Into the Mud Challenge 2012

I was fortunate to have a link to the Into the Mud Challenge come across my twitter feed a while back.  Having never heard of it I just had to look into it and see what it was all about.  It sounded really cool so I added it to my calendar with the hopes that I could make it out.

I thoroughly enjoy shooting sports (the more extreme the better), but I really have no desire to shoot your normal everyday road race.  No offense to you runners or enthusiasts, but the sport just doesn't have an appealing/creative look to it when photographed.  Add to that the clumps of people normally associated with such events and it just adds to what I think is a boring look.

Throw in some obstacles, a wild location, water, mud, sand, and it becomes a whole new beast.  This is my second event of the sort, having shot some of the Urban Epic in Portland last summer.  I'm more partial to the races with bikes (wheels), I'm not going to lie, but these events are really cool in my opinion.  The obstacles, sweat, grit, dirtiness and a smiling athletes just take things to a whole new level.  You just have to be impressed with the ability for these people to do these all while laughing and having a good time.  I'm pretty sure I couldn't put myself through it and especially not with a smile.  I'm just not a fan of messes and having my shoes fill up with foreign materials.

I did have a blast being a spectator and doing my best to cover the event however.  I'm just glad that I didn't need to hose myself off at the end of the day!  I can't wait for the next one.

If you are interested in seeing additional images, I have a total of 154 in my Into the Mud Challenge gallery.  Here are a bunch of my favorites: