Taking On Turf Games

Sometimes you sign up for something before asking the sensible questions, like when, where, and how much training you’ll actually need. That’s exactly how I found myself heading to Farnborough in mid-February for my first Turf Games…with a team I’d barely trained with!

Getting Roped In!

Late last year a friend mentioned he was struggling for a final team member. He’d signed up as part of a mixed group to take on the Winter Turf games but had a drop out due to injury with limited time to fill the space. Me being me and also being relatively fresh out of completing Hyrox I said I was good to step in.

I don’t like to back out of commitments, however, wasn’t thrilled to learn it was Feb 15th (not ideal when you’re in a relationship!) and also it was in Farnborough with an early start. Anyhow, what was done was done so down to training now, I guess!

Training For the Event…Or At Least Trying To!

An additional logistic headache was in store for the training as well unfortunately. None of us lived in direct proximity and due to the nature of the event we had to use a specialist gym to train. 3 months out and with little shared availability this was already shaping up to be challenging preparation for the event.

Over the next couple of months, we managed to fit in a few shared training sessions alongside some of the group training together at their local gyms. There were only a couple of workouts that required heavy focus on synchronisation and teamwork. Although we were able to get the sync to a suitable level it still didn’t bode well for achieving a strong performance on the day.

Also, in all honesty I’d said yes because when given an option between challenge myself versus not, I’ll always say yes. Due to all of the logistical considerations alongside work though, I along with the rest of the team hadn’t given it the training and prep it deserved.

A Last Minute Curveball

Days out from the race and another last minute emergency occurred. One of the team members and in fact my very good friend who had pulled me into the team fell sick. Firstly, he’s quite a unit so it was a big loss on the strength front but also it meant a last minute scramble for a replacement. Fortunately, we managed to get someone in but this meant we were then going in cold as far as full team training.

The morning started early, and I made life harder for myself by driving past the entrance twice before finally finding the car park. A brisk walk to the venue and a few “Where are you?” calls from the team later, I finally made it in time for the warm-up.

Down To the Workouts

We started on The Worm, the workouts we’d probably practiced the most to ensure we could manage height and strength differences. We performed pretty well, keeping in sync and recording a relatively good score. It made for a positive feeling start to the day although as we worked through the events, we started to see ourselves drop further down the leaderboard.

The Lift workout was a struggle and it was here that the last minute injury in our team really hit us hard. Everyone in our team performed admirably enough but we reached our limitations on the max weight we were able to push having no natural power lifter in the group.

After that it was a case of pushing through to stations, enjoying the experience and taking in the atmosphere.

We finished up on All Gas, No Brakes which is exactly as it says on the tin! It’s focused on maximum effort and intensity with a mix of row, bike, running and farmer carry. It’s potluck on your workout sequence for the day but at least finishing on this we could leave it all on the course knowing we had no more workouts to complete.

Would I Do It Again?

All in all, it was an enjoyable experience however if I were to enter again, I’d definitely prioritise dedicated and consistent team training time as well as consistent focus on each workout for the event. The event had a good mix of teams with some well-honed and ready to dominate the leaderboard whilst others were there for the experience.

Probably the biggest downside to Turf is the downtime between workouts. You can spend maybe 90-120 minutes between workouts which makes for a lot of sitting around in a relatively crowded environment. It also results in a full day where we finished up around 17:00 in the end.

You can of course work your way through spectating different events but after a while it can feel a bit long and preferably, I would have liked being able to complete it with less breaks between. Given the number of teams, people participating and differing ability levels it’s a difficult task to manage scheduling so I can understand why it’s structured the way it is.

Experience Over Results This Time

Turf wasn’t my best performance, but it reminded me why I say yes to these things in the first place. Even without the perfect prep, the early start, or even the team we started out with you leave with stories, lessons, and people you wouldn’t have met otherwise. I’ll chalk this down as a win as far as worthwhile experiences in my book!