technique, a sideways swing of the legs rather than approaching it head on, dawns on me. Once over, I discover the others have pushed on without me and I have to sprint to catch them up.



So I’m totally out of breath by the time we get to the outskirts of the Holme Pierrepont Water Sports Centre, where a more serious assault course presents itself. Cargo nets, a rope swing, the dreaded monkey bars that I’m not very good at and the infamous mud crawl, which isn’t as bad as I expected. Seems they hadn’t dug the deep pit of mud I had pictured in my nightmares, all the same the white t-shirt will now need a wash.

... and it’s about to get one as a grinning marshal hands me a life jacket and points the way to the River Trent. Oh dear, it’s the Lake Traverse. Yet without a word of protest, we all follow each other like a line of sheep heading into the sheep dip. No one seems to have been put off by the cyanide poisoning reported in River Trent in Staffordshire. I haven’t had chance to check which way the Trent flows and now it’s too late.

Another marshal assures us she’s warmed the water for us and even put bubble bath in it. Needless to say it’s bloody cold and about chest deep. The bubbles may just have been someone going under. They said at the start that there was an alternative route for non-swimmers and I thought they might suddenly be presented with more volunteers for that than they'd expected but I don’t see anyone duck out. Not that I saw an alternative route either.

I haul myself across on one of the ropes provided and then clamber up the muddy bank opposite. T-shirt clean again. Then I slip and go down head first in the mud. T-shirt dirty again. Not to worry I sense there’s another dip in the river to come.

Yep, next up it’s the water slide. There’s a quite a bottleneck here, which ruins the possibility of a fast time but offer the chance to get your breath back after the iciness of the water.

My turn on the slide comes around and I’m quickly returned to the icy water, aided by a fireman’s hose. Weeeee... oh shit, I’m going to hit the water sideways on.

Once I get myself upright again I realise that this river crossing is deeper, much deeper, than the first one. I can’t touch the bottom at all and there’s no ropes this time. So there’s no option other than to swim for it. Front crawl is out of the question in a life jacket so breast stroke it is.

When I reach land, I discover that alas it’s only an island, just a brief stopping off point, to realise how wet and cold you are, before plunging back in the water and engaging in more swimming across to the other bank. It’s so cold I’m struggling to catch my breath and swallowing mouthfuls of what is probably cyanide. Then thankfully I’m in sight of the bank but just as I’m about to grab hold of dry(ish) land, a waiting fireman gives me full bore of his fire hose in the face, pushing me back into the water. Funny... not.



So well soaked once more, we finally beat a retreat from the Watersports Centre, overtaking loads as my managing director, the non-runner of the three of us, sets a ferocious pace. All these girls in wet t-shirts and no time to look.



The Urbane Jungle takes us through cars, as in, in the through the rear windscreen, out through the front windscreen. The Construction Site takes us around cones and over scaffolding, one of which clouts me on the shin, offering up the prospect of a tasty bruise tomorrow. Then over the back of a black cab in to the Parkour Zone, through the skate park. Then we run through into a field where the option is down on your hands and knees through more water in a drainage tunnel or press-ups if you prefer, because the queues for the tunnel are so long. It would be silly to refuse a crawl through sewage would it?

Next stop a giant inflatable, which you need a bunk up to get inside and then once inside you discover there’s no way out, without help. I imagine the last man in is still there.

The penultimate obstacle is a simple run up and down the steps of the City Ground, accompanied by cries of ‘You Reds’ from the deluded few, not from us you understand. It's not too taxing, in the days of terracing this might have been more strenuous. I try to wipe the sweat from my eyes, yep despite the subzero water temperature I've now broken sweat, but can't find a clean patch of t-shirt to use.

Then a final blast along the embankment to complete the 10k course, passing the 11k marker on the way...

So just the eight foot high ‘Wall Of Fame’ to get over. Not a problem. Plenty of folk on hand for a bunk up.

We managed it in 1:17 and were 630ish out of 2,500. So not bad. If you take away the ten minutes of queuing we had, it looks even better. Was it fun? Of course. L though, doesn’t seem too keen to congratulate me with a snog, something to do with some dung hanging from my ear. Home for a hot bath I think.

Tonight for tea... pasta again. There’s far too much athleticism going on in our house this weekend and L’s got the little matter of the Birmingham Half Marathon tomorrow. Despite her event, she fancies a beer so we take the boys down the local for a couple.

While there we find out that the beer festival didn’t make it to Saturday night and was closed to customers by around 6pm, they’d run out of beer. Bet that didn’t go down well.