By Pete Williams
WINTER GARDEN, Fla. – We’re still not sure if the obstacle race category is evolving more into a fitness challenge or a mud run. The organizers of the Highlander Adventure Run seem to be placing bets on both.
The distinction might seem minor, especially to the 1,500-plus who raced the fourth edition of The Highlander on a day that started at 40 degrees (for the 8 a.m. first wave) and was approaching 70 by the time the final group set out at 11:30.
Newcomers want mud, not just for the novelty but also for the requisite Facebook photos. For those folks, race organizers Jonny Simpkins and Wendy Carson over-delivered. There were three under-barbwire-through-mud crawls, at least a dozen mud pits and several places where it was hard not to get stuck in the muck. Perhaps not to the degree of Highlander III in September, when participants carried sand bags through waist-deep, black mud, but still as much mud as you’ll find anywhere.
We’ve done two Tough Mudders in the last month and neither 12-mile course produced as much mud as today’s six-mile Highlander (a three-mile option also was available). Tough Mudder, facing increasing competition from Spartan Race, which bills its event as a timed, obstacle challenge and not a mud run, has amped up its obstacles for 2013.
Here, too, The Highlander provided greater physical challenges. It helps that its parent company, Rock On Adventures, has found a permanent home here at the YMCA Roper Ranch near Orlando and can leave obstacles up, adding to them with each new race. The Rock On schedule now includes a year-round slate of events, including the kayak-bike-run “Yak-a-Thon” on May 4 and a July event called “The Intimidator” that’s being billed as The Highlander on steroids.
Even those of us who have done multiple Rock On events at the Roper Ranch got a few surprises starting in the first mile, which included a crawl through freshly-dug tunnels. No race offers more tall obstacles to climb, including a 15-foot rope hoist from waist-deep water to touch a beam, and a challenge that seemed like navigating between two upright Lincoln Logs (below). Both were new for 2013. Simpkins also seems to have borrowed a page from last month’s Hog Wild Mud Run near Tampa, creating an obstacle that combined reverse monkey bars with swinging between a half dozen ropes (left). Few managed to complete the entire challenge.
At times The Highlander can seem repetitious with its multiple barbwire crawls and three tire carries, but nobody will complain about a lack of challenges or too much uninterrupted running. No race does a better job using ditches and trees – both upright and downed ones – to create obstacles, which makes it nearly impossible to count all the challenges. The Highlander’s final mile is one of the best in the industry, with 10 obstacles that include a 12-foot plank jump into water, a zipline, tightrope walk, water slide, and, of course, a race-ending barbwire mud crawl.
Simpkins and Carson, who are not married but have been together more than a decade, have built quite a following in two years one customer at a time. From early in 2011 when they tirelessly distributed flyers at dozens of events to their first two Highlander races that year in Bartow, Fla., to the current schedule of more than a dozen races, it’s perhaps the best local Florida race story in the industry, especially now that it appears the Dirty Foot Adventure Run will not continue beyond last weekend’s third event.
Other Florida-based events such as Savage Race and the Superhero Scramble are expanding beyond the Sunshine State this year, looking to take on the likes of Tough Mudder, Spartan Race, Warrior Dash, and Hero Rush, all of which have managed to take their show around the country and even the world, setting up and tearing down quickly.
We’re guessing Rock On’s local focus will continue to work well in the highly-competitive Florida market, especially with free parking, no spectator fees, a kid’s race, fitted Tultex T-shirts, terrific medals, and an attention to detail. Simpkins, who previously ran an irrigation business, had some water issues in September, but today delivered 8-ounce bottles at each water stop, ample H20 for the post-race showers and, of course, more than enough hydration at all of the many mud obstacles.
This is a tough industry to strike the right balance between mud and obstacle. At least for now, Rock On is managing to be all things to all runners.