Author Topic: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!  (Read 7201 times)

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Offline wheretonextrace

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NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« on: April 18, 2018, 03:51:59 PM »
Hi All,

Lurker here. A group of us is starting a race company that is similar to amazing race but in individual cities in the US. We are just starting out but I thought this board would be a very good place to get ideas and feedback. We are doing 2 races this year and 30 next year.

Our website is www.wheretonextrace.com

If you have any thoughts or questions, I would love to hear them.

Thanks!

Dan
« Last Edit: April 18, 2018, 04:08:29 PM by wheretonextrace »

Offline Marionete

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #1 on: April 18, 2018, 04:28:14 PM »
Wow, that's a really cool idea!
Is there going to be any way to follow this? I assume you're not gonna film it, but any way to see tasks, places, etc.?


Offline Granth

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #2 on: April 18, 2018, 05:07:54 PM »
Has the OP watched the Canadian edition? That's how one does a non-finale urban North American leg.

P.S. What's the reason for the list of cities skimping on Seattle and Portland?

Offline BourkieBoy

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #3 on: April 18, 2018, 05:18:23 PM »
We have a similar race in Melbourne. It's VERY good, but I haven't done it yet (

Anyway, good luck Dan! Hope you get LOTS of people doing your races!

Offline NELs

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #4 on: April 18, 2018, 05:21:53 PM »
I'm excited!!! This sounds like a great idea!!! :tup:



Offline ianthebalance

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #5 on: April 18, 2018, 05:44:02 PM »
Any chance of there being any races in Los Angeles?

Offline Declive

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #6 on: April 18, 2018, 07:51:40 PM »
This is so cool! Amazing job!
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Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #7 on: April 18, 2018, 10:19:06 PM »
Wow, that's a really cool idea!
Is there going to be any way to follow this? I assume you're not gonna film it, but any way to see tasks, places, etc.?

Thank you! We are building a following on instagram currently and will post highlights. Many clues will go out via our twitter account also. We hope to do race summaries with video and descriptions as well.

Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #8 on: April 18, 2018, 10:20:41 PM »
Has the OP watched the Canadian edition? That's how one does a non-finale urban North American leg.

P.S. What's the reason for the list of cities skimping on Seattle and Portland?

I am not familiar with the Canadian edition.

The reason for skipping Seattle and Portland is just our team is small and I live in DC. We would love to get there but we are weak on the West Coast currently. :-)

Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #9 on: April 18, 2018, 10:21:35 PM »
We have a similar race in Melbourne. It's VERY good, but I haven't done it yet (

Anyway, good luck Dan! Hope you get LOTS of people doing your races!

Thank you so much!


Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #10 on: April 18, 2018, 10:22:21 PM »
I'm excited!!! This sounds like a great idea!!! :tup:

Thank you! :-)

Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #11 on: April 18, 2018, 10:23:24 PM »
Any chance of there being any races in Los Angeles?

Yes! LA is on our list for the future. We would love to do LA.

Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #12 on: April 18, 2018, 10:23:52 PM »
This is so cool! Amazing job!

Thank you! :-)

Offline Palperro

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #13 on: April 18, 2018, 10:25:22 PM »
Come to Detroit! :conf:
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Offline ianthebalance

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #14 on: April 18, 2018, 10:33:25 PM »
Any chance of there being any races in Los Angeles?

Yes! LA is on our list for the future. We would love to do LA.

Awesome. I might try and do one of the San Diego legs

Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #15 on: April 19, 2018, 02:35:50 PM »
Come to Detroit! :conf:

we would love to! what would be the best sights to include in a race?

Offline Granth

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #16 on: April 19, 2018, 03:25:01 PM »
Has the OP watched the Canadian edition? That's how one does a non-finale urban North American leg.

P.S. What's the reason for the list of cities skimping on Seattle and Portland?

I am not familiar with the Canadian edition.

The reason for skipping Seattle and Portland is just our team is small and I live in DC. We would love to get there but we are weak on the West Coast currently. :-)

Then, Daniel, now would be the time to see TARCAN in order to learn the proper structuring of challenges in this continent's cities!


Offline Palperro

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #17 on: April 20, 2018, 02:14:45 PM »
Come to Detroit! :conf:

we would love to! what would be the best sights to include in a race?

There are a lot of cool/historical places in Downtown, surrounding suburbs also are nice.
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Offline RachelLeVega

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #18 on: April 21, 2018, 10:49:26 PM »
Since I was a teenager after watching TAR, I've been interested in traveling and racing, especially orienteering, and I'm glad there is a startup company modernizing this activity in a world where we are all consumed by digital info and addicted to Google (especially Maps for directions). This sounds like a fantastic weekend activity for people of all ages! A girls' trip/Saturday for the boys, family outings, co-worker join ups, etc. If done right, this could be the next "hot" experience game like the escape room. I checked out your website, I really love how in the "solve clues" example, the clues are cryptic and are not Wikipedia or Atlas Obscura-able, and that definitely challenges individuals or teams to build rapport and collaborate.

As for suggestions, I would highly recommend, if you haven't done so, gather as many sponsors from local, trusted businesses to support and help spread the word. The more people who know about these events from an already established brand or business, the more potential clients who will want to register for this adventure. The most important thing a new entrepreneur should do is promote intelligently and effectively. I've noticed an individual ticket costs $100+ including fees. Do you use Groupon or use promotional codes? Do you invite morning radio personalities from hit and Hot AC music stations to attend a race over the weekend? Do you have an app to enter the "clue portal" quickly? Do you go to any festivals and set up a registration booth? Any reliable source that will get the word out helps. :tup: I would even go as far as hosting this activity in smaller cities like university towns (Champaign, Illinois; College Station, Texas; Auburn, Alabama; Stanford/San Jose, California; etc.) since I feel like college students would LOVE an adventure over the weekend after a week full of tests and long, dragged out lectures.

For race designs, I would stay down-to-earth and go to neighborhood eateries who serve a certain style of food, unique entrepreneurs (local gyms to do a workout challenge, locally owned crafts stores to recreate an art piece relevant to the area, beautiful panoramic sights, etc.), and make the race worth the $100+ I, a potential customer, am paying for. I would love to touch, feel, sense, and listen to the quirks and beautiful aspects of the city rather than just taking a picture and solving riddles which does waste battery and data in places with no free wifi. For example, let's say Miami will have a race: I would love to experience South Beach in a way that makes me want to learn something tangible (like DJing, beachcombing, mobile spray tanning, etc.), I would also love to visit Little Havana and recreate a mural on canvas or do a blindfolded eating challenge in memory of the Catharsis Restaurant that used to run in the district, and I would love to explore the Everglades spontaneously by going to the nearby alligator farm and "invent" a special alligator treat for the zookeeper to give the alligators at feeding time, then ride an airboat in celebration of finishing the challenge! Memories to talk extensively about indeed!
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Offline georgiapeach

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #19 on: April 21, 2018, 11:10:39 PM »
Awesome ideas Rachel!!
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Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #20 on: April 22, 2018, 10:59:43 AM »
@Rachel thank you so much for the feedback!

We really hope this takes off and we can expand to large college towns.

We have not wanted to do Groupon because of how much money they take out of it. We have reached out to local businesses and local media and plan to promote the races over radio and podcasts. We are working on NPR right now :-)

we have an app in development but for now we will use our website and people on site at checkpoints for clue delivery.

Your race design ideas are really great! I agree with you. We think a variety of people will want to do our races. Hopefully many TAR fans but also people who want to see cities and explore and get a REAL sense of them, not a hop on hop off bus.

We will never run the same race twice and will always have new ideas. We are working with local businesses. I go into DC this week to meet with some really cool prospects that I cannot wait to see how it turns out. :-)

Thank you for the great ideas. I shared your post with our team on slack and they all loved it. 

Offline Pi/

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #21 on: April 22, 2018, 11:26:07 AM »
This sounds like a creative, engaging, awesome idea!

Will the race ever visit non-cities? For example- Vail, CO, isn't a "city" (population 5,000), but it's a beautiful destination and there's a lot of cool things to do there.
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Offline wheretonextrace

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #22 on: April 22, 2018, 11:31:10 AM »
This sounds like a creative, engaging, awesome idea!

Will the race ever visit non-cities? For example- Vail, CO, isn't a "city" (population 5,000), but it's a beautiful destination and there's a lot of cool things to do there.

We would like to do area races but will need to get enough signups. We need over 200 people to cover our costs with our current model. :-)

I have not been to Vail, though, so maybe I should go scout it soon ;-)

Offline jfarbzz

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #23 on: April 26, 2018, 11:33:25 PM »
This looks super cool! Reminds me of a race I did with my family in Cabo San Lucas, except a lot better!

Offline Cocoa

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Re: NEW Real life amazing race coming your way!
« Reply #24 on: April 27, 2018, 12:33:16 AM »
I've hosted three small-scale real life Amazing Race games with my friends years ago, so if ever you come to the Philippines you can def contact me! ;) Haha! I'd like to join your team! lol
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