Race for a Reason 2018

"Race for a Reason" lets students and others raise money for their favorite charities by running a race, the most interesting part of which takes them through the Army ROTC obstacle course.

Then comes the tall wall. This was a lot harder to scale.

At the top of the course competitors have to jump down from an embankment, walk a narrow plank, and climb three posts bound together.

Though not filled with water as usual, the ditches were plenty wet, which made them even more muddy. This participant looked for a mud-free path forward. There was none.

Having made it through the ditches, she continued, now bearing the weight of a lot of mud.

The competitors were enthusiastic -- the guy on the Air Force Marathon teeshirt even added an obstacle -- a park bench -- that wasn't part of the course!

Participants might have hoped that the long slip-and-slide that followed the obstacle course would wash all the mud away. It didn't.

Some really got going on the slip-and-slide, only to splash in the pool at the bottom, which they reported was very, very cold. The temperature was in the 40s during much of the race.

After the long, uphill course, and the obstacle course, and the slip-n-slide, the exhausted runners had to crawl under a net through chigger-infested grass while soaking wet before they could continue to the finish line at Peden Stadium.