This month was my chance to try my hand at writing a news piece rather than my usual shenanigans of a column. By looking in some pretty obscure yet reputable news sources, I learned about an incredible city in Djibouti that plays host to a crazy race known as the “وباركلي رجل مقابل المها وجبة دورة ثلاثة.” This race is a true test of a man’s limits.

If you ever plan on entering this race, you must first discover what dates it is run and the location. The race director, whose identity isn’t known, supposedly publishes a book every year with a code somewhere in its prose that will reveal when and where the race is held. The title of the book always has eight characters. Those eight characters are representative of the date, using two digits for both the month and day and four digits for the year. There are only 842 people in the world, since 1832, who have even been able to crack the code. Only 20 human entrants are allowed each year.

Well, if you have gotten passed the test of the book, the next challenge is a three-course meal. There is rarely a time when eating is a bad thing, but in this case it’s torture. Right before the run, you are required to eat a three-course meal. Immediately following your mandatory binge there is an eight hundred meter dash! If you are going to puke in this opening leg, you shouldn’t have come because you’re already disqualified.

Here’s another plot twist! The entire duration of this race is run against an animal called an Oryx Beisa. The Oryx Beisa can be found in Djibouti and is a large antelope donning spear-like horns, with a thick neck and compact muscular body. Their horns are typically 30 inches long, which is about as long as the longest recorded rabbit ears! The concept of racing the Oryx is to test whether a man or animal has better endurance.

Now that you’ve hopefully gotten to the right place, finished your most recent meal without seeing again, and found yourself next to the special type of antelope, you have over 100 miles of unmarked trail before you and nine books that you must tear the page with your corresponding bib number out to prove you ran the route. The books’ titles are less than encouraging because they run along the lines of As I Lay Dying, Southern Discomfort, and A Time to Die.

Each day begins with the traditional blowing of a conch shell. Don’t you dare fool yourself into thinking this race is easy; there are hills, mountains, and valleys that await you on the course and many of the trails are nearly nonexistent. The وباركلي رجل مقابل المها وجبة دورة ثلاثة isn’t for the faint of heart. A human hasn’t won since 2004 and the odds are never in our favor.

The last leg of the race is easily the most unusual part. Each person who has made all of the cut off times at their checkpoints must sit on top of the highest tree in the surrounding forest and incubate an eagle egg. Once the egg hatches runners have to teach the fledgling how to fly. Immediately following the flight lesson, runners climb down the tree and cut it down with a herring. That’s right, a herring. All the while, they must be singing the soundtrack to Monty Python’s Spamalot.

This little race has been called “The Race That Eats Its Young.” People new to the race are called “Sacrificial Virgins” and are required to bring a pack of Oreos and enough gum for everybody. Badges are outlawed because they don’t need no stinking badges!

The race isn’t nearly as impossible as it sounds! It only requires a 36-minute mile for 60 hours straight. There are two aid stations on course and you get a map! Don’t wait for someone to triple-dog dare you and enter today!