TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS
No obstacle was too big — or too muddy — for the warriors who chose to test their mettle in the recent heats of the Super Spartan race in Beijing.
“What’s your profession?” asks Beijing-based internet celebrity and actor Mike Sui.
“Aroo! Aroo! Aroo!” answered the Spartan warriors in unison, as they approached the line to start their grueling 12-kilometer obstacle race.
It was the start of one of the open group heats for the Super Spartan race held in Beijing on May 19 and 20, which saw more than 10,000 participants tackle 27 different obstacles along the way.
Also known as Michael Stephen Kai Sui, the Chinese-American comedian and his group of friends were handed their finishing medals two hours later, covered with mud from head to toe.
“It’s cruel, but I love it!” says Sui, who was attending the event for the first time. “The Spartan Race is not just a game. For me it’s a new lifestyle.”
The Spartan Race features a series of obstacle races of varying distances and difficulty, ranging from six kilometers up to a full marathon. With more than 130 races held around the world every year, the race is made up of three core events — the Spartan Sprint, the Super Spartan and the Spartan Beast.
By completing all three race events in the space of a calendar year at one of the events around the world, any “warrior” can then be elevated to become a member of the Spartan Trifecta Tribe.
Zhao Jiaju is hoping to join the Trifecta Tribe. After winning the Spartan Super Elite group in Beijing, Zhao‘s next step is to become a Spartan Beast. As a long-distance runner, he learned about the Spartan Race from WeChat in 2017 and joined his first race in Qingdao, Shandong province, last September.
“When I was a child, I was like a monkey and loved to climb trees. I like the Spartan Race because it combines cross-country running with tests of endurance,” says Zhao.
“Even though I’m good at running, I still need to build up my strength for the race. Everyone has to overcome their personal weaknesses to make it to the finish line.”
For each of the obstacles in the Spartan Race, a warrior is only given one attempt to complete it. If they fail an obstacle, they are handed a punishment of 30 “burpees” — a push-up where the chest touches the ground followed by a jump in the air with both hands held behind their ears — before they are allowed to try again. Elite group and Age group warriors have to finish the obstacles alone, while open group participants are allowed to help each other.
Competitor Xu Wanwei opted to try a new approach in the recent Spartan event in Beijing. In her first attempt at cracking the Women’s Elite Group event, Xu tried to achieve the best time possible by opting to bypass obstacles she failed on her first attempt rather than spending time on punishment rounds.
Aiming to achieve a better result in this competition, she planned to overcome all the obstacles along the course to give her a better chance at qualifying for the Spartan World Championships. While the former national athlete failed four obstacles during her first Elite event, on this occasion she initially failed three obstacles. After repeatedly failing to overcome each hurdle, she opted to repeat the series of penalty burpees before trying to overcome the obstacle once again. After several attempts at each obstacle, she finally overcame each hurdle.
“Last time I took part, I failed to get a good result. But this time I came mentally prepared to conquer all the obstacles and tried to figure out techniques to overcome them in advance,” says Xu, who was named a Spartan ambassador in February.
“To complete the Spartan Race, you need to be able to run long distances, and also have strong muscular endurance,” says Xu. “You also need to assign your strength rationally.”
As the founder of the CrossFit gym in Beijing, Xu also brought 40 of her gym members to join her public group. “I wanted to show them that gym is not the only way of doing exercise — you can do all kinds of sports.”
According to Xu, the Spartan Race can be a good way for people to identify their physical weaknesses, as different obstacles require different skills to complete them.
Richardson Manzol, who comes from Venezuela, is another Spartan ambassador. He led a team to run the Super Race an hour after he finished the Elite group event, and the following day, he returned to lead a vegan team in the Spartan Sprint competition.
Manzol says he has fallen in love with the event. “I took part in the Spartan Race in 2016, and I’m married to it now,” says Manzol, who completed his trifecta last year.
“It’s just like being a kid again. You are in a huge playground full of obstacles and you’re allowed to get dirty,” Manzol says.
Manzol has been a vegetarian for six years, and became a vegan two years ago. After learning about nutrition, Manzol realized that there were many other sources of protein other than meat and dairy, so he decided to adopt a vegan lifestyle.
By entering an entirely vegan team to compete in the Spartan Sprint for the first time, Manzol is setting an example of being a healthy vegan Spartan, which he hopes will inspire other people to try, or “even become a little bit curious about a vegan diet”.
Sponsored by Japanese automaker Infiniti and Chinese sportswear brand Anta, the 2018 Spartan Race will see more than 20 events being hosted in China, more than double last year’s nine events and five times the number held in 2016, when the competition was first introduced to China by sports marketing company SECA.
According to Zhang Haoyang, product manager for the Spartan Race in China, Beijing will host an event that combines all three major races on August 25 and 26 — the first Spartan Beast event in China — and the first chance for warriors to obtain their Trifecta glory in one weekend.
“Even though male warriors are in the majority, we are attracting more female participants, who are more willing to share their experience on social media,” says Zhang. “Eighty percent of our participants are aged between 26 and 40, and half of them are unmarried.”
“For the Spartan Race, if you can walk, you can definitely join the race, because for the open group, we encourage friends and colleagues to help each other,” Zhang says. “There is no time limit, so we hope everyone will come and give it a try because the spirit of Spartan Race is to challenge yourself.”