On October 13th and 14th I was able to compete in the Obstacle Course Racing World Championship in Toronto, Canada. The race was held in the Blue Mountain Village on the Blue Mountain. This was my first time out of the country and my first time competing at a race of this intensity. I ran a 3K (1.86 miles) on Friday and a 15K (9.3 miles) on Saturday. It was such a challenging and fun race.
I qualified for this event by coming in the top 50% of the Spartan Races I do. I came in first in my age group in just about every race I did this season, and I was very excited and proud to compete in Canada. I had such a strong obstacle course racing season, and I was ready for the World Championship.
The 3K did not go as planned. The way both races operated, is each racer is given a wristband, and all obstacles are mandatory. If a racer cannot complete an obstacle, they must give up their wristband. During the race, I encountered an obstacle where I had to jump on a pipe, which moved over, grab onto a wooden beam, move it back using my bodyweight, and finally reach and grab another pipe, climb up it and ring a bell (Pictured Below).
It took me many tries to complete it, because the last thing I wanted to do was give up my wristband. I wore out my grip very much during this obstacle, which ended up hurting my performance for the rest of the race.
The next obstacle I encountered was a rig where racers had to swing from ring to ring to ring to a thick handlebar, to foot rings, to low monkey bars, to a cargo net. I tried this obstacle many times before making the decision to hand in my wristband. I was stuck at this obstacle for about 2 hours. I refused to give in. After the many tries, my grip strength was worn out even more, and I did not have enough energy left to complete the other obstacles.
It was very hard accepting the fact that the 3K went horribly. I was mentally defeated, because I have never had a race go that bad before. This was probably one of my worst races of the season. After much strategizing and proper nutrition, I decided not to let the 15K course get to me.
The 15K course was incredible! It played more to my strengths, which are longer distance races and heavy carries and walls. The night before the race, I ate stir fry veggies with beef and yogurt with fruit to make sure that I had an adequate carbohydrate and protein intake. The morning the day of the race, I had oatmeal with honey and a banana and a fruit salad.
That was my post 3K and pre 15K nutrition, now it is time to get back out on the course and improve from the previous day. I started at 1:30, which is much later than I am used to. It was down pouring and the course was already well used, considering the first wave took off at 8:00. Within the first mile of the race, I could already feel that I was making a major improvement from Friday. I cruised through the barbed wire crawl and the walls and monkey bars. I encountered a sandbag carry, and I was in love. I kept powering through the race, and I encountered the pipe obstacle mentioned previously. My new strategy was to try the obstacle a couple of times, and then give up my wristband if it wasn’t going to happen. I tried this obstacle a couple of times and I gave up my wristband because my legs were so bruised from the many attempts the day before. I did not let it defeat me mentally, and I kept powering through. Another one of the obstacles was to carry a 50lb Wreckbag sandbag up the mountain. It was easily 60lbs, because it was raining the entire time I was on the course. I kept my forward motion going, and I completed it. When I encountered the rig, I struggled with the day before, I surprised myself and I got much further on it. I almost got to the end of the low monkey bars! I tried a couple more obstacles, and then I crossed the finish line. After going back to the hotel room and getting cleaned up, my parents and I went back to the venue (which was probably 10 feet from our hotel) and checked my time and ranking. I ended up finishing the 15K race in 25th place. I was much more satisfied with myself, and it is incredible to go from struggling and beating myself up mentally, to being 25th in the world.
I learned many valuable lessons during this event. I learned not to beat myself up if a race does not go as planned. I encountered many obstacles that I have never seen before. The main reason I struggled with the 3K race, is because I was putting an incredible amount of pressure on myself. I learned to remove that pressure and to just have fun and the rankings and success will come. I also applied this mindset to my schoolwork as well. I always get extremely nervous before an exam or quiz, and I learned to remove the pressure. It was incredible to be able to compete at a world championship event at 19 years old. The world will not end if I have one bad race. Some race videos will be posted on my Youtube channel. Now on to my 2018 season.
