I spent five and a half hours last Sunday running up
and down ski hills and through swamps, climbing under and over all sorts of
obstacles, and generally getting beat up – all in the name of completing my
first Spartan Beast race. And what’s
more, I actually paid someone about $80 for the privilege of doing all of that
shit! So what gives? Why would a cheap bastard like me pay money
for an organized form of exercise (torture) like this? And actually be planning on doing it
again? Well, since you’re reading this
anyway, I’m going to tell you.
For someone who’s always trying to find cheap or no-cost
ways to stay in shape, paying money for an event like this seems a bit
antithetical. But for me, even though I
aim to do most of my exercise regimen at little or no cost, there are times
when a person needs a sort of goal or benchmark to evaluate one’s
progress. This race was one of those
benchmarks for me. I’m not an endurance
guy really. I don’t log countless miles
of running each week. I don’t run
marathons. For the most part I subscribe
to the less is more, short but intense school of thought surrounding exercise. Practically, that means a lot of
weightlifting, sprinting, met-cons, tabatas, explosive movement-oriented sports
– that sort of stuff, with a few middle distance runs and swims thrown in for
good measure.
This race, pardon the pun, was a different beast
altogether. 24 kilometers long (most of those
at significant elevation). Not at all like my regular training. But I’m an advocate of well-roundedness (or
at least I’d like to think so) in fitness as well as life in general. Excessive specialization in any field has
never really appealed to me (perhaps a little bit of ADD…). So this was a new challenge. At the end of the day, I really just wanted
to see if I could do it, in the absence of any real distance training. Prior to Sunday, the last time I’ve run any
distance much greater than about 7 or 8kms was at least 5 years ago (prior to
my daughter being born).
In the lead up to Sunday, I have to say I was pretty
nervous, which is unusual because I’m quite calm by nature. Like I said, I hadn’t done any long runs
leading up to the event. Hell, I hadn’t
even run a 5k in about 3 weeks. My last
workout beforehand was on Tuesday and consisted of a few sets of muscle-ups on
rings. After that, I figured a few days
off would be good in order to come into Sunday totally fresh. I was genuinely scared of failing at this
thing, especially since I had mentioned it to a few people and would have been
pretty embarrassed if I wasn’t able to complete it.
I had been pretty casual about the whole thing in the
weeks prior. A friend of mine, who was
also planning to do the race (and who has a lot
more experience with distance events), was really concerned about issues like
food and water, talking to me about all manner of energy gels, camelback packs
for water, electrolytes, etc. In
hindsight, I was a bit cocky and flippant about all of that stuff. Food, I thought, ha! I already fast for sometimes 20 hours each
day. What do I need food for in a 4-5
hour race! Water, ha! I’ve heard there
are some water stations throughout the course, and in the 7km Spartan Sprint
earlier in June I had skipped past the only water station on the course without
even stopping! I didn’t like the idea of
spending 50 bucks on a bulky camelback and getting it caught on the barbed wire
and other obstacles. My ego and my
desire to be tough and minimalist was getting in the way. In the end I acquiesced a bit and the day
before the race I went out to Canadian Tire and spent 12 dollars on a little 1
litre leather wineskin thing. I hung it
from my belt with a climbing carabiner, with the thought that if it started to
get in the way, I could simply ditch it somewhere and only be out $12. I also stuck a handful of my kids’ dried
Fruitsource bars and a granola bar in the cargo pockets of my shorts.
The day of the race was absolutely beautiful. The week leading up to the race had seen
humidex values in the 40 degree Celsius range, but Sunday was low twenties,
sunny and breezy. Absolutely
perfect. I had run a 5km Spartan Sprint
3 years previously in 30+ degree heat and it had been brutal. Once I started, I realized that the wineskin
flopping around at my waist wasn’t going to be a huge burden. I had been worried that it’d interfere with
my ‘speed’, but the first massively-steep ascent convinced me that that likely
wouldn’t be a huge issue! Some of the
downhills saw it knocked around a bit but not a real problem. On obstacles such as the barbed wire crawls
and monkey bars, I just pitched it down to the other end and then picked it up
later. The fruit bars and granola bar
came in handy too.
The first third (roughly of the race) posed no real
problems. I knew what to expect from the
Sprint distances I had done before. I
was trying to be proactive with my water consumption to avoid cramping and
dehydration and I wasn’t pushing myself to the max (hell, I knew I wasn’t
winning this thing and I just wanted to finish and place somewhat respectably). It wasn’t until I got to, I’m guessing, the
10km mark and we had to stop and do a set of 20 wheelbarrow-style deadlifts
(really light weight) when I started to get some cramps in my inner quads. I kind of pushed past them, scarfed down a
fruit bar and few sips of water and kept on trucking. But they didn’t get better. For the whole remainder of the race my quads
kept cramping – then it moved on to the calves and hamstrings. It was a learning experience for me because
I’ve never experienced this kind of muscle cramping in the past. After briefly stopping a few times to stretch
them out for a few seconds, I quickly realized that my best defence was to keep
moving (and to massage them a little bit when possible to get the knots
out). Strangely the worst cramps came at
sections of the race that were really upper body dominant, such as having to
stop and do chin-ups. That was when the
legs cramped up the most and I ended up doing chin-ups in an L-sit position because
it seemed to help with the leg cramps.
Strange!
The other, somewhat unexpected (although shouldn’t have
been) thing that got me were the blisters.
At about the halfway point, I could really feel a huge one forming on
the inside of my right foot. I put up
with it for a while but then decided to take a short break on the side of the
trail during one of the forested sections.
I had stashed a few band-aids in a ziplock bag, so I quickly covered it
up and kept going. In hindsight, it was
a total waste of time, since it only provided a bit of relief, and pretty soon
I had one on the same spot on my left foot anyway. Your feet get so wet during these races,
running through streams, mud, etc. – this one even had an open water swimming
portion – that it’s impossible to do much once the blisters start. Next time, I know where I’m susceptible to
getting them, so I’ll try preventatively wrapping those parts of my feet in
moleskin or tape. For this race, it just
got to a point where you just had to try and ignore them. My attitude was basically to just deal with
the discomfort and worry about it later.
It certainly did slow me down in parts, because it’s hard to resist
being more tentative when something hurts.
Oh well, next time I’ll have to try the whole “ounce of prevention…” strategy.
Aside from the cramps and blisters, I was pretty
pleasantly surprised that cardio wasn’t a limiting factor. I had thought that I might have a problem
with such a long distance, never having trained much for longer runs. For most of the second half of the race, I
could have pushed harder, if it hadn’t been for the leg cramps and
blisters. Live and learn I suppose – and
good info to have for next year.
All in all it was a great event. Tonnes of variation and some really
spectacular mountaintop views of the lake country all around Mont Ste. Marie –
the only bad part was that I was reluctant to stop even for a minute to savour
those views for fear of cramping up worse.
The best tactic was to keep moving.
The final uphill section, following the swim, was so steep in parts that
you were scrambling on all fours over fallen tree branches and rock faces just
to get up, but it helped to just keep moving, however slowly, one foot in front
of the other.
Many of the obstacles were similar to the Spartan Sprint
races I’ve done in the past, just longer and more difficult, but there were
some cool new ones. My favorite was a
progression of hanging boards, rings, chains and ropes, all at different
levels, that you had to swing across like an orangutan. Very reminiscent of some of the stuff on
American Ninja Warrior! I was pleased
not to fall on that one. Actually, I
only had to do one set of 30 burpees (standard punishment for failing at an
obstacle) the whole day – on the spear throw.
That’s been my nemesis for the Spartan Sprints. I missed the spear throw in my first two
Spartan Races. I actually hit it for the
first time this past June for the Ottawa Sprint, after taking the time to get
it well balanced in my hand before the throw.
This time I did the same thing, took my time, and hit the target smack
in the middle of the chest….but it didn’t stick. The spear (well, shovel handle with a dull
metal poker attached) hit and bounced right off. Oh well, burpees it was for that one, but I
felt pretty good about it still. Most of
the obstacles themselves are not really that difficult. They don’t require a lot of brute
strength. But interspersed with the
distance and the elevation, they take their toll. I’m reminded of that great quote from Rocky,
“it ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep
moving forward.” The last quarter of the
race at least is purely mental.
I set out basically to finish the thing, but secretly I
was kind of thinking that 5 hours would have been a good goal. I finished in 5 hours 38 minutes, so lots of
room for improvement. I have no
illusions that I’ll ever match the top guys, some of who run this thing in just
over 3 hours! (WTF). One friend of a
friend flew through it in just over 4 hours, and apparently had scouted out the
course for 2 straight days ahead of time and had his wife strategically placed
to offer food at different sections throughout the course! Another guy I talked to (who beat my time by
about 10 minutes) had trained 6 days/week in preparation for it. My preparations (or lack thereof) pale in
comparison. But still, I’m happy. If you would have asked me in the half hour
following the race, as I lay on the ground stuffing a cheeseburger David
Hasslehoff-style into my face (lovingly provided by my wife), if I wanted to do
another Spartan Beast, the answer might have been no. But, once that initial fatigue subsided, I
can definitely say I’ll try it again and hopefully learn from some of the
mistakes I made this year.
