Spartan athletes flocked to Killington the past weekend, Sept. 14-15, to participate in a the obstacles course race that was born in these mountains. “Joe’s Backyard” refers to the founder of Spartan, Joe DeSena, who hailed from Pittsfield at the time.
There were a number of different challenges participants could choose from, with varied lengths and number of obstacles. The most challenging was the Ultra which boasted 60 obstacle over 50 Killometers (times ranged from 8 hours, 48 minutes to 14 hours 30 minutes for the 73 participants that completed the course).
The races namesake, the Beast, was half that (one lap instead of two) with 30 obstacles over 21 Killometers. The Sprint featured 20 obstacles over 5 Killometers and the kids races were 1-3 Killometers plus obstacles, too.
Photos By Paul Holmes/Top left by Lindsey Rogers
