As you may have noticed, I’ve started competing in Spartan races again. As you can see, I’ve been very subtle about it but now is the time for me to talk about it openly…
Who am I kidding?! If you follow me on social media (which if you don’t, why not?!), you’ll have seen there have been a variety of posts about me getting back into the competitive circles of Spartan Race after my hiatus from 2019 to now. Various life events have gotten in the way, some personal, some worldwide reaching, but I came back and it was with an unexpected bang.
This is going to be my honest appraisal of how I felt the 2022 season went, though partial, before going on to talk about where I want to take things next year, bringing about a step up in the level that I want to achieve.
What Is Spartan For Those Who Don't Know
The short answer: Spartan Race is one of the many franchises of Obstacle Course Racing (OCR) that takes place around the world. Featuring a variety of distances, obstacle variations and challenges, these are both challenging and fun races for people of all abilities to test themselves against. Though there are a variety of OCRs, for me, this is one that resonates with me and I thoroughly enjoy competing in.
If you want the long answer to this question, I’ve got you covered in a separate blog that details everything you need to know about the basics of Spartan.
Why I Stopped Racing
There were a couple of main reasons as to why I stopped competing for Spartan. The first one was simply down to not being able to get the time away from work to race. I was in the military at the time and unsurprisingly, you can’t just get off the ship that you’re on to be able to go and race when you’re miles out at sea. Also tying into this, when I was on land, the logistics and costs of getting to and from a race when you’re in various parts of Scotland wasn’t financially viable. This was compounded in 2021 when the races were back in the UK, I was deployed abroad.
The second reason for me not competing is hopefully an obvious one. The events of 2020 saw many organisations and races shutting down during this period so there simply wasn’t an event to compete in. Yes, there were the virtual events but it wasn’t the same for me and my love of the sport wasn’t great enough to commit to those.
You may have the question of “why not come back in at the start of 2022 then?”. The reason for that was my focus was elsewhere, preparing for an ultramarathon alongside becoming accustomed to life outside of the military after nearly 7 years. May sound crazy but it was a big of a crash landing for me and I wasn’t in the right frame of mind as I was picking up the pieces and sorting my life out.
What Brought Me Back
You may have the question of “why not come back in at the start of 2022 then?”. The reason for that was my focus was elsewhere, preparing for an ultramarathon alongside becoming accustomed to life outside of the military after nearly 7 years. May sound crazy but it was a big of a crash landing for me and I wasn’t in the right frame of mind as I was picking up the pieces and sorting my life out.
Expectations Going Into Things & What I Wanted To Achieve This Season
My expectations prior to my return were based upon where I was last time I was competing in 2019. Back then, I was able to achieve results that granted me qualification for the OCR European and World Championships (just!). I was just scraping inside the top 20 for my Age Group and with no training focused on OCR, having come from doing an ultramarathon a couple of months before, I wanted to at least achieve what I had before with qualification for those championships again. So the main aim for the season was to see where I stacked up against my previous peaks within the sport, see what my current benchmark was against the other competitors within my Age Group, noting that those I’d competed with in 2019 may have been more focused, and from there, see what I needed to work on to then have a full plan of attack for the 2023 season.
Each Race Weekend & What Happened
Don’t worry, I’m not going to give a break down of every race that I did mile by mile! Covering only the competitive races, I’ll give an overview of how I felt they went, my feelings on the performance and where my head was at during and after each race. One of the big things that I noticed within myself and want to give insight on is how one performance could change my thinking about where I should be suddenly, changing my expectations for the next race, and then becoming aware of certain things during a race, which can have a positive or negative effect.
Midlands
This was my first race weekend back and one that I felt ready for mentally and physically, going into it with the expectations that I had mentioned before, with me wanting to perform well and set a good benchmark, learning what I needed to improve on along the way. Some would say it was a great choice returning to the scene at this weekend, as it was during a heat wave, adding that little extra spice to it all.
I went into the Beast race with an open mind. I knew that I preferred a longer distance but for me, the aim was to try and have a clean race, learning from what I failed. There were new obstacles alongside some old nemeses out there that I used to struggle with, so it was just a case of getting through it. I ran my own race the whole way through, not really paying attention to who was around me or who I was overtaking/being overtaken by. To be honest, I didn’t know who was what age group or who to look out for.
So when I crossed the finish line, got my t-shirt and medal and saw the result tent, I was seriously surprised when I saw that I had in fact managed to achieve 2nd in the Age Group! It felt amazing but very shocked, not really setting in even when I was being presented with my medal. Completely exceeded my expectations!
The next day for the Super, knowing that it was a Regional Series race, I expected more to be competing that wouldn’t have in the Beast due them concentrating on the series. With this in mind, I was mentally focusing on again having a clean race as much as possible, see where I ended up at the end and no real expectations of hitting the mark the day before. The fact it was the 10km course, I knew it would be faster too, with me not concentrating on much speed work prior.
Even though during this race I had a bit of a stomach issue, which had to be remedied with a quick pitstop that maybe came too late for various reasons, I still managed to finish 5th and this left me thinking “what if?”. The weekend as a whole had been successful, I was definitely more than happy with what I had achieved and was coming away with, whilst having plenty of lessons to learn.
It was this weekend as a whole that seemed to trigger the sudden higher expectations in myself as to what I could achieve and what I should be aiming for in the season. There’s no issue with resetting your own goals but within the context of everything else, I found that it unsettled me, left me ungrounded and I put a much bigger pressure on myself to perform. Instead of running my own race, I let it get into my head and now, I was looking for certain people whether in front or behind, tending to want to rush through obstacles, leading to mistakes. There’s more on that later!
I was also allowing this pressure to come from external sources knowing that others were expecting me to compete at a set level and admittedly, the ego allowed this to carry me away a little bit.
European Championships - London South East
Only the second race weekend back into the Spartan fold and here I was, competing at the European Championships in my Age Group. I didn’t expect this to have happened at all but here I was and ready to embrace the challenge. Going into the race, I wanted to be realistic with what I could achieve and knowing that there were now 25 other nations to compete with, it was only sensible to assume that I’d slide down the order a few places. Knowing this, my expectations were grounded and realistic, with the aim of finishing in the top 20 in Europe. I felt that was a reasonable goal and anything better than that would be a bonus.
I tried to keep myself grounded from the beginning and run my own race, like I had at the Midlands race, not paying attention to those who were around me and putting on my best show so that I could come away proud and have a true baseline against the best Europe had to offer. I was overall content with the performance on race day and when I got to the results tent, to find out that I finished 8th overall left me over the moon! I was way above my expectations again so had the joy of that whilst realising that the other races weren’t a fluke and I could actually hold my own in a competitive field against Europe’s best this time.
Moving on to the Sunday, though it wasn’t part of the European Championship weekend, there was an Age Group competitive Super which I raced in. The first thing I noticed was that the field wasn’t as loaded as the day before with most of the Europeans heading home or otherwise. Then when we got into the race, I was feeling really good and made sure that I had prepared so that I didn’t face any of the stomach issues seen at the last Super.
It was during the race that I was just concentrating on doing my thing but from early on, I realised that I had overtaken some of the recognisable faces and was in a very good position. It was upon spotting the race leader not too far ahead that I got into my head and the race for me started to fall apart, giving me a major lesson to learn. I started rushing obstacles and with that, the mistakes came in. Missing the bell on one obstacle put 3rd place right behind me (after the penalty loop), followed by a spear miss, dropped me down into 3rd (penalty loop) and within striking distance of 4th place, before a failure on a rig that I should have completed whilst rushing left me running a third penalty loop in a row and now in 4th place with little chance of getting back any of the positions I lost.
Crossing the finish line in 4th place after being so strong for so long in the race hurt a lot and there were a fair few frustrations that erupted from me. It became motivation for me to not do it so I didn’t feel like this again and made sure that I was very conscious in the future with each obstacle. What I thought would save me a few seconds costed me several minutes and a podium.
A painful lesson but much needed one to learn.
Trifecta World Championships - Sparta, Greece
On to the third race weekend of this rollercoaster of a year and this time, I was in Sparta, Greece of all places! I was about to take on the Trifecta World Championships in the home of the Spartans. Surreal would definitely be a word that I would use to describe this whole experience. This championship comprised of running each of the traditional Spartan race distances competitively, with all your times being added up at the end to find out where you finished against your competitors.
My aim going into this championship was that of achieving a top 20 position. I’d managed a top 10 in Europe and with things now open to the whole world, I would have thought that there would be plenty from the other regions in the world that would slot in front of me.
Starting with the shortest distance and ascending, the first race was the Sprint. This was a good race for me that felt strong, things seemed to click into place for me and though it was a hot one, it was an enjoyable race. The only thing that didn’t work out for me was the spear that “dropped out” in controversial circumstances. This was one where the spectators said I needed to go back but not the referee. I didn’t want to risk any chances of DQ or a horrendous time penalty so I did my burpees.
Overall, good start to the weekend and with the interesting course design with carries into rope climbs and carries back out, it brought a different but certainly engaging challenge.
The Super was up next after a night of recovery to get me ready for another day at the races. This should have been a stronger distance for me so I went into it a lot more confident with how I could do. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case. Everything started well and throughout the course, I was able to complete all the obstacles with the exception of the Z Wall.
You’re probably wondering how I was able to fail such an “easy” obstacle. Well, this was due to two thirds of my race thus my performance, being hampered by me getting numb feet. Caused by my very tight tibialis posterior on both feet causing me issues and left me not being able to feel my feet for most of the race. The sensation of running with numb feet and trying to do obstacles with constant pins and needles isn’t ideal at all, let me tell you.
So not only was I frustrated with how I did overall in that race and my placing, I was very worried about how my feet were going to be for the Beast the next day. If after 3-4km my feet were numb, it was going to make what was now known to be a 24-26km race very interesting. It was all hands to recovery stations! Well, mine and my two roommate’s hands, helping to release both of my lower legs. Thankfully, one of them was trained in massage therapy and worked wonders!
On to the final day and the deciding day. After a night of storms, bringing heavy rain, anything could happen out there! Treacherous underfoot, rising water levels in the rivers and very slippy obstacles. With this, I was very conscious about two main things. The first thing was that the instability in foot placement could cause the tibialis posterior to flare up and bring me the issues of the day before, whilst the second thing was my torn up hand. I hadn’t noticed until I finished that I managed to tear to callouses off and even though I was all taped up, it could get painful.
Then again, this is Spartan race and time to prove what you’re made of.
Thankfully, the legs held up and with that, didn’t encounter the numb feet from the day before, which was a relief and allowed me to settle into what I find my strength: running. For most of it, I was able to cruise through the running sections and make up time on those parts. Where I was let down was my grip. My grip is something that can just about get me through a dry race so a wet one was always going to be a challenge. With that came plenty of burpees and frustration with myself.
Going into the race, hoping to pick up places that I had let slip the day before, unfortunately, that didn’t happen, leaving me annoyed at my performance. I settled into making sure that I kept my top 10 position overall instead as I knew that top 20 was my aim coming into this, so this would have left me over the moon with the end result. Maybe knowing that I had a big safety net of a few minutes to the guy in 11th meant that I took my foot off the gas a little but I was in a eco vs ego mindset and didn’t want to risk blowing up to try and get 9th, knowing that I was on the back foot as it is.
10th was the finishing result though beaten by others that I was hoping to be in front of. Plenty more lessons to learn from this one but a great experience and to have the accolade of 10th in the world felt great!
World Championships - Abu Dhabi, UAE
Another fantastic experience to be part of. Not only being able to travel and explore Abu Dhabi with the excuse of racing, to compete in a very challenging race against the best of the world was amazing. Of course, you have the external side of things of your end result compared to others but with such a challenging course in the sand dunes and blazing heat, simply finishing is an accomplishment in itself. It was a tough course, it was gruelling in places and I’ll be honest, there were thoughts of stopping at the next obstacle more than a few times.
For me, the race happened in thirds, with various issues coming up along the way that started to hinder me. At the beginning, I felt good and I managed to get into a controlled pace with some very controlled breathing patterns that I felt I could sustain. It was within the first few miles that I noticed that I was quite far up the order but after being affected by this in the past, I pushed all thoughts out of my head and kept things on the present.
It was around mile 4 that I came a little unstuck with a return of the tibialis posterior issues that plagued me in Sparta, causing my left foot to go numb. Obviously, this slowed me down slightly and wasn’t easy to block out, wondering what issues I could have long term if it didn’t clear, whilst having flashbacks to failing Z-wall due to not being able to feel where I was putting my feet down. Thankfully, this spontaneously cleared around mile 7 or 8 and stayed away for the rest of the race. However, some damage was already done.
The thing that I thought I’d dealt with but clearly not adequately enough was sand entering my shoe. I had ankle gaiters and I thought the meshing on the shoe would be enough to not let it in. I was wrong! Full feet gaiters next time! I came to find out that my shoes loved to hoover up sand! Thankfully, they weren’t too heavy but it was more my toes hitting the end of the shoe, which was very uncomfortable along with it being about some decent blisters on the heel. I had to stop a few times to empty my shoes out. Though the action of emptying them in itself wasn’t too time consuming, when you add it up with the time lost from running slower, it makes you wonder.
The end result of finishing 7th in the world though leaves me feeling very happy and rounds off a collection of top 10s in all of my championship races in the first season back.
As much as at times I’m pretty chilled about it, I am happy but don’t want to get complacent. Lessons to be learnt across the board, some that I already knew but with those ironed out in the future, who knows what could happen!
Overall Thoughts
So, when I sit back and think about the season as a whole, what are my overall thoughts about how it went compared to my expectations at the start?
The first thing I have to remember was that I was blowing off the cobwebs after not competing for a while. From the outside, it may seem like something I typically do on a day to day basis when I train but it’s not really the same. Yes, I run everyday and I go to the gym, walking on things like pulls and that but there’s something different about doing that in a dynamic environment. You’re racing against others, you have to ensure your technique is right, the terrain could be anything and unless you train specifically by doing obstacle courses in training, your movement is moving between pulling, lifting, running, hanging, climbing, testing you in different ways and combinations across the race. There’s definitely a skill to racing and it was about learning that again, getting into the groove.
The second thing that I have to remember about the season is that it was due to always be a learning curve and setting myself up for a strong 2023 season. I was never expecting to suddenly propel myself into the situation that I was with some of the finishes, and with that, losing my grounding of what I was setting out to achieve thus upping my own expectations of myself. This was one of the hardest things about it all: staying grounded. Very quickly, I suddenly had high expectations of what I wanted to achieve and with that, severe disappointment when things didn’t go well for me.
I was mainly here in the process of learning again, picking up lessons for the next year for me to improve on (of which there were many!), not to be fighting to podiums nationally and internationally. That was intended for next year maybe. That was never part of the plan for 2022 and is a bonus to everything. OK, a really nice bonus to it all but it was never the aim. The moments where things have gotten in the way of a great result, rather than beat myself up for those things happening, the purpose was for those to be realised and be corrected for the future. Where the perspective comes into things is if that had happened lower down the field, say dropping from 22nd to 24th in race, I would think very differently about it. Whereas, dropping from 2nd to 4th in once race, the end result thus the perspective afterwards is very different. These battles were with those that had been there, done that, had those experiences and were a more finely tuned machine to be comfortable in those situations, whereas I was learning on the spot.
Overall, I can come away with an amazing baseline of where I stand in my current Age Group and the sport. It gives me great confidence that with a good off season in the bag, who knows what next year can bring. Putting the lens that I had over it all that I had at the start, I’ve done so much better than I thought I would. I have to remember that after 2 and a half years away and not training specifically for this, that my 2022 Spartan season can be distilled down to:
5 months
4 race weekends
3 Top 10 finishes at championship level – European, Trifecta World Championship and World Championship
2 races abroad
1 great community that I have become part of again
For once, I’ll stop being hard on myself, give a pat on the back and say: that’s pretty damn good.
Plans For Next Year
Even before this season was over, there were already thoughts towards next year and what exactly I’ll be looking to do competing wise. Of course, I would love to race every race, every weekend across the whole calendar but with the consideration of being a lot more serious about what I want to achieve in 2023, I’ve got to be tactical about what and when so that I don’t affect performance.
Starting with Spartan, I have a variety of plans next year as to which of the races I will be competing in:
- Regional Series – I have already taken the decision to race the Age Group Regional Series with my fellow 25-29 year olds. I have booked all my races and that ensuring that I’m prepared for those will be one of the big targets. Let’s see what I can achieve!
- Trifectas – This is something that I need to work out. I don’t want to be running Trifecta qualifying races that will have an impact on Regional Series races so need to play this smart and work out this out for next year.
- Championships – At the moment, my aims will be definitely the European and Trifecta World Championships, with a consideration for the World Championships depending on time of year, location and finances.
- Ultra – I really want to do a Spartan Ultra. Partly for the challenge and partly to see what I can achieve in this distance. The only issue is working out when and where I’ll do one to not hinder the Regional Series.
- Abroad – There’s also a consideration for some races abroad. This is to see about having experiences of other races, the variations that they typically have and challenge myself in other climates, terrains and elevation gain.
2023 won’t be just about Spartan Race though for me. I have many other weird and wonderful things in my head about what I want to achieve physically:
- Supporting others – During the off season, I have one or two events that I have been invited to support for other athletes in other sports so will enjoy helping them achieve their best and their goals.
- Road/trail running – Mostly as a way of benchmarking and adding some competitive work into the training plan, there will likely be races in this arena to test myself. Not only physical training but allows me to practice race craft and the mental side.
- Other OCRs – There will be a consideration for what other OCRs are available on the calendar, how that fits in with other races and if it’s good training for Spartan, with that being the main focus.
- OCR EC & WC – There are a lot of variables around this one, in particular qualification if I haven’t already, but it’s something that I would like to be a part of if it works out for me.
- Ultras – I want to run a couple more single race ultras next year across a few different distances but I also have a BIG challenge that I am looking at sorting out the logistics for that will take a lot to do but will be worth it!
2023 could be a big year on many fronts and I’m excited for it!
Off Season Plans
With that being said then, you can imagine that the off season is going to be a big one for me that I need to get right. There are various elements that I need to work on that you can probably pick out from my individual race reviews:
- Review and plan – A full and private reflection on what I felt went right and wrong with the year outside of what’s publicly displayed, highlighting what the root causes were and then planning my way forwards on how I’m going to deal with those things.
- Training with consistency – It’s all well and good me making a variety of training plans for what I want to achieve but I need to ensure I am consistent, healthy in how I conduct it and bring everything else in. On the surface, things may look good but I know deep down that I need to improve this area drastically.
- Helping others – As I mentioned before, helping others in their challenges will allow me to change that mindset of me chasing something, turning off that area of my brain temporarily, and push someone else to chase their dreams and goals.
- Body maintenance – There were many areas that need ironing out to have a robust and efficient physiology, and one that doesn’t malfunction on race day so tackling those issues is going to be key to unlocking performance.
- Technique – This is no secret. When you compare me to the others out there who flow through obstacles with ease, though I can manage them, it’s very inefficient, taking me a lot longer than necessary and opens me up for both more failures, hand issues in races or fatigue.
For me, this was a great blog to get all my thoughts out on the page and to reflect on how I did, giving an honest appraisal and properly give myself a pat on the back. Alongside that though, there’s a hope that you got something out of it. One of the areas that you never see or hear about as much is the mental side of racing, especially with the self expectations and how that can so quickly change, almost flipping the table on what you were doing and how you approach things.
So whether you found an interesting read as you follow the journey of my OCR career or got something out of it in the shape of dealing with the mental demons, thank you for taking the time to read this.
Hopefully, I’ll catch you next season on the start line!
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