Obstacle Racing is a constant challenge of endurance, durability, stamina, and strength through a wide variety of unbelievable challenges. It’s grown in acceptance, intensity, and positivity like no other sport I’ve ever come across. Obstacle Racing has reached out and found millions of us and forged steel brotherhoods and sisterhoods around the world. Many of us Obstacle Racers have found that we are all family now whether you are just beginning in this sport with a 5K Obstacle Race or have endured Fuego Y Aqua’s 70K Obstacle Course “Survival Run” as 38 of us this past February as Elite Obstacle Racers on a volcanic jungle island in Nicaragua.
Obstacle Racing challenges us to go beyond what we think is possible intellectually, physically, and emotionally. Obstacle Racing is about Mind, Body, and Heart.
Quick note about me for those of you new to my background: In the late 1990’s I lost over 100 Pounds and it positively changed my life for the better! I gained back control of my life and found the real “Me” and new self-confidence! I love all sports and have always been an athlete, yet didn’t look like one! Lol! Since I was a kid I have played, Basketball, Baseball, Ultimate Frisbee, Soccer, Football, Karate, Tae Kwon Do, Akido, Greco Roman Wrestling, Free Style Wrestling, Grappling, MMA, Boxing, Running, Skydiving, Repelling, Rock Climbing, and more BUT no sport has touched my life like the sport of Obstacle Racing! I now compete and train with other Elite Obstacle Racers in the toughest challenges and wildest environments in the world and will continue to work to improve myself everyday and inspire more and more people to stop hesitating, blaming, and making excuses in life and just go for it! Life is what we make of it!
In the Health and Fitness world (after losing 100 pounds) I have been a top Trainer and Writer (sponsored by VPX Sports www.vpxsports.com & www.Bodybuilding.com “Elite” brand workout clothing & DRMC Danville Regional Medical Center www.danvilleregional.com & Wilkins & Co. Realtors www.wilkinsandco.com & Attorney Mark B. Holland www.markbholland.com ) for over 16 years and constantly see people make amazing changes in their bodies and get great results only to STOP when they get where they want to be. Listen… Just because you feel, look, or move good today doesn’t at anytime mean to stop adhering to preventative techniques or challenging and bettering yourself. We have all heard the phrase “Use It or Lose It” and it’s absolutely true with our Minds, Bodies, and Hearts.
Just because your back isn’t hurting anymore, doesn’t mean to stop strengthening it. Just because your weight and body fat level is down about to where you want to be, doesn’t mean to stop exercising, practicing proper nutrition, and getting plenty of rest. Just because you are stronger with dealing with an addiction issue, doesn’t mean to stop being aware and building even more defenses for later challenges thrown your way. Just because your marriage or relationship is fun and comfortable, doesn’t mean to stop working on it making it even stronger.
Too many times we all just get comfortable and let our guards down and that “Thing” creeps back into our life again.
We have to constantly challenge ourselves intellectually, physically, emotionally, and consistently build our resistances up to negative mind, body, and heart issues to withstand future let-downs.
We have a choice to be pro-active in our own lives and we have to because no one else will do it for us. No one else knows us better than we know ourselves so we have to constantly be strengthening ourselves for our future life obstacles and to cross over those barriers.
Problems are always lurking around the corner so we have to always be strong, capable, prepared, and ready.
Just because we are good runners and can whip a 5K, 10K, Half Marathon, or Marathon doesn’t mean we stop there. Don’t stop, get it get it! We can get into Ultra Marathons. If it’s not distance we seek then we can get into the sport of Obstacle Racing where we will challenge our same run distances with obstacles interwoven for challenges in Total Body Strength and Endurance. Then when you feel you have gotten good with the smaller Obstacle Races, with short distances, then try the longer distance Obstacle Races, then like a few of us you can work up to Ultra Marathon Elite Obstacle Races (if you really are ready physically, intellectually, and emotionally) combining way more running than a marathon with way more intense obstacles laid-out across primal, raw, and rugged landscapes with magnitudes larger than any of the normal courses (Such as Fuego Y Agua’s Survival Run & Hunter Gatherer).
Right when we get comfortable with something and accomplish it and feel we have the upper hand, then we need to make the choice to get out of our comfort zone and get challenged again and again and again. Obstacle Racing does that in so many facets.
I started with a simple 5k run, but over the years have gone thru many races to have grown into Elite Obstacle Racing that combines the toughest, most challenging obstacles with Ultra Marathon distance running. I absolutely love this sport and how as I grow and challenge myself it has something bigger, badder, better, and more intense to keep me getting stronger. Obstacle Racing never gets old.
Doing the Same Thing Over and Over Expecting Different or Better Results!
I have an old client who’s been MIA for a while, the reason I haven’t called to bug him is he’s 86 years old and I am respectful of how he wants to spend his time. This old client told an existing client the other day “tell Dave I’m still doing all the same exercises…but I’m not getting any stronger.” Look he’s 86 and was training with me 2-3 hours per week and I love him and hearing his words of wisdom as he trained pretty darn hard, actually harder than 75% of my clients. He’s a joy to be around! He wanted to get into training with me because he was just walking 3-4 times per week and felt like he wasn’t getting anywhere or any stronger. Well he was doing the same old thing over and over and expecting different or better results…it didn’t happen. Now he has taken what he’s learned, which was challenging and still continues those exercises, BUT now he’s back to doing the same old thing over and over expecting different or better results. He’s not with me learning new, better, and more challenging exercises and training techniques so his body has gotten bored again.
We are like that in life, we keep doing the same work/job routine over and over for 30 years and expecting things to change. We keep doing the same workouts and keep getting the same results. We keep doing the same old things, same old routines, same old attitude and our Bodies, Minds, and Hearts get bored and growth stops.
Look we can be pro-active and make positive changes for ourselves or life will force us to change in ways we probably will not like.
We have the choices to constantly better ourselves, improve our minds, strengthen our bodies, and better our hearts. It’s our own free will and choices that make us who we are. We will define our legacy here on earth from the choices we make during our existences.
Adapt & Overcome!
You won’t Believe what Your Body, Mind, and Heart can handle!
Only a few years ago, after only running, I was being challenged with my first Warrior Dash, then second, third, then Tough Mudder at Wintergreen Resort up monster ski slopes, then a GoRuck Challenge in VA Beach in April in freezing water, thunderstorms, cold temps, swamps and worse running missions and obstacles for 15-18 miles and 14-16 hours non-stop…as my body, mind, and heart adapted I overcame those challenges and went on to bigger, badder, and better. For example I did a few Tough Mudders last year within a few months of The World’s Toughest Mudder just for obstacle training purposes. I was working so hard with my own strength training, endurance training, cold water training, trail running, and recovery, but needed the actual Obstacles to get my mind straight before World’s Toughest. My body, mind, and heart were ready to go after covering all my bases and I was adapting and overcoming in all ways! As a side note: the only area I didn’t prepare for was a 55 degree late November day in New Jersey and I only brought 7mm total body wetsuits to run in thinking temperature would be 35-19 degrees:) fatal mistake on my part as I quickly completed my first lap without a wetsuit in 40 degree water but the 55 degree out of water temps just killed me once I put the 7mm suit on to get thru the 100 yard swims again. Then came training for the toughest, rawest, most primal Elite Obstacle/Ultra Marathon 70K Race the Survival Run in Nicaragua on the Isle de Ometepe (incorporating Ultra Running, climbing, swimming, jumping, Obstacles, and more extreme landscape than ever before) and on the same weekend as top Ultra Marathoners from around the world competed in 25K, 50K, & 100K Ultra races which apparently was almost the toughest in the world because of our terrain there on that hot volcanic jungle island in Central America.
What used to be Tough years ago…wasn’t Tough anymore. I do 10-12 mile Obstacle Race events as training days and just working on techniques for rings, bars, ropes, walls, swims, jumping, climbing, and testing footwear, clothing, gear, supplements etc. It’s not just me, but all of us adapt and overcome and look for the next toughest, grittiest, rugged, challenging event because we are all getting tougher!
Persistence Equals Progress!
We are capable of so many intellectual, physical, and emotional applications all at once and Obstacle Racing challenges us in all these ways! As long as we keep persisting and never give-up, we will keep progressing. When we are combining our minds, bodies, and hearts in an Obstacle Racing event we become a jack of all fitness trades and masters of none! Our Brains calculate so much during a race in conjunction with our Bodies, then on top of all that energy output and mental/physical calculation…we are able to help our fellow man up and over a wall, up Everest, or overcome a fear of heights or water…that’s Heart, then we keep on keep-in on running through to the next challenge!
Obstacle Racing…there’s nuthin like it!
-Dave Gluhareff
