Photo: Tough Mudder Australia

FIT AND READY

“Any exercises which require you to lift and move your body a bit differently to the way you normally do will make for an ideal preparation; your standard gym isn’t a great help because you’re stagnant and isolating muscles. You need to be doing exerises where you’re picking up and throwing things, challenging your body in much more realistic ways. Climbing as well ... climbing cargos. Literally hanging out in parks is good, where there’s monkey bars, etc. I went to the park quite a bit and climbed and jumped over things, crawled under stuff.”

FACING OBSTACLES

“There’s a lot of water and mud involved in Tough Mudder. Some of the most challenging obstacles I’ve seen are the climbing things, like cargo nets, and the ones where competitors jump into water from a height of three or four metres after climbing up onto a platform. A lot of people get stuck there because of fear. It’s beautiful watching people conquer those fears. To see someone sit there for ten minutes, then finally get the courage to jump, and seeing the elation when they come out ... When I finish, I go back and watch other people completing the obstacles. It’s beautiful. There’s a few dark tunnels you have to go through, too. For me, it’s okay, but for someone who struggles with confined spaces, it’s really confronting.”

Photo: Tough Mudder Australia

NO LOSERS

“I think I’m passionate about adventure and obstacle racing so much because it’s the only type of racing where I’ve noticed really strong fields of women as well as men. A lot of events scare women off, but women are attracted to Tough Mudder. Being a woman in sport, you go to an event and you think, ‘Where are

all the women?’ But you turn up to one of these events and there’s teams of women; there’s women dressed up in fancy dress and everyone’s smiling.