HELL RUN: "Super Hell" course, 6.85 miles,20 obstacles
Saturday morning we drove to Smithville, which is about an hour outside of Austin. We were signed up for the 10:30 wave of Hell Run, but packet pick up was on race day so we got there about an hour early. The course was located on a ranch in the middle of nowhere, so parking was in a huge field. We got in quickly, picked up our race packets without hassle and started checking out the other runners.
We had tossed around the idea of running in costume, but since this was our first obstacle course, we weren't sure to expect. Knowing that we'd end up in mud, we went with all black. Ooooohhh... wait, maybe I'll call us ninja's. (why didn't I think of that before?)
One of the fun things about Hell Run is that when you register you can plug your name into a "Super Hero name generator" and have that printed on your bib. This is what it came up with for Charles.
While people watching I noticed a PIMP, full out suit, even a chest hair piece. He was workin' it!
We got in the corral for our start when I saw these shirts
Cracked me up,totally need to steal the idea! We started chatting with them (a group of soldiers) and then I noticed the front of their shirts:front of shirt
Soon it was time to go. Charles and I planned on being conservative at the start, this was all about fun for us.So off we went, pretty quickly we were confronted with some crazy,muddy hills. I saw several peoples shoes pulled off in that mud and we hadn't even made it a quarter mile yet.
The most extreme thing about Hell Run were the insane hills and terrain. It was really rough out there, through the woods, and I kept an inner monologue of "don't trip,don't trip,don't trip".
We passed a few mud sections, and some walls we had to hoist ourselves over.
The hardest obstacle was found on the Super Course. They were the "LiveStrong" walls. There were two of them back to back, they were 8 ft tall.
Knowing they would be difficult,especially with mud-caked shoes, Charles decided to try to give me a boost with the first one. It didnt work out so well, I somehow fell off the top of it. An 8 ft fall, onto my back. It completely knocked the breath out of me, and about scared the pants off the guy next to me. For a split second I thought I wouldn't be able to move, but when faced with the fear of someone landing on my head I found I could scoot out of the way. I took a second to collect myself, realized nothing was broken, and decided to forge on.
I climbed the second 8ft wall alone and off we went. I looked down and saw my hand was bleeding. Soon it was dripping blood to my elbow, we hit a sand bunker with barbed wire. Crawling through the dirt helped clot the blood. I was SUPER excited and told Charles, "YES! We're only 2 miles in and I'm already bleeding, this is AWESOME!"
He thinks I'm crazy.
Mid-way through the course we rocked out to a KISS tribute band as we gulped water, then charged over hay bales that were stacked 12+feet tall. We also ducked through tunnels, more mud, and climbed over old rusted cars.cars
Towards the end of the course we had another tall wall to climb, this time it was slotted and much easier.
Directly following that wall was a stock tank, let me tell you: You could smell that thing a mile away. Nasty.
Here is my Pimp friend in the water,he stayed in costume the whole way (minus the chest hair piece,we passed that on the ground at mile one):
We ran through some tactical tires and sprinted to the finish where we (finally) jumped over flames. (The finish line pics haven't posted yet,I'll put them up as soon as I get them)
After the finish we collected our medals and grabbed a beer. Well, they called it "beer" but in reality it was a Michelob Ultra.
After some of the mud was rinsed off in that nasty tank, I took stock of my hand wound... .and had to laugh. My "hardcore" wound was a tiny little scratch.
That doesn't make me any less of a super hero though...
(capes were part of our swag) And of course super hero's have super kids
We had a lot of fun chatting with people at the finish line party.
I spotted this Speedo Guy aka "Big Poppa" early on, he said running in the near nude makes him faster.
Apparently the Easter Bunny runs in his spare time
And I ran into fellow blogger Super Quix
Captain America hadn't ran yet, curious to see how his muscles held up in that stock tank. Float or sink?
Caveman
And some cute chicks
Before we left, we showered off.
Nike Re-Use a Shoe
When I got home, I found lots of bruises, cuts and abrasions. We were super sore and smelled terrible, but it was totally worth it!
PROS: tough course, lots of hills, rough terrain, LiveStrong Wall very hard,well organized,easy parking,fast moving lines at packet pick up,great swag,on course music great
CONS: not muddy enough, barbed wire not low enough for my taste(basically,obstacles couldve been harder),showers/shoe drop location wasn't by exit,not enough live music at end,not many vendors
Overall I was impressed with HELL RUN enough to say I'm looking forward to doing it again next year.
And in the mean time, I'll be sporting this cape.
