Day 10 and another scorcher, my farmer’s tan coming on nicely! This morning we re-did Sheep Dip and it’s looking a little less ridiculous but still a lot of fun and Health & Safety are happy – we have some great conversions that usually start with ‘I’ve got an idea’ which is normally met with ‘uh oh’. It’s a very healthy relationship, everything is discussed and we always find ways of making my ideas happen (sometimes a little smaller and easier than I’d envisaged but I have to remember, our races for everyone, not just obstacle monsters). When I design our courses and obstacles I try to hit a balance of ‘challenging for the elites’ but ‘achievable by all’. I coined this phrase from Ross MacDonald (Team INOV8) from when he said it a year ago at his first Dirty Dozen. I took this as a great compliment. I knew then that I was hitting the mark and have tried to stay there ever since.

Once Sheep Dip was looking a little more normal, the team packed up Irish Table and headed over the Event Village. We’ve built it just on the perimeter of the village meaning all your loved ones will be able to come and cheer you on as you pull up and over the 6 foot shelf. It doesn’t matter if you do it on your own or get a leg up from a fellow runner, it’s just a fun obstacle (if you are elite, you need to complete on your own so check out the vids on our site). Today, The Bull (Steve) proved is worth yet again by drilling 156 holes in the timbers to attach the new rungs for Tarzan Bars – in the sweltering heat, this was impressive. He’s such a good addition to the team. Why did we need more rungs? Don’t worry, I’ve not gone mad and doubled the length of it, I’ve just doubled the width to cope with the additional runners this year. ‘Capacity’ has been the key word for this build; I hate queues at obstacles so we’d worked hard to ensure each one is wide enough and in the right place on the course to avoid this.
What games did we play today?

Crackerjack Olympics and Irish Table Olympics (with no legs or a muscle up). Mark, or Cookie Monster as he’s now known, dominated the field in the former and I won the latter (by not telling them how to do it first – ha ha, I love winning by any means).

What’s tomorrow? Big Walls, right on the finish line (again). Where else would I put a 10ft wall?

Thanks for reading.

The Beard.