Once I found out that parking was 20min away from the event, I was a little unsure of the actual time between buses to get to the event site. Upon arrival at the parking lots in Pocono Raceway, I was surprised to see the mass number of school buses lined up to shuttle us over. I still prefer to park on-site, just in case you need to run back to your vehicle for something.
This event had a special registration line for military, which was sweet! Much faster than having to stand in line with the masses, and a really nice courtesy to us prior service and active military.
This coarse had fewer obstacles than the tri-state event I ran at Englishtown raceway last November, but turned out to be about over 12miles also. Originally I read this PA course was going to be 11 miles, but my guess is that they changed it up a little, since it was just run a few weeks earlier at the end of April.
Many of the obstacles were already familiar to me with the exception of the electric eel, this obstacle was a nice addition to what I had already been exposed to. During the A-frame cargo net obstacle one of the volunteer staff with a mike and loud speaker, said “if you don’t want to wait, you can go around, it won’t hurt you from getting your free beer and t-shirt at the end”. This caused a bit of ruckus among many of us standing waiting for our turn. Not someone I ever hope to see at another TM..
There were no underwater tunnels at this coarse, and the plunge into the lake, was weak compared to the tri-state I ran, because there was no lake to swim across at Pocono manor. Instead you jumped off into what looked like a small pond, then swam back to where you started, then continued on. The 3’ tunnels were easier than what I remembered from the tri-state, the ones at Pocono manor were not sloped as much, because I was able to make it up w/o help, whereas last years tri-state, I distinctly remember getting stuck on the way up, and having to grab the person in front of me, foot to pull myself up.
At the end of the race, I felt the finish area was a little unorganized compared to the last event I ran. There was no one there making sure you got your photo next to the TM background. When I ran last November’s tri-state, it was much more organized, you got your t-shirt, headband, a few goodies, then an event staff directed you to the area to get your finisher photo with the badass TM background that was setup. This years PA event, I finished, someone handed me my headband, then fortunately I went up to one of the tables and asked if we got t-shirts and was directed to another table to pickup my t-shirt. When I went to get my free beer, not one person asked to see my wrist band before giving me my beer. Not that this is a bad thing because I grabbed a second before leaving the finisher area, but when I did walk out of the finisher area, there was no one outside, nor inside directing for final photos, as I had been anticipating.
The on-site venue was kick ass, the live music was great, as well as the food vendor’s at this event. Oh yes, then the 25min bus ride back to the parking lot, I will never run another TM event that has off-site parking, even with shuttle busses, I prefer not to have to wait for and sit on a shuttle.
Overall, I felt that this PA event was a cake walk compared to the 2011 tri-state Tough Mudder I ran. I’m glad I was able to raise money for our wounded warriors, and hang with such a good community of people again, and I look forward to my next Mudder event!
