Finding his way forward

In the mountains of Bozeman, Montana, where the elevation sits around 7,000 feet and the air gets thin fast, David Lovly of Goodridge put himself to the test. On June 21st, he completed the Spartan Ultra 50K, an endurance race that included just over 28 miles of rugged trail and 63 obstacles, all spread across a grueling loop done twice.

Lovly didn’t just finish, he placed sixth in his age group and 18th overall in the Ultra division, a field that included both men and women of all ages.

His reason for signing up was personal. A few years ago, Lovly found himself in a low spot. Once physically active, he said he let his health slide during a stretch of mental and emotional difficulty. The turning point came around the birth of his daughter, Letty. “I wanted to do something different for myself,” he said. “I didn’t want to be the guy who went out every Friday and Saturday night. That was my routine for a while. But things changed.”

Last summer, some friends invited him to take part in a Tough Mudder, a nine-mile race filled with obstacles. Lovly said it was fun and doable. That’s when he started looking into Spartan races. The Ultra 50K in Montana caught his eye. It was the closest of its kind, and he decided to go for it. “I told my wife I wanted to do it,” he said. “She told me I was crazy. And I said, probably. But I signed up for it in January, and that was it.”

He began training months in advance. Most mornings, he was up by 4:45 a.m., getting in an hour of running, push-ups and interval-style workouts before Letty woke up. Some days he trained twice, squeezing in another workout later in the day. His wife, Kenzie, supported the training and the discipline it required.

Lovly also completed the Memorial Day Murph Challenge through Great North Fitness in Thief River Falls, which involved a one-mile run, 100 pull-ups, 200 push-ups, 300 squats, and another mile run, all while wearing a 20-pound vest. He said that gave him the confidence to know he could take on more.

Still, nothing fully prepared him for the reality of racing at high elevation.

“People asked if I was worried about the altitude,” he said. “I wasn’t. But I definitely should have been. About three-quarters of the way through the first lap, I started feeling it. My heart was racing, I felt lightheaded. I thought, am I going to pass out or what?”

Those were among the moments he questioned signing up.

“You think things like, why did I pay 250 dollars to do this to myself? What am I doing here?” he said. “But like anything in life, you find a way through it to the brighter side.”

The hardest point came at the halfway mark when racers reached the transition zone around mile 14 or 15. That’s where competitors could access a tote they packed ahead of time with food, hydration packets and anything else they might need. Lovly, a fan of Hot Tamales candy, had packed himself a small Ziploc bag as a reward. “I told myself, when I get to the halfway point, I get the Hot Tamales,” he said. “It was a little thing, but it motivated me. Sometimes those small rewards keep you going.”

At that transition zone, he asked a fellow racer what the second half of the course was like. The man told him, “We do it all over again.”

“That hit me,” Lovly said. “We had just climbed a mountain. And I had to do it again.”

There were plenty of physical challenges. The course included monkey bars, Olympic rings, a ten-foot wall climb, and a 100-pound weight carry at the top of the mountain. One of the most difficult stretches included two sandbag carries and a pail full of rocks, all weighing about 70 pounds, each being carried for a quarter-mile. In true Spartan fashion, there was also a javelin throw. If you miss the target, the penalty is 30 burpees. Lovly missed it twice.

One mental obstacle stood out. Before the race, each runner received a number on their headband. Spartan staff took the last two digits and paired them with a random code and word. Each competitor had to remember theirs. “My code was Zulu 9963591,” Lovly said. “I had to remember that for 4-5 hours and recite it before I could finish. If you forget, you get penalized. I remembered it.”

Finishing the race in 8 hours and 16 seconds, Lovly said seeing his wife and daughter waiting for him at the finish line was his biggest reward. “There were a lot of emotions during the race,” he said. “You think about why you’re doing it, what it means. To me, it directly applies to life. You just keep moving forward with the things in front of you.”

Lovly placed 6th in the 34 to 39 age group and said the range of competitors was impressive. “There were all kinds of people out there,” he said. “Different ages, different body types. I was passed by two women at one point and thought, holy moly.”

When asked what made the biggest difference in helping him succeed, Lovly didn’t hesitate. “The mindset is everything,” he said. “You can be in the best shape of your life, but when things get hard, anyone can quit. I saw a guy out there running with only one arm. That’s a real test of self. If he can do it, I can do it.”

He isn’t done racing, either. Next up is the Goodridge Freedom Fest 5K, and he plans to enter more grappling and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competitions in the future.

Lovly works as the criminal justice coordinator and instructor at Northland Community and Technical College and also serves part-time as a Pennington County Sheriff’s Deputy. He balances that with family life and those early-morning workouts.

For anyone considering a Spartan race, or any major goal, his advice is simple. “Start small. That’s the biggest thing. People expect huge changes right away, and when they don’t happen, they quit. But if you start small and stay consistent, the progress becomes real. You can’t change the world in a day.”