I guess I'll begin at the beginning.. Huge, huge thank-yous to Tony Tabacco
and John Stimpson for helping with the course. John helped me piece
together some scattered ideas and about 10 different course drawings to
come up with a fun line. Tony reviewed it for safety and sanity. In one
way I kind of regret the tight, nasty finish which was changed for safety
at the last minute,. but it really wasn't THAT bad. It was a good lesson
for me.. (If I had it to do again, I think I might have moved that last
slalom cone in the second slalom to the right, or even removed it to make
the end flow better..)
Second, I'd like to thank our AWESOME setup crew! Tony's got your
names.. They got there EARLY and put down the course with cruel efficiency
and accuracy. The usual suspects were there from sun-up to motorhome
send-off.. Bryan drove the damn RV all the way down there, Don brought a
car full of newly refinished worker station signs and got immediately on
timer setup, Jeremy had the reg table on it's feet before the first cone
was stood upright... It's so automatic that I don't even remember who I
need to thank! It just happens!
Third, It's a beautiful thing to see people come forward and volunteer for
lightly staffed work groups. One of the morning groups was five or six
people short, and group 8 only had half a trailer staff and five course
workers sign up! I had all the volunteers I needed for those groups. That
makes me so, so happy.
I'd like to thank the timer gods for smiling upon our event and leaving
enough time for three fun runs to help ease the pain of those who did
volunteer to work through the last run group.
Finally, to the TINY number of volunteers (perhaps 4 besides Tony and me)
who stayed to help us pack up the motorhome, I salute you! I guess we
should have been more clear about what it means to "pack up". Watching the
fun-runners stream out of the gate while we loaded the motorhome was sad,
but we got it done and we were only a few minutes late getting off the
site. Fortunately the Angry Old Marina Guy(tm) was distracted by a gas
leak under his rusty old VW bus, so he left us alone for the first time
that day.
Thanks again, everyone. I had a blast!
Jake
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