Anyone training for a Spartan (Or similar) Competition

You can sign up for Spartan Workouts of the Day on their website. They'll email them to you or they're on their facebook page too. Those are definitely helpful because they are so versatile. I would suggest working on your weakness (mine is running) and especially running hills. I've done the Spartan Race, Warrior Dash and Rugged Maniac. Spartan Race was by far the most difficult of the three, mainly because their were 3 wicked steep hills to run up. Sorry I can't recommend any specific exercises though...

I have not done the Spartan Race; however, I have done the Mud Challenger. They look a tad similar from the website (I could be wrong.) They are fun. The obstacles are usually based more on strength. There were not too many parts at Mud Challenger of straight running, maybe a mile max. Most of the obstacles are close together. I have seen mud-run/challenge training guides online. I would just say to focus on upper body, and endurance.
I am not very fit at all. I mostly prepared with running (bad idea) for Mud Challenger. The estimated time of completion was 2 hours, I finished a little over an hour and attempted every obstacle.
Good luck!

I'm training for my first Tough Mudder in October.

At the moment I am training by running 2 -3 times a week, plus two sessions in the gym with a trainer working on strength and am going to do the tough mudder workouts as well.

Good luck!! That tough mudder looks awesome

Thank you very much

I have not done the Spartan Race; however, I have done the Mud Challenger. They look a tad similar from the website (I could be wrong.) They are fun. The obstacles are usually based more on strength. There were not too many parts at Mud Challenger of straight running, maybe a mile max. Most of the obstacles are close together. I have seen mud-run/challenge training guides online. I would just say to focus on upper body, and endurance.
I am not very fit at all. I mostly prepared with running (bad idea) for Mud Challenger. The estimated time of completion was 2 hours, I finished a little over an hour and attempted every obstacle.
Good luck!

Yea I was looking at one called Tough Mudder, looked a bit out of my league (Not sure if i'm fit enough) but definitely looked challenging. I was also thinking the same about working on my endurance for running etc. But I keep hearing a lot has to do with strength.
Thank you

By all means push yourself with these types of events as hard as you want and use them to challenge yourself...but also realize, there are going to be a LOT of people just walking, skipping obstacles, etc. Literally anyone can do any of these, including Tough Mudder...I've never been in one that was timed and you received any kind of award or anything. A lot of people just party their *kitten* off.

I usually do Warrior Dash when it comes to town and a couple other obstacle course/mud runs throughout the year. They are a blast. I did one at the end of August with my wife and it was really cool because she had started lifting with me and when we were on the course we got to the monkey bar cross (and it was a long monkey bar bridge) and she was just going to go around and told me she'd never been able to do them even when she was a kid...I told her just to do as many as she could and fall into the mud when she couldn't carry on...part of the fun and all...well, to her surprise and mine, she did the whole monkey bar bridge and she had her first glimpse of true functional strength gains from lifting. It was really cool...

I'm doing the Spartan Super in May and would love to have some additional support! Their emails, workouts are intense!

I am currently doing the 30 day challenges they send - 30 days of 30 burpees, 1 mile a day.. and I do a lot of Krav Maga workouts.. need more arm strength so I can do some pull ups so could use some help there! I did the Warrior Dash a while back but the Spartan I hear is way tougher!

I did the spartan race in Massachusetts last August, it was AWESOME, and hard! I trained more for the running part of it, so could have been more prepared for the upper body strength challenges. I climbed a rock wall, a rope, and had to drag tractor tires through the mud. I crawled 100 yards (felt like further) in themed under barbed wire, andattem
Ted to get over an 8 foot wall (failed, I'm only 5'2" and I don't jump well.

It was a blast, and I was ready to sign up for 2014 but my nephew is getting married that weekend. So I've signed upto be notified for the Fenway Park Spartan, but no idea on the date for it yet.

Next race I'd do way more upper body strength workouts, and hills. Some things, like throwing a spear at a bale of hay, I'm not able to improve lol, so I'll also work on my Burmese which is your punishment for failing to complete the task.

I'm also signed up for the 30 day challenges, although this month is pretty easy, a mile a day.

So encouraging to hear.. what is a Burmese? Is that like a burpee?

I have done the Spartan, Mud Hero and Badass Dash. Spartan was by far the most difficult but probably because it was 35 degrees out and only one water station available. Train for running hills is my only advice as the rest of it is straight forward strength and endurance training. Those hills are killer!

I did a Tough Mudder last year and a Warrior Dash the year before that. I basically just built on my running with a little bit of strength training twice a week. Lots of chin ups, push ups, upper body and core strength are a must! Also interval hill running was a big thing. But if you can run the distance without an issue you can get through the race.

Great advice, Im doing to Spartan in July. Super stoked but also super nervous!

To answer your question.

1. Do endless burpees until you can't move
2. Do pull ups
3. Run hills

Anyone can finish it at any level of fitness, but if you really push yourself to do your best, attempt all the obstacles, and complete every penalty, you'll nearly vomit or pass out at several points.

The burpees are killer though. Seriously practice burpees.

For #3, if your mud run is in a hilly area, dear god do this one. I trained by running on flat ground for my first and was doing 10k runs, figuring this would prepare me well for a 5k mudrun. The course was SUPER hilly with very steep hills, and I was dying.

By all means push yourself with these types of events as hard as you want and use them to challenge yourself...but also realize, there are going to be a LOT of people just walking, skipping obstacles, etc. Literally anyone can do any of these, including Tough Mudder...I've never been in one that was timed and you received any kind of award or anything. A lot of people just party their *kitten* off.

So true, so true. Most of them are not geared for people who want to try to go for time and have a lot of people doing it casually for fun and to just get through. The number of walkers or people blocking up the obstacles can get annoying if you are trying to push for time and are in one of the later heats. I waited for 20 minutes to go down a slide at one.

The Warrior Dash series has a competitive group in the beginning (not timed), although they recommended being under a 20:00 5K. I'm still a couple minutes off that pace, so I'm doing the heat right afterwards and hoping I can push for time (will self time) and be in front of the casual mudders.

The Merrell Down and Dirty one is timed and they have a 10k division for those of us who want to push for a longer run, but I still expect plenty of people will be doing it casually.

Tough Mudder isn't timed on purpose as it's supposed to foster teamwork and dedication. If you want to push for time on that one my advice is to bomb the first heat. It's not like they're keeping track of who is where for TM

I haven't done a TM, but I have heard the obstacles tend to require teamwork to complete. The mud runs I have done so far, I could complete every obstacle on my own and I wasn't on a team, so I bombed them as fast as I could go.