Blood, Sweat and ... Fire??
I ran a Spartan Race today with the beautiful Erica. It was her idea back in June or July and I said I would join her. After we signed up I read what I was getting myself into and decided that we were going to die. I was almost right.
Getting clean was pretty exciting. And by that I mean impossible. They had rows and rows of hoses that you could use to get the mud off. It seemed like it was never going to end. I am still digging dirt out of my ears. I have some fantastic battle wounds from the day too. My hands, knees, and calves are completely ripped up.
On the way there we had seen a sign for Applebees, our favorite place. We contemplated going there when the race was over. Then, toward the end of the race, we were crawling under the barbed wire through the extremely painful rocks, Erica goes, "Lauren we are definitely going to Applebees."
I replied, "Oh my god yes, I am so ready for Sangria."
Some guy near us went, "Who said Sangria!"
It was a bonding moment.
We did go to Applebees, and I did get Sangria and ate delicious food. It was the perfect way to end the day.
Now I am a Spartan and my trainer won't let me forget it. Erica and I are already planning on doing the one next year. I'm so ready.
Do you know how bad things happen in threes? That was us.
1. Erica slept over my house on Saturday night so that she wouldn't have to do as much driving early in the morning. We had just gone to bed at 12:30 when she calls me from the other room to tell me she forgot her sneakers. So she had to get up at 5:00 to drive home and get them. So much for sleep.
2. We left at 8:45ish and made good time. We had to stop for gas eventually and got off the highway in the middle of Massachusetts. It was then that I realized that my boss, Michael, still had my debit card from buying me subway. I didn't have any money and Erica didn't have all that much. So I set up my bank account to transfer money to her so that we could buy gas. It was a process, but it eventually worked.
3. We were following the GPS directions to the location of the parking lot we needed to park in. It wasn't anywhere near the race, we took a shuttle to it. The directions took us to this really sketchy dead end road. It was definitely not a parking lot. We spent half an hour driving around in circles before deciding to go right to the location of the race in the hopes of getting directions.
That ended up being a great decision because some homeowner right next to the race sight was letting people park on their lawn for 10 bucks. Perfect.
The day was looking up.
Once we got there everything was fabulous. Except for the running and jumping and general pain of using a lot of muscle. But we got to do cool things like jump over fire and crawl under barbed wire through gravel and mud. We also got to pull tires and scale an inverted wall. It was all as awesome as it sounds.
Here are some pictures of some other people doing these activities that I stole off of instagram so you could see:
If you couldn't do an obstacle, you had to do 30 burpees. I had to do them for the rope climb and the monkey bars. Upper body strength is not my strong point.
I felt incredibly badass when I finished. Not only because I was covered from head to toe in mud but because I had just done all those crazy things successfully! AROO!
Before:
After:
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| Getting our packets! Love this picture! |
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| We are ready! |
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| A view of the course! |
Here are some pictures of some other people doing these activities that I stole off of instagram so you could see:
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| Traverse wall. You went sideways across it without touching the top or the ground. |
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| Rope climb |
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| The inverted wall, you started from the other side. |
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| Like this. |
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| Mud pits. You had to just go into the mud and then over the trench. |
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| The slippery wall. I fell down it twice. That didn't feel too good. |
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| Rope climb and tire pull. |
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| JUMPING OVER FIRE |
I felt incredibly badass when I finished. Not only because I was covered from head to toe in mud but because I had just done all those crazy things successfully! AROO!
Before:
After:
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| SO MUCH MUD! |
Getting clean was pretty exciting. And by that I mean impossible. They had rows and rows of hoses that you could use to get the mud off. It seemed like it was never going to end. I am still digging dirt out of my ears. I have some fantastic battle wounds from the day too. My hands, knees, and calves are completely ripped up.
 |
| A little cleaner. |
On the way there we had seen a sign for Applebees, our favorite place. We contemplated going there when the race was over. Then, toward the end of the race, we were crawling under the barbed wire through the extremely painful rocks, Erica goes, "Lauren we are definitely going to Applebees."
I replied, "Oh my god yes, I am so ready for Sangria."
Some guy near us went, "Who said Sangria!"
It was a bonding moment.
We did go to Applebees, and I did get Sangria and ate delicious food. It was the perfect way to end the day.
Now I am a Spartan and my trainer won't let me forget it. Erica and I are already planning on doing the one next year. I'm so ready.
