Why Are Obstacle-Course Races So Popular?
Completing a marathon has long been the ultimate feather in the cap of an amateur endurance athlete. But the idea of trotting along a boring old paved road for 26.2 miles doesn’t thrill everyone. For the endurance athlete who gets bored easily, a new genre of race has emerged—peppered with obstacles requiring feats of strength and dexterity (Crawling under barbed wire! Climbing a rope! Throwing a spear! Burpees!), and designed to be an over-the-top spectacle where participants emerge covered in mud (and maybe blood), as if they’ve survived a battle.
The two biggest names in the world of obstacle-course races (OCRs) are and . These organizations put on OCRs that cover distances between three and 30 miles with the addition of up to 35 obstacles along the way. In some of the most intense races, participants might be asked to army crawl under live electrical wire or carry 60-pound sandbags up a ski slope in the middle
