Spartan Death Race Day 3 – Part 1: Mental Tests and Trench Foot

After a grueling night involving memory tests and long treks across the mountains, racers were brought into a bar and told to stand at attention while blindfolded. They then listened to a 45-minute lecture on the Hero’s Journey by Joseph Campbell.

During the lecture, staffers held food under racers’ noses, knocked over tables, and drank coffee next to them. Here, Race Director Jason Barnes held a Pringle in front of a participant. 

After the lecture, racers entered the sensory deprivation part of the challenge. Racers, blindfolded and wearing noise-cancelling headphones while on their second day without sleep, had to decide when an hour passed. There would be penalties for any racer who raised their hand too early or late. 

No one correctly timed an hour, so racers were forced to crawl up and down a hill on their stomach.

Each racer had to give up a shoe as punishment for a piece of litter being found on the farm. They were then instructed to do pushups.

A new race director joined the challenge and made sure each racer was in a proper plank position before running to fetch a stick.

Racers, over 48 hours in, were then told to drag themselves through the mud on the farm.

Cleanliness may be next to godliness, but none of that matters in the Death Race. Still, the racers were hosed down and more mud was created to crawl through. 

Neil Murphy (#25) and Tory Gisleson (#110) finally located the racers’ lost shoes, which had been tied together and thrown up a tree. 

Thursday morning in Pittsfield was a cloudy affair, but just as the racers began their next task—dubbed Lawn Care—the skies opened up.

Racers had to plant seeds in a straight row using toothpicks to dig the hole and chopsticks to place the seeds in the ground. They had to plant every seed in the bag this way.

Unhappy with the racers’ progress, the staff stripped everyone of their bibs before the next challenge was issued. This meant technically every racer was disqualified, and no one was eligible to win one of the coveted winner skulls. Each racer would have to earn their bib back over the remaining 24 hours.

The highest point in North America is Denali, located in Alaska. Taking inspiration from that, the next challenge forced those left to race up and down Joe’s Mountain 11 times, the equivalent of Denali. The remaining racers began their task in teams of three. 

Eric Hutterer, a Death Race finisher and last year’s barbed wire record setter, was disqualified from the race after the Land Navigation challenge. Spartan Race CEO Joe De Sena gave him an opportunity to rejoin the race by completing 14 trips up and down Joe’s Mountain while barefooted. Hutterer took this opportunity to help other teams, cheering them on and carrying packs as he went up and down.

The view from the top of Joe’s Mountain.

Once at the top of Joe’s Mountain, racers paused and refueled. The Denali challenge started at 3 p.m. Thursday and had a time cut-off of 8 a.m. Friday. This mean that teams had to do 11 round trips in that time with new surprises like carrying a 100-lb. pipe for a lap at each checkpoint. 

“Trench foot” became a real problem after running through so much mud. A racer examines their feet at the top of Joe’s Mountain.