Hosting 8 events each year across the north, south, midlands and Scotland, you’re sure to find one near you. But just how challenging is it? We’ve sent Mark and few friends there to find out and here’s his thoughts.
Registration and Goodie Bags
After picking the location to get filthy, you’ll be sent a race pack containing your runner number and chip timing band. Once you’ve completed the course you’ll be treated to a goodie bag, medal and most importantly the much sought-after Major Series t-shirt. I’d recommend bringing along some towels and extra water to help wash off the mud as you will be covered after the event….or maybe just wear a big bin bag for the drive home and get a new car air freshener!
On the Day
When you arrive on the day you want to make sure to can see the warm up area as the Major’s troops will ask you to meet there around 15mins before the allocated start time. They use a speaker system so you can clearly hear when they are gathering a new wave of starters so just keep an ear out for your wave. The warm-up will get you in the mood by doing some squats, running on the spot and press-ups before heading over to the start line.
The course has a variety of obstacles but each one will be caked in mud and often the trickiest part can be just trying to keep your footing or in some cases trying to find your foot in the mud! Try rinsing your hands in a stream or any obstacles that have water, otherwise you won’t be able to wipe mud from around your face if you need to.
There were a few sections of the course we found really exciting, especially the mud bogs! After running through the forest you are confronted with a long but narrow area of people knee deep in mud, some really enthusiastic runners just tried to run through the gap not knowing this was the deepest part. After they were thigh deep and stuck in the bog laughter erupted and others offered to lend a muddy hand to help pull them out.
The big kid inside of us was loving every minute of the day but kept looking around the corner waiting for the slide. Finally after running up and down dirt tracks in the forest and jumping over some ditches, there it was, that big blue beautiful slide! With one of the Major’s Troops making sure it was nice and slippery, the UK Fitness Events team launched onto the slide, bumping into each other and causing us to spin around we were met with a giant pit of mud at the bottom. We all slipped about trying to get to our feet laughing as we did, then carried on our way secretly wanting to run back up the hill to have another go!
Thinking we were near the end we were greeted with yet more obstacles, the ice tunnel (which actually felt surprisingly refreshing!), hay stacks to clamber over and tunnels to crawl though. Hearing noise in the near distance we spotted the finish line and picked up the pace to run through a wall of spectators cheering and clapping to claim our victory! We all proudly wore our new Major Series T-Shirts whilst clapping the next wave of finishers.
Our Final Thoughts
As each stage has the Major’s troops shouting commands at you, it really does encourage you to jump right in and have a mudtastic time. From the standard mud bogs to streams, tyre walls to log carries and of course the slippy slide each and every obstacle challenges you and your friends to work as a team to get around the course.
We absolutely loved this event and thoroughly enjoyed meeting some great people whilst having a fantastic laugh with all of the Major’s troops. Whether you’re an obstacle race enthusiast or fancy taking on your first mud run, you’ll find some great obstacles, tones of mud and a friendly atmosphere at The Major Series.
If you fancy taking on the Major Series have a look at their challenges here
