My Crazy, WONDERFUL Life! : We are Spartans......AAAARRRROOOOHHHHH!

Last year my younger brother Keithy invited Joey and I to do this race that he and his buddies were all doing. Keep in mind that Keith and his friends are at least 8 years younger than me which means they are about 15 years younger than Joey.

BUT...You know me I am always up for a race so I said yes and went to work convincing Joey that we should do it. I then googled the race and was a little bit frightened when I watched the video...Then my competitive side took over and I got excited!

I agreed that I would stay with Joey last year because he didn't want to run much of the race. Last year the race was 8 miles with 20+ obstacles called the Super Spartan. It was really tough and challenging but enjoyable. I was proud of both of us and how well we did. My brother and a few of his friends came in WAY ahead of us. My older sister came in right in front of Joey and I and a couple of his friends finished behind us.

We had so much fun that we decided to sign up almost immediately when we got the email that they were going to be doing a Spartan Beast in Utah in 2012. The Beast is 12 miles and 30+ obstacles. This year we actually trained for it. We started doing different workouts every day to prepare. Joey lost some weight and was running on the treadmill.

The week leading up to the race was the hottest week in Utah in a long time...Over 100 every day. I was getting nervous about running in it. I had signed us up for the competitive heat at 9 AM. I got an email a couple of days before the race asking if we would be willing to switch to an earlier time if we really didn't have a chance of winning the race. My immediate response was H@LL yes! So we moved to the 8 AM heat hoping to get a little bit more cool air.

We drove up to Soldier hollow the day of the race excited and ready to go. The first half of the race was GREAT! Hills to climb, walls to scale, mud pits, sandbags to run up and down hills with, monkey bars, cargo nets and things like that. I hadn't had to do burpee's yet and neither had he. (If you can't do one of the obstacles you have to do 30 burpee's before you can move on). Then we came to the rope climb. I looked at it and remembered last year when I got all the way to the top and reached to ring the bell....fell all the way to the ground and had some very nice rope burns on my thighs. I decided that I wasn't even going to attempt the climb the rope and went straight to my first Burpee's.
I felt GREAT and thought I must really be in good shape this year to feel this good still.
Well I was humbled ALOT when we came to what I think was the WORST part of the race. I knew there would be an obstacle that had barbed wire strung above me that I would have to army crawl under. I hated this obstacle last year because it was hard.....well this year they made it worse. It was an uphill army crawl climb with the barbed wire above you AND there was a fire house being sprayed on you so it was washing away all of the mud and basically you were army crawling on Razor blade rocks. I started out on my stomach like you would picture someone army crawling. It hurt so bad and I got so many cuts right away that I switched to my side and was moving back and forth between both sides until both legs and hips were raw...then I went onto my back and slid on my butt and back. I am sure that the guy below me saw EVERYTHING but I didn't care. I just wanted out of the hell that I was in. Once I made it to the top I really considered and wanted to stop. I had blood dripping down my legs. We continued on just a little bit slower this time though. We powered through the next 10 or so obstacles and running in between. My back was killing me and spasming and I truly thought I don't know if I can do this. We then came to where you have to shoot a gun and get a bulls eye. I was excited because I am a good shot and thought great I can blow through this. Well I MISSED! I had to do burpee's. With my back aching I was doing them the cheater way where you put one leg back at a time and don't jump your feet back together. The little helper yelled at me that I was doing them wrong and I am sorry now but I couldn't help myself. I yelled right back..."I am not competing and with my bad back you are lucky I am even actually doing these stupid things!" She got in trouble by the other helper there....They are only really supposed to make sure that the competitors are doing everything right. The rest of us are on an honor system. Once I get done with these burpee's...It is the Javelin throw and the guy tells me this is your last obstacle you are almost there...WELL that dude lied!
There were a couple more obstacles and then I came around a corner and saw MORE BARBED WIRE hill army crawling that I was supposed to do.I could see the finish line on the other side and still considered not doing it.
Joey asked if he could do burpee's instead of going under the barbed wire. I probably would have paid a lot of money and done 100 real burpees to not have to do it. But I got down and started to tear my legs, hands and elbows up again. Then I saw other people rolling and they said that it wasn't as painful. I had a water backpack on because of the heat and only thought for about a second about what it would do to my backpack and then started rolling. I made it through only to have 3 big guys with sticks trying to knock me down before I could cross the finish line. I staggered through and was so proud of both Joey and I. WE DID IT!!!
We got our medals and shirts and then headed for the showers...We waited in line for about 15 minutes until it was our turn. It took us about 15 minutes to get clean enough that I could get in the car...We brought sheets to sit on too.
Once we got home and had a real shower I was completely blown away by how bruised and cut up I really was. Not to mention my back was out and I was in pain.
I got the email later that night that if I signed up within 2 days for next year I would get a 50% discount....YA RIGHT!
I have also had friends email me telling me they have created teams and asking me to join their team. MIND YOU these are people who have never run it.
I have committed to no one yet.
I don't truly know if I can do it again. Maybe once the pain wears off I will be ready to test my spartan skills again but for now I am retired from Spartan racing.....and if you know me you know that means this was one hard as hell race because there isn't a race out there that I am afraid to do or wouldn't do again...We shall see maybe it will be like childbirth and I will forget and be signed up in a couple of weeks.......