I did feel like having a shoe with good arch support made it the most manageable. I had an idea before the event of wrapping up my arch to give it more support, regardless of whether or not a shoe was on. Sometimes, shoes loosen up, and then the arch support isn't as effective. If it's tape, it's more certain. That ended up working well. I limp even without it, and with it, I limped as much if not more, because of how it was tied, but at least the foot itself wasn't in pain.
At work, we can work half days on Fridays now, if we make up for the hours during the rest of the week. If meetings or other fires come up, you have to take care of those. Sometimes, it means that you do more than 40 hours because you plan on taking Friday afternoon off, but then you can't. Normally, it's nice. Sometimes, stuff likes to come up on Friday. I worried a little about that on this day, but with a 9pm start and only a 2 hr drive to Asheville, even if things went really late, though, I'd be fine, as long as there was no major accident on the road.
The start point was a shopping center parking lot. I was there early, so I shopped a bit at Earth Fare. I ate a couple of bananas in the parking lot, to top off. We ended up moving all of our cars down the road to the a parking lot by the trail that runs by the French Broad River, because upon arrival, the Cadre found signs in the parking lot that prohibited overnight parking. The new lot was a good spot, though.
There were 28 of us who showed up, maybe 75% of the total signed up. With the new no-transfer and no refunds within 30 days policy, it'll be interesting to see how it impacts no-show rates. Maybe it'll go down, because people can't switch to a different event. Maybe it'll stay the same or go up, because if you end up not being able to go within 30 days because of work or injury, you have no options, and you just have to eat the cost of the registration.
We formed up 2 rows deep on a small strip of boundary grass on the side of the parking lot, on an incline leading into brush. There was an assortment of empty sandbags, a weighted giant Ranger tab, our awesome horse saddle team weight, non-free-standing GORUCK and USA flags, and two water jugs assembled in front of us.
We began with some standard PT... unweighted push-ups, sit-ups, 4-ct mountain climbers, 4-ct flutter kicks, and ruck swings, led by our first TL. Then, we started our ruck along the dirt trail by the river. I was curious how long I'd last, and whether I'd make it through the whole event with my foot. Even unweighted, someone noticed that I was limping. I thought I hid it well, but I guess not. We stopped at some point to fill up the sand bags. We learned about special forces ODAs, which are the 12-man teams in which Green Berets operate. They're balanced with a variety of skills and levels, and are capable of being split in half to double the team's capabilities.
We started rucking with the coupons along the trail. My teammates tried to keep me fresh early on, to save my foot for as long as possible. Later on, I started taking 40#, to test it a bit. The taped up foot was holding up alright.
We stopped for a team pic early on. Cadre Igor knows that GRTs appreciate having photos to remember the event, so he was our photographer for most of the event. That was really thoughtful of him. We did have shadows, but they didn't stay the whole time (and having been a shadow for 2 events myself, I don't blame them).
We rucked away from the river, which involved going up some steep roads. Yes, this was mountain country. There was a 120# sandbag in the mix, and Cadre Igor wanted everyone to try it at some point. I shared it with others of similar height during the event.
We stopped for a team pic early on. Cadre Igor knows that GRTs appreciate having photos to remember the event, so he was our photographer for most of the event. That was really thoughtful of him. We did have shadows, but they didn't stay the whole time (and having been a shadow for 2 events myself, I don't blame them).
We got to a park, where we split into 2 ODAs (albeit of 14 people each, instead of 12 people each). I was on ODA 1. We competed with each other in a buddy carry and sandbag carry relay race. Fortunately, there was another tiny girl in my group, so that was easy. Buddy carries are kind of what I worry most about with my foot, because humans are generally heavier than sandbags, and getting them up and stable during movement is trickier, but she was super light. The third girl in our group, my @sistersofsteeldc teammate, was stuck punching way above her weight with a big guy, but she's as tough as they come, and took it for the team.
We practiced doing patrols in squads, doing a V-formation. We simulated dropping when we heard "incoming", and then rushing away from where the mortar landed, and then pulling security. That was fun. I enjoy learning cool skills like that during the events.
We needed another TL, and Cadre was counting down, so I volunteered next. We rucked more through the fog, which made it a bit chilly when we were sitting still between evolutions. We rucked under a highway, where we had a team building event.
We had to get each other, our rucks, and our coupons over two walls. With OCR experience, I proposed having the base of people do wall sits, to help everyone else up. The team did great, first moving coupons across with a few people on the other side to start organizing the gear on the other end, then rucks, then the rest of the people. Some people stayed on top of the wall, to help transfer the objects and people across.
My ATL was an experienced GRT, and helped to keep me organized and going the right direction, too. We switched team leaders, and it was back to rucking. We tried going into the city, but a static train blocked our way. That was a first.
We adjusted the plan, backtracked some, and went to a different park than the one that we originally planned. At the park, we practiced bounding with our 5 different squads, to close distance between us and an enemy position. The TL and ATL would tell each squad which direction and distance to go, to approach the enemy from multiple sides gradually.
We went to another park, though there were cops waiting in the parking lot, so we said hello, stopped in the parking lot for a lesson, and then did a contest between the two ODAs again to low crawl with three sandbags plus a flag per team, up a hill.
We rucked some more. We missed a time hack as we went into the City Hall area, so we paid with push-ups. I kept thinking for a long time that I was starting to see the sky lighten, but I thought that for many hours, haha.
We rucked more... it was nice to have daylight. It was foggy, too, which made it feel special. It's kind of funny when you start seeing what people look like for the first time when there's light out, even though you've spent all night with them.
At this spot, we came across real restrooms as we were leaving. It was amazing, and much-needed. It did start getting lighter, for real. It was a beautiful sight, and you somehow naturally get more energetic when it gets brighter. I did test the 80# sandbag, and it was doable. I limped throughout the whole thing, but nothing made the foot hurt.
We stopped at another park, where we got to make some deals. We did sit-ups as a team within a time hack, allowing us to drop a sandbag. We also took a quiz on Special Forces, allowing us to drop another sandbag. Having done the Vietnam GORUCK monthly challenge and having read the descriptions explaining the meaning behind each memorial WOD came in handy!
We got back to the parking lot where we had started. Hurray! 16.5-ish miles, in our nearly 12 hour event.
I'm glad I was able to get through the event. I'm glad that my teammate was there, and that she had my back and was looking out for me. We'll see how things progress with the foot. I was worried how it would feel after I took off my damp shoes and the tape. It ended up being pretty normal. Standard soreness from the event, but the foot doesn't seem any worse off than it normally is.
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