Great "carbo load" dinner tonight at Bally's ( included in the reg fee ) First class food and dessert and coffee during the welcome/awards presentation. Blazeman's mother and father spoke. Very emotional. Nice story of how challenge got started by the owner and Vigo did a great job MC'ing. These guys are doing everything 1st class so far. Can't wait for Sunday.

Good to see that Challenge put up a good show, hope more folks will give them a chance
What is the total number of entries, i hope it is at least 500!

The registration numbers go up to 800, so I figure we put 600-750 individual athletes in the water tomorrow. They have another 150 relay teams it looks like just eyeballing the board.

Walking on the boardwalk yesterday my thinking is now that the run will either be completely awesome or suck balls. I've never run on that type of surface for over 20 miles, and race hour is a sea of Jersey Bros, push cabs, and the generally bewildered. The locals will either get into it or be totally annoyed. I don't think there's much in-between here.

I agree that the run will either be awesome or totally suck. Not so much because of the surface but all the people and stuff. I'm really hoping they control the people some how. Last thing I want to be doing is swerving around people and stopping etc...I'm sure they (RD) planned for this.

I agree. Higher concentration of runners is better to 'stake our claim' of the course.

Water temp just announced as 80 degrees. No wetsuits for age group placing or awards.

A whole bunch of people around me just threw up in their mouths a little.

Will be a lot of people in the wetsuit wave starting at the end.

So, what exactly was the "rock-solid" crowd control plan on the run? I have seen at least two threads suggesting that crowds on the run were a problem.

http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...;;page=unread#unread (actually mentioned crowds making it so hard for runners a guy went off on his bike to help, which caused two runners to get dq'd for pacing)

http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...t_reply;so=ASC;mh=25; (one post mentions people walking all over the course and not "giving a rats ass." and another post called boardwalk traffic "inexcusable")


Maybe just those three people and no one else had a problem? Just curious.

I started the run a little bit before 1. The foot traffic going south from the hit you first hit the BW coming from bader field wasn't bad in my opinion. People would move out of the way when they heard you coming. Going north from the start of be hotels area were a bit more busy but I saw volunteers asking people to move out of the "run lane". I also noticed there were those Gator ATV's going up the run lane(north of the finish line) and honking the horn. People definitely moved out of the way for that.

I overheard a lot of people on the course asking what was going on IMO they couldve printed out more signs saying "please use caution, race in progress". Just don't think the public was fully made aware. I will say that it totally sucked the aid stations south of the finish line were every 2-2.5 miles. Maybe due to the last minute course change? However those aid stations were fully stocked and the volunteers were awesome.

Hopefully Vigo and DelMo can build off the SNAFU's. It was my first Challenge event and happy with the over all production put on.

And now, I'll be getting back to my Founders IPA I finally found. This town has poor beer choices.

The mile or so stretch north of the finish line, had significant traffic around the course, but I didn't have any issues with people slowing me down (and I had a top 10 AG run split, though don't ask about the swim). There were some volunteers redirecting people as much as possible, but there could have been more and definitely more signage. I found most people on the boardwalk to be encouraging or just confused. If you smiled and responded they would cheer and high five you. I had a ton of fun on the run, in all honesty, and think I set a course record for high fives. The people who walked onto the course were mostly oblivious, not malicious and apologized when they realized ther were in the way. At least that was my experience.

Like I said, I do think more signage, notification, and especially volunteers would have helped a lot, with keeping people from wandering onto the run course without knowing it. They were not allowed to rope off the course, but I think it is a great experience, and I'd rather run that course than a 13 mile out and back on empty roads. YMMV.