The Death Race

What a fantastically insane and exhilarating form of self-abuse. See the video here.

It starts at 4am in Pittsfield, Vermont, with a race across the field, four feet deep mud sink hole and 200 meters of barbed wire up a creek, which can only be crossed by belly crawl. At the end of the creek, they have to find the tree stump with their bib number, dig the stump out of the ground and crawl back through the mud and barbed wire to the starting point.

Next is a mile long river walk...participants must carry their bikes and stumps for most of the race.

Along the way there is a log cutting challenge (what would a Vermont race be without it?)

For those who press on, there is a 2000 foot vertical climb to the top of a mountain. There they are presented with a list of ten US presidents, which they must memorize and recite at the bottom of the mountain. If they screw up, it's back up the mountain they go.

Next, racers are given a bag of legos and must crawl up a culvert (with more barbed wire of course) where they are presented with an assembled cube. They can diagram it, but then they must go back down and assemble their legos exactly the same. If one piece is out of place, they must return crawl back until they get it right.

After the legos, they are given an egg and some firewood. They must build a fire, cook the egg and eat it.

Racers then retrieve their bike wheels and head to a pond, where their bike chains are put in a plastic bag and thrown in deep. They have to dive in, recover the chains, reassemble the bike AND to prove that it works, ride the bike up and around a hill and back. (Carried the bike for about nine hours and rode it for about...5 minutes)

Those who are left take 20% of their bodyweight in rocks up a steep mountain and poke around on the mountain for awhile.

Wow.