Spartan Race

Summer 2012
Part II of my adventure to finding some alternative fitness goals was signing up for the Calgary Spartan Race.

It was a riot that should be experienced by everyone.  Fitness, mud, fire and spear throwing. 

Spartan Race is a series of obstacle races of varying distance and difficulty ranging from 1 mile to marathon distances: the Spartan Sprint (3+ miles of obstacle racing), the Super Spartan (8+ miles), the Spartan Beast (12+ miles), and the Ultra Beast (26+ miles - one of two marathon obstacle courses along with Mudderthon). Spartan Race also has a time-trial obstacle course race that is one mile in length, and has a military series in which obstacles are designed by the United States military. Spartan Race's parent company, Peak Races, hosts the Spartan Death Race, 48+ hour extreme test of endurance and resilience. In a Spartan Race event, "participants will confront obstacles ranging from extreme to absurd that gain their inspiration from sources as varied as Spartan training, Navy SEAL training and American Gladiators".^[1] ESPN describes the Spartan Race as "a true test of will."^[2]

Obstacles 
While Spartan Races vary in distance from 1 mile to marathon distances, the obstacles themselves also vary and are unpredictable. Participants must complete the obstacles or perform burpee penalty exercises. Many obstacles are present at each Spartan Race. Unlike other companies, Spartan Race does not provide a course map or list of obstacle to their participants until race day. Frequently presented obstacles include:

1.     Fire jump: participants leap over flames. This obstacle is typically at the beginning or end of a race. The fire jump has appeared in nearly every Spartan Race, though certain venues do not allow fire.

2.     Barbed wire crawl: a crawl through mud under barbed wire. Participants must stay low to the ground as to not get injured by the wire. Crawls range from 20-100+ yards in length. The wire crawl has appeared in every Spartan Race to date.

3.     Over-Under-Through: a series of obstacles in which runners must first climb over a wall, then under a wall, then through a tire or square hole placed in a wall. This obstacle is often repeated three or more times in a row and appears in almost every Spartan Race.

4.     Spear throw: from a distance of 10-20 yards, athletes must throw a wooden spear into a target. If the spear does not stick, a penalty of 30 burpees is assigned. The spear throw is present at every Spartan Race with the exception of state parks that do not allow weapons. Typically, the spear throw is near the end of the race.

5.     Wall climb: as the name suggests, runners must climb over a wooden wall. Walls range from 4-8 feet and are often in sequence. This obstacle may be repeated throughout the course.

6.     Object carry: A signature obstacle, the object carry is often the most challenging. In a Spartan Sprint, this obstacle typically appears once. In a Super Spartan, twice; in a Beast, three times or more. The object to be carried may be a tire, rock-filled bucket, or sandbag. Both the bucket and sandbag weight between 30 and 70 pounds. Men must carry heavier objects than women.

7.     Herculean Hoist: athletes must hoist a cement block or heavy bucket off the ground using a pulley system. This obstacle is similar to the "lat-pull" exercise machine, but is more difficult because the rope is often muddy and slippery.

8.     Tyrolean Traverse: Spartans must traverse a single rope that is hung horizontally between two posts or trees. The rope is hung over a body of water, so if competitors cannot traverse the rope, they will fall into the water and swim.

9.     Traversal Wall: the traversal wall is similar to a bouldering wall.

10.  Slippery Wall: a wall built at an incline (roughly 45 degrees) that is covered in soap or grease. Runners may try to sprint up the wall or use a rope for assistance.

11.  Gladiator Arena: before the finish line, athletes must pass through the "gladiators" who try to knock down runners using their pugil sticks.

 (Taken from the Spartan Race Wikipedia Page)
Spartan Race Calgary (August 17, 2013)
 http://www.spartanrace.com/calgary-obstacle-racing-spartan-sprint-2013.html

You've got to risk it for the biscuit.

“Train Insane or remain the same.”  Fair enough.  Though does this really achieve the desired effect?  Does it reach its intended target?  Who does it motivate?  Is there a better way?

Often in life, and especially in fitness, we are bombarded with messages that are meant to inspire, motivate, drive, denigrate, chastise, or otherwise instigate change in the way that we approach our fitness.  These are meant to be “mile” markers on our way to a healthier, better us.  However, all of these messages have one thing in common.  They are directed at the faceless masses.  They speak to the entire demographic and in doing so go from a precision tool that can be an instrument of change to background noise.

I love fitness motivation, it gets me fired up and ready to go when I’m dragging it or motivates me to look inward when all I want to do is vegetate.  I see it all the time.  Social media, television, billboards, posters and in my very own gym but like anything, there is such a thing as too much of a good thing.

People who are reading this post are on journeys just like mine.  We’re not perfect.  We’re works in progress.  The marble before the artist’s chisel.  They are motivated and desirous of change.  They are interested in educating themselves but they are also intelligent enough to do their homework.  They don’t take anything for granted.  Not the newest trend, best fitness gear, exercise, running shoe or nutritional advice…and certainly not the bombardment of endless cliché’s and inspiring one liners that has become du rigueur in our global consciousness.

Motivation is important.  Motivation through social media or any of these other sources is also important.  As a means…not as the end.

Let the inspiration lift you up, give you one more kilometer (or meter if you’re me), one more rep.  Let it lift you when you should fall and drag you when you yourself have given up.

That’s what motivation is for.  It can’t be given.

HIIT Day (28/1/2013)

HIIT or High Intensity Interval Training has been great these last few weeks.  It has really pushed my capabilities and brought my fitness to a new level.  It's true that I look like I sprung a major leak in the gym, but the results during and after speak for themselves.

(Leaking)

In all fairness, this is not HIIT in it's purest form.  It's the idea behind it.  Maximal output and effort in a controlled time line with a challenging cardiovascular component. 20-30 minutes long.  Lots of variety in the exercises used and an effort to push your cardiovascular response each time you go through it.

Tools of the Trade for today:
- Kettle bells
- Skipping ropes
- Mat
- TRX
- Plyometric Boxes
- Bench

Exercise Program:
1. Bike 20 Minutes (2:30 at 110+RPM and Resistance 5, then 1 min at Resistance 15 fast as possible)
2. Circuit
                 Kettle bell Swings (10)
                 Push Up on Kettle bells (15)
                 Kettle bell lateral raise (10)
                 Kettle bell shoulder press (10)
                 Skipping (100 rotations)
                 Plyo box jumps (8-10)
                 Romanian split squat (8/side)
                 Elevated calf raises (30)
                 Kettle bell squats (10)
                 TRX high row (8)
                 TRX low row (8)
                 TRX bicep curl (8)
                 Tricep bench presses (30)

                  Complete and repeat 4 times total.

It was awesome.  Whole new level of challenge.  Sure there was very little in the way of "weights" but the tangible results don't lie.  I looked like a complete mess and my wife banned me from any contact with her, my kids, our furniture...even the dogs...seriously...until after I showered and burned my clothes.

It was a great first round and I look forward to continuously switching it up and keeping the effort high.

The only negative about the whole experience that I feel I need to bring up is that your results, as with most training types, are exactly proportional to what you put into it.  You have to dig deep and really push.

Angry lovechild of capture the flag and tag.

Heading back to training.  One of my training partners, we’ll call her R, hates weights.  Of all shapes and sizes.  Hate is a strong word.  It conjures images of loathing, ridicule and scorn.  So…”hate” works just fine.  She is a cardio chick with a thing for running.  We’ve run together once.  There was a lot of crying, swearing and a little dry heaving.  All on my side of it.  People say running is fun and chasing something is more fun.  I’m of a slightly differing mind set.  Cover me in gravy and let loose a German Shepard…then you’ll see me run.

Time for a continuity break…

It’s a little my fault.  In fairness, she thought I could run.  So do a lot of other people I work with.  See, I volunteered to go to a camp.  One of the activities at said camp was the Animal Game.  Think of it like the angry lovechild of capture the flag and tag…then add the fear element of being hunted by another person.  The Animal Game is to Tag what Paintball is to Laser Tag. 

Fear is a wonderful motivator. 

This, in and of itself, is enough to give people pause.  The consellors at the camp gave out all the good jobs to other adults leaving me to be a squirrel or “something else you can think of”.  I came up with the Grim Reaper...the kids called me death.  Rules of the game were simple.  If you were caught, one of your lives was mine.  They offered the teachers a soft bean bag to toss as an alternative to running and to preserve our dignity.  Check that at the door.  I’m running.  No bean bag for Momma Maher’s boy.

I showed up in the following:
- Trail Runners
- Gators
- Camoflage
- Face Paint
- Gloves

The game starts up and I am paired with the runner.  We look at this game very differently.  She sees it as a game.  I see it as natural selection.  The chase was on and the screaming started.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not what I would call “Physically Imposing”.  I am a towering 5’7” (if I stretch) and, as previously shared, look like a brick on barbie legs.  But I’m fast and I have very little regard for “obstacles” or personal safety.

They run around a tall bush or brambles…I’m going through it.  Branches?  They should break.  I saw an opening between two trees…didn’t even slow…even after I clipped one and it spun me around before I could keep going.  Pure fun.  I ended up doing the game multiple times and running for hours on end.  Never even registered the time or distance.  Just the fun of it all.

Still don’t like to run.  But I can, and will, do more of it.  It’s a game changer for me.

I digress.

Back to my training.  My partner likes cardio, I like weights.  We needed a compromise and I wanted something to discuss on my blog to motivate and educate others.  Enter HIIT or High Intensity Interval Training.

Basically HIIT is and aerobic capacity exercise paired with an anaerobic exercise.  For those of you who didn’t follow that…it’s a cardiovascular exercise and a strength based exercise done in alternating series in a variety of ways.  This has been replicated in numerous different styles and programs from Fartlek to the modern WOD.

So, over the next few weeks I will discuss with you the benefits (or detriments) of HIIT and give you my rookie opinion at the training and wide spectrum results.

This will be in addition to other training modalities that "may" bolster some results but in no way should it alter what is capable by a motivated individual.

I will also be using a bunch of different pieces of equipment to showcase their benefits and unique ways to use them.

By the way, in regards to the animal game, the kids got to leave comments about their time on the trip and what they remembered.  My favorite is as follows: “I looked closely at a tree and it smiled and chased me down…I was so scared. It was awesome.”

I love my job.

One Month Down

One Month Down

So, it’s been an interesting Month.  As the blog, and my training, improved I noticed subtle changes.  Physique, mental focus, and emotional freedom were all improving.  To break that down; I was looking better, feeling better and more capable with my “emotional” highs and lows…I wasn’t acting like a tool all the time.

Immediate benefit…less eye rolling from my wonderfully supportive wife.  No improvement on the giggling during self pics, but we’re working on it.

Then came the flu.  Regardless of your beliefs or opinions, my wife and I decided to get ourselves, our daughter and our yet to be born (at the time) son vaccinated.  We thought that we were adequately prepared.  We were more, or less, right.  While everyone around us was dropping like flies, we got what amounted to a gentle “kiss” of the flu.  We all got it, including our son.  As a (relatively) new parent…kid’s colds suck…in every possible way.  They don’t understand, you don’t understand, communication is impossible and all you want is to take that cold and ache away at any cost to yourself.  On the bright side, as with all things, this too shall (and did) pass.

I am also doing a dash of coaching.

As I mentioned in a previous post, this was never going to be a sprint.  It’s a marathon through and through.  I lost some time training and lost some time moving forward, but I am focused on the task and moving forward.  Training is locked in, nutrition is getting there and sleep is hard to come by but improving.

One month down.  More improvements and goals reached. One setback.  That’s a win no matter which way you look at it.

Monster Maker

“Alternative Workouts”

The term Alternative Workout brings to mind thoughts of meditation, hot yoga, tai chi, P90X and a myriad of other similarly “unique” training methodologies.  I’m not talking about any of these.

I recently moved into a new community and got my very own cul-de-sac.  As we were the first people into the block I more or less decided that the cul-de-sac was/is mine.  Hence the “my very own” comment.

With my background in sports performance and training I decided to morph this tiny little hamlet in Sage Hill into a “monster maker”.  A place where people within my community, and myself, could find a place to train and improve our fitness in a non-traditional way, in a non-traditional environment….and get some vitamin D.  To this end, I would create an aggressive circuit with multiple challenging exercises.

These exercises are designed around the simple premise of “what do you need to get more fit” in all aspects of your health.  Lifting, pulling, pushing, dragging, pull ups, chin ups, carries, speed, agility and cardiovascular fitness.

Some of the equipment/exercises include:
1. Sledgehammer swings, hits, carries, woodchoppers
2. Tractor Tire flips, rolls, jumps
3. TRX Suspension System
4. Elevated Bar chin ups, pull ups, leg raises
5. Skipping Ropes
6. Tow Bands
7. Medicine Balls
8. EZ Curl Bars
9. Heavy Plates
10. Plate Sled

(Tire Track)

My goal for this post and upcoming posts is to share these “garage” workouts with everyone.  All of the equipment, with the exception of the TRX, is stuff that was lying around, available from a neighbor or something I built.  I will attach any diagrams or plans for anything I build or locations where I found additional information on builds or gear.

Give it a try and build your own “garage gym”.  It’s rewarding, different and brings you to a whole new level with your fitness.  If you’re in Sage Hill, come on out and be a part of it.  Everyone is welcome.

Be your own “Monster Maker”.