CHRIS MCWATTERS
RACE DIRECTING STORY
Chris got his start early in life in the endurance world by winning numerous youth, junior high, and high school district, state, and national championships; holding a U.S. 4x800 meter relay youth record; finishing his first marathon in 3:06 at the age of 16; competing at OSU on a cross country scholarship; racing a lot of road races, and then finding his way to the trails.
Chris was always passionate about getting away from the city, and out into the wilderness. Friends got him into backpacking, mountain biking, rock climbing, and so on. His first ultra took place via the sport of Adventure Racing, with his first race being a 36 hour event in Arkansas.
From there, Chris ran a couple trail races, winning them each time, then he tried his first ultra distance trail run upon meeting Joe and Joyce Prusaitis. That effort was at Bandera, with a 9th place finish of 10:33. He followed that up by a 24 hour adv race two weeks later (that he won), then a sub-24 hour Rocky Raccoon finish two weeks after that (where he hurt real real bad). Although, those were his first two actual ultra distance trail running events, Chris had already polished off two of the toughest challenges in the world. The first was Primal Quest - a 10 day continuous Adv. Race, covering over 610+ miles via mountain biking, running/trekking, and paddling. That race had Chris moving through 10 days of South Dakota with only 21 hours of sleep total, covering roughly 240 miles on foot. A few months later, Chris got invited to try his first triathlon - a Double Iron Triathlon in Virginia. After getting last out of the water from the 4.8 mile swim, he came back and wrapped up the 224 mile bike ride, and the 52.4 mile run to a 12th place finish (mostly because the others quit, and there weren't too many people who started). But not bad for a first triathlon, and first time to swim more than 2,000 meters. There have been plenty of other 50-100+ mile trail finishes from there, but it's safe to say that Chris is always looking forward to continuing to test himself and seek the toughest events possible.
Event Directing has always been a part of Chris' adult life. Getting his event management start in Track & Field in Oklahoma, Chris got tested in the fire at an early age. He directed USATF Youth Championship events; ran a timing company for hundreds of indoor and outdoor meets; was the Youth Athletics Chair for USATF Oklahoma; traveled the country as an official for NAIA and NCAA Collegiate meets; as well as trained hopeful young adults on the oval. After that, Chris put on events at Christian Youth Sports and Adventure Camps in Texas.
He got into Race Directing, Course Design, Trail Building, and Event Promotion heavily in 2007 when he took a job (and huge life detour) at Camp Eagle. While there, he executed the largest inaugural XTERRA off road triathlon that organization had ever seen anywhere in the world at that time. He also launched a trail run he called the Camp Eagle Trail Runs. After the camps grew, he realized it was unwise for he and the other staff working on various racing events to continue on as those Event Directors. So they decided it better to focus on more of their primary roles (Chris' being over the summer camps). They gave away several events to various race directors specializing in those specific endurance sports; but still aided in course design, event promotion, setup and teardown each year. That led to Chris being introduced to Joe Prusaitis, and you can pick that story up on the "About" page.