2019 US National Series Utah Super | Spartan Race

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] now the hunt is on [Music] hey everybody we're here in snow Basin resort outside Salt Lake City Utah for the fifth and final stop in the Spartan US national series it all comes down to this one as your 2019 men's and women's champions will be determined by the end of this eight mile mountain course I'm David Medina along with Kevin Donahue and Kevin today it's all about the ladies Lindsay Webster Nicole miracle are separated by one point through the courses entire series so it comes down to today whoever crosses the finish line first wins the entire series well the men's series has not yet buttoned up either Ryan Adkins holds a commanding lead but the rest of the podium is not yet settled well Ryan Atkins would have to have an epic meltdown for him to lose this series Ryan Kempson would have to win and Ryan Atkins would have to finish in 46 place are worse for Atkins to lose a series but there's so many exciting battles just below that there are six men vying for positions two through six and all the prize money that comes with that now much of that's gonna play out based on how this course goes today for more information on this mountain courses our very own Steve Hammond well thanks guys and what a gem of a course we have out here in snow Basin for you eight point seven miles 2,500 feet of gain on this course it's going to be incredible my favorite part of the course is this first half mile it's gonna be chaos out there we've got sandbags and monkey bars really early on and then it's pretty much a race to the top for me it's the descent that really counts on this course it's the risk versus the reward I can't wait to see how it pans out back to you guys thanks a lot Steven that is a Cody moat sighting two-time world champion right there who else we got there's a slew of athletes out here that are just top-notch from all over the place and we just spoke about which Steve Hammond about the elevation profile and that sandbag really early at obstacle three is really gonna start to shake things up earlier yeah this is the first time we've actually ever raced at this course out here in the Ogden area so much beautiful stuff happening in this incredible landscape big mountains and not only that but it's full of legs rivers and trails that surround you would have welcomed elite athletes chasing championship titles from around the world and they welcome you to their playground and wish you a safe and fun day of racing we hope to stay in your stay go to the sampling of their vibrant historic artistic creative independent culture and know that that invitation is always open to return and visit our game arjen Utah is an absolutely phenomenal venue for a Spartan who have brought these athletes to it now we're gonna go up a massive three mile climb I had the opportunity to ski here in 2002 right after the downhill event for the 2002 Olympics and now our athletes are gonna charge up those same mountains so the way this thing is gonna shake out is it's relatively flat slight uphill they'll hit a few couple quick obstacles but as you mentioned before it's that sandbag carry that comes right after those early monkey bars it's gonna really just throw a wrench into everyone's plans this is a great opportunity for some of the stronger athletes such as Ryan Kent such as a Ryan Atkins such as a Killian as well to be able to establish a little bit of an early lead on something like those strength carries now what you can see right now in the back three in that shot you have Tyler veer meant to the left Ryan Kempson in the middle Ryan Kent to his right and then just ahead in that lead pack Ryan woods is trying to take things out fast Ryan Atkins right behind him lots of Ryan's here today and don't be surprised to see Cody mote jump into the mix early as well yet something that traditionally Ryan would normally does Ryan Kent has that man button in the back just to the right of Tyler Biermann in the blue tank top shirt so as they come over the over walls this is the first of 28 obstacles basically this is just designed to break your rhythm a little bit and as you hit this incline your legs fatigue quickly and you'll start to see the real athletes separate themselves early that's BJ Jones who was your winner in Alabama right behind Ryan woods and he's gonna try and assert himself early because he wants to prove that he is also strong in the mountains yeah Vijay Jones our Spartan Sicario who likes to come out and just do damage on this national series is actually slowly worked his way up the points even though he's missed a race it's incredible and it's a testament to his consistency and his training and again he is still super young youngest main contender in this field today youngest man ever to win a Spartan Race he did it at fit years old it's actually for not with our kids they're like still running kids races at that age there he is yeah they're just getting now into the age group competitive win says the athletes are jumping across the stream right now this is cut the first test where they have to jump across not trip on somebody else has no keyboard has a slip yeah that's right behind him is Mark Patras as well Baptist is a phenomenal marathoner and you can see Kirk DeWindt and a couple of the other top pros aaron newell and the purple making their way through and that was a jakob beau Secor as well so we have a deep deep field of guys who can run who can climb and are very adept at the obstacles this is gonna be one of the most competitive races that we've seen all year don't be surprised to see a bit of leapfrogging back and forth don't be surprised to see some guys make some tactical decisions early to go out a little slower or to try and break the field early as Ryan woods appears to committed to doing yeah don't sleep on our Newell either he he's wearing that purple purple ultra top he just took second in our Mountain series in Palmerton Pennsylvania last week he's also got a pretty rockin mustache that looks like a French policeman I'm just gonna call him inspect your new well for the rest of the race so what you see up front is still Ryan wood sitting at first position and Vijay Jones right on his heels and Kempson Ryan Kempson has now moved into third position with Tyler Fierman and then Ryan Kent rounded up the top five and Ryan at kids coming in in six as they hit the monkey bars quick you don't expect to see too many mistakes here as they move towards the sandbag now that was Ryan Kempson getting across very quick is this little green belt around his waistband and he's currently second in the US national series but that is not a lock for him he's gonna have to make sure he races real well to hold on to that position so a number of these little crevasses these little river crossings they just again just like those walls they break your rhythm up you've got a change you've got to stop you've got to think and you can see some guys making some decisions trying to keep their shoes dry willing to take a moment to actually slow down and lose a few seconds to maintain those dry shoes two reasons of course one because your feet will be lighter but two is so you can avoid blistering too early in this race because there will be some blisters because of that downhilling in the second half yeah if you don't have a good pair of socks it's very very very possible the other part of that is two that was the third time to head across that stream and use an explosive movement so that later on could lead to half cramping because now you're using a totally different energy system and really taxing the legs early that's Robert Killian he justs loaned that bag over his back and is heading up to Captain Killian and of course right behind him you had Johnny Luna Lima the winner in Big Bear and one of our favorites here today as these athletes begin what is probably the earliest sandbag carry in my recent memory and any race that we've had in the national series it is very early and what happens here is it's very hard once somebody gets into position here to pass someone you're going up a steep hill in a very narrow chute and you're not even little move bass so if somebody in front of you is not moving quickly it could automatically force you to moving into a pace that's slower than you want to go and that could cost you time later on and if you look how steep this hill is one of the big things about this race and Big Bear and some of the others is that the climbs are steeper and we talk about different styles of running some guys are better at throwing down more of a tempo running up up tempo paces some athletes are more grinders and they just throw it into first gear and they just grind slowly up the mountain and for some athletes that's a weakness and you're gonna see how the different types of terrain are gonna have an impact on different athletes and how other guys will move to the forefront yeah and we have about 40 athletes separated now by just about 50 yards on this slope and you're not gonna see much passing and as they start to charge down you could see some slips you could see some balls and you're probably not gonna see any passes though so it the position that Ryan Kempson right now who is in front Dez put himself in is very very optimal for us and raises Ryan Woods is right behind him and Kent has made a move past woods now strong positions of course but I would say the climbing is essential in this race because if you can't climb you can't run with these boys but the downhill is where this race is gonna be blown wide open and we saw that happen in Big Bear as Brian Atkins and Johnny Luna Lima were just much better downhillers than the rest of the field but there are a few other guys who are ready to risk it and as you can see Ryan Kent ready to risk it on that first downhill right there moving into first position yeah who's third place about 10 yards from the top went right past Ryan woods is now blown past Ryan Kempson but Tyler here man just keep it up and forth and keep an eye on Biermann we talked about him at Big Bear a lot he led for a chunk of that race and then blew up around mile seven or eight although he had already been dropped by Luna Lima that point he threw down a performance that day that put the world on notice that he is one of the main contenders and someone that needs to be watched out for and he is remained consistent throughout this season and that's what a lot of people are looking like is Jacksonville gonna be a fluke well he proved that wasn't again in Alabama he came back had a strong raise and he's done that for the rest of the season as Ryan Kent as with me thought he might do try to take it out early take advantage of early carry and his strength and be the first one to start this first climb up the mountain he was talking to us literally this morning before the race started about how he's been working so much on his downhill running and you saw it there his ability to just open up and let it roll and one of the hardest things this is on that downhill is how much pressure it puts on your quads and how it can just SAP the strength out of them there is a down hill on the second half of this race that's like two miles long and their athletes will start quickly but only some of them will be able to maintain their pace the entire way down without their legs giving out of them or without losing control of their legs and the Train is going to be very similar to what you're looking at here lots of different variations of sizes of rock ankle busting rocks so if you could imagine flying down the mountain nearly almost out of control constantly putting your feet on these stones that are moving a juggling underneath your feet with every single step it's a recipe for disaster but they're so athletic they're able to handle this your confidence is high Ryan Kent is trying to make up for a poor showing in Big Bear California he just did not have the wheels that day and he's being chased by a number of men who did that's Ryan Kempson who finished fourth that day and is currently sitting at second in the series was Ryan Atkins your series leader right on his heels he took second and Big Bear also Vijay Jones in that lead group as well so a ton of your major contenders and will continue to point them out as we go but that on-screen is Ryan Kent your leader on the day so far and he's in a dangerous position this is where he wanted to be but now he's being hunted by the climbers by the Kempton sea accent and of course Johnny Luna Lima and you know Ryan Kent can climb it's I think a little bit mental for him right now but he's being chased by guys who specialized in climbing I mean Ryan Adkins could do literally any he can do speed he can go long he can climb but when you're being chased by a Luna Lima that's a no Ryan woods it's a scary thing because those guys can ascend with amazing speed and of course Ryan woods not not just him but but uh Kody mode as well yeah I mean Kody mode is throwing down some of the most epic races we've ever seen on the mountain where he's just completely dominated people and it's great to see him back out there again it's gotta be in the heads of every athlete out there now where they're approaching the inverted wall and this wall is about eight feet high which is tilted towards you especially difficult coming off of an uphill and you're gonna see a lot of the obstacles today are planted on basically false peaks all over this mountain where they think they're coming to the top of the mountain they hit the obstacle and then BOOM right back up the next descent and a lot of the obstacles that are normally on flat surfaces or uphill or downhill such as this uphill barbed wire crawl which you see the grass there that's almost as high as the grasses in a bar bar crawl there's a lot of stickers in there and there's grasshoppers that just start popping up everywhere as you're going through so a lot of things to contend with so a long barbed wire crawl that they're about to head up into the nice thing about it is if it's grass it's less rocks to smash your knees on which is always a pleasant thing but right now you can see that moving into the lead that's Ryan Atkins Ryan Kent now in second position and in the purple top Tyler Fierman moving into third and Tyler's he is ready to have a big day today he's been training hard he's young newer to the sport only really about a year into this sport he's 26 years old he was a collegiate runner but he has fully dedicated himself to the sport of obstacle racing this year and he is on the verge of pulling himself into the top five in the US national series he trails Kirk DeWindt by just a few points it works at Home Depot so he's pretty good at putting things together let's see if you could put together a great race today so as they head up into what looks like the barbed wire crawl coming next be prepared to see things start to get a little bit sloppy and what I mean by that is these athletes are gonna start to tighten up again so right now Atkins is trying to apply some pressure to the field but they're all gonna get a chance to get their legs back and catch their breath in this barbed wire crawl but you can see just off in the distance here the interesting about the crawl too is because the grass is so high in the bark the wire is relatively low there's not gonna be able to really roll through this like they're used to so they're gonna have to get to a different variation of army crawls bear crawls this really taxes the shoulders gets a lot of blood flowing into the upper body making those up hills even harder once they get out of it so right now you have the creme de la creme of Spartan Ops athletes on the male side you have Ryan Adkins at first followed by Tyler Biermann right on Atkins his heels that's Bryan Kempson he wants to tolt serve and win this race today because he knows that his second position in the US national series is dependent upon holding off Johnny Luna Lima who's also sitting right behind him they're putting their hands right down the grass they can't really see where it is you see Atkins he's going down with his knuckles he's trying to keep the bottom of his hands off of that terrain that he can't see because he forgets a thorn in there if it gets a rock it could make it very difficult on grip strength obstacles later also there's a lot of work that's going into their hips here it's a lot of effort to crawl and get in that position and compress the body and come out of it and get right back up to speed and you can see how easily these athletes are able to just change gears and get back to a run most people can't do it this smoothly as Ryan Adkins now steadily sitting in first position Tyler Berman in second Ryan Kempson in third and that looks like Ryan woods right behind him in fourth so many athletes used a barbell crawl and rolling through it to kind of catch their breath it's a chance to recover being that that was uphill that they had to crawl on their hands and knees you heard the heavy breathing you heard the effort then for them to run out of that with such power and speed just showed you how fit these athletes really are but so a little bit of background on Ryan Atkins he has not won the US national series since 2016 really the first year that we had it when it was titled the US Championship Series when he came out and won the first two races of that series and just dominated the whole year through but it took in last minute essentially buzzer beater finisher out kicking JP setting away on the final race of the year to win that series by one point over Robert Killian very enough in the barbed wire crawl I run in the barbed wire crawl yes and that's a good point and Ryan Adkins this year is leading in this race right now and he has got a commanding lead in the series it's gonna be extremely difficult for anyone to reel him and I believe the position would have to be he'd have to finish at 46th place or worse to lose this series but the real stakes of today are not about position one it's about positions two through six we don't know how that's gonna shake out there's so many variables that could happen for example Brian and Kemp's in his position isn't solidified in the series if Johnny Luna Lima was to win today and Ryan Kempson came in third or worth worse Johnny Luna Lima would jump up into second place in a series and that's a big change of the money and obviously the prestige now look who's just latched themselves on to this group you can see Robert Killian and Ian Howe second now just latched on right in the back and now this lead pack is expanding to about eight or nine guys and this is where consistent climbing comes in there will be a little while now before they get to the next set of obstacles where they're gonna actually have to do so it's a ton of climbing they're gonna be able to get to a rhythm and that's like where somebody like a Robert Killian who's a Andean Xhosa core a great mountain runners could start to reel in these other guys look at its Cody mote right here world champion in 2012 and 2017 I've been 17 and and he's over 40 years old this is his first national series racing gear I believe it's only his second Spartan Race of the entire year this is a guy who's battled health issues for the last half decade thyroid issues that really really limited him and yet he was able to win another major championship just a couple of years ago he's back in in contention and what we also saw was a labouring Ryan Woods that was interesting to see he's usually one of the best climbers in the field Cody mode if you were looking at his shirt that is the same shirt that he's had since 2015 it just shows you how infrequently he races but he is the only person in history to place in the top five at six World Championship races his consistency is incredible amazing consistency and also when Cody moat pops a big race he doesn't always run a great race but when he does he's almost unbeatable we're approaching now the vertical cargo 2.0 and this shelf has been giving a lot of athletes trouble over the last few races they have to essentially run up to it and then boost themselves up and as they're boosting themselves their momentum wants to take them underneath and I was someone I had one more thing about Cody Bowen I believe he's the last person that's beautiful but the Dom is an almond in any obstacle race now we have the ladies taking off right now and as always there's the cold miracle taking it out back now Nicole knows this is her day she has to dominate today and the reason is of course if she wins today she wins the US national series if she lets Lindsey Webster beat her today Lindsey Webster wins the national series which could be her fourth title overall this is as this is basically a mattress yeah I mean a mattress it's the two of them and then there's the rest of the field battling for third fourth fifth there's gonna be some really deep shake outs that are gonna happen here in this race that the women's field is better than it's ever been but the top of that field has been Nicole and Lindsey all year long neither of them has finished off the podium the national series Lindsey's never finished worse than second this year and Nicole has two first-place finishes a second and a third we talked about the greatness of the athletes of the sport boats and men to women there's only gonna be one winner of this but there's so many of those other battles that you were talking about there's only 26 points that separate eight from 14 from the women in this national series right now so anything could happened in the back side of this and believe it the top ten is extremely prestigious in the sport of Spartans there's so much to gain today and there's even just as much to lose that's Lyanna wasted he just sitting in second position just in front of Lindsey Webster right now but Webster likes to go out slow she takes her time she trusts her fitness also someone trying to make an impact not just wasted he who you should look for in the top five throughout the race today face Denning has had a rough year last year was a little bit rough too but she's ready to reassert herself there was a time just two years ago when we thought she was the next great star in this sport and she's not that far off she's been incredibly consistent towards the end of each one of her seasons but in the last few years she has started slowly and it has struggled in the earlier part of the year she's been living in Manhattan now for almost a year she actually did prepare for some of these mountain races has invested in a like a sleepy bubble and an elevation pen and she sleeps there every night and does a lot of her office work in there so hopefully that'll pay off for her today being at that kind of manufactured out the two conditions and really give her the boost that she needs yeah I mean so she lives at sea level so she needs that given how many of these races are at altitude including this one and of course Tahoe which would be a major altitude as well as LeAnn wasti wasted excuse me trying to keep pace with Nicole miracle who as usual sets down a blistering tempo on the first one it's really important for us to mention night when you look at this course with the climbing Lindsey along with Raya Coble essentially the best climbers but there's nobody better in the world in the women's side at descending then Lindsey Webster so the second half this course could be your bread butter she just has to stay close from the beginning now just make sure they know she maintains that contact it doesn't let the light press in the ladies get too far away those are very slick paths I don't know if you noticed that Lindsey Webster did a solid leap right over that thing while the other women around her all went through the middle of that crevasse through that river as you can see Rose Wetzel just climbing out of it Rose trying to keep the top five position in this series as well we had the first race in Jacksonville Rose talked about one of her goals was she wanted to be top 5 in this series at the end she's in fifth today so it's gonna be very hard for to hang on to that but she has that opportunity she race as well as the ladies at the bunky bars it's not a very difficult monkey bars but they are some big gaps they're very far apart today and there's a couple hi ones that are a bit tougher Lyndsey Webster already starting to stretch out a little lead you can see Nicole Merkel is sitting in second place with LeAnn wastin e and then four or five base Denning and ran copal so this is your typical top five but someone trying to crack that top five is gonna be in Ashley Heller someone else is gonna be trying to crack that top five would be Rose Wetzel there in the yellow top Ashley hell are currently eight in the US national series right now she just had a terrific effort Paul Merton laughter she is beloved by everybody new smart and everybody who gets to know her I believe that's her starting to walk up right now and pick up the sandbag and we wish her luck today and I'm that going to tell you what Lindsay Webster is surprising me right now I've never seen her take the lead this early in the race she looks like she wants to put this away now if she certainly wants to impose her will she knows she only has one major climb on the day today albeit it's broken into little pieces but you're essentially climbing for 90 percent of the first three miles of this race and there's a ton of descending and if she can at least a hair ahead of Nicole when they get to the descent she'll know she's got an amazing chance to wrap the series up in that that's exactly where she wants to be in I think with one race to go where any mistake could actually cost you big-time cost you not only the race but could cost you the series I think there's much more sense of urgency for this race for Lindsay to get out fast and quickly then there wasn't Big Bear now this is something incredible we're talking about not even a mile in we have a sandbag carry and already you can see that the women are closing in on some of the men that started 15 minutes before them so again to those of you at home this is the creme de la creme this is the best female in the sport and they are gaining rapidly on some of these men who lined up 15 minutes in front of them for some of those men remember we do have age group competitive racing that might be a better spot for you we have open waves we could go a little bit later in a day if you're not that competitive now Ryan Atkins again out in front on this climb and this is what I was talking about with that like kind of gear one just just settling in and putting some tempo on but right behind him Robert Killian has moved into second position and that might be Cody mote sitting in third that is Kody mode yeah we're looking at a couple different techniques here Brian Atkins tremendous grip strength kind of monkey through that and Robert Killian and Cody Moe a much more conservative yet very quick backwards technique yes the other twister backwards technique of course and that was Tyler Furman sit in fourth position isn't it incredible how code emote goes away for a year comes back and is immediately running with the top athletes of the sport I mean Kodi mode is his background if you don't know much about Cody he was an outstanding wrestler he was a outstanding trail runner and cross-country runner and now he coaches cross country and wrestling if the high schooler teaches at two cross country teams are routinely state champs so I guess he's constantly working out with those guys a lot now he was also a wrestling and cross country state champion multiple times over in high school and he was the trail running marathon and 50 mile national champion as you can see Robert Killian making quick work of Olympus right here using just the holes I think that's the best grip to use I believe so too if you notice what Atkins and Robert Killian did there as well as Lindsey Webster's bombing down this Hill now was their foot position they made sure they got their feet out in front of their hands to set up net next grip so their hands don't slide down yeah long lead with that with the foot and then crossover a hand over hand if you're new to this sport this is Lindsey Webster again the greatest descender in the sport just bombing down with that sandbag right behind her Nicole miracle looking very good as well and both of them have put a little bit of a gap between themselves the rest of the field already here's Cody Road again our 2012 and 2017 world champion and I'll say this again I've said in the past there's nobody better when he's at his best make Cody boat has been in his history in this morning it's true he was one of the first true great champions one of the first multi chimed champions and he's one of the guys that whenever he lines up at Joe's up to erase it kind of shakes the rest of the field they're all a little bit nervous about it well the rest of fields got to be a little bit nervous now because Lindsey Webster one of the greatest climbers of the sport is in the lead very early in the race where she's normally not at and we put this away we've got a battle on our hands right now this is very exciting because not only do you have one two is the two best female obstacle racers in the world but they're separated by just a few points in this entire series that it's going to come down to who could take it today and right now they're going toe-to-toe 26 points separate these two ladies in one position over the course of the entire US national series and they that there they are Matt racing up the first big climb in the final race and that is already some significant separation considering it's only about a mile into this race and Lindsay Webster as usual looking very comfortable Nicole not showing very many facial expressions but you'd like to see her make some kind of move and put some pressure on Lindsay early on this is kind of like the dream cast with athletes that we have out here and it's also an absolute dream day it's probably about 65 to 70 degrees no humidity nice light breeze these are the kind of running conditions you dream about and they're getting them in this race and look early and quickly Lindsay is already separating it's looking like she's feeling great today the altitude isn't seem to be affecting her too much we're at about 6,500 feet 6,000 feet at the bottom of this mountain will climb to about 8500 feet so enough altitude to put a little bit of difficulty on your muscles in your breathing system but not enough to truly wreck you it's not the kind that completely debilitated one thing I will say yesterday's had a lot of Spartan races we have what's called an open house it's an opportunity for the athletes to come in the day before and test out some of the obstacles the spear throw today is one of the hardest fears I've seen in years it's uphill so uphill that they actually had to kind of modify the base of it and Lindsay Webster struggled on the spear yesterday in the open house and for the first time all season property for the first time in two years I saw a lack of confidence on her face at least for that obstacle so as great as she looks now that's got to be looming in her head for the rest of the course and again every time there's an opportunity the Col has to pull her back a few sec that means taking on an obstacle but that means jog that while it sees power hiking she's gonna have to do it because there's just too much climbing ability right now from UT Webster and the reason you're saying that is to make Lindsay Webster work make her worry and as Lindsay Webster just jumped over that inverted wall she took a look back to see to where Nicole miracle was and so Lindsay Webster again with the lead her husband Ryan Adkins holding the lead in the men's they're both well right now Lindsay leading in the series for the women Ryan leading in the series for the bend and of course each of them out in front in this race today if either of them takes it it's open and they're all gonna get some muddy feet right now because out of all things on the side of a mountain they just ran through what looks like a marsh so their feet just got a little bit of water logged a little bit muddy a little bit slippery noses Raya Coble on screen right here and she is one of the better climbers in the field she's also an ultra athlete the longer the nastier the grinds that's better for her she's got herself a task of trying to pull the : today she but she's not quite the descender that Nicole is so she's gonna have to get past her and get a gap she injured her foot in the middle of last season she hasn't really necessarily come back met with her descending but one thing about Raya she's also a veteran of the slovenian gymnastics national team so our obstacle ability is also incredible so that's at least in another place where she can make up a little bit of time so right now that's your one two three for the women and then there's a big drop back to the next chase group yeah and that chase group is gonna be led by a lot of ladies such as an Alex Walker such as Lacey Burgess such as Natalie me ah know people that are all vying for that last end spot in the national series these athletes are now about two miles it may be a quarter into the race recognize that spot well and that's Kody mode on screen and now you see face standing she's in that first chase group sitting at about maybe fourth position it looks like just behind that she hits the barbed wire crawl with Brea Koval right in front of her so she is pulling herself back into the thick of things as well it seems like a lot of these athletes are picking the same line all the way over to the they must have seen a lane that looked a lot smoother there's a lot of kind of like very thick bushes in there then it looks like they're all trying to skip as Lindsey Webster blasts just pass some other gentleman I would say most of them it's not about the bushes that they're trying to avoid it's the height of the wire itself usually at the edges the wire doesn't sag as much you can get a little bit more room to breathe you can crawl a little higher and higher means you can move more efficiently more quickly and Lindsey was in and out of that quick and again just separating you're looking at another person on the course with a hydration pack the people of Lindsey's class so people are really competing here they're not carrying water on the course they might have a little bit of good with them their aerobic systems are so developed and they're so good with managing their hydration that they really need a minimal amount of fluids food on the course if anything to complete an eight and a half mile raised in an optimal performance you may see them take water maybe not a pack but a flask or a head held or something a bottle of some kind on the waist belt that they could carry on a beast course but typically not on something this short here the water stations will suffice but they will as you mentioned need to carry some sort of nutrition because about 45 minutes into this race if they're not taking nutrition they are setting themselves up for a bonk yeah we saw a Cody mo take a quick sip of water when he was up there before and funny story about Cody we were racing and I believe it was Breckinridge a few years ago and he had just hit his spear and guys were racing up to the spear next to him he stopped pulled a cookie out of his little like waistband and just started eating it while the other guys were taking the spear he was so confident he's gonna be able to outrun them afterwards that he just let them throw this failure Spears eat his cookie and then took off and dominated by about another 10 minutes and that's what he does and right now you're looking at the Comerica second position in the US national series she led all season up until the last race at Big Bear she won the first two races easily the first fly about seven minutes I believe in Jacksonville on the flatter courses and we were talking all year about how wait till the mountains come wait till the mountains come because that's when Lindsey comes out to play and now Lindsey Webster with the lead buttface standing looking determined to pull herself into a podium position today yeah if a sitting doesn't have a lot of mountains in Manhattan to train on there are mountains in the Adirondacks and then the Catskills and what's called Harriman State Park is just outside New York City but it doesn't have this kind of elevation she's historically been very good in the mountains though we've seen her on the podium in Tahoe a couple times actually top 504 almost beat Lindsay at the Burpee off a couple years ago very close Louis said it was a literally down to the wire Faye was a head failed an obstacle Lindsay failed the same obstacle as well they both completed 30 burpees side-by-side and finished within eighteen hundredths of a second of one another on that seventeen and a half mile tahoe course we got ray Cole who looks like she's about 1800 seconds behind the coal miracle eyes they're heading up this hill running really strong and where would you rather be in this position Kevin would you rather be the one just in front of the one stalking just behind just stalking just making them nervous you also it gives you the opportunity if they're not moving that great to back off a little bit and manage your energy let them tire you up the hill at their own pace and then you could explode on the map words she says my old coaches used to say back in high school they said make him your mule let them do the work for you so she's gonna allow the tempo to be set by Nichole and all she's got to do is mindlessly run behind her it's an easy way to let someone kind of pull you up a hill pull you up a mountain and maybe if she can close in just a little bit you could even draft a little and those hurdles don't look like much but after you just been climbing up that hill and finally got into a rhythm now that rhythm is broken you're having to push over using your core and you're using your upper body muscles all that blood now has to force a little bit up into your arms which takes away from your legs and makes your cardio respiratory system just work a little bit more harder than you want it to it's anaerobic after all this aerobic effort and and one of the things is you're trying to avoid pushing your body into an anaerobic state where you're you're working very muscular you're trying to keep it just aerobic keep it just under your lungs it's already hard enough when you're just climbing climbing and climbing if you're getting more lactic and your calves are working so hard so for the first half of this race it's your calves it's your glutes it's your lower back that's getting a lot of the pressure your hamstrings on the second half of this race when they start bombing downhill then it's lots of clogs and then things start to get kind of messy everything what they're doing right now the average athlete they what they would back off immediately you saw them past those guys that were just walking right they backed off they didn't have the confidence in your ability to run uphill or the ability these athletes are so well trained that even though it feels like their legs are gonna blow up they know just how hard you have to push it without going anaerobic and make it as far as they possibly can before you have to hike I mean you're looking at what Lindsey Webster's doing right now and how relaxed and how calm she looks it's just fluid it's just easy it's another training room for her and these are places where you gotta kind of really open up this is gonna be somewhat similar to what they'll see in Tahoe and if this is what we're gonna see in Tahoe with Lindsey getting out like this people should be very very worried I would be worried I mean she doesn't look like she has a care in the world and it looks like she's dropped a coal and as steep as his climb looks it is steeper when you're on it I had the opportunity to hike up this climb with John Lima that says Johnny Luna Leamas dad yesterday and I had a great conversation with him and talked about his background and where they're from in Brazil and a couple stories that we're gonna share later and that's Ryan Adkins right there and he has lost the lead right now I believe that's Ryan Killian run Robert Killian running right in front of him and Captain Killian winner of the best ranger former world champion four-time podium finisher at World Championships and you're looking at this beautiful single track over the snow basin Resort again the home of the 2002 Olympics but there's so much more that they do after its resort on on Monday nights they have movie nights like right down in the base area they have Blues and beer booze music festivals there's so much going on in this valley other than just running but you can see all the wildflowers this is kind of like spring there it's nirvana that is probably my favorite part of the course it's just this gorgeous view Hue's and you'll stay we'll switch back and work their way up this final piece of the ascent it's the most runnable piece and it's also the most beautiful and you can see right here just how steep this section of the course is for the women the men are already past this point but this is probably the most brutal portion of the climbs and you can see it's kind of broken in there but even with each one of these powerful steps they'll step in some loose dirt that's gonna give back and make them have to work harder they're gonna be stepping on rocks that are gonna kind of turn their ankles as they're going up so you have to work so much harder in this craggy undulating rocky terrain than you would on it just a normal path well it's uh it's it's quite an effort that they're putting in right now and this is the switchback and trails that I was talking about look at these views that's Robert Killian we're seeing right here he is using this opportunity to open up his stride and really fly this is probably one of the quickest sections of the course and he's trying to put some space between himself and ryan atkins he's saying I'm the one who wants to ruin the points for everybody today I'm sure you can relate to this this is one of those sports where every now and then no matter how hard you're working and Spartan you're able to go to these beautiful areas just take a quick peek and look at the beautiful areas you're in gives you so much energy in such a great feeling now look over the shoulder of face standing and could see those Snowbasin be used is this beautiful ridge line she may not get to enjoy it as much as you or I would but when you're up there this is one of those races that's really worth coming to because you come up at the top of the hill you come around the corner and the clearing is just some of the most phenomenal views you've ever seen at snow Basin every time you pop around a corner you're gonna see something that's going to take your breath away it's stunning and again you get that challenge of these extra steep climbs as well because why not come to one of the more challenging Spartan races as well you might as well get some steep kickers and then again a super fun second half of the race where you get a bomb down the now you see strategically face setting there right now we're going into intermittent power hikes that's not like she's walking she's just trying to use different muscle groups and try to maintain or speed without trying to run herself out full of her quads her look coupe blew up it might have been on a rabbit right there because Ryan that kids just blew right by him Robert Killian just gapped him and now unless he's headed back looks like he just got out run he's pretty epic go Robert Kinion taking the lead go right at kids okay kinda thing maybe a Johnny Luna Lima it's pretty epic robber killing his on form guys Brian hockey is looking super strong they've done the switchbacks well I'm gonna go keep chasing him it's Johnny Luna Lima he's made a phenomenal move from mid-pack that's pretty awesome he's on fire guys I'm the descendant he's still to come back to you here we go well thanks a lot Steven first of all can we point out the fact he has run up this entire mountain that's why he's so gassed out right now and he's trying to keep up with some of the best in the world and Steve is a phenomenal athlete in his own right but Johnny Luna Lima who is now at third position looks like he is running faster than anyone at this point and that's gonna make them so nervous cuz we saw him Big Bear what that man could do on a descent up until Big Bear Ryan Atkins was clearly known as the greatest ascender and obstacle course racing Johnny Luna Lima took that title away from him Ryan Atkins knows it and he is on his heels right now yeah John Bryan knows that Johnny is coming he knows that he's gonna bear down on him on that downhill and he better have a significant atleast minute long gap by the time they reached the peak of this mountain as you can see the women have now hit twister this is the twister obstacle so as they work backwards through it you see a few different techniques Lindsay Webster is gonna work mostly with the backwards technique some people will try and swing forwards this is a safer but not quite as quick technique not quite as energy efficient as it forward Towson's and a very difficult twister as you notice it is a few degrees uphill it might only be two sections but each one of those sections is much more difficult as you see Johnny now running through the single track before we get to some of those down hills this is the end this is the peak right here so these gonna take a sharp left and the descent begins Johnny father John and I were walking up the mountain as you were watching the cold miracle attempted nicole has some of the best grip strength and a sports outstanding rock climber so I see her making quick moves through this and not having any problems as you're watching her match her hands this is a lateral move lateral Dizzy's should match it's interesting because she has small hands to match them under each one of those bars most people with bigger hands cannot do that Andrea Coble sitting right behind her in third position has managed to climb with her so far Mireya with her is not enough ahead of her is where she's gonna need to be if she moves with the second half of this race if we get through the downhill andrea has again great grip strength being a gymnast from Slovenia that was something that she could work up as well if you can see just the man after man after man these women are passing this is it on a situation that when you sign up for a race if you're gonna get gapped by in the first two miles by women that are started 15 minutes behind you please start in the age group race and I promise everybody that finish the story on Johnny I started before but I don't want to take the focus off the ladies right now we're approaching so Olympus and like some of the guys there's the cold perfectly executing those poles notice how she gets her feet out in front and sets up the hands and that tilted reach now Nicole Merkel is a excellent rock climber as well she and her boyfriend Aaron Newell who's great athlete the men's race in his own right a great climber both of them spent a lot of time with rock climbing and that's a huge aid to them when they get into some of these grippy obstacles they outfitted a Sprinter van so they could drive around the country live out of the van so they could go to all the great rock climbing spots as well as gets themselves to Spartan races one of the things you'll notice on that Olympus it just passes there's the cold going over the wall wonderful supporting things if you're just starting the sport is getting perpendicular pressure with your feet against that wall that'll keep you from sliding off now faith is using her knees to get that perpendicular pressure maybe she doesn't have the best shoes in the world that are gonna get tacky enough to stick on there so she's using those knees but that will also rip up the skin on your legs also just bumping up your knees and banging him around it's not great for your runners but for Fay it was an easy move for her just to get through that obstacle without risking any slips and you know she's on to the next one so she still kept her hips back and away from the wall that's the other thing hips back feet or knees in that's really the secret to staying tight on that wall our good friend and smart legend racquet Crocker always said doing an obstacle slow is always better than doing 30 penalty burpees so that might that could have been their head right there it's true keep it simple so now you can see face standing sitting in about fourth position trying to close in on koval into that podium spot and maybe just maybe she can even reel in the Comerica face thinning is a native of Calgary Alberta as you see PJ Jones blasting through this area and this is kind of terrain that she's used to seeing so I got a feeling when she gets to that top of that Ridge Snowbasin she looks down and sees how beautiful it is it's gonna remind her of Calgary Alberta now this is probably the best section of the race for Vijay he's a solid climber no doubt but on the flat terrain as he approaches beater right now on the flat terrain on some of the milder down hills he's absolutely phenomenal now beater this obstacle has a rotating bar a couple bars looks like an egg beater he's gonna jump up it's gonna rotate he swings straight to the next my gosh he's so good at it it barely even rotates he's in and out in three seconds at about six foot three with tremendous length and his wiry strength and grip strength that is something that he just made easy work of as we get to the e-book box now with Robert Killian and he is an Army Ranger this man is a green beret and just saw how difficult that obstacle wars for him that is not easy the thing about the 8 foot box that's so tough is one it's very slippery on the top especially if you've been sweating and so when you try and chicken wing your elbows over the top you start to have a little bit of trouble maintaining that grip you can slide back the rope on it isn't really super helpful and really what you have to do is get about halfway across the top of that box to get to the bar that you can grab to pull yourself over there's nothing to really grab at the top and the rope because it tightens up so much you can't get your fingers underneath it once you get halfway up the wall and the wall is a little bit slippery so it's hard to walk up it with the rope as well and look at the steepness as this terrain how it's both their quads and that is aaron newell in the purple shirt this is mile 4 FYI for those of you guys wondering the men have made it to the peak and everything from here on out is about to be pretty much downhill so you just think your legs are just blowing up at that point now all of a sudden you have to press them up against that wall and compress them just to get over it that's gonna get your heart rate up a lot as now Robert killing starting to descend down the mountain so what's gonna happen here is this descent starts mild they're gonna take a hard right turn momentarily and then it becomes this rocky steep loose dirt and rubble descent after bender here you have bender and a short climb and then the descending and that descent is gonna blow this field wide open because quads are gonna fail people are gonna become exhausted and people are gonna start to get a little nervous on the descent because they're tired yeah this bender isn't really an obstacle that is going to blow you up or anything or gonna fail on burpees it's just something again to break your rhythm it's our pumping blood into the arms that makes it harder to run speaking of rhythm that's Lindsey Webster right there putting down one of the smoothest rhythms in the sport Robert Killian and he may look like he's a little bit choppy in the arms but his leg stride is always perfect we talk about that all the time this is a great champion that we're looking at right here Spartan world champion 2015 he's won a national Series championship and of course we're looking at a Kona military division world champion as well as army best Ranger is also our two-time defending North American regional champion and just loves to compete this is a guy who when he first got into the sport it was at a US national series racing Palmerton Pennsylvania one of our iconic hardest courses never saw into the obstacles got a quick tutorial went out there and took fourth and it just went out took the world championship later that year now that's Aaron Newell right there shares the van life with Nicole miracle and right behind him Ryan kept sit in for Kempson this is big because he knows he's behind Luna Lima he has to stay within a couple positions of him at a bare minimum if not beat him today to maintain second place in the US national series because Luna Lima is streaking up that leaderboard there's a couple variations we could happen if Johnny Luna Lima was to win today and he's in position to threaten that and Ryan Kempson finishes third or worse Johnny Luna Lima would move it into second place as now we have Ryan would hit better for Ryan woods coming off a hamstring injury and just before Seattle here to pull out of Seattle race it's clearly have impacted him in the Big Bear but he managed to like power through it we expect him to be one of the best climbers in the field this is a strange performance for him it's been a strange year for me he's the defending US national Series champion he came into the season with extremely high expectations and hopes he's on the poster for the huge billboards that we have in the venues for that national series but then he had the huge point penalty down in Jacksonville failed an obstacle in Alabama the season blew up for him along with that injury now looking over the shoulder of Lindsay Webb speaking against he the most beautiful part of this course here at Snowbasin Resort and rayet copal in the chase behind her and if we go back to talk about Ryan woods for a second you know this is a guy that was dominant last year we expected him to be dominant again this year especially with the way the early portions of these races shook out the way Jacksonville was laid out way Alabama was laid out good courses for him to use his speed and then later he can use his climbing ability it just hasn't worked out in his favor a series of unfortunate events after Jacksonville just seem to like spiral in control and he just couldn't reel it back in and it's unfortunate but it doesn't diminish who he is as an athlete and what he's done in his career in obstacle course racing all I'll say is don't count Ryan woods when it comes to the North American or World Championships you'll have some time to Train he'll have some time to get better and you know what the reset button starts when this race is over because the US national series would be over everybody is back to square one with new goals to be able to chase in that very refresher now Radko bull he got on screen right here what she's really looking forward to is that World Championship ultra going on in Sweden in November and she's been talking about that all week she's hoping that somebody at Spartan and I'll put the word out there for you will assemble some kind of ultra marathon national series so we'll see what we get from that maybe a world championship series of some kind but one of the best cure climbers and pure ultra runners that we have men or women and this is one of the best views she's ever gonna see here it's Snowbasin and you might be seeing hey this is like a place that maybe I don't want to run or hike you could mountain bike here you could rent mountain scooters you could play mini-golf at the bottom and watches there's so many other different activities you could do with this place it's just a playground not only for the best athletes in the world but the best adventures that people want to have fun now that's Johnny Luna Lima finally hitting some descent said this is the best descender in the world and he is rapidly approaching the part where this descent starts tickets and when it does this field is about to get blown up this is gonna get insane I started a story about Johnny earlier as you can see ray of Cobo a beautiful race etiquette just asking people to pass on the Left running by and giving you a nice thank you but when I was back in the mountain with Johnny's father John Hughes tell me all about this story that Johnny had won he was 2 years old they went walking together on some trails about two mile trail and Johnny naked and barefoot hook off running down this trail ran the whole two miles and smiling and laughing and he still has that same that same passion that it seemed like zest for life that he's showing on the course that's what part of makes R so good now again you're looking at women's second place in the national series holder that's Nicole miracle trying to reel into Webster back in trying to salvage her opportunity to win this championship to stop Lindsey from collecting her fourth in four attempts and there you see Ryan Atkins if you're thinking how is a man that muscular able to run up a mountain that fast well he wasn't just only a football player in high school we played linebacker he played rugby as well but most importantly he was on the Canadian national mountain bike team it was a stud there so his aerobic engine is huge and he's one of the most unique athletes in the world because of all these different things that he's done the two of them Ryan and Lindsey they are I would describe him as relentless when it comes to the lifestyle they live we just get up go for a run go for a hike get on a bike ride the bike for a while do some rock climbing if it's winter maybe they're doing some Nordic skiing or some ice climbing they are constantly in that dough mode that training Logan and Ryan Atkins for a guy who's only about 5 foot 11 he's able to route ride mountain bikes that some of his friends had their six foot for as they enter the pipe layer which is again an obstacle it just takes a lot of mobility to take some out of you and who pops out Johnny Luna Lima ahead of Ryan Atkins so we have Johnny Luna Lima now sitting in first position Robert Killian in the chase group right now trying to hold on and as this is set happen Killian is a good descendant but he's about to find out what it means to go up against the best Center in the world as he now closes in on the PI player as well at the World Championships last year in Tahoe Robert Killian was in the lead until the very top of the last hill John Alvin Ryan Atkins caught him and blew past him to win the world championship so this is a spot again where Robert killing doesn't want to be in in third place on the Descent coming down the mountain our Biermann just popped out as well that was a surprising sight right there fear men trying to make his move into the top three right now and Tyler Biermann is shocking the world today but proving that what he did in the first half of the race of Big Bear was no fluke part of being in this series is the coveted top five we talked about the top 10 but it's also the top five is Johnny starting his descent look at the way that he just fearless sleek bombs down this mountain he's not even looking for his footing he just knows that his feet and his ankles can handle it it takes so much courage just to get back to Tyler oh fast he's in fourth place position right now if he finishes fourth and beats Kirk DeWitt at any place he automatically moves into fifth in the series and we had a moment to catch up with Tyler and how he's approaching this season this is my first legitimate season actually following the whole series so I didn't set too high of expectations for myself I mean something pretty achievable I kind of was shooting for a top 10 and so I kind of just went into it with with that mindset and you know after the first race kind of opened my eyes that showing what I'm actually capable of and from there I kind of set higher goals for myself and still fairly achievable but goals I know I have to work for and you know just I knew I can put in the right training to get to where I want to be and and achieve possibly that top-five finish you know I'm still I'm just ultimately my goal is just have fun with it and not get not get burnt out from any of it and so far I could say I've been I've been doing that I've been enjoying it well you know Tyler's a phenomenal athlete and a bright future ahead with only 26 years of age right now but each race he seems to be getting better and he's been consistently sitting in that 5 6 7 position in most of the races this year yes funny the rock Dwayne Johnson has a quote he talks about success isn't always about greatness it's about consistency consistent hardwork gain success and then the greatness will pump we're watching that greatness right now well tellers Mirman is a solid dissenter we saw that in Big Bear California he's rock solid on the flats as well we saw that in Jacksonville and Alabama and you know he was strong and in Seattle as well but this is the day that he has an opportunity to make himself into a star he could move into a top 3 finish in this race with this field with these stakes that's something else yeah he took the words right out of my mouth and there is Atkins again Johnny Liu Molina might be putting on incredible downhill performances but this man can still descent he runs with power he runs with courage and that is probably one of the most important things you need to do here is run with courage and have confidence in that agility this isn't insane downhill he's actually doing right now you may not realize how hard this is to go downhill this fast but your ankles are working hard your quads are working hard this terrain is dangerous it's easy to catch a toll to go flying especially the speeds that he is running at just for our rabbits right now to be even attempting to keep up with him is actually pretty insane so credit to them these runners that we have serving as our rabbits right now are actually some of the best trail runners of America this is switching back left and right with undulating sideways terrain this is so hard to run at any moment you could go out of control and wipeout and it looks like Nicole miracle is about to reach the peak of her switchback climb here and finally begin her journey down as well so she'll make that approach in the beater and all those opportunities can you talk about people who like a little bit of a flat chorus this is her real house right here yes she likes this there's gonna be a little bit of slight uphill the rest of the way but this is one of the fastest sections of the course because the hill is light enough then you can actually get out in the world with some pretty nice tempo and this is where race etiquette comes in very very important there's very thin single track there's a steep drop to your left and there's bushes to the right and if you saw that gentleman move right out of the way allowing the coal to get by that was perfect beautiful race etiquette now BJ Jones another powerful descent right here when he got to the top of this mountain he was not up there with the leaders although he had been fighting with him for a big chunk of the race now his opportunity to reel them all back in on the set he's gonna have to go a little bit risky and a little bit crazy on his descent as well and he's running under ski lifts there and if you're wondering what the gondol are taking people up for right now there's a beautiful wedding going on at the top of the mountain right now so not only do you get to get married they get to see you Spartan rates at the same time here in snow basin I need to see that sign of just passed that said mile six for the man we're looking at about eight and a half miles total distance on this course so six miles in they're still flying like this Congrats Brian Kempson right there Ryan Jepsen again running a little bit desperate because where is he gonna find the ability and the space to pull in Johnny believer we see what's going on we go that Johnny Luna Lima is in the lead right now Ryan Kempson does not know this so he has to hustle as fast as he can because he has no idea what's going on in front of him Ryan Kempson was also in about 13th place when he got to the top of the mountain so he has a tremendous amount of ghee of ground that he needs to pick up he's way back right now but charging hard well here's your woman's leader this is Lindsay Webster and as we look over to the men's race right here looks like Ian's hosting yeah the ends are stronger now that's a fine woods so we have a number of some of the best climbers and dissenters in the field working their way down what is really a sketchy ouchy ground terrain that we have right here these big rocks slippery to sex a lot of hidden rocks because of these needs that are growing up this is an easy place to fall on your face and it's talented and as that cameraman was he just could not keep up with that athlete who's doing a version of like an agility ladder going down that mountain while keeping his footing incredible incredible footwork we got a really cool Ridgeline to run along a lot of these amazing beautiful spots as Lindsay Webster is starting to open up and use this opportunity to recover as well so she's not just trying to put distance between herself and Revival's she's also trying to catch her breath because that was a very long time and whether or not you made it look easy it did take a toll and you can see how wide open the terrain is do so if you're a skier and if you're a snowboarder it's so big and massive when I came here right after the Olympics you felt like you're you're a mountain on this mountain all by yourself it's such a beautiful place to visit that's Tyler Biermann again trying to make up some ground trying to reel in Ryan Atkins Luna Lima I don't know if it's possible out kids I'm not even sure if it's possible given the strength of their dissent but Biermann is trying to establish himself right now and separate from Robert Killian for that third podium position he made a move right after that stairway to heaven and he's not giving it up and he's moving quick right now what's been amazing is to see this new young rising stars that we're seeing in the men's field every year we seem to add a couple new guys and this year Luna Lima and Biermann are emerging as two main contenders when it comes to World Championships for many years it was a lot of the same faces it was Kody mode he was Kobe call it was a hunter McIntyre and they recycled every year we'll always at the top of the game now we have like you said so many young faces like Tyler coming in and we even saw obviously Cody in the race we saw Hobie down in the venue area they were going up to each other in the vineyard before the race talking and strategizing and kind of trying to pick those guys brain so you see the younger guard talking to the old original gangsters now the sport now this was a nasty little start to the first descent that we have right here so Lindsey Webster's approaching beater at the bottom of this she's gonna hit beat her have a little kicker and then as the there's a one steep little hill and then she'll be at Mile 4 she'll be halfway into this race but she's through the tough half she's through the tough half and into the spot that she likes the most and that's the downhill and there's Tyler Biermann approaching the rope climb that is at obstacle 16 and this is right before that last real gnarly descent down the mountain that was quick work he made of that obstacle in and out Lindsey's approaching meter now some of these grip strength obstacles some of these hanging obstacles that they make some people a little bit nervous in the women's field a lot of this has to do with a little bit less reach shorter arms and smaller hands all of which could be factors that can you know throw a wrench in things a little bit something that's gonna make some exactly's a little bit nervous today is the multi rig it's facing downhill and as a very big drop when you get on this rate it will slingshot you down the hill so that could cause problems later it's gonna make them a little bit nervous and hopefully everybody makes it through safely that is he and hosting it is Ian ho SEK trying to make a move trying to stay in the thick of things now as he's rotating Lindsey's gonna use it to swing herself to the next bar baby that's Chaz Edmonds behind her by the way and if you'd notice she put both hands on that bar when you're whipping through who creates so much more centripetal force on a single hand that she wisely used both hands to kind of catapult yourself up to the next bar so this is that mile for steep incline I talked about very short just a little bit of something to SAP your strength and then she begins a very long series of down hills mostly downhill the rest of this entire race smartly taking water and I think she's gonna be very happy that this is not a false summit this is the actual summit of where we to be on the racecourse and that is a pretty significant gap that she put between herself and red couple who was just hitting that steep descent we mentioned before that's a good minute and a half right now and this is where Raya Coble is gonna have to start showing a little bit more courage she's been very very timid timid very conservative on these downhill quads it's big bear and she needs to put the gas down if she really wants to make some noise today well you can see Lindsay Webster beloved by the men she's passing right now as sure technique for eight-foot box is gonna be just getting her knees into the wall because you get as we mentioned it's slippery for the feet it's just it's a slick material not a lot of good friction on there but she got up and over pretty smoothly and there's not much left on this course that should give her truck she actually made it faster than Robert Killian she was able to get to that other bar with relative ease and got through there very quick that's Biermann again what they're approaching now are these tubes that doesn't seem like much but for at all athlete like Robert Kelley that's a compress and get down and crawl through there it's kind of like doing that for our water crawl so we saw Biermann go over that wall and now this is Killian hitting it maybe 20 seconds later so for them this is a really tight battle and Killians got a lot of pride on the line right now because he hasn't had his best year yet either and he's used to being on the podium for every single race he runs right now he's fighting just to maintain that third position and if you're Tyler here man to have a world championship breathing down your neck but having the guts to go out there take it to him shows a lot of maturity on his part is Nicole miracle is gonna make quick work out of this meter as she sling she yeah so that's the Comerica off and move it and she's got our work cut out for if she's gonna catch up with Lindsay who's here is starting to hit that dissenting defender and after this there's not a lot of real estate where the Cole's gonna be able to be quicker than Lindsey and being how good she has it descending we still have the spirit and with the lack of confidence I saw with her yesterday Lindsey has to make sure that she's putting together a solid downhill to give herself a gap as Ryan Kempson now is starting to gain ground he's hammering these down hills faster than I've seen him in many many races that he's run that was a very very quick move through that area Ian Howe six right on his heels are hosting loves the longer races loves the mountains and for him this is an ideal course he's already ahead of Vijay Jones right here Ian Howe cick just took the lead in the u.s. mountain series in Palmerton last weekend by winning there and that was a brutal course for him to recover and do as well as he's doing right now industries says something about his fitness any kind of athlete he is well Lindsey Webster is absolutely flying right now she is blowing by these people and you could see that there's quality etiquette from the athletes out there on the course that are letting her by that is how this works don't make her work too hard to get by you because she's out there trying to win a championship right now their metal is very important but there's a lot of money on the line here listen is how hard our rabbits are breathing try to keep up with these stellar athletes and Lindsey Webster right now is just putting on an absolute performance for the agency she's about to claim her fourth championship as long as she could run clean through the rest of this race fourth consecutive and when it comes to running clean it's all about the spirit oh that's the one obstacle that could get in her way it's done so in the past and she's told us all about it when you mrs. Speer throw it's devastating like you spend all race long eking out just any second that you can and you and then you mrs. fear and all of a sudden you have to do two minutes worth of burpees and it's sort of just like all that work that I did is down the hall and the sphere through is just sort of like comes down to luck whether or not you hit the target and I just think that it's really silly too that it can make or break our races at this point especially when it's so close to the finish line but I mean I have had it cost me races before so probably I'm just a little biased opinion well thrown a spear is definitely a skill and this court requires a lot of different skills so it's just one that you have to master if you want to be at the top of your game in this sport but I'll tell you what when she hit her first spear ever in Ashville in 2016 she was literally doing cartwheels down the course because she was so happy so wouldn't she make some she celebrates up as much as anybody else - as you see Johnny doing work out there - Johnny Luna Lima sometimes it looks like he's not even feeling well it doesn't look like he's running that strong and he just manages just keep cranking out that tempo it's just the style of running that he has and Ryan Atkins over here another athlete that really just makes it look easy but maybe a little too easy I would say like it's sometimes you can't even tell if Ryan's working or not he just is so smooth he's a strong powerful dude so moving out tired isn't the hardest thing in the world for him is now Johnny Luna Lima is on the Z wall and let's see if you can make quick work of this it is downhill and it's slanting to the side of which he's going into the Z wall is an obstacle that we saw a bunch of athletes in the lead fail in Seattle it makes guys nervous but Johnny's gonna make it through there looks like no problem at all to the Bell so safely off and now not a lot of failable stuff left for him but the spear Pro is still looming the spear throw is Luna looming but at the same time he has this downhill to make up some ground but Ryan Atkins is still chasing them so this is one of those opportunities for luna llena we have bucket carry right here he's gonna have to fight every bit he can't do the nail because AB kids is one of the best heavy carriers in the world you know what carrying heavy things is in Johnny's blood his father grew up in a town called San Miguel in the eastern part of southern Brazil he lived on a farm he grew up having to take a wheel barrel and carry food three miles to their pigs and to their cows every single day he had to carry water jugs for 15 meters just to go feed the horses his grandfather farmed in the mountains and would have to hoe and rake and make all his crops grow and he'd do this on little food and water all day his entire family was grown up grew up and raised in this fashion and johnny has been basically bread in the Spartan lifestyle by his grandfather by his father and now himself well Ryan Atkins made quick work out of that Z wall he's in and out and headed into the bucket carry himself and I would say probably about a sixty second gap between them right now so it is still pretty close yeah he's good Johnnie knows that he has to put work in on this bucket carry because Brian Atkins is obviously one of the best carries in the sport too but this is when he's gonna get a chance to actually see his lead on accent Atkins a second he gets to the top of that hill you'll be able to really judge how much of a lead he does have and you've got to wonder about Ryan Atkins right now what he is feeling trailing Johnny Luna Lima after putting in an effort like this for the second race in a row something about that after being so dominant as you saw them I each other up and down as they passed each other but something about being so dominant all year and then see somebody else come in and be more dominant than you were and this is two races in a row on courses that Ryan Atkins would normally dominate now we said it before Ryan Atkins would have to have a monumental meltdown to lose the series today well I certainly don't think that's gonna happen but Luna Lima is definitely making a statement everyone is certainly nervous about where he's gonna be at World Championships and Steve what do you got for us today he's been rocking on the sand by Carrie it's Robert Killian and Roy Kempson just behind me oh boy what a battle we have look at this top four right there well this is the battle that matters right now I know we have Luna Lima doing his Atlas carry five carry the stone five burpees carry it back that's why he's doing them but the real battle here is for the third position with Fierman Kempson and Killian all in a war on the bucket carry less than half a mile for the finish and Kempton had the second fastest ascent down the mountain right in between Johnny and Ryan Atkins flew down the mountain wow that's incredible and right now what you're seeing Johnny Liu Molina out in front Ryan Atkins sitting in position two as usual always right up there near the lead but a war for that third and final podium spot in the last National Series race of the year and Lindsay Webster out in front dominating her than usual and there was Johnny's dad cheering him on he stayed home from a Brazilian vacation just so he could come and cheer him on today and the cheer on his rivals as you saw he was cheering for Tyler Berman and a few others and that's part of his sport is there's a lot of camaraderie between the athletes a lot of them spend a bunch of time training together living together working together in order to make each other better Ryan Atkins puts down the Atlas stone has to perform five burpees here pick it up and then move on down the course now those aren't the fastest burpees but they are clean they are definitely full extension and now this is the moment of truth for Johnny because he has to hit this spirit if you could see there's an uphill spear throw which means your angles are a little bit off your power off the ground on the throws a little off everything about how you aim the height of that spear is gonna be a little bit off and the pressure on this obstacle is just not to win the race this is for second place in a series right now Ryan Kempson is in third or fourth place if he stays there does it pass Atkins Johnny could win second place in the US Nationals fears with this throw so he needs this throw and he need that Adkins to hit as well now a stick from Luna Lima now he needs a little bit of luck all the way to the finish line to take this win but Atkins also has to hit his spear if Luna Leamas can all take second place in this series he's been his rival all day now he's his best friend he needs that help from Atkins let's see if he could give it to him this kick home is pretty quick he's gonna have one sharp right turn and a frame cargo net and then he's into the finish line drying Atkins this is for your series title but also for Luna Lima second place and this is something that hasn't been the easiest for Atkins either and this is an obstacle this is probably the hardest sphere throw that we've seen in a Spartan race in two years you know that uphill very difficult he's taking his time you saw him straight in the tip of that spear Deadeye right through the center Ryan Atkins has just helped Johnny Luna Lima secure second place in the national series but he himself is about to take home another national series championship his first since 2016 Kyler Biermann pardon me Johnny Luna Lima came in to Jacksonville this year very much an unknown hit won a few races overseas as he's now bounding down the hill really putting it down to the finish beautiful square as you get south in an apron Park world-class descender and here's Tyler Verma and all Biermann has to do is hit this spear but he is not far ahead of Robert Killian Ryan Kempson you could see them coming in now so the pressure is on there's Killian here's Kempson Kempson opting for the spear closer and Heerlen throws nails e they have to risk it right now Tyler took him or a very little bit of time to through it if killing wants to catch him he has to risk it and go now Killians throw Oh No Killian is off to the side he had to risk it he had to do it fast because he what his fourth place for him he wanted that podium and he is gonna miss out on that podium today as Johnny Luna Lima moving into the final obstacle of his day the final big one of course the her quest yeah and you heard the absolute of displeasure coming out of Robert Killian right there but he did what any champion has to do take a risk and go for it yeah you know fourth place is probably the worst position in this sport and that's not something that he was looking for and he would rather risk showing up to take a fifth or sixth if it means he has a shot at reeling in Biermann and taking third and now that it's up to temp soon we did not see Kempson throw we have to just hope he hit it and we get a big finish in he's gonna have to catch Ryan Atkins if he did hit it we just saw some athlete go over the a-frame cargo net we don't know if that was Kemp's in Biermann or Atkins at this point and right now Johnny Luna Lima on the verge of winning his second race in a row as he goes into this dunk wall big leap under and out it's just one slip wall away from winning the second u.s. national series race of his career the second in a row the second in a mountain course and now you are looking at Johnny Luna Lima second place overall in the national series with this win taking home the title in Utah today and now you see a major threat to the podium at Lake Tahoe World Championships this man right here has put fear into every wound but man you are 2 years old took off naked and barefoot down a trail has just ran shirtless across the finish line to second in a US national series and that's Ryan Atkins making his rapid approach as well into the finish line not even far behind up the slip wall this is really the man of the hour because this is your two-time National Series champion Ryan Atkins has done it again second place today but first on the year mr. consistent Ryan Atkins takes home another national Series title and that was a performance where he could have just kind of laid back and not done a ton of work as lying tension right now is running into that her boys but because Ryan Atkins came in second Johnny Luna Lima has taken second and here's Tyler Furman this will be his first podium finish that he has had in a national series event we've seen him in fifth we seen him at six we've seen him flirt with that podium finished for the brightest he comes over this wall this is something he's been working towards for the entire last year and Tyler Fierman has clinched third place today in Utah in the Spartan US national series race number five and he is ecstatic claim that Tyler because with that third-place finish you have just moved into prestigious place a fifth plate the new US national series yeah you know he's thrilled his goal for the year was top ten and he's made it in the top five very emotional right now it's crying that just shows how much this means these athletes it was Johnny Luna Lima it Mayfair crying and today it's Tyler Biermann and Ryan Kemp said coming across the line in fourth he finished fourth in each of the last two races and unfortunately for him just not quite enough Luna Lima came on strong at the end of the year Kempson will have to settle for third in the series this year but what we have is a changing of the guard at the top of the entire men's series in the entire men's field Ryan Adkins holding strong in there but Luna Lima Kempson and Tyler Viren these are the new faces of the men's fields if we were told Ryan Kempson at the beginning of the year that he would have finished top three in the US national series he would have been a static and it just shows you how well he did he'll actually lose second place in the very last day now Robert Killian very disappointed for himself death to settle for fifth place today but he took a risk and that's what champions do he took the shot on that spear he didn't really bother to set himself for it but he had to do it you didn't have a choice he's a champion as another champion Cody Motors coming in right behind him now it's a close finish with Cody and I gotta say a heck of a performance for him all things considered sixth place really strong race for him and Robert Killian had nothing to gain at this race as far as a series he had missed a race he had no chance to even place anywhere near the top 10 but he's just a champion he's a competitor and this is what he does and he gave it his very best today and I give him major major respectful well Robert Killian all he has to do is go up this slip wall and his season in the national series will be done and you know we've got to see where the points shake out for him but certainly not the year he wanted to have but his best race still to come his two favorite courses I believe West Virginia where he's won twice at the North American Championship and Lake Tahoe where he has been on the podium each of the last four years so a bright rest of the year to come - Robert Killian absolutely I think his best races ahead of them and Cody mote who has had some of the most epic finishes in the history of Spartan Race comes across to the respect of Ryan Kempson and Robert Killian and you know what blood sweat respect the first two you give the last one you got to earn and he just did it there let's take a look at the men's leaderboard you have Johnny Luna Lima in first Atkinson second Tyler Berman in third captain and Killian rounding out the top five the story of the day has to be Johnny Luna Lima who managed to dominate yet again and we have him with Steve Hammond I'm here with today's winner and second overall in the US national series absolutely phenomenal you had your dad watching you as well win the race oh my goodness how does that make you feel yeah these I mean it's super special when you have family here to watch you win a race like in Big Bear I actually had my whole family there so it's just these two races I've been like super just have been really special to me you know it's like I've been working real hard since I don't know since like eight years old to be a professional athlete so when you see it come together it's just it's just beautiful and I'm just super grateful like right before the race I actually talked to my grandma and then she she had some little words of wisdom you know in her own way and it was just a special day overall it's like I kept my family close to me throughout the whole race and use them to fuel this this effort and super grateful to be here well that's awesome Johnny Luna Lima your men's champion here today oh boy watch out and tell her he's gonna be a factor back to you guys thanks Steve and congratulations whoo were very emotional John we saw a lot of emotion at a Tyler Fierman as well you could see how much heart and soul goes into each of these races Lindsey Webster putting hers on the line right now yeah she just got to obstacle 16 so she's down that first major climb and now she's running down towards an obstacle gauntlet towards the end well Lindsey Webster just like her husband on the verge of claiming yet another u.s. national series championship and all she's got to do is finish this course clean we don't know quite how far back the coal miracle is right now but a set of burpees might bring it real close that's what's got to be in her head now as she continues to put the feet down pedal to the metal and gain as much ground as you can and it's hard looking at these weeds and these flowers in this terrain that you're just ripping up through you can't even really see in front of you as if we could barely see the athletes themselves so they're gonna take a sharp left here coming off the top of this steep uphill and then they're gonna bomb a little bit down again it's it gets intense here the quads are taking an absolute beating on this section of the race and here's that multi read that we talked about earlier it's downhill and these are gonna slingshot you down the hill so it's gonna be very important that she controls yourself as she takes off this first hand grip yeah and again you know we're talking about grip obstacles these are the ones that make you a little bit nervous and it's interesting she was able to bypass that pole entirely and thank goodness she had the grip strength because if you notice she just started to get slingshotted down the hill it was able to hold it and come back and land with a certain amount of control very athletic move right there and showed her grip it was very well done to skip the pipe too because the transition onto and off of the pipe is what trips up a lot of people as well so the state just on the Rings was a very savvy move by a very by a champion many times over let's put it that way and all the years have been around the sport is the first time I've ever seen someone bypass a pipe yeah I can't say that I've seen it all either Lindsey is just off and moving and taking no risks on this descent I think by this point in the race your quads are on fire they're hurting a little bit your ankles are a little bit sore and you see this little tunnel here I think the hardest thing about this is not the compression it's just banging your knees on that hard ground yeah that it's a it's basically a plastic baggy and there's nothing separating the rocks underneath that well she looks pretty happy and she looks pretty comfortable as she moves in towards that finish line and it's a few walls and a few basic obstacles and of course that bucket carry could good you know I'll put a little wrinkle in things but it's no one to be very conversational on the course what do you have that kind of a lead you can afford to do so yeah the other part this too is her experience she knows to strengthen weaknesses of the other athletes around her she's able to kind of read how she feels gingka project back to previous experiences where athletes have been around her and I could tell you whether you need to really speed up whether you need to slow down even if you can't see the other athletes in your frame well right now Lindsey Webster is on the verge of reaching the bottom of the last big descent and then things are gonna get aligned to show line through a couple switchbacks as you can see that's Leanne wasted any we haven't seen her in a little while but she's starting to reach the end of the big descent as well and that is Raya Coble that she's catching up to right there so we've got a kind of a little bitty battle going on right here Raya Coble is third in the national series and Leanne I believe is somewhere in sixth this is an interesting battle because this is actually for third position overall today right now this is quite a war so you basically have your two front runners in Lindsay Webster and Nicole miracle and then right now a little war between red kopelyan ways to knee and face setting is there lurking somewhere as well she's floating around someplace pretty close there were right now wasted he she's just been a model of consistency this year and each year you see her inching closer and closer to that upper echelon in the sport the last few races she's really been right there we're starting to see her turn a corner with her career yeah we saw breakout for her in West Virginia at the new North American Regional Championships where she took third and she's been very consistent since then and you can see right here it's an opportunity for her to gain some ground just any of these obstacles where you can take a few seconds from Raya here or there Raya tends to be a little more cautious just a little bit more deliberate than a lot of the athletes there's face standing just like we talked about so we have a three-way battle for third place this is really the race within the race that we were hoping to see and another race within the race is for that series points because face standing if she is to come in third place today and Rose Wetzel finishes fifth or worse they would take over fifth place in the national series and bump rose out of that goal position she's had for the entire year from being in the top five and you know Rose Wetzel has been been consistently stronger than she'd been in the previous couple years this year and we're starting to see her reach her peak form although we haven't seen much of her today as Lindsay Webster takes that hard banked corner and makes her approach into the final couple obstacles of the day that looked like Daytona right there the way she just banked up on the side right there like a race car flying around a course at 180 miles an hour never raced on a banked indoor track I have not but you almost get horizontal what will it do the thing about these Bank Trax's you run up coming into the turn and down hill out of the turn and you accelerate out of the turn and that's what she did right there was almost like she's done that before now we have the whole miracle accelerating down that same area we saw Lindsay and this gives us an idea of how much time Lindsay put on her because she's just getting to those tubes and the seven foot wall we were talking about earlier and again you could see like how tentative they are compared to where these descents began this is because your quads are just totally blown at this point in terms of descending speed and then the other thing is you know when you fatigue a little bit you're a little worried you might not get your feet up or you might misstep and you take a little digger and you just go flying face-first this is not a good place to be at these kind of speeds the longer this race goes on the more fatigue he's at these get the more chance they have to have a slip and fall yeah that's just not what you need right now we talked about how all that Brian Atkins needed to do for example was finished today basically in order to lock up his championship from Lindsay at this point all she has to do is not make a major mistake and not get hurt yeah our supporting kind of if you want to call it triple crown is the u.s. national series the North American regional championship and then Tahoe so after this is over they still have two more segments of their season and they certainly don't want to get hurt now with the stakes the way they were with the points the way they were today this was essentially a championship race this is your season championship race for the national series because this is where we determine where things actually shake ballot then you have a North American Championship as mentioned before and then you have a world championship and then for those brave enough we have two other Championships to go to Sparta trifecta World Championships in Greece and a week later the ultra world championships in Sweden so explain the one in Greece it's a trifecta weekend which means they do all three distances of Spartan a beast a super and a sprint in a scene two-day weekend the combined times of all those designate your time and where you place such a Trudel such a cool format good luck beating Jonathan all been there but hey you know give it your best and Jonathan Alvin if you don't know it is there one of our two-time defending world champions as well on the men's side now he's the current world champion he was second place the year before to Cody mote he won in 2014 and Killington so he's won on both courses for the championship courses and he seems to be winning pretty much everything he puts his name his hat into the ring for he's the sky racing-inspired ace extreme champion for the last two years and to those times he took the world champion chip Brian Atkins was second yes it's uh a sore subject but right now the story is not Ryan attitudes the story is Lindsey Webster and Nicole miracle going 1-2 again as expected but that battle for third is Lumi I'm so excited to see where they pop out of it in what position they're at yeah this is gonna be quite the little head to head to head for the final position here you know there's three athletes and only one can take it so - we're gonna leave disappointed you know we always talk about how fourth is the worst place in sports it only is until fifth is on the line - exactly then it becomes six and right now Rose Wetzel where in case she because face setting is about to steal fifth place myrrh if she could take that third place position yeah I mean it's just too close for comfort for all of them and we talked about this for years about how in these series in these points series every place counts it's for pride every place counts in terms of position at the end of the year and you can't take a single moment of any of these races off because if you slip up just a little bit somebody can steal a few points from you and snag your podium position and every place is decided by possibly one missed obstacle so one miss obstacle that you had back in like Alabama early in the year could cost you thousands of dollars in points just in the entire series for one missed obstacle so what Lindsey Webster's about to approach right now is sea wall she's got to navigate very carefully we saw people slip up with that in Seattle then she has a tire flip and then it's on to the bucket and then of course you know what's looming after if she was also very smart though she picked the side of the Z wall that is in the Sun it doesn't look very bright but the other side of that is is it is in the shade and when it's shady more Dew and moisture could stay on it from the morning Sochi picked what is certainly the more dry side most you made quick work of that one in and out and Lindsay Webster now making her way towards the bucket Kerry now bucket Kerry from here it's bucket its spear throw so this is what we've been kind of worried about she's been worried about it and this is a tough spear throat the the time back to the coals the big thing if the pole Nicole could push herself and if Lindsey makes a mistake and we got ourselves race again exactly so it's imperative that Nicole right now tries to close that yeah because if for example if Lindsay was to miss this spear you want to be able to get that spear while that person is still doing burpees so at least you know how much time you had to get that throw off and make a move if possible I mean the other thing is of course if we know the impact that those burpees have it's if it becomes a footrace in the final half-mile this race and you've just done 30 burpees and there's still tough spot it's not a place you want to be and there's still another small climb in descent after that before you get down to that Hercules way so the last thing you definitely want those 30 burpees well Lindsey webs are making quick work out of this bucket Carrie this is a 55 pound bucket for the women the men's bucket is about 80 pounds and regardless of which one you're carrying putting a lot of pressure on your lower back here which is taking a beating up these climbs already a lot of pressure on your grip strength and in general getting that heart rate way way up where they'll also do is tax those calf muscles that have already been burnt down from climbing and descending so far in the hill as we see the top three that are fighting for that third position from a base standing has moved into that third place position Lian Wasson e poi su Li and wastin E and red Coble just a hair behind her and now the chase is on because only one of them is gonna get to claim that podium spot there's a lot of money on the line not just for this race but for the series right now and it's gonna come down to when they get to that sphere who could get the draw fast and who could get it off accurate and this is that face setting that we have been missing all year long the ferocious attacking faced inning that we used to see all the time the run the one that runs with aggression you know what sometimes it's not how you start this season is how you finish and right now she's finishing with our strongest performance in US national series well right now this is the Col just making the Yokohama tire flip look like piece of cake in and out and what you heard right there was face standing breathing it's very distinct she could run and redline with as much of a heart rate like when she breathes it sounds like she's about to blow up she could keep it up higher than anybody else in the sport it's very distinct meanwhile Lindsay Webster is as stoic as could be but there's that breathing we talked about face Denning gonna push her body to the verge of collapse we've seen it before and here she is coming into her last few obstacles as well and that gap is spreading significantly she hammered that down she put at least three to four seconds on there and that is so huge when you're going into the spear as much time as you could have the better well there's one clip she knows this is her moment to also catch her breath just slightly but she just lost a few seconds as well on those flips she did LeAnn got in there very fast as well as ran now it's off to the Atlas Carrie where they have to do five burpees after picking that up so it doesn't seem like much but five burpees could really get you and whoever could do that more efficiently and quicker is gonna get to the spear first I mean it's gonna it's gonna be a pacing thing at this point you know it's not just the run but five burpees one person could do it five seconds faster than somebody else and again that lead evaporates phase only running with about an eight nine second gap on them right now but we've talked about the laws of you know diminishing returns right now she's blowing up and she putting too much into this part of the course whereas at the spiro right after that is she gonna have enough in the tank to hold off the other lady I think we're looking at the same situation we saw with the kilian situation which is you just don't have a choice if you're gonna win you gotta take a risk you know and right now third place would be winning for her third place is just worth everything it's monumental it really is and there's wood you rat hole miracle making quick work at the Z wall would you rather go down fight you know would you rather go down you know just aimlessly I think there's no question here the time to move is now in waste this looks like she may be just running gasps and Ray had just made that move that you're talking about but the N is tough and maybe LeAnn's is holding back just a little bit knowing that this is gonna come down to the spear maybe she's trying to make sure that she has enough in the tank and that she's able to get her breathing better so she can have a more successful spear throw now this is Lindsey Webster your leader in the series your leader in the race and this is the spear throw we know she fears so much she's been dreading it all day and it comes down to this moment and Lindsay has delivered another miss another miss of the spirit row this is critical and whoa I don't know what she just tripped on I'm not quite sure she tripped over the rope with a competitor right at the end and went down right on her face as far as I've seen everybody all season and you have to hope that she's okay right now because the last thing you want to do after falling right on your ribs is drop right into burpees right now and she has to pull herself together and she has to crank because it's not just this race on the line right now it's also this entire series Nicole miracle could totally reel her in right now and she has to prepare herself inside out if she's going to stand a chance of maintaining this championship she talked earlier about all the seconds that you gained in a race and that you could lose at the sphere throw with a Miss so all the fast running that she did on this course and the work that she put in has to pay off now for her and she's putting in a great rhythm right now and we have yet to see Nicole miracles show her face over by the spear throw but her husband Ryan Atkins the men's champion is cheering her on right now and he has given her any sort of clue about where the other women are that is Ryan Atkins in the white hat and Ryan would just came in to cheer on as well so much on the line here at this moment and with Lindsay Webster crank it through these burpees right now the question is where is the cold miracle and is she about to hit her spear that's face setting right now sitting in third position on the bucket carry in an absolute war with Raya Coble and LeAnn wastes if you want to talk about gutting it out here's for third place with three women with so much on the line right here and a basically comes down to who wants it more well there's the question about where is Nicole miracle but how much further is it to that spear throw and how many burpees does Lindsey Webster have left you know she's been doing them in an absolute panic right now flustered and rushing to get through those 30 and 30s a lot but it looks like she is back up and running and she has not been caught then your gap that she put on Nicole miracle all the work that she didn't just paid off there because now she's able to run to the finish get through the hurt points and those other obstacles and she will be your champion so all she has to do is make it through a her choice and it's pretty much wrapped up Lyndsey Webster absolutely incredible multiple world championships about to finish up her fourth national series championship absolutely great fourth consecutive every year that we've had a US national series championship she has won it nobody else has held that title she is without question the greatest obstacle racer of all time male or female there's nobody more successful just consistently dominated in the end wasted he is now put down the bucket and is in third place going into the Spears so she has the lead going into that important opps so he talks about Fay redlining herself a little bit I'm not sure whether she did or she didn't or if LeAnn somehow just pulled herself together and just dropped the most massive bucket carry we could have ever imagined but now Leon wasting he is making her move into the spear throw and trying to clinch her first podium finish of this national series for 2019 such a back and forth is Lindsay Webster now going into the a-frame cargo net maybe face standing held back just a little bit just to get a little bit more wind so that when she goes in to spear she's feeling a little bit better there's so much playing going back and forth so many mental games in so much strategy now this is a very tight and stiff cargo net today so it's very easy to climb it makes easy work it's not it's very energy efficient so that will give her no problems no risks she's not even gonna take any she's gonna itsy bitsy spider her way down this thing rather than do any roles and even with a little foot snag there Lindsey Webster is now just one available obstacle from the finish and it's off there in the distance it's the her quest yeah that apron cargo net was just a really great way to look at Snowbasin right it really wise and right here this is your race for second place the Comerica trying to hold off the other three just needs to hit this spear she's making sure she's straightened up a little bit but this is way more precarious than Lindsey Webster because she has more heat coming in behind her with that pack of third-placed girls running it yeah I mean I think there was a lot of pressure on Lindsey as well but right here a few practice shots not messing around no risks here that was a true throw from the Comerica it looks like she has just locked up that second place finish in the day and that second place in the u.s. national series but this is the story of the day Lindsey Webster jumping and diving under that dunk wall it's going to come out and up that slip wall and claim her fourth consecutive u.s. national series title she had her back up against the wall early in this series as Leah and lay City throws that's it in and out are they calling it good or no that is no good if went in and fell out too quickly she would have had to get past that black flag in the end for heard that spear-throwing account it didn't stay in long enough with Lindsey crosses but now phase at that spear and she has a shot at third place so Leah and listen e is to in burpees right now and we'll get back to Lindsey Webster but for Fay this is her chance to steal this podium finish she had just gotten dropped and she sticks it just barely phases out this rheya have a shot to get her rays out as well so Raya is doing burpees and face Denny is about to steal this one how brutal for both Raya and Leah who both had pulled away from Fay briefly only to lose it again and now fake it steal fifth place from Rose Wetzel we don't know where she's at if she finishes a third and and Rose finishes behind any two of these women then Rose moves up into that top five position it's possible right now we have a burpee off for fourth place we have podium positions for the national series on the line and right now it's about who wants it more and we have no idea where she is we don't know where roses but right now all we can do is wonder what's gonna happen next is that Rose coming in right now for the throw we have not seen her all racing this could be her oh it is Rose Wetzel Rose Wetzel somehow hiding all the way back at the first spear with her shot to just sneak in by and steal the fourth position Rose always takes a very long time when she throws she always milks it she's very cautious she stuck it Rose what sells out and Rose Wetzel has a kick so watch out because if these two hop up this is about to be a war now VA wasted he is out of the Burpee penser she has to run down Lee Anne to be able to come in fifth so all of this now for Rose Wetzel to be able to close on the day in the fourth position to catch Lee in and also to move herself up into that podium position top five in the US national series comes down to her closing kick as this is Nicole miracle second place coming out of the dunk wall and over the slip wall she won the first two races of the series this year she put Lindsay Webster under duress for the entire season she made it exciting for all of us and she's going to take second in the national series as faced inning now battling up the climb for third position herself today Rose Wetzel's goal from the very beginning after coming back from basically a year off from pregnancy was to take fifth place overall in this series and now she has it in your sight but she has to run down the end who is now surging up the cargo net herself well we have quite the battle now we're looking at face standing jumping off getting ready to kick it in and right behind her Leah and wasted e and of course Rose Wetzel just trying to steal that last podium position as well a war to the finish Rose Wetzel is an Olympic caliber 800-meter runner so if anybody could sprint out somebody to the finish it's her but she's gonna have to put in work and get through boys faster as well so right now you're looking at a potential pass right here leann way sitting on the a-frame cargo net and Rose Wetzel just gained on her up that climb as face Denning is just a couple pulls away from clinching third place today in Utah race five of the Spartan US national series she's made it up she must lower under control and now her kick on home one of the hardest things to do is actually show your poise and low that lower than her core is rich control when you want to run away so fast so right here this is the battle that we have for fourth place today and for potentially the last spot on the top five podium positions for the national series who wants it more this is the question Rose Wetzel Leanne Way city who's going to get that thing up and down the quickest and who's got some savvy and roses away wasted he's still lowering she's got her work cut out for Rose took it on the hand she let that rope slide through she's gonna have blisters later but she took that risk that Killian took it it paid off it's that savvy Phet move we keep seeing it out of the old pros and here's an opportunity Rose Wetzel just stole that race from Leanne wasted he she just has to get over this slip wall wasted he desperately trying to make a move to catch her but it's good Rose Wetzel clinching fourth position and fifth place overall in the US national series it depending where Alyssa Hawley is today she can actually move up into fourth with the points that she just got by hitting fourth Wow and a devastating one for Leon waisted he who ran a third place race but has to settle for fifth look at that face it says everything she's such a competitor she put her heart and soul everything and she's very disappointed with that result you're looking at some absolutely incredible athletes is Raya Kobo coming in in sixth position she had a shot at third as well so we had quite the battle going on in that final third podium position spot and now the top five finishers for the day Lindsay Webster winning once again three races in a row to steal the title from the coal miracle who has to settle for second on the series and the day face denning Rose Wetzel and Leanne wasted he rounded out the top five and we've got Steve Hammond over with Lindsay Webster today's winner and overall Series champion this is your fourth series overall Lindsay what is the keys to success you're the world champion you're the US national series champion this is incredible what is your key thank you um I think it just it's a really long season so every year I kind of ramp it up as the season progresses so I started a little bit slow and then progressed but this year obviously it was tighter than ever so might have to change that strategy for next year if the women's field keeps getting stronger like it is well I wouldn't change anything Lindsay website you're a force in the ocl world congratulations back to you guys well thanks a lot Stephen if you look up at this leaderboard you could see that face tanning has moved into the top five in the US national series Rose Wetzel with her finish today taking fourth fall red Covell in third Nicole merkel clinched in second but for the fourth consecutive year Lindsay Webster wins the US national series she is four for four and she had to work for it this year Nicole miracle made sure of that and on your men's series tyler Fierman taken in fifth with that finish today Ryan Kent holding on to fourth Luna Lima Leapfrog and Ryan Kempson taking second and your winner again Ryan Atkins the Atkins family taken first place both of them and this was quite a year for Kevin Donahue for Steve Hammond and the rest of our production team I'm David Makita we will see you at the North American Championships you

Channel: Spartan Race

Views: 130,346

Rating: 4.8484502 out of 5

Keywords: Spartan Race, Spartan, OCR, Obstacle Course Racing, Full Spartan Race, Spartan Athlete, Training, Race, Utah Super, Utah Spartan

Id: B2XlCmqrric

Length: 113min 11sec (6791 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 21 2019