Open water swim

We Mucked It!

muckfest

Hannah and I met up with some friends on Saturday to run MuckFest MS Pittsburgh!

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MuckFest MS is a 5-mile mud and obstacle fun-run. 100% of fundraising dollars for the event go towards the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

I will preface this post by saying that I didn’t want to run this race. True story. Hannah’s friend asked her to run it about a month ago, but they figured out that they weren’t old enough to run it by themselves.

Hannah begged my mom, dad, and brother to run it with them and they said no. I felt bad, so I decided to run it with Hannah and her friend’s family. I figured that it would be something fun and different.

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I’m pretty sure I have really bad luck with race day weather. The weather has been gorgeous in Pittsburgh lately, with temperatures in the 70s and 80s.

Not the day of MuckFest. I woke up and checked the weather. It was 35 degrees outside. I was shivering just thinking about having to jump into muddy water pits. It reminded me of doing an open water swim in August when the temperature was 50 degrees. Not cool at all.

Thankfully, our starting wave didn’t begin until 11:30 a.m., so it warmed up to about 55 degrees.

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We stretched a bit, and then headed to the starting line.

I don’t even know how to describe how much fun I had running MuckFest with Hannah and her friend.

I knew the race was going to be crazy when we were sprayed with water before we even started running.

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Within 30 seconds of starting the race, we were all 100% soaked because we had to run through–and up–a pit of mud. I could not get myself out of that pit! It was so slippery and my shoes felt like they weighed about 10 pounds from the mud.

I looked over at Hannah and saw that she had a mud mustache. I lost it and started laughing so hard. Then I kind of freaked out because I remembered that over 100 people were behind me in the same mud pit. I felt like I was going to be crushed to death. Over dramatic? Yes. But the pure fear propelled me out of that pit and onto the next obstacle.

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We had to run through these huge balloon-type balls. So many people were hit by the balls, lost their footing, and fell into waist deep water and mud. We moved on and ran to the next obstacle.

I can’t remember all of the obstacles we did, but we skipped one because Hannah and I were afraid of going underwater underground. Did that sentence even make sense? Oh well.

We saw my mom at mile two, and she took some pictures of us going over another obstacle.

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We climbed a big rope obstacle, got some water, and I picked my mud wedgie. Then we ran up some massive hills for about three miles.

We also ran through a mine. Kinda scary.

muckfestms

At the end of the race, we had to jump into more muddy water…

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So I just went for it. Tongue out and everything.

muck festms

We finished feeling muddy, cold, and happy. The only bad thing about the race was the amount of mud I swallowed. I had a fever that night and my nose was running like crazy. A little dirt never hurt anyone though!

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Summer of 2012

This past summer was amazing. I wanted to recap it all in one post so when I need a happy moment I can look back on something to make me smile!

May

I kicked off my summer by running 18 miles and going to a Pirate’s game with my family. I then babysat my sister and all of our pets for a week while my parents went to Florida to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary. It was a struggle because everything went wrong LOL. I was also able to go to Kennywood and wash my truck with Hannah & Jimmy.I read two great books: Made To Crave and A Love That Multiplies. I made Jimmy a welder cake for his birthday.I taught spinning 3-4x a week, swam in my pool, hung out with friends, and helped my mom recover from foot surgery.

June

Hannah and I made a music video. Please go laugh at it.My 20th birthday was awesome and included carrot cake and a cactus. I made some cute pancakes. My sister and I were “actresses” for a week and I had an minor toe surgery. Apparently I ran a 5k too… I actually forgot about it until I looked back through my pictures!Toe stuff. Gross.

July

I went on the best vacation ever to the Outer Banks with my family, grandparents, uncle, boyfriend, brother’s fiance and my neighbor. It was like one big party for a whole week.

Hannah and I took Lola to a coffee shop and I went to Benihana for the first time.I found out I had a stomach infection and had to take a butt-load of pills that made me really sick.

August

Hannah turned 14 and my family + her boy & my boy all went to a Pirates game to celebrate.I swam in my second open water swim and it was cold. So very cold.I competed in my first run-swim-run and placed second overall.I visited my brother at Penn State and had an endoscopy to see if the stomach infection I had in July was gone.I spent my last weekend of summer with Jimmy at the Pittsburgh Ren Fest & the Pittsburgh Zoo.

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This summer was not what I expected it to be… in good ways!

I never would have guessed that I would be a spinning instructor or that I would teach 4x a week throughout the summer. Blessed.

I never would have guessed that I would let go of my try-hard ways and let loose all summer by sleeping in, staying up late, and doing nothing sometimes.

I never would have guessed how fun vacation was really going to be.

I never would have guessed that I was going to deal with problems when my parents went away, toe surgery, a stomach infection, and an endoscopy.

I never would have guessed that the summer of 2012 would become my most favorite summer yet.

I had some challenges and I became closer than ever to God. I worked hard and still had many fun times of relaxation. It was the perfect mix and truly blessed in every way.

It was the perfect summer.