#3 Preparing to Win

With the race starting at dawn on Friday, we had a busy Wednesday preparing.  We officially registered for the race and got our wristbands with our medical information on them.  Then we had to pre-run from the start to mile 38.  They had just released the GPS coordinates for that part of the course that morning.  This is so the locals in the more populated area near the start aren’t endangered by pre-running trophy trucks for a month before the race.  

Then we’d meet our race bikes for the first time.  They were built for this race for us in California by our race support team.  We had to shake them down, and ride them for a while to make sure everything was ok.  Then we’d take the wheels off, put the spare ones on, and get them up to speed to make sure there were no problems.  

Our tires did not have air in them.  Instead, they had a hard foam donut in them.  This way we couldn’t get a flat on the sharp rocks.  When it got dark, we put four different combinations of lights on the bikes, and tested and adjusted each one.  If your lights go out, which happened to Tanner at night and me during the day while pre-running, you’re stuck in the desert until morning.  Jimmy, the race bike builder, put a second power supply on each bike.  If the lights went out, he showed us how to disconnect the old power supply and use the new circuit to see if that would fire up the lights.

I wanted lots of rest before the race.  Unfortunately, we wound up riding nearly 100 miles on Wednesday testing, just 36 hours before the race.  Not energy I wanted to use up so close to the race.  Everything counts.

I was excited because today, our friends came in.  In an unusual move, I invited seven friends to come and chase us during the race.  Why?  You’ll see.

Bobby Miles, Kevin Koval, and Todd Lutinski would chase Tanner in a Jeep that Todd borrowed from his friend in Tijuana.  (You can’t rent a car and drive it to Mexico – it’s illegal in Mexico, and against rental car company rules.  If you get caught in Mexico, you go to jail).

Franz Froelich and his son, Trevor, are from California.  They picked up my friends Ralph Carpinella and John Sayour in San Diego and brought them down.  They each met us in Ojos Negros where we were testing the race bikes.  I was glad to see them.  The group ranged in age from 20 to 73 – a diverse group to be sure.  These friends didn’t hesitate when I asked them.  But I don’t think they realized exactly what was about to happen.  An adventure was about to begin that will never be forgotten by any of us.  

When we got to the hotel that night, they only had two rooms for seven guys.  A snafu with little cure as the hotel was sold out with racers and crews.  Four guys in a room?  No problem in Baja.  

It’s amazing what we’ve come accustomed to complain about.  In a country like Mexico, when a mother holding her baby walks up and down lines of cars waiting at the border selling churros to people waiting to get back into America, or when that 8 year old girl who learned how to juggle comes by your window and shows her skill and waits for you to hopefully approve…

The size of obstacles is relative.  My friends cheerfully accepted their situation without much discussion.  This was nothing…