It’s not Pamplona, but desert bull run draws hundreds of gutsy runners

Sunday, July 11, 1999 | 9:08 a.m.

MESQUITE, Nev. - It was decidedly not Pamplona. There were no crowded city streets, just barren, sun-baked desert. And many of the bulls seemed more curious than furious.

The second annual running of the bulls kicked off here Saturday with about 600 runners, some dressed in chicken suits, matching wits and stamina against 40 bulls.

No one was injured, although both the runners and the bulls seemed exhausted by their exercise in temperatures hovering around the triple digits. Phoenix promoter Phil Immordino said the bulls flipped several runners into the air.

"If you see footprints in my back, you'll know I didn't make it," Ray Sheppard, 61, of Phoenix joked as he prepared to run in a knockoff of the 400-year-old running of the bulls in Pamplona, Spain.

Immordino had hoped for a crowd of 10,000 to 15,000 for the three-day weekend, but only 3,000 people turned out Saturday. About 2,000 watched a bullfighting and bullriding event Friday.

Immordino said Thursday's massive flooding in Las Vegas, 80 miles to the southwest, had hurt attendance.

Big crowd or not, the hardy souls who paid $65 for a taste of Pamplona in Nevada couldn't be deterred. A group of seven friends and family wore T-shirts that said, "Trample the weak, hurdle the dead, run with the bulls."

Twenty bulls were used in each of Saturday's two runs, released five at a time in 30-second intervals.

The first round of bulls seemed more lethargic than lethal, ambling past runners spread along the one-third mile dirt course at the city's rodeo grounds. The most excitement came when a 1,900-pound bull named "Taking Care of Business" broke away from cowboys trying to round him up at the end of the run and started roaming back toward the track, surprising many of the runners.

The second set seemed more agitated, often lunging at harried runners who scurried out of the way or climbed fences lining the route.

While the bulls in Pamplona are antagonized before the event and invariably killed by matadors later, there was nothing of the sort in Mesquite.

Randall Crane, 41, had another idea.

He carried a spatula while he ran because he planned to "swat" the bulls on the behind.

"I plan to get up close and personal with the bulls," Crane, of Suisun City, Calif., said.

Immordino said a third run originally scheduled for Saturday morning was canceled because "the bulls were wiped out."

Seamus Clark, 38, of Seattle and his brother Kelly Clark, 32, of Portland made the run in Scottish kilts.

"He's bloody insane and I'm his little brother," the younger Clark said. "This is what older brothers do to younger brothers."

The event continues Sunday with two more runs.

Last year's bull run was held in Arizona, at a Mohave County site on the outskirts of Mesquite.

archive