YHC has been a long time rucker. You might tell that from my long line of GoRuck rucks and sandbags. Recently, I had been focused on gathering miles for the Sandlot Challenge. I hadn’t rucked in a long time outside of an over 5+ mile ruck at FSRC with Swag and Asian Zing ( the R can be for run or ruck). Join us by Forest Spring Nutrition each Friday from 0530-0615. I am glad to have done a warm up as my back felt it the next day at my O Ruiner pre-run and run heavy Q.
The F3 Louisville HIM team was comprised of: PCI, Tall Tale (R), Swag, Sump Pump (R), and Meter Maid. Our plan was to go out a relaxed pace but Tall Tale and PCI pushed the pace for our team.
GoRuck usually does well on events but this event was a disaster from a back office perspective. I had signed up and could find my name in their sandlot app. Cadre said that had errors. The night before had 50 on the list and only 10 showed up. Clearly a system/process issue. For our 12 mile ruck, he had three lists with duplicates, missing participants, and in no particular order. I helped check in our F3ers prior to the event and also others that pointed at the list while I checked in.
Brisket did the BFF before the event and crushed it. No surprise as he was one of the strongest having seen him previously on the Winter Olympic rucks.
The event started 25 minutes later than expected. There are reports on slack that I was “standing on business” when we took the pre-team photo with our F3 pax. It was very true, the work had not yet been competed. We could smile when we were done.
This was my sixth GoRuck event: 2 custom toughs, 2 lights with my M, 1 50 mile star course in Columbus, and the 12 mile City Ruck. While the cadre spoke, we loaded our way points into road warrior to hit the ground right at the start. The road warrior all showed about 15 miles, which was much higher than we completed in the event (11.53 miles). Knowing from prior experience, it was better to catch the further way points and leave the closer way points for the end to keep us motivated by having quick wins.
The thing I like about rucking is the mumblechatter with others and the focus on seeing the path from a much slower perspective. I find that I remember being on many of these routes previously and locations from other events.
Along the way, I came to know Tall Tale much better. The most memorable moment for me was when we finished the last way point at Peerless and were going back toward endex. Tall Tale asked me to get a Gatorade from the back of his ruck. Then, he didn’t say anything and went over and gave to one of the homeless who was napping. He said he didn’t need it and it could them a lot of good. And no, he didn’t do it for the recognition. He did as a high impact man (HIM). It was very fitting for our team name.
It also has me thinking it could be a future interesting ruck. Think of it as a compassion ruck where we ruck around and pass out food, water, hand warmers, etc.
Glad I was able to get out and get better with my fellow pax.
-Meter Maid
F3 Louisville 