14-May / fitness / 0 COMMENTS

I’m normally always up for crazy challenges, ways to push my comfort zone and get an in-the-moment adrenaline rush. So when I heard about the Spartan Race coming to Vancouver I jumped on the chance to participate.

I scouted out for a team with the mindset that if nobody decides to participate with me, I’d register by my lonesome. To my surprise, it turns out I have more gutsy friends than I thought! Yeah!! So, the team was set: Team DCube BR (not as creative as I could’ve gotten but it works)!

Months of training at a leisurely pace and a few bootcamp sessions crammed at the tail-end I felt pumped for this race but not quite ready. My team and I really had no idea what to expect so we each individually trained however we thought would help us on the course. One of us is a strong runner, another a quick thinker, our third member had been religiously training for the past 4 months and me, my upper body had been my targeted area of improvement.

Sadly, our strong runner had to bow out for business but I managed to find another gutsy guy! Woo hoo, or how the Spartan announcer puts it “Aroo”!! Alright, we were ready!!

Race day finally arrived!

The moment we got there I noticed the amount of people was impressive, the first few heats were the real competitive groups and then came the others. A lot of coordinated teams with knee high socks or same color t-shirts… When our heat got announced we made our way to the starting line, 5…4…3…2…1…Go!

We started running, jumped over fire, pulled concrete blocks, challenged our balance…and I even said “bring it!” to those pesky burpees. Yes, it all paid off! At the running part, I felt at a huge loss, specially with the amount of uphill running but I did notice how much my upper body had improved, I felt it stronger than from when I first started. Heck, I was able to pull weight I wouldn’t have thought to pull at the pace I did.

Right from the beginning, our team had said it was about challenging ourselves – our personal selves – and that is exactly what we did. I came in at 1:05:57. Like I said, the running killed me – an area to focus on for next time (and there will be a next time) !

I’d go into more detail of what we had to do but what fun would that be for those thinking about participating next year Let’s just say that at one point, I was taken back to when I was 9 or 10 years old – playing in the mud, not having a care in the world. I scraped and bruised my knee, played with rocks and rolled around in the mud! I loved it. Would I do it again? Hell yeah! I’m eyeing the Super Spartan in September.

What was my meal of choice before the race?

I whipped up a cup of oatmeal, half of a green apple, a banana and some cinnamon to taste. I wanted to fuel my body with carbs so my body can burn them off as energy during the race but, unfortunately, my calculations were a little bit off. I had my breakfast 2 1/2 hours before the start so by the time we had to start the race I was already getting hungry. Had I had more than a cup, I think it would have kept me satiated.

What challenge did you take on this weekend?

breakfast spartan race