“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”

At first, I was nervous.  Very nervous.  I had spent the past few months training for this race.  I was training my whole body and doing cardio 2-3 times a week.  That is, until I pinched a nerve in my upper spine.  I had to take a 4-week break from my workouts, during this time, I apparently lost my self discipline.

When I was finally able to return to my training, I started doing it sporadically and never got around to doing cardio.

Fast Forward to July 14th: race day.

After having to push our heat back 30 minutes, we were finally at the starting line.  I was getting more nervous by the second.  Hell, even as I write this, those feelings are coming back.

And the opening didn’t help.  We had to jog up an incredibly steep hill.  “If the rest of the race is like this,” I thought, “I’m not going to last very long at all.”

Upon finally reaching the top of the giant, steep hill, we got to our first obstacle. We had to crawl under a 5′ wall with a 2 ft gap, jump over a 4 ft wall, and go through a 6 ft wall with 2×2 ft opening; rinse and repeat.  Easy enough, this is the kind of thing you’d picture in any obstacle course.

From there, the course directed us through the trees, where we ran into an older gentleman taking a rest.  We couldn’t help but notice when he pulled a can of beer from his back pack.  After joking with him a bit, he offered us a can and we accepted.  I’m not going to lie, it really helped.  Between my high level of nervousness and the first mega-hill, my mouth and throat were bone-dry.  It was at this time, that my nerves were eased and I really started to enjoy the race.

After clearing the trees, we were made to run up another hill, though not as steep.  It was here that we made our first friends during the race.  Together, we yelled our Spartan cry “Aroo! Aroo! Aroo!”, and shared our thoughts on the course.  “I heard that x obstacle is the halfway mark!” or “There’s apparently a 200 ft slip n’ slide on the way down!”  “…No way, that’s so awesome!!”

Eventually, we found ourselves at the rope climb.  The objective was simple:  After jumping in the water, climb up one of the ropes and ring the bell at the top.  If you failed, you had to 30 burpees.

I had been looking forward to this one and was eager to prove myself.  I ran down the mound into the water and was immediately surprised that it went up to my shoulders.  This is it:

I jumped up and grabbed hold of the highest knot I could reach.  I then pulled up my legs and secured them on the knot below.  I then continued to making my way up the rope, securing my hands and feet with every knot.  Upon reaching the top, I looked around, the view was amazing.  Not because the land was ascetically pleasing, but because of the effort I had to put forth to be able to see it.  I then remembered that I still had a goal to complete, so I promptly rang the bell and made my way downward.

After the rope climb, we were rewarded with our first of two water stations.  My thirst had been quenched by the half-can of (warm) beer, but the cup of water was still a delicious, delicious, treat.

After the water station, we found our first endurance-based obstacle.  We had to grab and empty 5-gallon bucket, fill it up with stones, and carry it uphill and back downhill.  The objective wasn’t tough by any means, just tiring.

After hiking through the trees and climbing up/down rope nets on our way to the top of the mountain, we came upon, in my opinion, the toughest obstacle in the course.

Pancakes, they were called.  We were made to carry soft sacks that were filled with 40 lbs of sand down a hill, around, and back up a very steep hill.  I had a somewhat easy time on the way down, but decided to rest at bottom because of the upcoming task.

I found myself having to create “semi-objectives” in order to complete this obstacle.  I would find a spot to reach, or pick a number of steps to take before I would let myself collapse and rest.  I looked over and noticed that Randy had the idea to just pick up the pancake, throw it as far as he could, and walk to it; remembering this idea at a later obstacle really saved my ass. At times, I found myself taking far more steps than I had planned – I was determined.  I wanted nothing more than to reach the top and throw the pancake one final time.

Randy and I made a lot of friends while completing this task.  Sometimes we found ourselves in small groups discussing the race, comparing our times (there were many heats), etc.

We knew that the second and final water station was just around the bend, but weren’t expecting another obstacle to stand in our way:  Monkey Bars.

The gaps between the bars were wider than most and would fluctuate in elevation.  I saw quite a few people hesitate, slip, fall and be forced to do 30 burpees as punishment.  I can only assume they didn’t do much on the playground at recess, because man, did I breeze through this one.  I swung to the first bar and let my momentum carry me through the rest.

After another savory cup (or two) of water, I finally met with failure at an obstacle.  We were made to use a pully-system to bring a 60lb bucket to the top of the obstacle.  I’d say this thing weighed bore than I did, if I didn’t know any better.  I pulled with all of my might, but it kept pulling back.  I then planted my feet against a tire so that I could go nowhere and used all of my strength.  It was incredibly tough, but I managed to get the bucket 12-15 feet in the air.  Suddenly, I was being pulled up and could not catch myself for the life of me.  My punishment?  30 burpees.

I vowed to rock the next obstacle.  Luckily, all we had to do was scale some 10′ walls.  I saw many teams using each other as stools and pushing each other up as recommended.  To make up for my previous obstacle, I had to 1up them, which I did.  With a running start, I jumped up, grabbed the top of the ledge, and pulled myself up.  Without thinking, I just jumped down and slightly hurt my ankle, lesson learned. For the second wall, I did the same; except, instead of pulling myself up, I just held on kind of walked up.

I should add that I wore skele-toes for this race.  In case you don’t know, they are those shoes with the toes that conform to the shape of your foot.  They were perfect for this event.

Unfortunately, my awesome shoes had nothing to do with the next task, an army crawl under barbed wire.

This obstacle wasn’t hard, it was just long.  The barbed wire was probably 1.5 – 2 ft above mud and rocks, with the addition of bails of hay to get in your way (heh, rhyme).

Soon after this, came one of the best parts: The slip n’ slide.

It was 200 ft. long, down hill, and ramped you into a (muddy) lake.  From there, we were made to swim to the other side, diving under barrels along the way.

Over the next half-mile or so, Randy and I scaled over muddy ledges, hopped across tiny tree stumps (loved this obstacle) and eventually found ourselves at our final endurance-based task.

Our job was to pull a cement slab, that was attached to a chain, down a hill, through some shallow water, and back up a slippery, muddy hill.  The downhill part was okay, the water was easier, but the slippery slope was troublesome.  It was here, that I recalled Randy’s idea of throwing the pancake, meeting it, and repeating.  I would walk to the end of chain, pull it all in, and repeat.

Skip forward:  Finish Line.

…and then, after coming around a bend, I saw it.  I saw the finish line.  Never before have I felt such a rush.  Any energy that I had lost, was immediately returned.  The only things that stood in my way were fire, a slick ledge with rope to pull yourself up, and finally, 4 Spartans ready to knock me over with their giant Q-Tips.

With a great run and an even greater leap, I cleared the fire, ran straight up the wall that had tricked others, and stopped in front of the Spartans.

I wanted to calculate possible routes to dodge their blows, but there were none.  So I just ran in, dodged the strikes that I could, and got hit by others.

When the rush was over, I found a medal around my neck.  The past 4 months of anticipating, training..over.  I worked hard, I pushed myself, I’ve become nothing short of powerful beyond measure.