Here comes 2015! I am ready for a big year, starting with Hoverboards and flying cars. That's supposed to happen, right?? Well, either way, I want to take a few minutes to reflect on 2014 before I get ready for the new year.
This was the year that the sport of obstacle course racing jumped from being a love to becoming an obsession. When I take a day off of work now or I tell people I am going to travel somewhere, the first question I get is, "What race is this for?" The Wolfpack was born in 2014. These are simply the greatest people in the world. We share not only a passion for OCR, but for striving for excellence in all we do, and doing it the right way, with honor and class. No shortcuts. They are an amazing support system that lifts me up when I'm struggling with those days in between races.
OCR Police was born in 2014, too. Along with my GoPro, I can't do a race without my OCR badge. It's a symbol to challenge yourself and do what is right instead of taking the easy path. Especially during a race, because you never know who is watching! So many of us have seen people climb the shorter wall, use assistance they shouldn't, or skip penalties, in order to gain some advantage. It's one thing to do this if you are running the race for fun, but in a competitive wave, how can you really be proud of "finishing" the race when you really didn't complete the same race as your peers? But, I can go on and on forever on that subject. Let me get back on track and talk about the races themselves.
Overall, I ran in 23 OCR's in 2014, including SEVEN Mud Endeavors and 3 Spartans (got my Trifecta!!). With my last OCR of the year coming back in November at BattleFrog Miami, I filled my schedule with some road races to finish the year off. Altogether, I ran 30 races, and am currently on a streak of 13 weeks with at least one race!
Aside from the numbers (which I love because I am a math nerd), I saw some really big changes in my races throughout the year. I named this blog the MediOCR runner because that's how I saw myself. I did alright in the races, but I was nowhere near the top. Fastest of the slow people or slowest of the fast people. That's how I always described myself. Why? Because most of my races I was alone. The top people would be way ahead of me, but I would be ahead of the next group of people.
I kept working. On Saturdays when I didn't have a race, I would head down to Fit Lorenzo for their obstacle course training class. Then, something started to happen. My races changed. I started keeping up with some of the fast people. They helped me be better because we would battle each other, passing back and forth trying to inch our way up the standings. This made OCR even more exciting for me.
I ended the year doing so much better than I could have hoped, especially considering I was the old man in my age group (for most of the OCR's age groups are in 10 year increments, so I was in the 30-39 year old group going against children haha). I ran seven OCR's in October and November to finish off the season. One of those was the 13 mile Carolina Spartan Beast, which kicked my butt. In the other six, I did not finish lower than 4th in my age group (where getting top 10 used to make me happy), won 3 age group awards, and finished in the top ten OVERALL three times as well! I am not saying all of this to brag. If I can do it, anybody can. I remember doing a LOT of walking in races before. But I kept working hard to get better. There were times when I didn't believe that I could get any faster, and if I didn't love OCR like I do, or have a great support system there to encourage me, I probably would have quit. But I didn't, and I can't wait to see what 2015 has in store for me. It's going to be huge!
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