Spartan 2012

We have completed the Spartan Sprint 5K today at Amesbury Sports Park. It was a great race and obstacle course. The first leg was to run up the ski hill into the woods. When we came out, we had to jump into 5 moats. They were filled with mud and cold water. With each moat, the water was deeper and deeper. There was no easing into this race. The next obstacle was to climb over a wall, then under the next and through the last. This was repeated twice. I was able to use my upper body strength to climb over. After the last wall, we picked up the pace and jogged until we hit the mud pit and swamp. Scott went right through it and almost lost his shoe. I went on the side of the trail which wasn't as deep. After trudging through even more mud and having to bend down under trees in the mud, we came upon the monkey bars. Our hands were wet and muddy. I climbed onto the first rung and started to swing to one bar and then the next until I ended on the other side. I was in awe. Most people fell off because it was slippery. If you fall off any obstacles, you have to do 30 burpees. I was able to rest my arms while I watched Scott and the Adairs do burpees. (Yes, I did have to do burpees on a horizontal wall climb that I slipped off of and they didn't)  I was thrilled. I couldn't believe I conquered this challenge. Continuing on through more mud and hills, we made it to walls. Each wall we had to climb over was taller and taller. The first few, I was able to run and jump and muscle over it. Once the walls became over my head, Scott boosted me up. But it was a long drop on the other side. I slowly lowered myself down then jumped the rest of the way.
One of the other challenging obstables was the rope climb. Fortunately there were knots every few feet. Of course, it was muddy and we started in a muddy water pool. It was all upper body strength again to pull myself up the rope. I climbed and climbed until I reached the cow bell, rang it, and cheered for joy. I never thought I could do a rope climb.
Next came more moats and then we dragged a cement block around a circle. The hardest part of the challenge beside walking up and down hill with a 20 pound weight, was the barred wire. We had to crawl on "mud" covered gravel under the wire for at least 50 yards which then turned to uphill crawling. My knees and shoulders were killing me. Fortunately, none of us were injured. After that we ran through the woods and uphill again, jumped over fire conquered one final obstacle, followed by being hit by the Spartans themselves.

We had a great time and even signed up again for next year. I don't think I could have completed this last year. I would have been doing quite a few more burpees instead of completing the obstacles. Because I have been weight lifting, my upper body strength has improved tremendously. It was a great accomplishment to get over those walls by myself, or rope climb, or monkey bars. I am pretty sure I wouldn't have done this last year.
Since September when I started to weight train, my trainer really pushed me to do pull-ups. She had me doing this at every workout. When I first started, I could not even do half of one. Now I am up to eight. Being able to do pull-ups is very empowering for a women. It shows my strength that I don't need to rely on anyone else, that I am powerful and I can accomplish anything. That's what the Spartan did for me as well. All the training led to this use of my running and strength abilities. I have conquered my fears and prove that "I AM WOMAN".
What are you afraid of? What do you want to do that you can't do now? How would it feel to be able to do pull-ups? Don't let that little devil on your shoulder get the better of you. If you want to accomplish something, then work hard to do it. No one can do the work for you. Transform your body, mind, and soul to be a better and empowered you.