HEBRON — Fresh off a successful second year of the Redneck “Blank,” the event’s organizer has already started work on his next project: a 5K obstacle course.
The Redneck “Blank” went off this past weekend mostly without incident, organizer Harold Brooks said. There were no arrests and no one transported to the hospital. “The Daily Show” filmed the whole event, and Brooks said they plan to air it Thursday night or the following Monday.
Now he’s working on building an obstacle course to benefit the Wounded Heroes Program of Maine, a volunteer-run organization that helps wounded Maine soldiers. He’d like to see the event grow as other Maine athletic events have.
“We want to do the same thing for veterans that (Patrick) Dempsey does for cancer,” Brooks said Tuesday.
Brooks has experience in organizing events. For years, he’s been on the board of directors for the Great Falls Balloon Festival and this year ran both the Redneck Rodeo and Redneck “Blank.”
He said the plan is for competitors to carry the names of soldiers who were killed or wounded in battle. In the final obstacle, they’ll write those names on the wall.
It won’t be all serious, though. The event will be Oct. 27, a few days before Halloween, and the course will feature Halloween-themed obstacles, including hordes of zombies that runners will have to break through.
He said he hasn’t heard from the U.S. Olympic Committee yet about his Facebook page, which still uses the name “Redneck Olympics.” He said he expects the USOC will get back to him once the Summer Olympics are over. In the meantime, he’s on a mission to get more followers to his page in hopes that Facebook won’t make him change a popular page.
Brooks said around 2,700 attended the Redneck “Blank” last weekend, which was up from 2011’s count of 2,600. Many camped through the weekend; others bought day passes.
“There weren’t a lot more people,” he said, and the event may be the perfect size already. “I would rather have a few people have tons of fun than a lot of people have no fun.”
“We’re not trying to be the biggest. That was never the option,” he said.
treaves@sunjournal.com
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- Les Strout wears a pig mask while carrying the Redneck “Blank” torch and an American flag in the opening ceremony in Hebron on Saturday. Organizer Harold Brooks said attendance was up about 100 this year to 2,700.
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