1. The Venue: you can’t beat walking across the street to race. A perfectly flat course. Pretty incredible weather. And totally cheap rooms. I had comments about the hose pull that ranged from “hardest ever” to “didn’t even notice.” The black top had been finished with a special paint for a racketball tournament. Perhaps that added to the friction. But it was the same for everyone. Did we luck out on the windstorm? Those 70mph gusts took a dumpster across the parking lot and right into our Chevy pickup, breaking the fender and a tail light.
2. Jeannie Allen: Incredible to see Jeannie- and the inspiration that is so infectious. Makes all of your daily issues seem pretty inconsequential. The out pouring of support, especially at the Lion’s Den was a testimony to the incredible people who make up this amazing fraternity. Look what the rest of the fire service is missing out on.
3. TV: My earlier post below provides some mandatory reading about how TV works within our sport. But, absent the ≈1 hour network down time (not our fault), I got a lot of atta-boys from viewers around the world. For 84¢ per day, not a bad deal. We were streaming at 44mbs - which is full on 720p, HD quality. (That works out to be way less than 1¢ per minute.) All of the content is up there still and you’re free to capture your run and repost wherever your heart desires.
4. Lion’s Den: Many thanks to John Granby and the folks at Lion for a great evening event. No one went home hungry. And what a great new crowd of inductees!
5. Our Over-seas Visitors: Holy Cow. What a blast! They are definitely stepping up their game. I can’t wait to get back to see how things are going to go in France this year. Loved the red, white and blue wigs! Thanks so much for making the trip.
6. Robert “Jake” Jacobsmeyer: Engineer extraordinaire of the Las Vegas FD. With Jackie’s assistance, this team jumped through hoops for months. You can’t believe all the nit-noid stuff that they had to deal with. Like, every time we come to Las Vegas, there’s some new permit. The latest was an unexpected $1K out lay for the generator inspection. Jake took it all in stride. And a shout out for the Mayor and the Fire Chief showing up.
7. The Walk On: Belinda Shuttlesworth has got this dialed in! Thanks everyone for making this a visual desert! Mayor Goodman was in awe of the range of competitors.
8. Our Announcer Team: Mike Word and all his energy, with assistance by John Kraft -spelling Mike so that his voice would last to the end; Jim DeGrandpre who was there before the sun came up and after it went down. Maria Prekeges- with all of her energy in capturing guys in the end zone - breathless.
9. Randy Huntington: My bad- scheduling Randy’s presentation at 4:30 when the Thursday crowd went on till 7P. But, Michael shot all of it and will be editing the PowerPoint presentation so everyone can view it. I now know how Mike Powell broke Bob Beamon’s long jump record. It was a pleasure to have side ringside and engaged Randy’s incredible powers of observation on all things Combat Challenge.
10. C.A.B. Meeting: This will be a separate, upcoming recitation of the 90 minute meeting Saturday Morning at John Granby’s room.
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