Bumi, Abu Dhabi and the Chinese sovereign fund: so who won?
1 October, 2013A history of the future
1 October, 2013Discovery Channel Magazine, October 2013
In hindsight, it was the electrocuted testicles that first made me suspect I’d made an error of judgement.
Maybe I should have heeded the warnings when I crawled in mud under barbed wire, or plunged off a five-metre platform into freezing water, or approached an obstacle called Arctic Enema which turned out to be exceptionally well-named. But, no, it took a low-hanging wire to a low-hanging fruit to make the folly of the situation fully clear to me.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
My story starts with a Facebook post from an old school friend about an obstacle course called Tough Mudder. This is exactly how most people end up involved in events like this: a friend posts something through social media, it sounds like fun, and before you know it, a potential team has come together.
Billed as “Probably the toughest event on the planet,” Tough Mudder is a 12-mile obstacle course, combining a rugged cross-country run with 25 or so challenges designed by British Special Forces. Its rise has been truly extraordinary: the first event was held near Allentown, Pennsylvania in May 2010, half a million people competed in 35 races worldwide in 2012 alone, and in May this year the company passed one million registrations since launch. There will be 53 events this year in the US, UK, Australia, Canada and Germany. And all participants pay – typically between $85 and $180, depending how far in advance people sign up. Even allowing for the fact that some of the money goes to charity (currently Help for Heroes and the Wounded Warrior Project), getting muddy is big business.
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