Detail 2008; An Interview with Jim Mee

Rob Howard / 04.02.2008

The Detail Events race portfolio is expanding rapidly in 2008 and the man driving this growth is company MD Jim Mee. Together with Detail racing chief Gary Tompsett and the rest of the Detail crew, he will be overseeing 20 (maybe more) very different events and races this year, including adventure runs (Deerstalker), Mountain biking events (Polaris Challenge), Rat Races and ACE Races, Gael Force events (and more Rat Races) in Ireland, and some new races in distant parts of the world and closer to home.

So, I undertook one of the most difficult disciplines in AR, i.e. tracking him down and navigated to a Starbucks near to his latest corporate, client or council meeting, to get the detail on Detail Events for 2008.

With so much planned, I started by asking him about the one that got away, the expedition race Wilderness ARC, which was last year’s World Championship but is not taking place in 2008. So, the obvious question was, “Why not?”

“We took the decision to take a break after the World Champs, but don’t worry, Wilderness ARC has not gone for good. It will be back in 2009, as good as ever. We’ll add a corporate category too and look at having more shorter course options which are more achievable than the full expedition route, drawing triathletes and multi-sporters into AR.

“The World Champs took a lot of our energy and resources last year so it seemed right to take a rest, particularly as we want to devote more resources to expanding the Rat Race series this year. There is only so much you can do and increasing production in that series is our priority.”

This led onto Rat Race talk, and with a new one-day format and 3 of these races already announced there has already been plenty of exciting news for Rat Racers.

“There is more to come”, was Jim’s first comment. “We’ll announce the first Rat Races outside the UK soon, in Ireland … and one on much more distant shores by the end of the year. Potentially the new Nine 2 Five format could be expanded to any major city and to deliver the new races in the UK we are tapping into the expertise of racers here to help us. We expect to have as many as 20 different planners working on different projects in the coming months.”