Spartan, Here We Come!

I thought I would never see the day when I would run a Spartan race. My husband started running these races about three years ago and I just thought there is no way that I would ever be crazy enough to try it myself. If you haven't ever heard of what a Spartan race is, it is basically a trail race through rough terrain interwoven with crazy obstacles such as intense monkey bars, mud pits, rope climbs, walls to traverse, sand bag lifts and the like. There are different lengths as well, the Sprint (4 miles), Super (8 miles), and the Beast (14 miles).

I am an extremely competitive person so when my sister-in-law challenged me to a Sprint, I couldn't refuse! I only had about a month's time to train for it and within that time I injured my heel which put me out for about a week and a half. I didn't feel very prepared but I was anxious to see if my every day farm work would pay off. I mean, hauling hay, scooping poop, bailing flood water, and chopping ice with an ax has got to be somewhat beneficial!

Littlefield, AZ and the weather is gorgeous! We started off the day with the kids race. It was so fun and the kids had a blast in all the mud.

After the kids went to play with cousins, it was our turn to play in the mud! Before I knew what was happening we were doing the beginning cheer with all the other racers and then we were off! It wasn't too bad, a few walls and some ditches, easy-peasy.

Barbed wire crawl? You see this all over on a farm.

Then came the mud. It reminded me of thick, chocolate pudding and there was no going around it. We waded through the knee deep goop for a long time. I don't think they were intending for this race to be so muddy but thanks to all the rain fall, we were definitely enjoying a serious mud run. I was surprised how quickly the race went by and I felt good!

We finished! The final fire jump!

Out of the 21 obstacles, I ended up only missing three of them. Sand bag carry? No sweat. Bucket haul? It was just like a bag of grain. I honestly attribute my success to simple but physically demanding farm work. Gotta love it!

Aroo!