More than 1,300 Oklahoma and Arkansas children can look back on 2014 and remember a unique physical experience they enjoyed thanks to a University of Arkansas alumnus who created a mud run for kids.

It’s not every day your parents let you get as dirty as you want to, said many of the children splattered from head to toe with thick, brown Oklahoma mud, their eyes bright and big grins flashing. Visit the Colleague news magazine website to see more pictures.

Competitive mud runs or adventure runs that feature obstacle courses have become popular with adults in recent years, and Timothy Baghurst wanted to expand the opportunity for children. Baghurst teaches in the health and human performance program at Oklahoma State University. He received his doctorate in kinesiology from the U of A in 2008.

He and his wife, Terra-Leigh, have two sons, the older of whom was the catalyst for Baghurst’s idea to create what he named Mud University with the slogan “Fun in the First Degree.” Asa Baghurst, 8, loved watching his father compete in athletic events and was an enthusiastic participant in the spring and fall events at Lake McMurtry near Stillwater, Oklahoma. His 4-year-old brother, Asher, wants to do it, too, when he is big enough.

The event is not a race, Baghurst said. Its purpose is to provide a fun, adventure-based activity for youth.

“We want to get kids outside doing something that improves their health, fosters friendship and teamwork, but is above all fun,” he said.

The course featured 15 obstacles of varying difficulty, and some required teamwork to get through successfully. The two-day event held in April and again in September was open to children from 6 to 13 years old with time set aside at the end of the second day of the fall event for teens 14 to 16.

The mudholes got murkier and stinkier as hundreds of children splashed and slogged through them. The spring event was marked by 40-mph winds while the temperatures during the fall event in September rose into the 80s.

Parents said they heard about Mud U at their children’s schools and on the radio and Facebook.

“My kids saw an ad for Mud U and said, ‘We’re doing it!’” Terri Harris of Stillwater said. “How can you not let your kids run through a mile and a half of mud?”

Baghurst offered some simple instructions and a little pep talk as each group of five to 10 children left the starting line in five-minute intervals.

“Repeat after me,” he told the children. “I am a Mud U participant. My goal is to graduate by completing the course. I will not race. I will help others. I will embrace the mud that I am about to face.”

The course took about 45 minutes to traverse and the participants enjoyed a dip in Lake McMurtry at the end.

Chris McNeil brought 50 Tulsa children from the Carrera Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Program, which is under the umbrella of the Children’s Aid Society. The students raised some of the money to pay their registration and travel by holding car washes, and the Carrera program matched what they raised with a loan, he said.

“These kids come from all kinds of different backgrounds and many have never left Tulsa, so the chance to tour Oklahoma State University and participate in Mud University was a huge undertaking for this group of seventh-graders,” McNeil said. “It evolved into an excellent lesson about working hard for something you want to do.”

After the event, the students began doing car-detailing work for teachers in the after-school program to pay back the loan, McNeil said.

“The kids are learning about business at the same time that we are promoting health and wellness,” he said. “They loved it every step of the way.”

Of the 50 students, McNeil said, about 20 initially were not excited about the mud. They were students who preferred to read while others were playing a sport. When they got to Lake McMurty, that attitude changed.

“They kind of went primal,” he said. “They saw other kids, especially younger than them, enjoying it, and 49 of 50 jumped in headfirst.”

An experience such as Mud U builds confidence, McNeil said, which is an important tenet of the Carrera program.

Grady Lester, a former Lake McMurtry park manager, met Baghurst a couple of years previously when Baghurst began to plan the event. Lester had since moved to Arkansas but he brought his two sons, Caleb, 13 and Carter, 9, back to the park to camp overnight and take part in Mud U.

“I thought it was a great idea,” Lester said. “I do mud runs and they wanted to do it because they had seen pictures of me. This requires teamwork as well as the physical impact it has. This is a great opportunity for kids to get involved with the park and the outdoors.”

Baghurst said there wasn’t any information he could draw on to design a mud run specifically for children so he reviewed guidelines for adult races and adapted them with his own ideas. Plenty of volunteers were necessary because parents were not allowed on the course beyond the starting and finishing lines. Several area civic groups stepped up to offer their services. OSU students majoring in athletic training and Jennifer Volberding, assistant professor and director of the program, also pitched in to help, standing by in case of any injuries or problems.

Both the participants and a parent or guardian wore identical wristbands that included the adult’s phone number to make sure that only that person could pick up a child at the end of the course, where everyone received their medals.

Baghurst is a competitive athlete himself, but he’s also an academic expert in health and exercise so he couldn’t pass up the chance to incorporate some research into the event. He is analyzing the data primarily to provide a rational for operating this kind of event for children, particularly those that do not generally participate in sports and physical activity.

For example he found that, of the 1,338 children who participated in the two events, 685 were girls and 653 were boys.

“When the parents were asked how much exercise their child typically got outside of school per week, the average was 6.2 hours,” Baghurst reported. “However, 35 percent of the participants exercised three or less hours per week, and 113 of the participants were engaged in no physical activity outside of school. It’s exciting to see so many kids who aren’t very physical doing something that is both active and fun!”

Some children wore costumes and many came in teams with names such as The Fast and Muddy, Muck Commanders, Pink Mud Warriors and the Mud Scout Monkeys.

A girl in pink observed on the trail, “We make mud look really good.”

To learn more, visit the Mud U website.