Type Private Founded 2007 | Industry Sports Website Official website | |
Founder Joe De Sena, Andy Weinberg, and Julian Kopald Brands Death Race and Spartan Race | ||
A Spartan race is a series of obstacle races of varying distance and difficulty ranging from 3 miles to marathon distances. They are held in US and have been franchised to 14 countries including Canada, Europe, South Korea, and Australia. The series include the Spartan Sprint, the Super Spartan, the Spartan Beast, and the Ultra Beast. Spartan Race also has a military series in which an obstacle course is designed by the United States military. There are also winter and team events.
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History
Peak.com and Peak Races were founded in 2007 by Joe De Sena, Julian Kopald, and Andy Weinberg. Peak Races, the parent company of "Death Race", eventually went on to create the current Spartan Race series. The first Spartan Race event was held in 2010 at the Catamount Outdoor Center in Williston, Vermont and represented the city of Burlington, Vermont. Roughly 500 competitors had to "run, crawl, jump and swim" and overcome a variety of obstacles. All finishers received a medal, and prizes were awarded to the top athletes.
In 2012 Raptor Consumer Partners invested in the Spartan Race company. In 2013 Reebok had became the event title sponsor, and the races were renamed the "Reebok Spartan Race Series". On December 7, 2013, Universal Sports broadcast a special on the 2013 Spartan Race World Championships. In August 2015, parent network NBC then approved a Spartan-based television series, Spartan: Ultimate Team Challenge, led by the producers of fellow NBC series American Ninja Warrior. Later in 2015, Spartan Race founded the "Spartan Agoge" which is described as a "60 hour physical, tactical, mental and team based training and testing" event, to be held in Vermont twice a year. ESPN describes the Spartan Race as "a true test of will."
Obstacle race
Spartan Sprint (3+ miles of obstacle racing, 20+ obstacles), the Super Spartan (8+ miles, 25+ obstacles), the Spartan Beast (13+ miles, 30+ obstacles), and the Ultra Beast (26+ miles, 60+ obstacles – one of two marathon obstacle courses along with Mudderthon). The obstacles themselves also vary from race to race. Frequently presented obstacles can include a fire jump, climbing under barbed wire, wall climbing, mud crawling, the "over-under-through" (a series of obstacles in which runners must first climb over a wall, then under a wall, then through a square hole placed in a wall), spear throw, rope climb, heavy object carries, "Herculean Hoist", "Tyrolean Traverse", monkey bars, Traversal Wall (similar to a bouldering wall), Hobie Hop (a thick rubber band is placed around the ankles and participants hop through consecutive tires), Slippery Wall (a wall built at an incline, roughly covered in grease), a zig-zag log jump, steep mud climbs (rolling mud), tractor pulls, underwater submerging below walls (dunk walls), Atlas carries, tire flips, stump balances (skipping on stumps across a pond), rope swing, and the now discontinued Gladiator Arena.
Failure to fully complete any obstacles results in a 30 Burpee penalty in which runners complete before advancing to the next segment of the race. A participant can obtain a Trifecta medal after completing a Spartan Sprint, Spartan Super and a Spartan Beast in one calendar year. As of the 2016 season, the finisher medal includes both the traditional circular medal and a "pie piece" – one third of a larger Trifecta medal. Each Spartan event also provides races for children ages 4 to 13: half-mile races for ages 4–8, and one mile races for those older than 8.
Charity
In 2014, Spartan Race donated a portion of its entry fees to charity, however some critics state that the amount forwarded was only a small portion of the total fees received.