Sundried Ambassador Emma Vincent Conquers Nuclear Races
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At the end of 2016 a good friend of mine, Lisa, asked me if I wanted to go to a taster session of a Muddy Obstacle Course Run. At the time, the thought of running through woodland, jumping over tall walls, and crawling through muddy ditches didn’t appeal to me one bit. People did this for fun? After a few times of Lisa asking me to take part in an OCR event, I made the loose promise that I would sign up to the first one of 2017. I didn’t realise Lisa took me seriously and held me to my promise as she booked me onto Nuclear Races Rush in May 2017. This was a 12k run complete with over 100 obstacles. 12k?! I hadn’t run in about 10 years and the last time I went for a run I couldn’t even complete 5k without stopping. Weights are my thing, not running!
I decided one of my new year’s resolutions was to get running again. I dusted off my running trainers and every Monday morning decided to start running at least 5k. It took a while to get back into it, but having Nuclear in mind I knew I wasn’t going to quit this time. Within a few weeks, I started to increase the miles on the road and managed to run 10 miles. The running was no longer the issue.
I have never been able to do monkey bars or climb over walls. Despite having a good level of strength, my upper body was a lot weaker than my legs. In April, a month before the race, Lisa booked us and 8 others into a private session of the PT Barn. A unique training venue filled with monkey bars and rigs and they specialise in helping you with your technique for such events. After the 2 hour private session I had conquered monkey bars, turns out my lats are stronger than I once thought! The walls were still an issue but I knew on the day there would be people helping me get over any obstacles I needed help with.
13th May – the day had arrived. The nerves kicked in as soon as we arrived at the site. I signed in and picked up my timing chip. I was part of a team of 12 people, and I was the only newbie. During the warm up it started raining, oh great that’s all I need, until I realised I was about to be throwing myself in lakes and mud so a bit of rain really isn’t going to make an issue. During the course, I had been over walls (by climbing on people to get over them), crawling through muddy bogs, riding zip wires into the lake and even managed to throw myself down the death slide. When I ran through the finish line and was presented with my finishers medal I was relived it was over, but also pleased with what I had accomplished. I enjoyed every minute of it! It's surprising how many fears you accomplish when you do an event like this.
It was then I become part of the Mudd Queens. An online community of likeminded females who devote their time to entering and training for these events. Everyone offers tips and hints on what to wear on race day, down to training. The encouragement you get from these legends is unbelievable and I am proud to be a part of the team. They post up about events they are doing and it makes me want to do more and sign up too!
It’s down to the Mudd Queens that I have found a new love for OCR events and running. My OCR events calendar is now filled Nuclear Blast, Nuclear Blackout, Only Fools Ride Horses (Blast and Blackout both on 16th September and Only Fools Ride Horses on 17th September – again what was I thinking?!) and Nuclear Fallout to finish out the year. In terms of running I have a 5-mile charity run this year and 2 half marathons next year.
It’s great to be able to tell my clients about the events I am doing and I have even managed to persuade a few of them to come on a few runs with me too!
I would encourage anyone who is thinking of doing an OCR to sign up – it’s definitely worth the mud, water and bruises!
