So initially I just wanted the bag because I am a bag whore but I couldn’t justify the price. Someone at work (The General) said I should do it if I want a real challenge so one night I got drunk (not a special night…regular night) and signed up for a Challenge so I could get the 20% off of a bag – the GR1. That’s my excuse.

A year ago – October 13, 2012 Class 281- I destroyed (lies – I barely survived if I’m being honest) my first GORUCK Challenge in Dallas, Texas. About 15 minutes into the thing I was going to quit. No doubt. Done deal. This shit is whack. I gave it the good ol’ college try but it wasn’t for me. Check please.

Except it was for me.

Training for my first GORUCK Challenge…I rucked twice. A 3 miler and a 6 miler (got a come-to-Jesus talk during this one), did lots of lifting – 5×5 – and then showed up for the Challenge. I’m not going to bore you with the details of everything we did during that Challenge but I want you to know it sucked. In my mind it still sucks and was more difficult than the Heavy. We were a failure as a team for about 3 hours and it uh, got easier as time went on. I’m lying. It was quite possibly the worst thing I have willingly signed up for in my short time on this Earth. But we did it. It was ugly but we did it.

I died like twenty times during the event. I have never wanted to quit something so bad and so often as this Challenge. I wanted to quit but if I did, the walk of failure back to my car would have been the same way we would’ve walked back as a team to our next, uh…adventure.

The next 9 hours…blah blah blah I hate life, I hate GORUCK, this is stupid, I want a refund and I will never do this again.

4 Challenges, 2 Lights, 1 Scavenger (GOLD! #BTC), 1 Heavy and 1 Trek later and every event I still swear I will never do another GORUCK again. That’s how you lie to yourself. It makes it easier. Just one more and I’m done…honest.

That’s the tale of Bee joining a cult-that’s-not-a-cult.

You see, what had happened was