Thursday, August 8, 2013

And They're Off!

All 27 riders on the roster made it to the starting line and are out on course.  But it was touch and go for a while for Mike Sturgill -- when Mike landed at Philadelphia Airport, he discovered that his bike was still in Detroit.  He finally got reunited with his bike and finally make it to the start/finish hotel about an hour before the start.

Some thunderstorms rolled through the start/finish last night, but thankfully cleared out in time for a dry start.  Lot's of humidity this morning, but it looks like the riders will at least have several rain-free hours today.  A line of impressive rain bands are rolling through the overnight controle in Hallstead, as a cold front works it way south east. It's a pretty safe bet that the riders will see some rain at some point today.

Most of the riders have already cleared controle 2 in Danielsville, and are tackling the first of 3 climbs today that cross the Appalachian Trail, atop Blue Mountain.  You can follow their progress with the live tracking at:
http://trackleaders.com/endless13
... there is an interactive map where you can get rider and checkpoint updates by clicking on the map.

The SPOT trackers for Luis Vargas and Jos Verstegen appear to be off-line for now.

2 comments:

  1. It's a pitty the family of Jos Verstegen cannot follow his spot, we are here, far away in the Netherlands, curious to know how he is doing!

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    1. Jos Verstegen has met up with volunteer Steve Hallett who is manning the Fox Gap secret controle. Steve reports that Jos is smiling and in good condition. His SPOT tracker is not showing up on the Tracking website, due to a technical problem with the database (which we hope to sort out soon). Meanwhile, those following Jos's progress can go to this alternate link:
      http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=08huP9hdZSaLBqeAcj5Ys73NfZzxgnrOf

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