I. AM. SPARTAN!

I. AM. SPARTAN … You yell this at the start line, and you believe it as you think ‘Yes, I WILL conquer all these daunting obstacles – I definitely am Spartan!’ By the end you’re more likely to be whimpering ‘Thank God I got through that relatively unscathed!’

I haven’t been too active on the hill running this year, but I’ve not been slouched on the sofa either. I’ve been hard at work in the gym doing all sorts of cross-fit and strength training stuff ahead of the Spartan race which was held in the centre of Perth this year over the middle weekend in Sept (previous years it’s been just down the road from the Carnethy race start). Perth offered a fantastic route up and around the Deuchny Woods and Kinnoull Hill. This year I plugged for the Spartan Super race – which is kind of the middle distance one (8–10 miles, 24–29 obstacles) – and thoroughly enjoyed it despite giving myself a bit of a rotator cuff injury lifting an atlas stone, along with the inevitable cuts, scrapes and bruises! I was beaten by quite a few of the obstacles but the camaraderie is good and you tend to get a helping hand from other competitors and some of the volunteers for things like getting over 7ft vertical wooden walls (a bit of a problem for short-arses like me).

It’s brilliant fun. Time is irrelevant unless you opt to race with the elite field. Basically it’s a giant play park for adults with stuff to climb up, over, under, through. Stuff to lift, swing from, pull and push. And plenty mud!

Highly recommend it!