Spartan Race

This training plan is the one I developed and used for the Killington Ultra Beast. I raced all year and really wanted to make my way up to Killington to tackle the founder's race with authority.

There is nothing like getting all beast mode on an obstacle course. And of course, what could be better than getting beast mode on a Spartan Beast. Spartan Races have become the most popular and widely recognized OCR. With that, the Spartan teams have to do more and more each year to improve the events, the turnout, and keep the OCR faithful coming. South Carolina is the state, Carolina Adventure World is the venue, and a Spartan Beast is the challenge. The final Beasts of the year. Challenge Accepted.

It hasn’t been a strong fall for Spartan, and that trend continued this past weekend at Rough Creek Lodge. Things seemed to start going that way at Killington, a lack luster World Championships, and then there was the mud fest this past weekend.

Spartan Races offer race types for all types of competitive athletes. The common misconception is that many believe the shorter distance races are easy. We are talking about Spartan Races here, nothing is easy. These races are designed to challenge you, no matter the distance.

Getting down and dirty in the Barbed Wire Crawl is mandatory. There are few things more challenging on your entire body than trekking through a rocky creek-bed on your elbows and knees trying to avoid getting ripped up by barbed wire just a few inches above you. Arch your back a little too much and you will need a new shirt and some band-aids. Lift your butt a bit too high and you may be mooning everyone behind you.

The Fire Jump has become one of the signatures of any Spartan Race. This final obstacle is the only thing standing between you and victory. Jumping over the smokey remnants of once living forest and grab your finisher's medal.

The Bucket Brigade is one of those obstacles that makes you test the fabric of your willpower. The task? Fill a five gallon bucket with gravel and carry it in front of you up and down steep inclines. If your rocks settle below the holes, do it again. If you spill, do it again. Failure is not an option.

The dunk wall, while not all that challenging, will get you extremely muddy. The idea is to completely submerge yourself into a foul mixture of mud and water and navigate under a wall to reunite yourself with oxygen on the other side.

Like the Bucket Brigade, the Sand Bag carry is one of the more challenging obstacles. Although this obstacle doesn't require any amazing acrobatic skills, it will test your intestinal fortitude. Men and women alike will carry a bag filled with sand up and down steep inclines to insure that your legs feel the burn. Like the Sand Bag Carry, there are variations of this obstacle in which you will carry a heavy log around a similar stretch of landscape.

You are going to want to get real low to the ground to grab that stone, so hopefully your squat form is impeccable. You are going to pick up the stone, carry it to the other flag, do five burpees and come back. Keep a flat back as you pick up and lower the stone, and move quickly. Don’t cheat on those burpees either, chest to grass and feet off the ground for it to count.