A dozen or so people take part in an obstacle race. Their barriers include getting through a barrel, putting on extra clothes and getting over a wall.
The comic chase was well established in the cinema when Alice Guy made this movie, and it's an amusing entry in the genre. With the race and a cash prize the only goals, there are none of the incidents in the usual chase comedy that puzzle the viewer. Instead, the fun is provided by the clumsiness or agility of the racers.
Alice Guy (sometimes credited as Alice Guy-Blache; Herbert Blache was her husband from 1907 through 1922) could reasonably be called the first movie director; she worked for Gaumont when they first entered films, and was their supervising director through the end of the 20th Century's first decade. Then she came to the United States and, with her husband ran Solax. Her directorial career ended in 1916.