Free And For Me

Almost three months after his participation in the Kids Adventure Games in Mammoth, CA my son is still talking about his awesome experience.

We did many things this past summer that I thought would top this, but my son has explained that the participation, sportsmanship and adventure was something he experienced and it made him feel like he accomplished something on his own, meaning without me.

I was shocked by his statement, but yet proud that he was able to take away something from this day of adventure.  He participated in the clinic with his teammate the day before to prepare them for the race.  Mind you they had not trained all summer, but they were confident they would do well as a team.

The obstacles seemed intense and it had many parents wondering how could their child participate in such a race.

The obstacles included:

• Slick Wall
• Cargo Net
• Catapult
• Cargo Net
• Bike Transition
• Blow Dart
• Darwin Dash
• Balance Beam
• Bike Transition
• Water Beam
• Bike Transition
• Mud Pit
• Slip ‘n’ Slide
• Finish!

It was shocking and yet pleasing to see that these kids could endure all of this.  I was definitely a proud mom.

Although, my son enjoyed the race I was a bit disappointed about some things.

First, as the race was going on there were people racing about in their ATV’s/ carts going from one station to another.  The only reason I knew this, was because I was one of the few parents that took the ski lift up to one of the obstacles to see some of the race.  As  I sat with a couple of parents we discussed how reckless this was.  I thought it was reckless until about after an hour of watching these people (camera crew and medics) I discovered the medics had to race to my son’s side because he had hurt himself during the race.  Please note, they did not tell me.  I only knew that he was hurt because I was about three quarters away from him and after I saw his teammate coming down the hill I began to panic and run up the hill to my son, but my daughter beat me doing that.

Secondly, there was not enough staff/volunteers.  While sitting at one of the stations I witnessed kids going in the wrong direction and the one person that was there to guide them was not paying attention all of the time as the kids came down the hill.

Lastly, after all of the racing around the camera crew did, you would think we would have been provided a picture or two.  I received an email that we should check the Kids Adventure Facebook page to see all of the wonderful pictures.  Having raced in large races, like the Spartan Race or Color Run, I just knew we would receive actual pictures via email or something.  I did not think we would have to search for our kids on Facebook. The Spartan race has at least 10,000 racers and we received action shots.  When I went to the page I was disappointed to only see pictures of the boys at the finish line.  After sitting for hours I would have liked to see pictures of them actually participating in the race.  It seemed like all of the other kids manage to have shots of them doing something adventurous.   I tried reaching out to Kids Adventure Games and did not receive a response.

Overall this was an experience my son will never forget and will always cherish.

Disclosure: Product/compensation was received in exchange for review.
Don’t be afraid to be free!!!