OCD FOR OCR

I was supposed to be in England, but due to unforeseen events I flew back from England the night before to Boston and ended up going to Fenway both days. It was a last minute decision to run the course. I hadn’t brought any of my race gear with me on Saturday and ended up racing in the wrong sneakers, jeans and a button down shirt.

• Registration and Festival:

The registration area was just across the street from Fenway; this was a smart decision as it kept large amounts of people off the streets and away from the one closed city block set up for the venue booths and sponsors.

The festival area at a place like Fenway is not as simple to set up as other venues as Spartan could not provide the finisher beer in the stadium or on the closed street and racers had to go to a local bar. They also couldn’t have booths selling products inside the stadium so they had some booths indoors, but most outside. Considering the challenges, Spartan did a really good job setting things up.

• Pre-race MC:

The stadium races are a fast moving starting line, so the MC for these really doesn’t get much time prior to sending out each wave all day, but with that said the MC’s did a decent job both days keeping people fired up and sending them out to conquer the course.

• The Course:

The course immediately started out by entering the baseball field and running around the edge of the field. After a short sprint, the course turned to the left and went into the seating section and stairs going up for a short distance. The course made its way through several sections of seating and I learned fast to pay attention and not ram my leg into the seats (ouch). The course made its way up to the outer ring of the stadium and it was cool to be running and be able to look to my left and see the city of Boston.

After some time running around the stadium, the course entered one of the player’s lockers and racers had to do off the ground push-ups on the locker room floor. We then exited the locker room and ran around the stadium some more. After a nice and long sprint throughout the entire stadium, then next obstacle up was the sandbag carry, which went up and down parts of the seating sections and stairways. After a short sprint the course went inside the stadium and up next was a nice a light version of the Hercules Hoist! Almost immediately up next came a modified version of the Atlas Carry. The next two obstacles were back to back and just after the carry and they were a short wall to jump over and then just a few feet after came the cargo frame climb up, across, and back down.

At this point, the course continued the trend of being obstacle heavy and immediately up next was another short wall to climb/hurdle over and then just up ahead came a higher wall to again climb up and over. The course then turned to the left and right away up next was a modified version of the Z-walls to traverse across. Just a short distance ahead came two shorter walls to jump up and over and then the course turned to the right and went through an area of the stadium that smelled really bad and then exited to an outside section and it was time for the Spear Toss and immediately up next came the Spartan uneven monkey bars.

The course then turned to the right and went back into the stadium and made its way through the stadium for a short time and the next obstacle was a series of stair crawls under bungee cords. The next obstacle was two sections of bungee cords to crawl/roll under. The course now went on a really long sprint throughout the entire stadium and eventually made its way to the heavy rope jump-rope obstacle/challenge. It came time again for a long sprint and the next obstacle up was a water jug carry (two jugs for the men and one for the women), which went for a nice and short distance and wasn’t the much of a challenge. It should be noted that the carry distance was changed on Sunday and made shorter and easier.

Just after the carry came the eight-foot walls to climb up and over. After a short sprint, the course made its way to a heavy medicine ball slam, which wasn’t so bad this deep into the course. The course had its last sprint throughout the stadium and made its way back onto the baseball field and up next was the A-Frame Cargo net climb and then a short distance ahead came the Box Jump challenge and just after that came the rope climb that was set up right next to the famous green monster wall at Fenway. The rope used was not the typical Spartan rope, but a black nylon type that was more slippery and this obstacle had delays most of both days.

After the rope climb, the course looped around the outside of the stadium and made its way near the finish and last but not least came the hanging CKO kickboxing bags to run/ram through and then a short distance ahead was the finish!

• Run with a Wreck Bag:

I didn’t care about how long I took to run the course on Sunday, so I stopped by the Wreck Bag booth in the outside festival area and asked if I could borrow one of the twenty-five pound bags to carry with me on my lap. I carried the Wreck Bag the entire course and even up and over most of the obstacles. I have to say, that I had so much fun carrying the bag and it made the course way more fun on Sunday for me that I decided to run a second lap with the bag.

My suggestion for courses like this that are not as challenging for some, take a Wreck Bag with you and make it a more fun and challenging course for you. It’s also great training for some of the harder obstacle course races most of us will be doing in the very near future.

• The Bling:

The bling is the same as it has been for all of 2016, the newly designed Stadium series finisher medal and the standard Sprint finisher shirt. I like the Stadium series finisher medal and the shirt, but am looking forward to a cool and new sexy look for 2017 Spartan bling!

• Overall Feelings and Event Rating:

I had to change plans fast and I am happy things worked out and I was able to go run Fenway both days and see some good friends. I had a rough few days and being able to race and see good friends was exactly what I needed. I have only done this Spartan Stadium race, so I don’t have a lot to compare it to, but I was very happy with the course.

The course, volunteers & staff, bling, and even the weather were great both days, so I am rating the event/course 5 out of 5 stars.

Article Written by: Walter F Hendrick (OCRSandy)