1. COURSE- Set up on Hurd's Family Farm in (not literally, and no offense- really!) West Bumblef*ck of upstate NY (ok, slighly offensive, but just not an ideal place to try to draw thousands of people for a race). Anyway, the course was designed around primarily an apple orchard farm and its surrounding woodsy/stream areas. That being said, most of the course was flat and relatively easy. I certainly do give the planners credit for what they did with that venue though- there were several (surprisingly) excellent water obstacles such as a backwards rope drag across a river, many upstream and very muddy treks along the winding water, and a wade/short swim though a murky pond. Most other obstacles were the standard military type -cargo net climb, tunnel crawl, over/under walls, etc. The trademark barbed wire mud crawl was a joke with its yard high clearance, and the fire leap (can't really can't call it that) was a half burnt out duraflame log- had to laugh, almost cute though! Major points loss however for the poor course direction marking and few volunteers or staff who could have saved me and others from a wrong turn or confused stalls throughout the race wondering which way to go next. GRADE = C
2. FESTIVAL- local band playing cover songs was a nice change of pace and certainly fit the more "hometown" feel of the event. Obviously, everything was scaled down if compared to any of the "monster" mud run series, but they could have taken some cues from their big brothers to have more food options and some things to do after the race other than sit in the mud again with your one free beer. Saving grace were the contests put on by the Army and Marines to win their swag, and the tent from Zico coconut water (big fan!) with the generous samples they provided me with. GRADE = B
3. SWAG- I'm trying to think how I could say something nice about the giveaways and freebies, but its gonna be hard. T-shirt was just plain and boring white cotton, one that will probably get lost among any other Fruit of the Loom tees in my drawer. They made a nice attempt to do something different with the included "cinch sack" backpack, but again kind of cheap and not that useful at least for me. But the big downfall was the finisher medal that looked like something you would pin on a girl scout sash- a brass logo of their race, literally the size of a quarter, strung on a red ribbon you'd use to wrap a small Christmas gift, and came in a tiny plastic bag. I know the races shouldn't always be about a medal, but it would have been better to not give anything out at all then to make such a joke out of it. GRADE = D
OVERALL GRADE = C
