The Baack Paack

Spartan Super Barre, Mass – Sunday edition
(You should read the Saturday race recap first to get a more detailed story of each obstacle, day one of my two day Spartan Super weekend.)

 

CRAAACK — KABOOOM!!!

I awoke at 4:32 AM to the sound of thunder and flashes of lighting through the shades in the hotel room.  I got up out of bed and opened the curtains.  large puddles were all over the parking lot and heavy rain was falling.

“Great” I muttered, as I closed the curtains and headed back to bed.  Today was day two of the Boston Spartan Super, and I had run the day before, and was looking to run today to clean up my 5th Spartan Super for the year.

My mind drifted to the Colorado Beast the weekend before and what happened to the racers who were about 20 minutes behind me and got caught in a thunderstorm.  They closed down the course for safety, and once the lightning had passed, resumed the activity.  This is a great safety plan which I whole heartedly support, it just sucks for the racers out on the course.  But, better to chill out and race another day, then be “that guy” known forever online from getting electrocuted while on a rope climb or the A frame cargo net.
Flipping the comforter back over my legs, my mind wasn’t relaxing to drift off for the last hour of sleep.. it was starting to wake up and think about the day ahead.  Thirty minutes of tossing around in the bed, I got up and started getting dressed for the event.

I went through a very complicated wash procedure of my race gear the night before as seen below:

IMG_6010

So, my gear was  still full of dirt and slightly damp when I put it all back on in the morning.  This snapped me back to my AT thru hiking days, where I would hand wring out the water from my socks in the morning and then put them back on, along with wet shorts and shirt than had not been washed in weeks.. Ahh.. those were the days.

Within 10 minutes I was geared up, socks, compression sleeves, neoprene sleeves, shoes, compression shorts, race shorts, BaackPaack team shirt.  I carried all my other gear (race pack, checked bag, arm sleeves, watch, etc) down to the car along with all of my other hotel gear, threw it in the trunk, and then headed back in for a quick breakfast, which opened promptly at  6 AM in the hotel.  I killed a few cups of coffee had some eggs and a few slices of paper thin bacon (is this the new industry standard for bacon?  This translucent cut of meat?)  Sitting there I saw a fellow racer who was running in the elite heat this am.  He was making a cup of tea and all donned up in Spartan & innov8 gear.  I could tell from the accent he wasn’t local.  He was excited about the rain, due to the cooler temps.  At that moment, I wish I shared his enthusiasm.  I was tired, and this coffee wasn’t giving me the push that I needed.  My mind kept flopping from “Thunderstorms and the race being cancelled.. to, let’s shoot for a PR today!  You know what the course looks like.. you just did it yesterday..  you need to think about your wall technique, these walls are going to be very slippery today”.   Basically, my body was tired, but my brain wouldn’t shut up.

I grabbed an apple and one more cup of coffee and made my way to the car.

The drive to venue I had the wipers running full time.  The rain was falling at a good clip, however, there wasn’t any lightning or thunder, just a lot of steady rain.  Forty minutes later, I get to the parking lot for the racers, and immediately think how this field is going to be a MESS in about 4 hours.   The steady rain, with folks driving on the same path over and over again.. is going to lead to a lot of mud, which is going to lead to folks spinning tires and creating more mud.. etc etc.  I was glad I was not a parking volunteer that day.

Upon parking several rows closer that I did yesterday (and arriving at the same time), I snapped this pic.

Walking to the bus I set a goal for myself.  Two hours and 30 minutes.  I wanted to run this race faster than I did yesterday, even with the weather.  I had a strong feeling I could do it, and I set my TomTom Cardio to a timing goal which would fire off at 50% of 2:30, then 90% of 2:30 then again at 100% of 2:30.  I knew if I pushed and didn’t fail a lot of obstacles (and burn time on burpees), I could do it.

I had a feeling that several folks were going to bail on this race due to the weather.  It wasn’t an option for me.  I needed to get it done to keep on track for the goal of the 7 trifectas this year  which consists of seven Sprint races, seven Super races, and Seven Beast races in one year. Twenty one races of any sort is an ambitious plan.  Twenty one Spartan obstacle races?  That is a whole lot of suffering.    I got out of the car and headed to the buses to get the ride to the venue.   The attitude was definitely different here in the rain.  Everyone was subdued, from the volunteers to the bus drivers.  It was wet, foggy and cold* (*Well.. cold for this Arizona resident)

Getting to the venue I met another racer who was running today for her second round on this course as she was going after 3 trifectas.  We talked about the course from yesterday and which races she was running next.  Due to the weather, she was going to take today easy “walk the whole damn thing if I need to”.  I could understand her logic.  Everything was going to be harder today.  Slick pipes, slippery walls, more mud, deeper water, hidden rocks, slick ropes, etc.  My brain was still firing in about 6 different directions as far as what I was going to be doing, all of them fighting for overall attention and dominance of my headspace.

I took a deep breath.
“Shut up!” I told myself.
I began to have an internal dialogue with my own thoughts.
“I can only effect what is right in front of me.  I can’t be thinking about “what if” situations 7 obstacles down in the race.  Focus on the now, only on the now and shut the hell up.”

By now I was at registration, grabbed my race packet and headed to the only place that was dry and I could take a moment for myself, the porta-potties.
Yeah, it isn’t the cleanest place to hang out.  Depending on the one you choose, it isn’t the most aromatic environment either.  However, it WAS dry, and allowed me a few minutes to get my pre-race head straight, consolidate things to my checked bag, get my X-Racewear sleeves on as well as my bucket carry wrist bands.
Twenty minutes later… yeah, twenty minutes.. I was tired of sitting and decided to get my bag checked.   From then on, I was going to get wet for the next several hours.  I knew it, I just needed to accept it.  After all, this IS a Spartan Race.  It is supposed to TEST you, they WANT to break you, they want you to be uncomfortable and push yourself.  I knew all of this going in.  Today the weather was going to add to the challenge.   I headed over to bag check, dropped off the bag, and checked my watch.  7:40 AM.  I knew the women elite racers were starting at 7:45, so I decided to head down there to check to see about the memory test for todays race.  I had a pretty good feeling that there would NOT be a memory challenge, but I was not 100% sure, and I was not willing to risk 30 burpees on a maybe.   Heading to the start line, I was about 200 yards out when the starting line official with the mic gathered all the elite racers for the start of the briefing.. then promptly shut off the mic.

DAMN!!

Too far to hear anything, I continued to walk over to see if I recognized any of the racers.  The briefing finished just as I got there and Norm the RD (one of the most feared Race Directors) was walking away from the briefing.  We caught eyes and I got to chat him up for a few minutes, him in his Spartan Staff blue rain jacket, with the rain bouncing off his hood, me, in my race gear, with the rain giving me a good soaking.   We chatted about yesterday’s race as well as today and how the course was going to be completely different due to the weather.   I agreed and he laughed.   Evil Norm.. evil.

A few minutes later, the elite women were off and my 8 AM heat was jumping the hot gate, which was slick as hell from all the mud right before it.   The volunteers were telling each of us to watch it, as I guess a few had already twisted an ankle, just jumping over this wall.

* Awesome *

The starting speech was not as “rah rah rah” as the day before, with more focus on the weather, the mud, the deep water, and the possibility of getting pulled from the course if the staff deemed the weather being “too stupid to be out here”.
“Ha…” I though.
“Everyone who ISN’T here, thinks it is too stupid to be here right now..”

That made me smile and relax a bit.   Crazy Jay was living up to his name.

The starting 8 AM heat was not nearly as populated as the 8 AM heat on Saturday, I am sure directly related to the weather.  However, I did notice a pair of Spartans from Virginia wearing matching team jerseys and they were hanging out with a Spartan wearing one of the “Corn Fed Spartans” team jerseys. (A very large OCR team).
*This nugget of information would provide valuable later in the race. *

The smoke was popped, GO GO GO! was yelled and we were off.   My “go” / “no go” body check was definitely learning towards “no go” for as I moved, I could hear all the muscles in my legs talking back to me.  I told them to shut up and work harder, I had seven miles to cover, and needed them to work.

I flew over the hay wall, and headed to the 6′ wall.   Like yesterday I grabbed the top took a big swing back with my left leg and hooked the ankle on the top of the wall.  I pulled with my left hamstring to lift me over the wall.

I pulled with my hamstring…..

I pulled with my hamstring………

HEY LEGS!! I said “I PULLED WITH MY HAMSTRING!!!”

Nothing happened.

So picture this.   Some tall, grey haired dude is standing there with his hands on the top of the wall, and his left leg at about the height of his face, hooked over top of  the wall.. just standing there.
It must have looked comical.  I had never been in this position before.  I throw the leg, hook the leg, and pull.  The leg does all the rest.
However, this time, I threw the leg, hooked the leg, and there was no pulling going on.  Almost like I was driving a car without gas.

“Oh.. damn…” I though, “This is going to be a long day“.

I quickly jumped up with my right leg to give my left leg (which is 6′ up in the air) a bit more mechanical advantage and slowly pulled myself over the wall.  It was ugly for a wall climb, especially a 6′ wall.   Not good.  In came the flood of negative thoughts like a water damn holding back these thoughts had just broken in my mind.

“What about the 7′ wall.. you will not be able to get over that.. forget the 8′.  What about the inverted?  You are going to need help!  How about the rope climb?  and the dreaded SLIP WALL!!!”

SHUT UP!!

My mind was in a death spiral as I jogged to the monkey bars.   This was throwing off my heart rate and my breathing.   My mental game was shutting down and this was effecting my physical game in this race.

SHUT UP!   Focus on NOW.  ONLY NOW. NOW NOW NOW NOW NOW.. with every step of my run I yelled “NOW” in my head. Left foot hits the ground, “NOW!” right foot hits the ground “NOW!”, over and over.

This helped to reconstruct the damn of negative thoughts with thousands of little bricks all with the word NOW on them.  I just needed to think about NOW, and I would get through this.   The negative thoughts were receding and slowing down.

I looked up and saw the Cliff monkey bars.  The same ones I had conquered as yesterday, only soaking wet and muddy from the racers before me.  I psyched myself up as much as I could and grabbed the first set of bars.  Two grabs later I fell off the obstacle due to how wet they were.

Damn – start cranking out burpees.    To this point my running time was good, I was averaging a 13:45 mile, which is right where I needed to be for my 2:30 goal.   But these burpees are going to eat time.  I cranked out three sets of 10 quickly and hit the barbed wire obstacle.

One hundred and three complete rolls later, I was out of the barbed wire.  My race pace had dropped to over 25 minutes.   DAMN.. this crawl sucked up a lot of time.  Now the negative thoughts started to squirt through the cracks of my ‘NOW’ wall.. Do I abandon my 2:30 goal and switch to “just get it done mode” or do I keep pushing?  I picked up my jogging pace and continued on.

Good luck and Corn Fed Spartans

As I talked about yesterday, there was a memory wall obstacle in which you had to remember a word as well as a 7 digit number.   I got to the wall and pulled my head band off.  6398 was my bib number.  I looked on the wall.. 01.. 02… 12..13..55..76..88..97.  No 98.  I looked at my headband again, and looked at the wall again.

“Hey” I said out loud.  “Does anyone see a 98 on that wall?”
“Lucky bastard” was the only reply I heard.
YES!!!  No memory challenge to even have to think about for me!
I threw my headband back on and headed off to the 7 and 8′ walls.

Knowing that they were slick I wanted a solid and fast run up on the a wall.  Run up to the wall, put my right foot on it, grab the top with both hands, tuck my legs under, walk up the wall.   Perfect technique if the wall was dry.  Not so much if it is wet.
My legs slipped out and my hands slipped off the top.   Oh boy, alternative technique time.

I looked over my shoulder and saw the two guys from Virginia and the Corn Fed Spartan running up to the wall.  I called out the Corn Fed and said “Hey man, give a boost to get a boost?”  He smiled and said no problem.

I helped him over the 7′ wall, he came back around and gave me a thigh to stand on, which gave me the height I needed for the leg hook.   The same took place on the 8′ wall.    At that moment, the their team of three became a team of 4.  With me making a point to be be the first guy to offer to help the shorter member get over the 7 and 8′ wall as well.    YES!  two more obstacles down.   I thanked them and ended up running with them for the next several miles as a sign that I wasn’t an ass who needed help then bailed.  At mile 3 they paused for a long water break and I continued on. (We would end up seeing each other the entire rest of the course as we leaped frogged each other at each obstacle and the runs between them).

Calling out Manly Men

At the sand bag carry the volunteer was shouting:
“Women carry the black bags, men carry the red, manly men carry two red!”
As I ran up I asked, any manly men yet?
His response, “Nope, not a one, NOT ONE MANLY men amongst us” as several of the male racers grabbed one red bag and took of on the course.

As the members of the BaackPaack know, never challenge Crazy Jay, he will just end up doing something crazy.
I grabbed two bags and loaded then on the center of my shoulders, (80# total) and took off on the course. I passed several folks carrying just one (just to prove a point).  Navigating the streams was a challenge with two bags but I managed and pressed on.

Throwing the bags back in the bin, a smaller framed racer muttered to me:
“Hell, you just about carried me that whole way.”
I shot him a smile.   He didn’t realize that I used to carry about 100 pounds MORE than those 80 pounds each and every day of my life for years.    Going from 40# to 80# on a level course for me isn’t that big of a stretch.   By now the rain is so hard you can only see about 50 yards in front of you.. and we jogged on.

Inverted and Z wall

Heading to the inverted wall I started thinking yet again about the slipperiness of the wall I was going to be facing.  I had go back to “NOW NOW NOW” to snap my head out of the negative thought.   Hitting the wall, I approached it as usual and promptly found my grip slipping at the top.  I quickly tucked the wall under my right armpit and threw my left leg to get on top of the wall to hook.  An unusual technique for me, but this weather had me adapting to each obstacle.  My first throw, I only get my toe on the top of the wall and it slips off.   The second swing nets the same result.  I start to struggle.  I then took a moment, closed my eyes and reached WAY back behind me with my leg to get a full force of momentum to get my ankle hooked on the wall.  Success!  I jammed my leg father over the wall so the wall was now resting behind my left knee, as then easily pulled myself over the wall.   DONE!

The Z wall was not as successful.  I tried to get up on it and promptly slipped off the first block.  I then reached for the top of the wall (some volunteers allow you to do this for the first grab ONLY) and tried again.  Same result, slipping off the first block.  Burpees for me.  Total penalty burpees to this point: 60.

After the slip wall as a short run to the bucket carry, which after a near fall 10 yards into the event where my left foot slipped lateraly into the right foot and pushed my right foot off the ground. I quickly caught my footing to many AROOs! from the folks behind me who said and I quote:

“I thought you were going to eat it big time… NICE recovery!”

For a minute there I thought I was going to eat it as well, not fun when you are holding a 70# bucket of rocks in front of you.   Using my breathing and pace technique, I crushed this obstacle again, however, the top of the loop was no longer soft dirt as it was on Saturday, it was a mine field of mid calf mud and muck.   That was a serious test of balance as you slipped left, right and forward with each step, while carrying this heavy bucket in front of you.  Dumping the rocks back in the bin at the end of the obstacle  I headed to the Stairway to Spartan and faced yet another wet wall issue that took SEVERAL tried to get up and over.   I quick slid down the hill to the water station, with the spear throw coming up next.

Burpee… Er… Wait!

Running through the woods to the spear throw I was finally feeling good about an obstacle.  As long as my grip was good, throwing the spear technique in rain is no different that in the heat of the Arizona sun.  As I ran up to the obstacle I heard the same volunteer in what I thought was a English accent telling everyone what was coming up at the spear throw station.  The other volunteer was yelling “Burpees” after each throw of the racers.  Heck, he was yelling BURPEES!! as each racer threw the spear- as no one was hitting it.  There had to be 20 people at the station and 18 were in the penalty box doing burpees.  No one was hitting the spear throw.  The person next to me threw, and the spear hadn’t traveled 2 feet when the volunteer yelled “BURPEES!”  Yes, the racer missed his spear as well.   The volunteer was trying to make lemonade out of a lemon of a day and was having a lot of fun with the burpees that everyone was doing.

I pulled up to the station (the same one that I hit the throw on yesterday), gingerly put the rope on the far side of the fence, grabbed the spear, bent the tip to straight, balanced the spear in my hand, found my grip, placed my feet, squared the hips, inhaled, and let it fly – just as I did yesterday.
As he did with all the other racers the volunteer yelled:

“BURPE…er wait……….You freaking hit it!”
I ran out of the spear station, the only one who had hit it in this group.

11 for 11 this year baby!

Slip and Rope

After this I hit the moats and the slip wall, which was wet, but totally do-able without issue.  Feeling good with that I headed to the rope climb.   Here my head got in the way again, my arms and hands were telling me they could handle either the rope climb or traverse, but not both.  I climbed down into the pit and started my climb, but my heart was not in it.   I missed my first foot lock and slid back down.   I tried again and got a good foot lock, but the rope started to twist around.  I reached up for another grab and got a decent foot hook, but could feel it slipping in my feet.   I let go about 8′ up in the air.  Splashing back into the pool, I climbed out and started my burpees.  Penalty burpees to this point: 90

I finished up the burpees and headed to the traverse.   My hands were sore, my forearms were sore, my shoulders were sore and I was tired.   I knew I would have to dig even deeper than I did yesterday to make this happen.   I picked a rope, took a deep breath, and grabbed the rope, throwing my legs up on the rope.   Within 10′ feet I could feel my shoulders aching and my hands screaming at me.  I looked back towards the bell.  It was soooo far away.  This wasn’t going to happen.  My head was not in it, and my muscles were tired.  I just wanted to drop.  I moved my right hand forward.

I wanted to stop, I was gritting my teeth pushing air out of my lungs with each movement.  I moved my left hand forward.

I closed my eyes.  I had to go to another place, a happy place, a pain free place, any OTHER place then hanging from this rope.  EVERYTHING on my body wanted to stop, and I moved my hands forward again.

I could hear that the volunteers had stopped cheering, they had moved from “You can do it” to internal thoughts of “he is going to drop at any second”.. and I moved my hand forward again.

I thought about Vicki, and the BaackPaack and how they look to me as someone who can do this obstacle when they cannot, and I moved my hand forward again.

I thought of Amanda Sullivan, and everything she has to overcome to run a race with full leg braces and support canes, and how she does it with a smile on her face, and I moved my hand forward.

I thought of my sister on her bike on the Trek across Maine, covering 180 miles in three days, sitting on those tiny ass bike seats, through the heat and the rain.. and I moved my hand forward.

I thought about the world, and how small and insignificant this moment in time was, and I moved my hand forward.

The last thing I thought of was my pet phrase.. “You gotta get comfortable with being uncomfortable.. and I moved my hand forward..

I looked back towards the cowbell, and like Saturday, it was just within reach.  Knowing how this ended yesterday, I did the same maneuver and netted the same result.

CLANG CLANG rang the bell.

OOOPH!!!  The air escaped out of my lungs as my neck and shoulder crashed into the ground.. and for a moment I was stuck there.   Neck and shoulders holding up the upper half of my body, like some new fangled yoga bridge pose while my legs… were still wrapped around the rope.    My legs dropped to the ground like a bag of potatoes and the volunteer medical staff sitting in a John Deer Gator, staying dry from the rain opened the door and yelled:

“Jeazus!  You ok?”  I laughed and stood up, swaying side to side from the effort I just put in to get my body across a suspended rope.
“Yeah, I’m good” I replied in the driving rain.

“Man you smacked you head good.. you sure you are ok?”  he asked.
“Yeah, I am good to go” I replied, threw him a thumbs up and headed to the Cliff Multi bar station.  Mission accomplished – traverse completed.. but at what cost.

Tic toc.. could I really do this?

I got to the Cliff multi bar station and walked up and touched the obstacle then went right to the burpee area.   Penalty burpees to this point in the race: 120.  I didn’t even bother trying, I had nothing left.  Just right to the burpees.

Standing in the burpee zone, for the first time since about mile 2 I looked at my watch.

Total race time: 2 hours 15 minutes.

What the hell?   2:15???
I had less than a mile to go, three obstacles and these 30 burpees.  Could I really do this all in 15 minutes?  I started in on the burpees with some effort, but I could tell my body was slowing down.  I have given just about everything I had on the last obstacle, and I was smoked.   I grinded out these burpees in about 5 minutes. (UG!) and pushed off to get to the next obstacle, which was the hec hoist after about a .6 mile run.   Every time I would push to jog, I found nothing in the tank.  I was walking at about 3 miles an hour, but I needed to go faster to make my time.  Then I heard it.  That familiar beat, that  go-to jam on my playlist when I am out running in the heat of the Arizona sun..

“Fire up that loud
Another round of shots
Turn down for what?
Turn down for what?
Turn down for what?
Turn down for what?
Turn down for what?

DJ Snake was calling me home.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUNzcqxsw7I

I looked up and found a Spartan direction arrow marking the course about 200 yards ahead.  I started a quasi dance, jog, run as I fixated on the arrow.  Get to the arrow. Run to the arrow.  I hopped, sashayed, and jogged to the arrow.  It wasn’t pretty, and I am sure anyone else who was looking my way might have thought I was crazy.. but I was moving to the music, moving faster than 3 miles an hour, and for the first time in a while during this race, I smiled.

What the hell?  This is heavy!

The music was still pumping as I made my way through more swamp, roots and over flowing streams to where the trail opened up to the herc hoist and the A frame cargo net.   I ran up to the herc hoist with a new found energy fueled by the music blaring out of the speakers, and tugged on one of the ropes.   The bags didn’t lift off the ground.  What the hell??  I know I am tired, but I am not THAT tired.

I yanked again. The bags didn’t move.   A pair of male Spartans were doubled up on one rope next to me, where they were both pulling together on the rope.  They commented to me:
“You need to double up!  The rain has added about 10# to the weight of the sand bags”  “You can double up with someone, you just have to each do it twice.”

Without thinking I snapped back : “That ain’t freakin’ happening!”

I wrapped my left hand in the rope, death gripped the rope with my right and pulled while falling to the ground.  The bag moved 6″ off the ground.

NO FREAKING WAY I thought.  I am not that tired.  I can do this!

I looked up to the heavens looking for a sign as to what the heck was going on, rain pelting my face and blurring my eyes.. then I saw it.

My rope that I was pulling on was twisted around the rope with the weight on it.  NO wonder I couldn’t pull this weight up!   I let the bag down, and moved to the other side of the pair and started pulling again.  The bag leaped off the ground heading towards the sky.
I yelled out loud: “THAT IS MORE LIKE IT!”  As the bag ascended skyward.   Within a few more pulls it was at the top and I starting to let the bag back down.   Watching it kiss the ground on the landing, I took off for the last obstacle, the A frame cargo.
I flew up the side and getting to the top took a second to slow down for the transition down.

No need to wreck myself now!

A quick run through the woods I spied again the two racers from Virginia and the Corn Fed Spartan.  About 60 yards behind them I started thrashing through the mud and rocks.  I must have sounded like a heard of cattle crashing through the woods, because at 10 yards away they all turned around to see what the hell was making all that noise.

“Hey Arizona!” one of them yelled.
“Right back at your Virginia” I replied as I passed them through a knee deep mud pit about 20 yards from the end.   My heart rate was screaming as I was gasping for air at this point, but all I could see was the fire and the finish line.    I burst out of the woods, jumped the fire throwing a set of pistols at the camera guy, and crossed the finish line.   Looking down at my watch, my heart rate was cranking at: 172.  Time on course: 2:39.

Not quite my goal, but I was done.  No more burpees.  No more running. No more holding things in my hands. No more struggle, no more pain.   I bent down and accepted my medal around my neck.  I was done!

Thirty hours later as I type this all up.. I am very.. very sore.  Sore from my neck to the soles of my feet.  Plenty of bruises, wounds and scrapes.  My hands are still sore and my hamstrings are super tight. My chest feels like someone stood on it and jumped up and down for an hour, and my abs hurt so bad they woke me up in the middle of the night every time I turned over.. But, Spartan Supers #4 and #5 are done for 2015.

If you asked me: “Jay, would you do it all again knowing how bad you felt during the race and how sore you feel now?”

My reply would be simple:

 

 

 

 

“Where do I sign up?”