On Saturday 21/5/16 I ran Tough Mudder, now I’ll share my thoughts on it. The venue where it took place was very scenic and probably would be a nice place to visit if you weren’t there to get filthy and exhausted. One thing I’ll say now is, as good as the venue was maybe it’s not a great idea to pick one that has only one way in and out, on the way out it wasn’t so bad as people get spread out in the waves, but on the way in it took over half an hour to travel the final 100 yards or so and on to where we parked up.

Once on site though you start to see why Tough Mudder has such a big price tag. Lots of sign posting and things setup for runners and spectators, like a live stream of different areas of the course. The event village seemed a lot busier than at other events I’ve been to, granted this is the biggest obstacle course run I’ve done so far, but there seemed to be a lot more available for spectators to do. The after race rinse stations were more substantial than others that I’ve used in the past. Adding everything you begin to get an idea of why it’s one of the more expensive events available, but I got the impression that you got what you paid for.

The run itself was good fun and the obstacles all offered a decent variety of challenges, a lot of them required teamwork, which seems to be the biggest pull to Tough Mudder, the main aim is to work with others and have fun doing it, hence the other big attraction to this event, the atmosphere, pretty much everyone is in good spirits and happy to talk with and help out others along the way. Everyone was willing to help each other over obstacles and support each other if they appeared to be flagging.

A far as difficulty is concerned I would say it was tough in parts, the obstacles that require any kind of upper body strength are always a challenge because it’s something I still need to work on, things like the walls and the monkey bars I was rubbish at, though I did enjoy king of the swingers, basically something you had to swing out on in order to try and ring a bell, even though I was rubbish at it, I’m just going to blame my fear of heights for that. Other obstacles I enjoyed were the cage crawl , where you floated on your back in fairly deep water and pulled you self along on a cage above your head. Of course the obstacles are another big cost for this particular event as they all appear to well built and sturdy, although some did get slippy when wet or muddy which added an extra challenge.

All in all it was good fun, I enjoyed most of the obstacles (that weren’t too high off the ground), the running was great, we went through some decent scenery and terrain. The facilities were fairly good and the event village was packed out with stuff. The obstacles were good. Could have done with better access to the site and the running sections could have been a bit harder. Would I do another one? Maybe I wouldn’t rush to do another, it wasn’t tough enough to justify the price or it being called Tough Mudder, that being said the atmosphere was good and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Anyway, Bring on The Pain and Suffering at the end of June!