Wednesday, February 10, 2010

"Tough Guy" Contest

Forget marathons. Forget triathalons. Forget Iron Man competitions. Dare I say it...even forget Ninja Warrior competitions. They should all bow and pay homage to...Tough Guy.

This year's main event was held a couple weeks ago, in South Staffordshire, UK. Though it's only about 8 miles, this event is far from a level race...it's far from a race full of hills...Tough Guy has underwater tunnels, barbed wire fences and fire walks. There is even an electric fence called "The Tiger," which comes after a long, steep-hill filled run including a slalom portion which forces competitors to run up and down an extremely steep hill. But after the Tiger comes the worst.

There are a series of walls to climb over, after which is "The Behomoth," a series of 4 towers which you have to climb up and walk a rope across, under which is a patch of nettles, a plant that would cause discomfort to say the least if you were to fall. After this comes the fire...then a tire crawl...then a swamp...then the "Vietcong tunnels"...then a rope climb...(are you getting the picture yet?)...then a rubber slide with firemen spraying hoses at you...then underwater tunnels...and so on and so on...until you climb another hill to run to the finish.

But my description doesn't come close to doing it justice. Check out their website (you can sign up for the next one if you want!) and take a look at this video:




2 comments:

Mike said...

That's all contrived.

Real tough guys run with bulls.

Kevin said...

True...however...I'd "run with the bulls" (if you can call it being as far away as possible, running fast as possible and jumping the fence if the least bit panicked) but I don't think I'd enter a Tough Guy competition.