Prep went well. I showed up on race day reasonably well rested. I had a cup of tea at 7 AM when we walked over and a Larabar at 8 AM prior to a 8:40 start. I did my hip hammy flow, pushed/pulled the sleds, took a couple of steps with the sandbag and finally a couple hundred meters on the ski erg and row erg.
Out of the gate, I waited for the field to take off and then settled into an easy run. My plan was 7:30 splits and I ended up averaging 8:20
7:46
7:02
7:13
7:30
9:15 (stopped to pee ~2 min)
7:58
8:28
11:16 (post sandbag lunges, walked)
Ski Erg plan - plan 6, finished in 5:47
Sled Push - plan 8, finished in 3:39 (this felt great)
Sled Pull - plan 8, finished in 6:11 (not bad)
Burpee Broad Jumps - planned 15, finished in 10:44
Row - plan 6, finished in 6:30
Farmers Carry - planned 4, finished in 3:09
Lunges - planned 12, finished in 11:14
Wall Balls - planned 10, finished in 10:11
Rox Zone - Plan 8:00 (actual 11:33)
It was actually an amazingly well executed race plan. Aside from some early spikes in the 150s-160's, my heart rate stayed safely in the 140's or lower. The stations went incredibly smoothly until the sandbag lunges. My right hamstring started to lock up and the left hamstring was not far behind. I would take a step, take a few breaths and repeat. I walked the last run and was fortunate to get through the wall balls as planned as a 10 minute EMOM.
Per preliminary data, I was 36th among 50-54 year old open men and there were at least 64 athletes in the field.
Post race, my legs were absolutely shot. I tried walking, stretching, holding them in the air against a wall and nothing was helping. I did some serious damage to my hamstrings. Swimming on Monday helped a little and by the time I flew home Tuesday, they were just normal sore.
