Before I get on to 2009, I thought I'd write a little more on 2008 from my annual journal."We started setting up on Saturday June 14 at 2pm with Kristen and Dan, two of the SDSU interns. Jim Lang came out a little later and helped. At 5pm Joe and Barb Anderson came with another tailgate tent from the BBC storage shed. So, everything was ready and where's the riders?
At 6:45pm the Gran Fondo Fixies came through. The resting rider of the 2 man team jumped out of the car and offered us cookies! Shouldn't it have been the other way around? This was the first fixie category of RAAM, and the organizers weren't quite sure just how "fast" they'd be going across the country, so they had them start 1 or 2 days before anyone else. We were quite surprised that they were the first ones here. We chatted with them at length about his fixed gear biking. Wow! The Fixie came through and missed the turn on 2nd St. Time to mark the wrap around.
Jan Christiansen, solo woman, coming through.Paul Stern and his wife stopped by. He's the time station director, and we met after all the e-mailing we've been doing the past six months. We talked for quite some time, and Jim Lang recommended Truffles for a fancy supper. Hope they liked it, while I had a cold Wendy's double, however Jen did deliver some cookies and banana bread.
Jim Lang, Klaus R, Jen M, and a couple of RAAM officials waited for the Slovenian Army to arrive. Johnny Boswell and friend have been following the Robic contingent since California. We found out they're from Fredricksburg, Texas and invited us down to Hell Week. They decided to bed down awhile in the tent and lounging chair.
The Bloomington police came by to check us out. Naturally, they knew nothing about RAAM, but after some educating, they were cool. Some Cutters came by to be there for Jure, but still no Jure. Finally, at 4:47am, Robic went by and we exchanged some souvenirs to the Slovenian Army."
more photos
