Merrell Mud Run BF Friendly?

Their promo video has a guy

Their promo video has a guy with no shoes, so I am guessing it's OK. Otherwise, the advice is to duct tape your shoes to your legs. I think this will be one race where 99% of the other runners will be jealous. My husband is doing it. We'll both be doing the Warrior Dash bare in October.
 
How did you find out that

How did you find out that shoes were mandatory? Did you ask? I would just run and not ask. Also, did you point out to them that the guy in "their own" promo is barefoot? What did they say to that?
 
You go TJ!

You go TJ!
 
Get busy on that profile,

Get busy on that profile, Board, sir!
 
They sent out a "Race Day"

They sent out a "Race Day" logistics message and it was very explicit about the rule which is how we found out. My guess is the guy in LA in the video lost his shoes in a mud pit. Hubby is pissed. I doubt he has a chance of winning anything since he's in a very competitive age group, but I told him I thought there was no point in getting disqualified, just in case. He'll wear his water shoes or huaraches, I guess.
 
You can always ditch your

You can always ditch your shoes after the first mud puddle and tell them, should they ask, that you lost them in the mud puddle...damn.
 
Barefoot TJ wrote:You can

Barefoot TJ said:
You can always ditch your shoes after the first mud puddle and tell them, should they ask, that you lost them in the mud puddle...damn.



That was hubby's plan - that's when I brought up the disqualification point. Heck, it might just happen even if he doesn't plan it. I have heard people duck tape their shoes to their legs for these things.
 
I wore the water shoes and

I wore the water shoes and the run was great.

There was some very rocky terrain and a lot of sticks on the trail. I would have appreciated the challenge, since I haven't run on that sort of ground very much, but the water shoes worked out well.

There was also a number of small fallen logs on the trail. Is this common for trail runs? I kind of enjoyed it - while everyone else took big leaps over the logs, I stepped lightly on almost every one.

There were a lot of steep ups and downs. At the bottom of one descent, there was a big deep puddle and everyone was running around it. I went right through the middle and headed up the muddy slope on the other side. That was probably the point where I most wished I were barefoot- the water shoes didn't have very good traction. But I got my footing again and headed up the hill. Someone behind me exclaimed,

"Water shoes!"

"Yep," I answered.

"That's gotta be uncomfortable." Where people come up with these notions, I'll never know.

"It's awesome! But they wouldn't let me go barefoot."

"I bet you're glad you didn't now," she answered.

"I coulda done it."

On the uphills, I passed a few people - some walking, some huffing along. But on the downhills, I took a suicide plunge and blew everyone away. I was probably a little more careless than I should have been - at least once I was stumbling and slipping on bumpy, rocky ground, but the feeling was incredible.

A lot of people passed me on level ground or on slight downhill slopes, but I was surprised how many of them were people I thought were already ahead of me. I finished 41 out of 123 in my age group with a 10K time of 1:08:21.
 
Yeah, Mikee!  Congrats!

Yeah, Mikee! Congrats!