Have you seen those crazy obstacle courses that everyone seems to be getting into on their days off? I had the immense pleasure of going to a Tough Mudder event first hand with Old Spice. Tough Mudder is no joke, the tough really says what they stand for; grueling challenges backed with an awful lot of mud, but let me tell you, what an incredible day it was.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6RT0mCl598]
The Tough Mudder event was exhilarating; from the moment you arrive, swarms of people are getting amped up and ready to go. It looks like complete chaos from the offset, but hang around for a few moments, and you’ll reveal an intricate cobweb of teams – broken into battalions of men and women who are on the verge of tribal warfare.
Old Spice Tough Mudder Los Angeles EventMany teams opt to wear similar clothing; some may wear the same face paint or another identifying marker. We wore our red Old Spice shirts. I was intrigued to see each team deep in conversation. Unlike a marathon, where runners stand to one side in solitary confinement steadying themselves for the race, Tough Mudders were building each other up with incredible gusto.
I would later learn why; the race itself is an endurance e of the physical and mental. Tough Mudder runners tackle everything you can imagine including an ice pool, electrotherapy, and as the name would imply, gallons of mud that holds you back at every obstacle. Watching from the sidelines with the Old Spice crew, however, was an incredible experience and I learned a lot about comradery that day.
The Tough Mudder Ethos
Technically, the Tough Mudder race begins before the battle cry lashes out; it starts back at basecamp, where Old Spice set up a tent where the team could get ready. We hung out together, and it wasn’t long before the team was cheering each other on, getting loud and excitable as everyone lifted each other’s spirits and got the team pumped for the impending race.
In regular races, it’s common for one person to win, but in a Tough Mudder event, it’s about the camaraderie. This change of dynamic totally altered the muddy landscape. Rather than the top athletes (and there were many), blasting off into the distance, I saw them looking back for their team mates, and launching back into often painful circumstances just to help their teammates get ahead.
Old Spice Tough Mudder Los Angeles EventI learned such an important lesson at Tough Mudder, and that it is we are only as strong as our weakest link. Whether you are in a team of your friends, family, colleagues, or employees, we are all defined by our peers and the teams we operate in. Are you the top dog? What do you do to lift the team up? Are you the weakest link? How are you striving to pull the team upwards?
Tough Mudder also showed me that in life we are brothers; it doesn’t matter what our abilities are or how wealthy we are; what matters is how we build one another up. By the end of the race, no one even remembered half off the crazy obstacles they went through. All that remained was the lifelong bonds and the sense of Brotherhood that was earned on the battlefield.
Old Spice Giveaway
My good friends at Old Spice have an awesome sweepstakes for you to celebrate their partnership with Tough Mudder, as the official Men’s Body Wash and Anti-Perspirant/Deodorant Partner. Old Spice gets what tough men go through and created the Hardest Working Collection – an Odor Blocker and Sweat Defense Anti-perspirant/deodorants and Dirt Destroyer body wash.
ENTER HERE: Tough Mudder Giveaway
If you demand more and live life with a ‘work hard, play harder’ ethos then we want to hook you up; all you have to do is submit a picture of yourself and your #LegendaryTeam with a description as to what makes your team legendary on Instagram or Twitter by August 17 for a chance to win an Old Spice-powered all-expenses paid trip of a lifetime for you and three friends too Tough Mudder Las Vegas October 29-30.
Visit ToughMudder.com for the list of event dates and locations. Visit the contest page to enter.
Disclaimer: Thank you to Old Spice for inviting me to the Tough Mudder event in Kentucky, and for sponsoring this post; while this is sponsored content, I truly believe in the power of building up our Brotherhood. All thoughts are 100% my own.