the world’s most gruelling events. Fire, barbed wire and 10,000-volt shocks

Slottsskogen Park in Gothenburg is an idyllic place – for 364 days of the year, at least. On one particular day, however, this oasis nestled in the middle of a Swedish city becomes a mecca for masochists. Cries of agony ring through the trees; smoke billows from burning barricades; and blood, sweat and tears fl ow in equal measure. It is the day of the Tough Viking race, which along with internationally renowned event the Tough Mudder, is considered to be one of the world’s most extreme obstacle races. Members of the Swedish Army’s Special Forces developed the concept a few years ago. The objective is to take every participant to their physical limits – and beyond. The race through the park gives runners 19 obstacles to conquer over a distance of 7.4 kays. Just a few hundred metres from the starting line, dozens of rugby players await the runners, ready to tackle them and take them down. Competitors who manage to get by without sustaining injuries will go on to suffer through stages that require them to crawl through mud, under barbed wire, then sprint over red-hot burning coals and dive into a pool of ferociously icy water.
All the while, runners are simultaneously racing against the clock and battling their own urge to simply give up and make the pain stop. Not everybody wins the latter battle – but those who succeed in making it to the fi nish line, after up to three hours of hellish agony, still have to get past the most feared obstacle in the entire race: the 10,000-volt cage. Hundreds of electrically charged wires that send a shock through the runners’ bodies every time they touch one (see right) hang from the ceiling of the cage. The shocks are not life-threatening by any means, but they are very painful. No other obstacle in the race produces louder screams of agony. In spite of all this anguish, next time hundreds of runners will once again queue at the starting line to take on the Tough Viking race – ready to test their limits and disturb the idyllic peace of Gothenburg’s Slottsskogen