Getting Social with X-Dog

Densely forested rolling hills surrounding a lake in North Plains serve as a backdrop for a tropical themed party. Flowered tables packed with cold cuts and chips and dip, along with a large Gatorade jug dispensing mai tais, beckons campers dressed in aloha shirts, grass skirts, and coconut bras. Every drink has a tiny, bright, umbrella, and a stereo competes with the peacocks barking and screeching through the towering evergreens. This is Horning’s Hideout, the day before an X-Dog trail race. The campers are race participants, volunteers, and family and friends, gathering before the second annual Havoc at the Hideout.

Camping Saturday night for the Sunday morning race has a practical application, as it brings race organizers and volunteers together earlier so they have more time to prepare for the event. But more importantly, camping adds a social element to the whole experience.
“Other event organizers hold races where there may be a social factor involved, but our events are more of a social gathering where there’s also a race,” said Kevin Foreman, Race Director of the Havoc at the Hideout trail run and other X-Dog Events.

X-Dog is also one of the first race organizations taking full advantage of new social tools available online. They have a Facebook page, video posted on You Tube, postings on Twitter, and a Google calendar, along with email blasts and their own interactive website. These new online tools do not replace the social networks already formed by participants and volunteers, but they can work to help spread the word, serving as extensions of the race producer’s online existence. Many people at the Havoc had found out about X-Dog by simply searching on the internet for fun races near the Portland area. Once they do one race, they’re hooked.

“We were one of the first groups to sign up races with Active, so we’ve been bringing people in through the internet for a while,” Kevin said. “But, I had resisted using Facebook, Twitter, and all that stuff up until recently. For a while, with the MySpace pages, it looked like only kids were doing it, but now professionals are using Facebook, Linked In, and others. So, I finally had a meeting and said, hey, you’re either in front of it, or you’re behind it: let’s get in front of it. Plus, it’s all free advertising.”

This strategy seemed to work for the Havoc at the Hideout. They had one and a half times as many finishers this year than in 2008. Plus, last year the race was on a Saturday, and this year it was moved to Sunday, in part to allow participants and spectators to gather over the weekend. And it also helps to have an incredibly fun and challenging course set in a pristine woodland environment. The finish and awards celebration were also very popular, with a post-race feed featuring octopus salad and birthday cake, and pink lawn flamingoes given away as special awards.

The Havoc at the Hideout kicked off X-Dog’s summer race calendar. The Mt Hood Scramble on June 21 is already sold out, and the McCubbin’s Gulch Scramble on July 19 is filling up. The rest of the summer calendar includes the Tillamook Burn on August 2, the Great NW Mountain Run on August 18, and Ole’s Assault on September 13. For more information, visit http://www.xdogevents.com/.