Coming out hot in the elite wave of Rugged Maniac.
Rugged Maniac was back in Calgary for its fourth year. This was the fourth year I was coming back to this race. Its a fun, family friendly, party like OCR. Lots of fellow friends, Rampage Racing teammates and Hurtin Albertans would all be there. I knew it would be another great day.
Course Description
Course map for Rugged Maniac Calgary 2018
The course was a total of 5.2km on my Garmin Forerunner 215. There was a total of 25 obstacles spread throughout the course. The course itself was mostly on flat grass with some pavements and gravel trails thrown in here and there. The course had little elevation change with the only hills been man made mounds of dirt typically put in before and after obstacles to slow racers down. This course allowed for a lot of fast running and fast finishing times.
Preview
This was a race I was really looking for redemption at. The last 3 years at Rugged Maniac have not been kind to me results wise. I have finished 4th twice and DNF’d a guaranteed second place. The Rugged Maniac podium is something I really wanted especially after been so close years previous. Saying all that this is one of my favorite races of the year as most of the OCR community and some great friends show up to this one and usually hang out after the race for a good time.
This year there were several great racers and with years past Rugged Maniac always throws in some fast road runners that challenge for top spots. My OCR training this year has been lacking as I have been focused on my running times (road running) 1st and then trail racing. I was hoping my increased running speed would carry me over as the obstacles in this race aren’t too challenging.
My Race
I felt great going into this race and Kody and I had a few friendly chirps at each other ( I knew he would be so hard to beat). We started out at a decent pace (3.45 a kam) and there were several runners keeping up with Kody, Brayden Jessen and I. One guy went out at a blistering pace but we all knew this wasn’t a sustainable pace. Everyone hit the first 4 obstacles together (shoe catcher, barricade, commando crawl and quad burners) at the same time. This is when Kody and Brayden started opening a small lead. Next was the trenches and they were wider than previous years, it is where you jump across a hole in the ground. Unfortunately I miss timed one of my jumps and almost fell into one of the holes. I dropped about 4 spot here scrambling back to my feet and fell back to 7th.
This year I have been training mostly running and trail running so my heart rate was spiking hard on even simple obstacles! The next three obstacles (Jacobs Ladder, Jump Start and Pull your own weight) had flat running sections in between so I opened up here and an encouraging shout from Kody to move my ass defiantly helped big time. By the time we got to the 10th obstacle, sled dog, I was in 3rd place. I caught up to Brayden at The Gauntlet and Claustrophobia but once he saw this he opened a small gap on me. We ran fast and actually caught up to Kody by obstacle 16 (Speed Trap) he saw this and stepped his effort up and he too opened a lead on us again.
After catching up to these fast dudes, they took off and left me in their dust!
The new obstacle Off the Rails was fun, it was like a zip line that was slanted upwards and you run slide along the zip line to ring a bell at the end. My first attempt didn’t work too well as I didn’t run to gain enough momentum, I slid back but nailed to with a faster harder run on my second attempt. By this stage I knew 1st and 2nd were out of the question with about a kilometre to go. I looked behind me after I got through The Ringer (suspended rings over a pool of water you swing from ring to ring to get across) and the Crag (an inflatable obstacle you climb over). There was nobody in sight which was a relief, I picked the pace up slightly as I knew there was only about 500m left and I had 4 obstacles to go.
The Ringer
No problem through anti-gravity, next was the warped wall that was attached to mount maniac and accelerator 3.0 (a big side to finish). I ran at the warped and slide down on my first attempt, the wall was slick from the morning dew. I panicked a little as I have had 2 fourth place finishes and one DNF in the past three years. I looked around to see if any other races were coming by and there was no one in sight, I had another chance to score the podium.
One deep breath and I gave it all I got, I chose the outside lane that looked a little dryer, sprint just as I approached the wall. Reached one hand up and just held on. There was a little cheer form the crowd as I climbed up the wall and slid down the slide to take home 3rd place. My first official North American OCR podium. I was so happy with this finish and the support from my OCR team Rampage Racing was amazing.
My First Official North American OCR Podium
Afters
Gun Show! Repping X Warrior!
There was a party feel to this race with lots of vendors on site, a free beer with your race entry and Kody’s sexy celebration dance for his 1st place finish all made this event one of themes fun OCRs of the year. After the race I got to hang out with fellow racers at the X Warrior tent and it was a lot of fun. Rugged Maniac is a race that I will keep in my race schedule each year.
Rampage Racing
3 of the 6 podium spots went to Rampage Racing team but everyone on the team crushed their own race and we all had fun. It was great to hang out with a lot of the team members and the support we give each other helps with training, racing and life in general. I am delighted to be part of this team, we have had a strong year with new members added, goals crushed and overall a good time. Looking forward to see what the team does for the rest of the year.
Team Rampage Racing
