Ridiculous Obstacle Race

This would be best as a team building/​friendship building race. As a solo racer, this was boring and poorly coordinated. There were few volunteers/​staff on site to tell people how to go about completing obstacles. During the swinging balls obstacle, I fell in and it was a huge struggle to get out, since there was a hump on the top of the ladder.
This was not a challenging race, but it did go through many terrains, from concrete ground, indoor carpeting (inside the casino), and grassy terrain.

I’m still glowing from all the fun I had this past Saturday running the Ridiculous Obstacle Race. I’ve run the venerable (but very boring) Chase Corporate Challenge for a number of years and it was going to take quite an inducement for me to run another 5k again. With all the novelty 5K runs that have popped up (e.g. The Color Run, The Great Bull Run, the Spartan run, etc. etc.) this was the one that I knew I had to participate in. I always wanted to become a contestant on Wipe-​out, but after 3 years of no answer from the show after applying and updating my application every couple months, this was definitely the next best thing.
Due to the government shutdown, the venue was moved from Brooklyn to New York Aqueduct. Actually part of the course ran through the horse track and inside the World Resort casino and it’s parking lot. The obstacles ranged from the simple (rows of tires that you have to step through) to the truly ridiculous, like the foam slide that block parties rent out so that kids have something fun to do in the summer. Even though I went solo, most everyone I ran with were either encouraging me to finish or helping me past the obstacles. A treat for the New York event was the debut of a towering slide that must have been at least 100 feet tall that was busted out for the finish line. It was truly a YOLO moment to stare down the bottom and jump down.
I didn’t see too many people show for the first day, but that was probably due to the change of date from government shutdown (the original venue was at a national park). Lots of people were wearing goofy costumes that it seemed like an early Halloween. Definitely planning on going to the next one in New York.