My Very First Spartan Race. Are they any good???

Spartan Race is arguably the biggest OCR franchise in the world and despite my many OCR exploits I have never been able to get to one, well in 2019 riding a wave of great year of OCR I succumbed to the lure of Spartan Race and booked myself onto the Windsor Trifecta weekend.
The Spartan MC started the race with “Let Battle Commence!!!!” and we were off!
For the sake of my video I have mashed up clips from both the Beast and the Super, hence why my clothes change, but as the obstacles get repeated it just gave me a couple of goes at recording it.
…and we were off initially weaving around the event village back and forth over a few warm up obstacles, 4ft hurdles and the like. Just before we leave the event village we go over the A frame net over the registration queue, and then off into the woods. The running gets a bit technical for a while as it goes up and down various inclines, over a few more hurdles before spitting out to a now vertical net climb, after that there was the first multi rig, hanging rings into hanging poles to transition. What I might have failed to mention about Spartan Obstacles is that if you fail them it’s a 30 Burpee penalty, and to signify you’ve completed it there’s a little cowbell at the end of each to ding before you get off. This was the first of such obstacles. I shimmied across, it was a bit awkward at first but I got to the bell, gave it a whack and was on my way. A short run later im met with another very similar looking rig, this time it was just monkey bars, all be it varying widths. It was also quite wet and I was overly sure of regular style so I opted for a more secure side swing which had me over in a jiffy. Down a hill and im now looking at the dreaded bucket carry, a drum filled with gravel and sent off on a loop carrying it. I was quite surprised by how long this took and how heavy that damn bucket became, I was well glad to be rid of it. A few hundred meters down the road there was our first water crossing. I’m not going to lie, it was cold and the neck high water took my breath away, but it didn’t last long and I was out the other side.
Next, was the barbed wire crawl, it felt a long way to crawl and it was uphill making rolling all but impossible. I’m pretty sure all my shorts have new holes in the bottom of them now. Now out of the trees and heading uphill out into country park territory. At the top of the hill was yet another multirig, this time it was monkey bars into rotating monkey bars, again sideways got me through this efficiently. A few turns later and I’m looking at a rope suspended between two A frames, the cowbell on the other end. The objective was to traverse the rope without touching the floor to the bell.
Next was an obstacle in my wheel house, a heavy ball weight on a chain, the good ole duck walk. A quick lift waddle drop and away. Now came the infamous sandbag carry. The blokes sandbags were about 30kg and despite it not being massively heavy you get sent on a right long windy muddy slippy course with it, before the end it feels like you are carrying a baby elephant on your shoulder. I jettisoned my t shirt as wet, gritty was chaffing me on the lifts and it was actually really liberating.
About a mile of running later and we are at yet another sandbag carry, man o man. This one went down a hill and back up it, it was treacherous and wet and seemingly went on forever. Immediately after this was the 10 meter rope climb. Knowing this was in all 3 races I had practiced this beforehand so I knew the footlock was key. It was clear about 90% of people did not know how to do this and were taking burpees without even trying. Up I went ding the bell is rung. Another half mile later and we are back in the event village all be it with back to back obstacles. The first is the Atlas stones, now I have experience lifting atlas stones so I knew how to get them up hold them so wasn’t really a problem, polished them off quickly. Then came the 45 degree rope climb, not overly difficult but when wet it can be a wee bit slippy. Round the corner is the inverted monkey bars. These are arc shaped into an overhang upper body strength was key to this one I was up and over it pretty swiftly. Now came the trademark Spartan spear throw, a pointy stick on a string which you need to get into the bale of hay. I refused to give up on this but it did take me a few goes to get the technique right. I didn’t take this personally, id never thrown a spear before. Ultimately it stabbed the hay… I swiftly moved on. A quick balance beam and I was faced with the hoist. One last turn up and over an inverted wall and there right in front of me was the fire jump, which is little more than a photo opportunity. Over the line, finished, medal, drink and a sit-down.
For the beast we did 30 obstacles, 25 for super and 20 for sprint. When I finished all 3 I must admit I was elated and relieved it was done. My upper body was aching, bruised, stretched, strained, and I felt wounded.