January 2014

So with Fenway behind us the wait for Amesbury Sprint begins.  During the wait my running training has died.  I was still eating healthier then normal and being active but I wasn't running any more.  Mainly because I get very bored with running and my mind is easily distracted from it.

     The next event we did was in January.  The Blizzard Blast is a fun 5K obstacle course race.  This race is a local race put on by SmithFest events.  This is the first event we really caught wind of the biggest team award.  We were determined to win.  My girlfriend and I thought long and hard on a team name.  We happened to be at her parents house for the holidays and someone mentioned incorporating our work into the title.  They suggested Gun & Needles, since she is in law enforcement and I'm an emt.  Although that sounded off we liked the idea.  Since I am also a firefighter we were able to transition that to Guns & Hoses.  Now that the team was started we needed members and lots of them.  Our first stop on the recruitment trail was some people we knew were crazy enough to want to do an obstacle course in the snow.  These are the ones we choke, kick, punch and all around beat the crap out of each other for fun.  I probably should elaborate on this. We take 8 week seminars of Krav Maga.  They are 2 days a week of self defense style fitness training.  So needless to say they were on board.  After that was just advertising on facebook trying to get our other friends to sign up.  In the end we got about 14 members.  We thought we were doing good, until we asked what the top team had and heard the number 50 or so.  Our dream of largest team was shattered, but we still had a good crew going in.  This was a typical 5K obstacle race only with snow.  They had some seasonal twists to the obstacles like the keg swing, sledding, marshmallow toss, and of course the Christmas tree carry and throw.  Wasn't too cold and the snow flurries really made it a great day.  In the end we got our core running team down.  No more thoughts of getting biggest team.  We are a team, we train together we race together but most importantly we make sure each one of us crosses that finish line.  We push each other to the limit and then lift each other up and get us past our limits.