Please allow me to introduce myself...

Hello, my name is Nikki and I'm kind of a wuss. I am not one to subscribe to the theory of pushing yourself to the limit. My activity of choice is yoga. I like to run, bacause I am only competing with myself. I have two nicknames circulating amongst my group of friends: Foot and Wankles. These stem from my uncanny ability to break a foot or injure an ankle with the greatest of ease, doing regular, everyday activites such as: walking down a flight of stairs, running to first base in a softball game, or crossing a gas station parking lot.

In addition to the aforementioned badass qualities, I suffer from an acute lack of motivation to put down my glass of chardonnay (or hell, just postpone it) and get outside to train for events that I sign up for. And I sign up for quite a few. This past January I ran the Disney Half Marathon. Not only did I skip the training part, but I dropped a 30 lb. box on my foot 2 days before the race. I know you will be shocked to hear that this landed me with a knee injury, walking the last 4.5 miles of the race. Not fun. At all.

This coming July I am registered to run the Boilermaker, a 15k in Utica, NY that dead ends into the brewery once you make is past the 9 miles of hills in the heat. Today is June 5, 2011 and to date my training has included some serious carb loading, weekly yoga classes, and two training runs that included a hill. Yeap, one hill. But I did run over and back so I am thinking that counts for something. I feel like this is an important moment to point out that I am not some lazy, unfit, bump on a log. I run 5k's, 10k's and recently did the Merrel Down & Dirty Mud Run. I am just no where close to accomplishing what I know that I am capable of.

A month ago my brother, Adam, did the Spartan race in Miami. I didn't sign up because I assumed that I would not be able to finish it. 8 miles, countless burpees, crazy obstacles...tough stuff. We went down to the park to cheer him on, and I was struck by a feeling of disappointment in myself that I didn't even try the race. I saw people crossing the finish line that certainly did not look to be in better shape than me, out there having a blast and pushing through it. It was inspiring and exciting.

Cut to a few days later when Adam asked if I wanted to try the Muddy Buddy in November and the Tough Mudder in December. He was probably asking about the Tough Mudder just to be nice, good brother that he is. The Tough Mudder is not a race, it's a personal challenge. And this challenge is 10-12 miles long with 20 obstacles in between. They don't time you because the goal is to finish. Good lord. Of course I said yes.

I immediaitely started to talk a little smack and psych myself up. Then I watched the videos on the website and checked out some of the obstacles. NBD - just running through fire, live electrical wires and chest high ice pits. Crap. The Tough Mudder website states that it is an exceptional event for the toughest of the tough, and that's certainly not me. But it's about to be, because I'm hooked, and I really want to complete this challenge for myself because I know that I can. So I am starting today with my training and I decided to blog it. Because even if I am the only one that ever sees this, there is a level of accountability in putting my goals out there on the internet. So with that, here we go....Day 1 starts now!