Normal people spend Saturday mornings in IKEA

I'm not sure when I realised it. It might have been as I slid down a huge hill into a rowing lake while being soaked by a sadistic fireman, or as I posted myself feet first through a giant inflatable. I'm not really sure. But whenever it was, I suddenly thought "if I was normal I'd be buying a purple coffee table in IKEA right now".

But hell, who wants to be normal, right?!

So instead of spending the morning deciding which size of yellow spatula to buy, I went and covered myself in mud and bruises at the Men's Health Survival of the Fittest race in Nottingham. The race is one of a series of 3 around Britain over successive weekends. The format of each race is the same, but the uniquely sadistic obstacles each race includes are dependent on the topography of the city. So in Nottingham the lovely race organisers use the Holme Pierrepont National Watersports Centre, the muddy riverbanks and the stairs in the Nottingham Forest football ground. In order to cover all these, the race is slightly longer than Cardiff or Edinburgh at 11.5km.


Runners are set off in waves of 250, with coloured wristbands denoting your wave. You pick up your wristband and your race t-shirt the day before and all runners must wear their t-shirts on the day. Colette and I were in Wave 8 and lined up with our dayglo pink wristbands and shiny white t-shirts (WTF?!?! Seriously, white!?!?!) with about 4 other women and 244 testosterone filled, gung-ho guys. As you can see, we were rather nervous, but very clean and shiny.

We set off at 11.45am and immediately hit the Hay Bale Wall. 8ft of hay bales made into a wall. You get the picture. A couple of miles later there was a bit of parkour, involving running along planks (arrrr Jim Lad), jumping off platforms and hoisting each other over walls, then it was off down the Trent to the first of the mud - the Army Assault Course. Huge, slippery, climbing frames, monkey bars and a seriously muddy cargo net. The mud didn't last long though. It was a quick dash past some very confused looking kayakers and senior citizens walking their dogs and then into the rowing lake firstly via a muddy bank and then via a massive hill slide (with the assistance of Nottinghamshire Fire Brigade). A breath-taking (literally) swim across to another muddy riverbank (are you getting the gist of this yet?) found us on our way back home.

Obviously the home route wasn't going to be easy, and I needed Colette half dragging me along for parts of it. Obstacles on the return included the Men’s Health at Work (clambering over safety barriers, another scare-filled climbing frame and a massive slippery slope to head up), the Urban Jungle (running up and over skate halfpipes, shimmying under park benches, through cars and more bike barriers to try to get over), the inflatables (posting yourself through a large red inflatable... weird) and finally up, down, up, down through Nottingham Forest’s Riverside Stand.
By this time, the finish is in sight (behind the infamous 8 foot MH Wall of Fame). With the assistance of about 3 guys pushing my enormous butt I just about managed to scale the damn thing, then helped haul Colette to the top as well. Scariest thing of the whole race? Jumping off the top of that thing onto a crashmat which make my duvet look plush.

10foot later and we were over the line! I'm a Survivor, I'm gonna make it, I will survive, Keep on survivin'. Don't think my t-shirt will be ever be white again though.

Race report - Survival of the Fittest
Time: 1:31:29 (creditable)
Organisation: Can't fault it... but then it is by Rat Race, so its bound to be slick.
Course: Awesome, crazy, sadistic.
Would I do it again? I'm saying no, but you know what I'm like. Expect me to be out for a PB next year.
After effects: 3 showers later I was still a bit pongy. Oh yeah, and even my mum can't get my t-shirt clean.

Here's mud in your eye (and your ear, your toe, your nostril....)