This one is called Leap of Faith or, as this fella will soon find out, Plunge into Abyss!!!

I arrived at the first obstacle.

What greeted me was one big pool of dense, black mud with a giant fishing net hanging low above it, leaving just enough room for people to crawl underneath. So I did, on all fours at first, then completely on my front, worming across with my face just half an inch above the slimy bog. Unfortunately, the attempt to keep my face clean was thwarted by the person in front of me whose wiggling motion was spraying the black stuff all over my head. When I finally emerged from the crawl, I felt like the Tim Robbins character from Shawshank Redemption when he escaped from the prison. But instead of covered in human shit with little bit of mud mixed in, I was covered in mud with a little bit of cow shit mixed in.

And that was how my inaugural Tough Mudder race began two weeks ago, on a windy, cloudy Sunday, somewhere between Timbuktu and Wherethefuck, 2 hours outside of Sydney, surrounded by trees, bush, mud and more mud. Continue reading →