The quarter-mile strip where Richmonders and bulls will meet on Saturday. (photo courtesy of Virginia Motorsports Park)
Rob Dickens and Brad Scudder always hoped to one day run with the bulls in Spain.
But for the two lawyers from Boston, work schedules and thousands of dollars in airfare stood between them and the streets of Pamplona.
Now, they are betting they aren’t the only thrill-seekers who want to check that off their list. And they’re testing their theory first in Dinwiddie County on Saturday.
Dickens and Scudder, who for the past three years have run a traveling 5K event called “The Rugged Maniac,” founded The Great Bull Run modeled off of the iconic running of the bulls in Spain.
“Everybody knows the event, it’s a legendary event,” Dickens said. “It’s a bucket-list item. But a lot of people can’t afford it.”
The promotion’s first go-round is Saturday at Virginia Motorsports Park, just outside Petersburg, and, for $75, Virginians with the right mix of guts and adrenaline can take on a horde of bowling bovine. The Richmond-area run will be the first of ten scheduled events in the next year, including stops in Atlanta, Houston, Dallas and Chicago.
The cost of admission comes with a bandana, a T-shirt and a beer – for a little liquid courage before the quarter-mile run or to soothe broken bones and bruised egos afterwards.
So far more than 6,000 people have signed up to run in and watch the event, which is just outside Petersburg. Dickens expects to sell another 4,000 to 6,000 tickets before it ends Saturday. Tickets run from $10 for spectators to $75 for participants. Several runs will take place throughout the day.
While the entry fee is cheap compared to the cost of a cross-Atlantic flight, getting the venture off and running has been no small task, Dickens said.
“There are huge, huge startup costs for this, we’ve probably spent at least a million dollars getting ready for this series, and that includes your insurance and all of your supplies,” Dickens said.
The supplies include two dozen bulls, provided by a rodeo company, and tens of thousands of dollars of dirt to cover a service road next to VMP’s quarter-mile NHRA drag strip. But finding dirt and bulls was easy compared to finding someone to insure the event, Dickens said.
“Insurance is very, very difficult to acquire, and that’s putting it lightly,” he said. “That was one of our biggest costs.”
The promotion will also put on a massive tomato fight alongside the bull run. Borrowing from another Spanish tradition, the Tomato Royale is something for those who want to get a little wild without testing the limits of their health insurance plans. The tomato tossing spree will accompany the Great Bull Run at each of its 10 stops across the country.
“We knew that not everybody wanted to run with the bulls; that’s pretty wild and crazy,” Dickens said. “So we wanted to give people something wild and crazy to do that wasn’t as wild and crazy as running with the bulls.”
Part of the Great Bull Run logo
As wild and crazy as it is, The Run is taking steps to mitigate risk for both the bulls and the bullheaded.
In Petersburg the bulls will run on a dirt track as opposed to city streets (as is tradition in Pamplona), because bulls trip and fall on pavement. In Spain the running of the bulls culminates in a bull fight, but Dickens’ bulls simply run from one end of the track to the other, only to line up and do it again.
The Pamplona running of the bulls uses Spanish fighting bulls, whose horns have been sharpened. The Dinwiddie running of the bulls will use steers and rodeo bulls. They’re a little bigger, Dickens said, but risk of impalement is much lower.
Word of the event has garnered plenty of publicity including national coverage ranging from Businessweek to Fox Sports. The Washington Post’s coverage of the run featured animal rights activists who are opposed to the event.
While the event might be a little less dangerous than its Spanish counterpart, Dickens admits it’s far from safe. But for adrenaline seekers like himself – Dickens will be in on the 3:30 running – that’s all part of the fun.
“Those rodeo bulls will run over you, and they will get after you,” he said.
The quarter-mile strip where Richmonders and bulls will meet on Saturday. (photo courtesy of Virginia Motorsports Park)
Rob Dickens and Brad Scudder always hoped to one day run with the bulls in Spain.
But for the two lawyers from Boston, work schedules and thousands of dollars in airfare stood between them and the streets of Pamplona.
Now, they are betting they aren’t the only thrill-seekers who want to check that off their list. And they’re testing their theory first in Dinwiddie County on Saturday.
Dickens and Scudder, who for the past three years have run a traveling 5K event called “The Rugged Maniac,” founded The Great Bull Run modeled off of the iconic running of the bulls in Spain.
“Everybody knows the event, it’s a legendary event,” Dickens said. “It’s a bucket-list item. But a lot of people can’t afford it.”
The promotion’s first go-round is Saturday at Virginia Motorsports Park, just outside Petersburg, and, for $75, Virginians with the right mix of guts and adrenaline can take on a horde of bowling bovine. The Richmond-area run will be the first of ten scheduled events in the next year, including stops in Atlanta, Houston, Dallas and Chicago.
The cost of admission comes with a bandana, a T-shirt and a beer – for a little liquid courage before the quarter-mile run or to soothe broken bones and bruised egos afterwards.
So far more than 6,000 people have signed up to run in and watch the event, which is just outside Petersburg. Dickens expects to sell another 4,000 to 6,000 tickets before it ends Saturday. Tickets run from $10 for spectators to $75 for participants. Several runs will take place throughout the day.
While the entry fee is cheap compared to the cost of a cross-Atlantic flight, getting the venture off and running has been no small task, Dickens said.
“There are huge, huge startup costs for this, we’ve probably spent at least a million dollars getting ready for this series, and that includes your insurance and all of your supplies,” Dickens said.
The supplies include two dozen bulls, provided by a rodeo company, and tens of thousands of dollars of dirt to cover a service road next to VMP’s quarter-mile NHRA drag strip. But finding dirt and bulls was easy compared to finding someone to insure the event, Dickens said.
“Insurance is very, very difficult to acquire, and that’s putting it lightly,” he said. “That was one of our biggest costs.”
The promotion will also put on a massive tomato fight alongside the bull run. Borrowing from another Spanish tradition, the Tomato Royale is something for those who want to get a little wild without testing the limits of their health insurance plans. The tomato tossing spree will accompany the Great Bull Run at each of its 10 stops across the country.
“We knew that not everybody wanted to run with the bulls; that’s pretty wild and crazy,” Dickens said. “So we wanted to give people something wild and crazy to do that wasn’t as wild and crazy as running with the bulls.”
Part of the Great Bull Run logo
As wild and crazy as it is, The Run is taking steps to mitigate risk for both the bulls and the bullheaded.
In Petersburg the bulls will run on a dirt track as opposed to city streets (as is tradition in Pamplona), because bulls trip and fall on pavement. In Spain the running of the bulls culminates in a bull fight, but Dickens’ bulls simply run from one end of the track to the other, only to line up and do it again.
The Pamplona running of the bulls uses Spanish fighting bulls, whose horns have been sharpened. The Dinwiddie running of the bulls will use steers and rodeo bulls. They’re a little bigger, Dickens said, but risk of impalement is much lower.
Word of the event has garnered plenty of publicity including national coverage ranging from Businessweek to Fox Sports. The Washington Post’s coverage of the run featured animal rights activists who are opposed to the event.
While the event might be a little less dangerous than its Spanish counterpart, Dickens admits it’s far from safe. But for adrenaline seekers like himself – Dickens will be in on the 3:30 running – that’s all part of the fun.
“Those rodeo bulls will run over you, and they will get after you,” he said.
WWHD? What would Hemingway do?
Hemingway probably would have cried in his beer.
Should have gotten Patient First to sponsor the event.
This is just so wrong….