- Eco-Challenge
Eco-Challenge: The Expedition Race was a multi-day expedition length
adventure race in which teams of four competed.Eco-Challenge was created by
Mark Burnett . inspired by anL.A. Times article about Gerald Fusil'sRaid Gauloises adventure race in Costa Rica, Burnett formed a team and competed in two Raid Gauloises events. Although his teams did poorly, Burnett decided to create a similar race in North America. When the race went international, Burnett purchased the rights from Fusil and set out to make the Eco-Challenge the world's premier adventure race.Each team comprised a mandatory mix of both men and women, racing non-stop, 24 hours a day, over a rugged 300-mile (500km) course, participating in such disciplines as trekking, whitewater
canoeing , horseback riding,sea kayak ing,scuba diving ,mountaineering andmountain biking . Teams originally consisted of five members, but the team size was reduced to four members early in the event's history.The first Eco-Challenge was held on April 25,
1995 in theUtah desert and was held each year in a new locale until2002 . Burnett recently noted that he did not intend to hold another Eco-Challenge, but had considered selling the rights to it.Fact|date=August 2007 In contrast, other expedition-length races, includingPrimal Quest continue to be held.Each Eco-Challenge was broadcast on cable television. The 1995 Utah race was shown as a 45-minute feature, produced by and broadcast on
MTV . The 1995 Maine/New England event was broadcast in segments as part of theX-Games broadcast onESPN . Starting in1996 , Eco-Challenge was aired on the Discovery Channel and the production enjoyed a significantly expanded budget. The 1996British Columbia production, broadcast on theDiscovery Channel won anEmmy Award . In2000 , theUSA Network agreed to a three-year contract to broadcast the Eco-Challenge. Later that year, the show was nominated for a Prime-TimeEmmy Award . USA did not renew the show after the 2002 Fiji race.Although long out of print, the 1996 through 2001 Eco-Challenge races were released on
VHS . Utah, Maine and Fiji were never officially released in the United States. Copies of the races are occasionally available on auction websites such as eBay [http://www.ebay.com] , iOffer [http://www.ioffer.com] or from online retailers [http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_v?url=search-alias%3Dvhs&field-keywords=eco-challenge] .Eco-Challenge events
* 1995
Utah
* 1995Maine /New England (as part of theX-Games X-Venture adventure race)
* 1996British Columbia
* 1997Australia
* 1998Morocco
* 1999Argentina
* 2000Sabah , on the island ofBorneo
* 2001New Zealand
* 2002Fiji ources
*"This article incorporates text from Eco-Challenge.us [http://www.racingwithgiants.com/] released under the GFDL license [http://www.racingwithgiants.com/Ecochallenge/GNU.html] "
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