Obstacle Course

Asia's first mud run will kick off tomorrow in Kolad, promising both adventure and music.

Paras Turakhia, a real estate professional, having spent several years in the US, moved back to Mumbai in 2007. Upon his return, he felt a lack in the options for interesting outdoor activities. "Social life here is limited to visiting malls and pubs. I was looking for something more stimulating," says the 29-year-old.

In 2009, when he agreed to accompany his friends to participate in a mud run in Delaware, US, nothing had prepared him for the "awesomeness" that lay in store. "I took on several challenges — crossing mud pits, swinging from monkey bars and crawling through pipes — for the first time ever. The latter was particularly challenging as I had to travel 20 feet in a dark drum. It was one filthy but high-energy day," says Turakhia. The experience prompted him to put together a desi version of mud run, The Mud Rush (TMR).

Together with his friends Jay Goradia and Saurabh Shah, Turakhia has floated a company called Happy Feet Entertainment, which has joined hands with Sheer Management to come up with TMR. Essentially an all-terrain marathon-style run, it is scheduled to take place on Saturday along the banks of the Kundalika river in Kolad, Maharashtra — a few kilometres from Mumbai.

TMR will stretch across a seven-kilometre circuit with obstacles designed by the adventure company Z–Bac. These include countering barb wire, coloured smoke, foam party, 30-feet-high stacks of hay, water bodies, high-pressured showers, barrier walls, slope climbing, fire obstacles, ice plunge bar, and, of course, a whole lot of mud. "We have designed most of the obstacles based on a commando drill but scaled it down for civilians. So these are neither tough nor easy, but interesting and doable. Also, this way, people get to spend a day in a soldier's shoes," says Retired Captain Satish Swaminathan, director of Z–Bac.

... contd.

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