Saturday 3700 runners
Sunday 2800 runners,
Rainy wet and cold all weekend, slightly less rainy Sunday. We say about 300 patients Saturday, swamped the entire time. Most hypothermia, 1 tib/fib fracture, and a few sprains and strains. I was later than I wanted getting out of work on Friday due to a phone interview. And got in after dark on Friday night, ( 22:00) just crashed w/o even putting the top up. + last year they were not keen on folks camping in the lot. No one bothered me for a early 5:45 start at the Med tent. Had some troubles with the Tent heater until Spartan could deliver a larger generator. Not really any pictures of day 1, and it looks the same most years. Other than us being placed in a different location. It was so wet we had to dig a trench inside, and outside the heated med tent to drain the water.
Treatment is what you'd expect, get all the wet clothes off, wrap in a mylar blanket, hot chicken broth to drink, and we also made heat packs by filling XL gloves with the broth and a knot in the end, and placing in bilateral axilary zones. ( Think both arm pits ).
Day two, another medic and I were reassigned to help with the spartan kids race as they were short staff, and have a very strict policy on the kids. It was actually a blast, although stayed just as busy if not more so. They have 1/2,1 and 2 mile courses for the kids. Rankings are grouped on age bracket. Other then being tiny, its a mirror of the adults course, timing chips, 15 burpees ( versus the 30 on the adult course) if one cant complete an obstacle. From tiny to 14. It was a great laugh and time. The med tent had < 20 patients all day. Dont tell them I lucked out..
The strict policy, is this: Once the kids finish their course the finish line is inside a barricade with two choke points, where the can get their water and bananas, and medals. The kids cant be released until the parent/guardian/ older sibling shows up with a matching wrist band and numbers. We were instructed, if they dont have a way to verify to not let the kids go w/ someone. If they lost their matching bands, we were able to verify with pictures, family, fb, lock screen,etc. Almost all the parents were super great about this added security measure. One woman, got quite angry that we would not just let her 7 year old daughter go to wander around and meet her at the main stage. ( it would of taken the mum at least 2 hours to do the course, and her daughter 30 mins) Camp Sparta is a pretty friendly place, but its still they guesstimated about 7k ppl on grounds that day....
A few pictures of the tear down of camp sparta from afar,
I was very thankful to have the toad ( camper) with me, and that I took Monday off of work so i could drive back slowly. And stayed late helping take down part of the course. Its at least a 4 hour drive for me one way home w/o stops. I decided to take the extra hour detour through Mt Rainiar national park to get home, qued up google maps and away I went.
It was a beautiful day for a drive, I was pretty stoked about the route home. Clear blue skies, flip flops and shorts, windows down and up the mountain we climbed....
We got quite a ways................................right until the gates to the park and pass were closed............................... Now this is obviously on me. However I was surprised no signs spoke of it being closed, and even more so of google maps. The same maps that tells me when there is an accident, or when traffic is slow, routes me around construction heck it even tells me when there is a speed trap up ahead...............but it ad no idea a national park and pass were closed. The same google maps that told me " there was a sparta race at the meadow wood equestrian center, and that it would be closed when I got there at 21:30 )
Dang
Millennials generation ( me ) who are increasingly blindly trusting the digital devices. I had wondered a little why the road did not seem to have much traffic on it, but a few cars every 10 mins or so- both directions.. also no snow. Cest La VE, like i said; beautiful day for a drive. I did not even mind the drive back, again
