My First Spartan Beast! – Part 2 (Some Good Stuff)

September 23, 2014

Aurora De Lucia carrying a sandbag over her head at the Spartan Beast Race in Temecula
Grrr.

Picking up from yesterday

Sure, the beginning was harder than I thought. But I was amazed to see what I’ve become capable of.

As I leaned over to take a breather, and my hands grabbed my thighs for support, it dawned on me how much smaller they are than they used to be!

I feel like I’ve been talking about weight way too much, and I know it’s not everything. But I’m still just not quite used to a smaller body yet. When I felt my thighs, I expected more surface area!

As I felt my smaller (though admittedly not yet small) thighs, I thought about how much easier it is to move without so much extra weight on me. So, that was great. (And I think that improvement really helped me during the race.)

When it came to the obstacles, I wasn’t a superstar. Sometimes I did pretty okay (carrying a bucket of rocks or a sandbag around a loop, and climbing some of the easier stuff).

Sometimes I struggled (climbing over some of the taller walls without a boost, lifting the bad at the Hercules Hoist, throwing that javelin – oh the javelin (edited to add: I learned it’s a spear, not a javelin)).

Every time I struggled, a fellow racer came along to ask if I needed a boost, or a hand, or anything.

I’d heard that Spartan racers are all about teamwork and being in it together (even if we’re technically all in the race separately), and I loved that! What a nice, beautiful camaraderie. (There was only one time during the race I didn’t feel it, but we’ll get to that in the bad stuff.)

I felt so cool crawling under barbed wire – and we got to do it twice! As I crawled along – most likely looking totally awkward – since I felt that I must’ve looked so amazing, I called out to spectators, “Can someone please take my picture?! Tweet it to @AurorasBlog!”

I’m sure everyone thought I was a bit crazy, but when do they not? Someone looked as though he was taking a picture, but alas, I never got a tweet. (And maybe it’s better that way if I looked super awkward, so I can keep the mental image of me looking like a gladiator – grrrr!)

Tomorrow, I’ll tell you about my favorite obstacle!

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