Spartan Ultra World Championships | Trans World Sport

we're in a place called Orion Sweden it's really cold here even early in the season there's lots of snow it's a particularly special place there are mountains beautiful village lots of atmosphere and culture it's a great place for the Spartan Ultra World Championship the Spartan World Championship is an obstacle course race often referred to as one of the toughest endurance events in the world this is testing the athlete that was to come out for 24 hours see how many miles they can do the ultimate goal being to break 100 miles and every lap being 5 miles with 25 obstacles on each Lattin Robert Killian leads the Spartan ultra leaderboard coming into the race and is the most likely contender to take home the grand prize of 1 million US dollars I'm Robert Killian we're currently in Oriya Sweden for the Spartan Race Ultra World Championships it's a 24 hour endurance race and essentially the winner is the person who can complete the most laps in 24 hours and as you can see there's some ice and snow and you know I guess some terrain that's going to be very challenging a former Green Beret Kilian is accustomed to the mental and physical endurance necessary to thrive in such harsh conditions I think my military background definitely helps me in this environment it's you know something that we do as a green beret as a ranger in the Special Operations community are obstacles in austere environments we're out there contain training in the worst conditions you know in the toughest environments so that we are able to then go to combat and not you know necessarily stress out and a you know panic in eight and a certain environments or a certain situation so I think that mental toughness and that experience definitely is what got me into ops so of course racing I think at what it's what kind of helps differentiate me a little bit between myself and the other athletes one of those other athletes is Canadian Ryan Adkins I won the ultra World Championships last year in Iceland and so yeah I think I stand a pretty good chance of doing well here and but I'm just here to compete do my best and I just want to finish the race having kind of given everything that I can give and feel completely spent at that finish line Atkins will be Killians main competition in Sweden aiming to repeat last year's success and retain his title as the best obstacle course racer in the world [Music] I think defending my title would mean a lot to me pretty cool to be the best with the world at something and they pretty cool to do that multiple years in a row so ultimately I just want to have the best race that I can have that means first place or if that means 20th place if I can cross that finish line just completely shattered I'll be happy [Music] thanks for showing me around I only need a couple things but okay cool Oh elevator yeah there it's not run more miles than half - right and you can choose any race you want it means I cannot be awesome so he's gonna help me Pitt tomorrow dude named Logan so see how good with a start fast approaching but to take time to prepare their meals for the day ahead so yeah tonight I'm gonna make a little bit of spaghetti for Killian this is also a chance to reflect on the opportunity that lies ahead this is the last race in my season like I am done after this so no matter what like honestly I'm just so excited for that and to be able to go home and spend some time with my kids because it was a very tough tough time this time you know like I've been leaving him a lot all year for races and this was the longest stretch I've been gone for a week and a half now and for one of the first times my son Linc just started bawling out crying and he's like I don't want you to leave I want to be with you and I was just like that like hit me like really hard like it was so hard to come and I just want to get back and hang out with him but I I would probably regret if I didn't try to take this opportunity because it could be life-changing for them to win this amount of money so it's kind of like a double-edged sword I could sacrifice a little bit now and maybe not have to work for the next five years and spend a lot of time with him versus if I didn't you know come here and I was home with them I I'd be watching it on TV like man why didn't I go it is a very large amount of money it would you know give me an opportunity to spend more time with my kids the main it's kind of ironic the main reason I'm away from my kids is to provide for them but you want to spend that time with them so I think this would be an awesome opportunity because I could forego you know the next five or six years of having to work and and you know save the amount of money that I could potentially win in one day and and spend a lot of that time with them race day and as the start time approaches the elite athletes prepare themselves for the challenge ahead [Music] we welcome you to the 2014 [Music] [Music] the race begins at midday making athletes through the village of hora fear a host of challenging obstacles [Music] [Music] Ryan and I have battled like back and forth in so many races and unfortunately in 24-hour events I've never beaten them I beat them at three World Championship events out of five but um so we're about 50/50 maybe over all but uh yeah like I think we go back and forth and we have you know a little bit of personality differences but we try to you know get past those and just you know be as respectful towards one another as we can I guess I'll just leave it at that as the race progresses Atkins heads the pack tackling the mountainous claims with Robert Killian only a few minutes behind [Music] I was aware of where Rob was but I could only really control what I was doing in my race and I just wanted to throw down consistent but maintainable kind of laps for a while I think I did a bunch of laps around an hour and 19 minutes which was about 10 or 12 minutes faster than he was doing so that really built a big lead pretty quickly lap after lap [Music] [Music] as night falls athletes continue into the darkness trails becoming perilous obstacle slippery and injury inevitable I fell on a bucket like and it hit me right the top of my patella and I think that impacts when I slipped in ice I think that just kind of bruised it and then as I continued to run on it it just got worse come on how much [Music] after 55 miles they sat down eat some food and that's when my adrenaline kind of like started to subside and I really felt like how much it hurts to like bend it the conditions are getting worse it's really windy it's cold to start there's a lot of ice on the course and I was just seeing people falling like all over the place and I just I don't know is this is literally the first race where I've ever listened to my body and actually stopped and I was gonna stop after 30 and I still like convinced myself because I'm so stubborn and go to 55 miles so I did five laps more when I told myself I actually should quit I just didn't you know I didn't feel like going on anymore my knee was hurting I was getting passed and I just wasn't enjoying myself and I think once you get to that point I just felt like if I had a bad experience and kept pushing myself it might take away from like future events and I don't want to lose that like you know enjoyment that I have from Apso of horse racing [Music] with Robert Kelly and no longer in the race dawn brought with it the opportunity for Ryan Atkins to close in on his second Spartan ultra World Championship title [Music] just in the morning when the Sun came up and we could get rid of our headlamps no longer need them that's such a nice feeling and being on the race with you no natural light for a while it's like so great while Adkins had not run enough miles to claim Spartans $1,000,000 prize victory ensured he retained his title as the best obstacle course racer in the world [Music] Vardhan is a really good gritty gnarly raw race that really lends itself well to putting up against those physical limits and when I'm in that situation and kind of going after the maximum of what I'm able to do that's when I'm kind of the most alive in total Adkins ran 80 miles in 23 hours 22 minutes and 5 seconds finishing the race almost an entire day after it began [Music] coming into the finish line that all the village is kind of waking up and people are coming out and starting to tear and the whole whole lot was just a bit of a celebration to me [Music] it's really special to Mack it and be able to defend my title something I wanna do all season long this race it was kind of a big focus for me so you know to show up and perform on the day of this [Music] you [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Trans World Sport

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Rating: 4.9452057 out of 5

Keywords: Trans World Sport, highlights, player profiles, exclusives, IMG, WME, Spartan Ultra World Championships, Spartan Ultra, hardest races in the world, Robert Killian, Ryan Atkins

Id: v76BbFreVW8

Length: 13min 43sec (823 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 11 2019