Wednesday, July 14, 2010

An MR340 Help Solicitation

As some of you know, the most venerable Norman Bates and I will soon be foolhardily participating in the MR340. This is a 340 mile paddle race from Kansas City, MO to Old Town, St. Charles. The event starts on Tuesday, July 27th and we are projecting to finish sometime on Friday, July 30th.

All along the 340 mile route, there are checkpoints that we must stop at and check in. The checkpoints also serve as a place where we can replenish our food, water and perhaps even grab a few moments of shut eye before shoving off again.

What I am wondering is if anyone may be available to meet us at a checkpoint or two during the week. We wouldn’t require much, perhaps a sub sandwich or two, snacks, some water/energy drinks and maybe the pleasure of your company for a few minutes to provide some sanity in the madness. There are a total of 9 checkpoints mostly equally spaced along the route. Closer to St. Louis, we will be stopping at Jefferson City, Hermann and Washington. We are roughly projecting we’ll hit those areas early Thursday morning, Thursday night and Friday morning respectively (who really knows until we get out there!?).

Let me know if you might be interested and we can give you many more details. The St. Louis Adventure Group (SLAG) also has a few people participating in the race, including Bend Over Granny, and is also sending support teams to meet its members at the checkpoints. We may utilize their services, but I would love to see if we could count on a hash contingent as well. (I am going to send this to Dos Hixxies and the KC hasher crew as well as there are other checkpoints a lot closer to them.)

Regardless of the support we can solicit from you during the race, the 27th running of the Tumbling Dice Full Moon Hash will take place on Friday night, July 30th, in Old Town St. Charles, which is conveniently where the MR340 will be finishing. It promises to be a festive atmosphere as all the teams finish the nearly 88 hour race in various states of delerium. More details will be provided on the hash.

So if you have a few spare hours (or days) to spend driving around the gorgeous country roads of middle Missouri and helping out a couple of crazed thrill seekers, just let me know. It promises to be a fun time checking out the race and meeting other race and support teams. Our appreciation would know no bounds if you took some time to come cheer us on.

I will also try to post updates somewhere during the race to track our progress.
Norman and I sincerely thank you for considering this insanity!

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